Relics--The Edge

by Tim Lebbon

  20

  Lilou emerged from the woods one morning and surprised Angela while she was taking a bath. Sammi had woken early and disappeared on one of her regular long walks. It took a while to fill the bath, using buckets from the spring-fed well and heating saucepans on the wood burner, but Angela did it once each week. Cool showers were all right, but she’d always enjoyed a long soak. Back home in London, in the maisonette she shared with Vince, she’d bathed most evenings, sometimes with a coffee or a glass of wine, always with a good book. Jay had brought a selection of books to the cabin, but Angela had found she could only ever read when schooling Sammi. It was more to do with her own mindset than Jay’s choice of books.

  For most of the summer they had the bathtub beside the cabin, out on the rough timber deck partly sheltered by the overhang under which they stored firewood. Angela had developed strong shoulders and arms from chopping logs. Living a more basic life, she’d found her strength building month on month.

  As the water cooled around her she heard the nymph’s footsteps. She could instantly tell they weren’t Sammi’s—the girl walked with a different pace, a heavier gait—and she crossed her arms over her chest and sat up.

  “Oh. Sorry.” Lilou didn’t seem sorry at all. She smiled at Angela and sat on a pile of logs. “I brought breakfast.” She held a rabbit in one hand, its neck broken. A drop of blood pattered onto her boots.

  Angela grabbed her towel and stood from the bath, wrapping herself up.

  “You could have warned us you were coming.”

  “You didn’t hear me calling from the lane?”

  “No. In a world of my own.”

  “It’s hot,” Lilou said. She eyed the bath, holding back from actually asking.

  “You stink,” Angela said. “What do you do when you’re out there, roll around in deer shit?”

  “It’s good camouflage,” Lilou said. “Actually fox shit is better, but then wolves want to roll in me.”

  Angela laughed. She couldn’t help it. “Have a bath,” she said, taking the rabbit. “I’ll gut and skin this bastard, and cook it while you relax.”

  “What about Sammi?”

  “That girl’s got a good sense of smell.”

  Angela was right. By the time the rabbit was stripped, sliced and fried, Sammi had returned from her walk and Lilou had bathed and dressed again. They ate sitting on the porch deck, with insects buzzing around them and birds calling from the nearby trees. Angela realised that she had not felt so relaxed for some time. It was over a year since Vince had vanished into the Fold, and she and Sammi existed day by day. She was constantly on edge, waiting for a visit from the law or, even more worrying, a Kin. There was no saying that some of Mallian’s followers hadn’t remained in the area.

  When Lilou was with them, she relaxed. Angela could never quite get past the tension between them, and the element of mistrust in her that was settled and solid. But the nymph had a way of making her feel that everything was going to be all right, even though she knew it never would be. Nothing was going to be all right ever again, but that day, when she brought a rabbit and stole her bath, Angela knew that, despite everything, she was a friend. Bringing peace and comfort was what friends did, with no thought of payback, no ulterior motives.

  * * *

  “She was my friend too,” Angela said as they ran. “It was complicated, and sometimes I thought I hated her, but I didn’t really.”

  “I know.” Vince could hardly speak, broken arm held across his stomach. They held hands and he squeezed hers tight, but at that moment she could not tell what was going through his mind. Her own mind had never been put completely at rest about Lilou and Vince. The nymph had sworn that they had never slept together, but she had seen what Lilou was—had experienced some of that extreme allure herself—and she knew that in his own confused way, Vince saw her as more than a friend.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “He killed her. Right in front of us. Didn’t care.”

  “She tried to kill him,” Sammi said. She ran beside Vince. Angela was steering them, across the valley floor and up a very gentle incline towards the green landscape above. If they could reach the trees, perhaps they could get away.

  There was something strange about fleeing. If Mallian wanted to catch and kill them he could do so himself, or send the raving infected Kin risen from their silty graves, or the powerful fairy now in his thrall. She could only deduce that he did not care about them, and did not consider them a threat.

  Perhaps murdering Lilou had affected him more than it had appeared.

