by A. M. Shine
On their last night, in the safe house, Mina had drifted off to sleep as Madeline sat at the desk, the hunch of her back concealing whatever she was doing. Danny had nudged in close to her, like brother and sister, sharing whispers in their room, trying not to disturb the adults. She always felt safer when he was beside her.
‘What do you make of all that stuff about the watchers changing the way they look?’ he had asked her, staring anxiously at Madeline in case she had heard him. ‘I know that we never actually saw them, but do you believe all that?’
‘I don’t know,’ she replied, shifting in against him and leaning her mouth to his ear. ‘Maybe it’s for the best that we try to forget about it. We have a long day tomorrow, Danny. We’re going home.’ Here she gently elbowed him in the side. ‘I bet you thought we’d never be saying that.’
‘But what about the next person whose car breaks down here? Even if they find the coop, what use will it be to them now? How will they know what to do?’
‘I don’t know,’ Ciara said, solemnly. ‘At least we had Madeline to take care of us. I know we haven’t always liked her way of doing things, but we’re still alive, aren’t we?’
‘Do you know all those days when she would disappear?’ Daniel asked. ‘Where did she go?’
‘I always thought she was showing you how to work the traps?’
‘No,’ he replied, speaking even lower now. ‘I heard her telling you that a few times, but I wasn’t with her. I don’t know. I just always thought it was strange. I mean, why would she lie about it?’
‘That’s our Madeline.’ She smiled, patting Danny on the thigh.
‘Where do you think she really went?’
‘I don’t know,’ Ciara replied.
‘There was one day,’ Daniel whispered, awkwardly kneading his hands together, ‘when I was out preparing the traps. You know, looking for a good tree that I could climb. It was so quiet. I mean, there wasn’t a sound, and I was listening, trust me.’
‘It’s always so quiet here,’ Ciara put in, ‘and cold.’
‘Well, anyway, I turned around and there was Madeline, standing right there behind me. And I swear she wasn’t there a second earlier. There’s no way that she could have crept up on me that quickly and without me hearing her.’
‘What are you saying, Danny?’
‘It was like, I don’t know,’ he said, agitated now. ‘It was like she just appeared. And there were burrows around there. Big ones. I saw them myself. What if Madeline goes underground?’
‘Danny…’
‘I know, I know,’ he cut in, ‘it’s mad. It was just so bizarre. It wasn’t like she had sneaked up on me. She was suddenly there, as surprised to see me as I was to see her. Not that you can ever really tell with Madeline, I suppose. Her face never seems to change.’
‘Just the eyebrows,’ Ciara added with a smile.
‘Yeah,’ he replied, ‘and only to frown at us whenever we do something stupid, like talking or breathing.’
Ciara missed Danny so much. She’d never thought to tell the boy how much she loved him. No Danny. No John. Was life ever meant to be this cruel? Ciara looked to the mantel. The man that she loved was gone, and those memories were all that remained, interspersed with the horrors that she hoped someday to forget. If only he had stayed with her instead of seeking help. But any change to the past would have sent tremors through to the present. Would Daniel have snatched Madeline’s key? If they never discovered Kilmartin’s bunker, his message would have never been heard. They could still be sitting in the coop, none the wiser as to what secrets lay buried beneath it.
Why had Madeline left them during the night? Ciara was surprised by how much she missed her. In her own weird way, she had taken care of them; sweet as she was sour. Only you couldn’t taste the sweetness. She had to be strict. Ciara had come to understand that. The rules were there to keep them alive. And as nasty as she could be, Ciara knew that she would never do them any actual harm. Every family has their oddball. It doesn’t mean they aren’t loved.
The two corner lamps suddenly lost power, leaving only the fire to fend off the shadows. The coop’s nocturnal light had denied them such profound darkness. It was thick, as though Ciara could feel it in her lungs. It seemed to swarm around her, primed to swallow her up should the flames falter for a second.
‘It’s okay,’ she whispered, more so to John than herself. ‘It’s probably just the fuse box.’
John had educated her in the ways of rectifying such a problem. It was actually quite simple, and yet when she had flicked the switches up to restore light, he had given her a high five like a master proud of his apprentice. Ciara didn’t need any light to find her way, but in the darkness of the hallway she saw only black trees and even darker eyes. She listened, waiting for a scream that never came.
‘We’re home,’ she mouthed as she hugged her body tighter. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of here.’
Memories of John guided the shuffle of her slippers to the utility room beside the kitchen, where she knew he had left a torch for this exact predicament. It was the electrician’s fault