  “We’re going the wrong way,” Sammi said.

  “What do you mean?” Angela asked. “Any direction away from that mad fucking monster is—”

  “She’s right,” Vince said, and he slowed them down. He was sweating and pale, and she couldn’t imagine the agony he was going through. His left hand rested between the buttons of his shirt, and there was no saying how badly the arm was broken. At least she couldn’t see bone protruding anywhere.

  Angela glanced back and Mallian was out of sight, somewhere down in the remains of Longford and hidden from view by folds in the landscape. In some ways it was even worse not being able to see him.

  They stopped and she could see the memory of Lilou’s horrific death flickering behind Vince’s eyes. It would play on a loop in his mind forever—and in hers.

  They stood by the remains of an old wall on the beginnings of the valley slope, stones slumped down and mostly covered with dried silt. A few small plants had made a home in cracks in the silt, taking root in the short time since the reservoir had drained. Life found a way everywhere.

  “I don’t see what we can do,” Angela said.

  “Nothing here,” Vince said. He looked at Sammi. “Right?”

  “Nothing on this side,” she said.

  “You want to go back?” she asked, aghast.

  “Not without you. Nowhere without you.” He held her tight around the shoulders, half turned aside to protect his arm. It needed tending to, perhaps splinting, but there was no time. “But it’s the last place he’ll expect us to go, and we have to do something to try and stop him. This is what Mallian has wanted for years, the power to stand. This is Ascent, and he’s not going to waste his time. He’ll call his supporters to him, somehow, and with Grace on his side...” He shook his head. “Lilou knew. You must have talked about it with her.”

  “We didn’t talk about much, really. Staying hidden. Catching rabbits to eat. You.”

  Vince blinked, and she saw a sadness that might never wane.

  “He’s cast a spell back in the Fold that gives him control over Grace, so if we’ve any hope of reversing it, it’s back there.” He looked at Sammi.

  “We don’t know what Sammi’s capable of,” Angela said. She feared for her niece, and their brief dash had revealed how weak she still was from the taste of magic she had already used.

  “Neither do I,” Sammi said. “Won’t know without trying.”

  “What’s in there?” Angela asked. She couldn’t deny that part of her wanted to go into the Fold to see. She’d been in there before, briefly, but she’d been looking for Sammi, and in fleeing had no time to take in her surroundings. Grace might have made that place anything.

  “It’s a big valley. Green, lush, a river, some cliffs, meadows and forests. There are insects and birds and animals there, but mostly small ones. And there are Kin.”

  “Ones like me,” Sammi said.

  “Yeah, humans with Kin blood. Mallian calls them mongrels.”

  “Charming,” Angela said.

  “There’s so much to tell you, show you,” Vince said. “It might be the only place we stand a chance against him, and maybe some of the Kin will help us. None of them have any love for Grace, and if they know what she is now, who she’s serving...” He shrugged, wincing at the pain it caused.

  “What about that?” she asked, nodding at his arm.

  “What about it?”
r />   “Okay. So, what happens here?”

  “Here? Now? I don’t know. Nothing we can control. All we can do here is run, but in the Fold, maybe we can make a difference.”

  “For Lilou,” Angela whispered, and as Vince’s eyes grew moist, her own vision blurred.

  “This way,” Sammi said. “Across the valley side, then we’ll approach the doorway thing from the other side, behind Mallian.”

  “What about Bone and those things he released?” Vince asked.

  “I don’t know how dangerous they are, but we can’t do anything about them, either, not right now. As for Bone, he knew we were running,” Angela said. “He’s on his own.”

  Every step of the way she expected Mallian to appear from somewhere and stop them, stomp them into the mud, crush them to pieces. Maybe Sammi might be able to fight back for a short time, but she was only just sensing the strange powers she carried, accepting the blood in her veins and allowing it to feed her magic as it gave her life. Grace had been a fairy since the moment she was born. Any confrontation could only end one way, so they had to shift the balance.

  Mallian did not stop them. Grace did not appear. As they headed back down into the valley, Angela was assaulted with doubts about what they were doing, and they all came from the fact that Lilou was dead. With the nymph alive she had felt insulation against the strange world of the Kin. Lilou had been a barrier between Angela’s real world—the life she had left behind, with all its lost hopes and dreams—and the more fantastical place she now knew existed. Even when Lilou spent long periods absent, Angela knew she was out there, a friend with a foot in both worlds. Now she was gone, Angela felt naked and exposed.

  The landscape of the reservoir bed was lacking in cover, and they had to search for wrinkles in the terrain to take them out onto the valley floor and towards the shimmering portal. What if we go through and Grace shuts it forever? she thought. It was not a consideration. They were in danger already, and putting themselves at more risk in order to combat Mallian was inevitable.

  They might not have very long.

  They might not have any time at all.

  “There,” Vince said, pointing ahead. His voice was flat. He held onto Angela’s hand as they went, and Sammi led the way towards the place where two worlds touched.

  * * *

  I can’t believe she’s gone.

  Saving Lilou from Mary Rock’s thugs was how Vince had discovered the world of the living Kin. Before that they were merely relics to him, ancient remnants of obscure, ambiguous creatures that were worth a fortune on the collector’s market. He’d become a relic hunter for the London gangster Fat Frederick Meloy, another man who had subsequently fallen under Lilou’s spell, and who had sacrificed himself to save them all.

  Now Lilou was dead, and Vince too felt exposed to the world of the Kin.

  Angela was with him, gripping his hand. He had to hold onto that. Lilou would want them to be together, and she’d want them to continue the fight she had begun. The nymph’s cause had been strong enough for her to go against the creature that had been her best friend for far longer than Vince had been alive. He would never betray that.

  How could such a rare creature be snuffed out so easily? She’s still burning, he thought. Somewhere behind us, Lilou’s corpse is still hot to the touch, because Mallian made Grace burn her to death.

  He would do everything he could to avenge her murder. It wasn’t only about preventing Ascent and a conflict that might cost countless lives, both human and Kin. It was about taking revenge for the death of the other woman he loved.

  There was no time to waste.

  “Straight through,” he said when they reached the portal, and he pulled Angela and then Sammi after him into the Fold.

  A brief disorientation came and passed. He shook his head and looked around at the new landscape, and it was depressingly familiar. He supposed most people might consider it beautiful, its wildness something rarely seen back in the modern world. He saw it only as a prison, and this time Angela was incarcerated with him.

  “She might have felt us come through,” Sammi said, her gaze distant, not yet taking everything in.

  “Maybe,” Angela said, “but that doesn’t mean she’d tell Mallian, or that he’d automatically know. Does it?”

  Sammi shrugged.

  “We need to find the relics,” Vince said. “The ones Gregor collected, and a new one Mallian got in here.”

  “How did he get it?” Angela asked.

  “He made a Kin bite its own tongue off for him.”

  “How the hell are we going to find them here?” Angela asked, and Vince realised that she was right. Even though he knew this landscape well, and had only escaped from here maybe an hour ago, something about it had changed.

  Mallian and Grace aren’t here anymore, he thought. Maybe that’s it. But it was more than that, something deeper and more profound than an absence. The Fold had always been wild, and its air of wildness had always encouraged him to keep his head down and take care over every movement and encounter. Now, that wildness had come to the fore. Storm clouds played over the opposite hillsides, lightning arcing down. The river roared along the valley floor, apparently in flood and carrying clumps of dead trees and undergrowth with it. Rain was sheeting down at one end, its line visible as the clouds progressed across the whole terrain.

  “It knows she’s gone,” he said. “The Fold’s already starting to fall out of balance.”

  As if to illustrate his point a subtle vibration shook beneath their feet.

  “Earthquake?” Sammi asked.

  “There’s a dwarf tunnelling in these hills. But that might have been anything. This is Grace’s place, and it could be more an integral part of her than we can ever understand. Without her here, the edges might not hold.”

  “Maybe it’ll fall apart if Mallian keeps control over her,” Sammi said. “It takes fairy magic to make this place hold together. It takes effort. She’s not directing her own efforts anymore.”

  “We might not have very long,” Angela said. “Where the hell do we look, Vince?”

  “Maybe where I saw him last.” He pointed. “Down that way, I think. If not there, perhaps down by the river where Grace held him.”

  “You mean that river?” Angela nodded downhill, through the misting rain that was now falling around them. The river roared and surged, white water dancing in places, and it had already broken its banks in several areas. Where once it had provided the Fold with a gentle, timely flow, now it was a raging beast.

  “One step at a time,” Vince said. “Come on.” He led them away from the portal and down the lush hillside, skirting a copse of trees and heading for the small clearing where Mallian had held him down, crushing him into the ground. His burning arm reminded him of how recently that had occurred.

  So much had happened since then.

  Rain fell harder, soaking his tattered clothing and causing a chill. He shivered, but the constant movement kept him warm. That, and fear. Fear of what would happen now that Mallian was free, had taken control of Grace, and would undoubtedly pursue his agenda of Ascent. Fear also of the Fold. He had survived this place for two years, but he realised now just how dangerous it was, perhaps more so because Grace was no longer here to maintain balance.

  “It was here,” he said when they reached the place. His voice was deadened by the rain, but Angela and Sammi were close enough to hear. He looked around, sweeping his foot back and forth through the long grass, and the hopelessness of what they were doing hit home. The relics were small, the largest barely the size of his fist, and even if they did find them, there was no telling whether simply disrupting their arrangement would do anything at all. He had no clue how the glamour worked. Maybe Sammi did, but probably not.

  “Not quite here,” Sammi said. “A bit further over there. Over by that pile of rocks. That’s where he did it.”

  “How do you know?” Angela asked.

  Sammi shrugged.

  Vinc
e hurried to the rocks to see if she was right.

  As he and Angela paced back and forth, Sammi knelt and pulled aside an overhanging bush. Beneath it, hidden in the shadows, were the relics.

  “Fourteen of them,” she said. “Thirteen old and sad and filled with regrets. One fresh and still screaming in pain.”

  “You see what he’s done?” Vince asked. He stood behind Sammi, looking over the kneeling girl’s shoulder at the strange display. Mallian had placed them here to keep them out of sight, which hinted that there must be some danger in him leaving them alone. Would it be as easy as just kicking them asunder?

  Angela stepped forward to do just that.

  “No!” Sammi said. “It’s dangerous. I don’t understand how or why, and it’ll take time, but I do know if we mess them up now, something dreadful will happen.”

  “How do you know?” Angela asked. “What will happen?”

  “Something to Grace,” Sammi said. “This pattern of relics has... it contains... some of her soul. She’s been pulled in two by Mallian.” Her voice was growing deeper and flatter, and Vince noticed she was sinking down onto her haunches, as if settling in for a long time.

  “So what do we do?” Angela asked. Sammi didn’t reply. She looked at Vince, raised an eyebrow, and he indicated that they should move back a couple of steps.

  “I think Sammi’s in charge here,” he said. “Let’s give her a moment, see what she has to say.”

  “We don’t know how many moments we have left,” she said, and perhaps some of the moisture on her face was tears.

  “We never really do, do we?” Vince held her with his good arm and buried his face against her damp neck. He wished more than anything that the rest of the world would go away, and that they could stand like that forever.

  21

  Bone soon lost track of the other three as they ran. Instead he aimed up out of the valley, hitting the green line and continuing without pause. Being amongst colour again felt good. The greyness of the revealed valley had seeped into his soul, discolouring his vision of the future.

  He knew that he had done wrong. Releasing Mohserran, the gargoyle and the werewolf Francine had been a stupid error, something a man with no sense would do, a man with no true path. After doing it, he could not recall his reasons. Was it really in the hope that they would attack Mallian and stop him doing whatever it was he had planned? Or was it simply because one of the infected was his father? His mind was fractured. Usually if he found Kin it was a simple matter of protecting their secret and letting them go again. Mohserran and the others were not a simple matter.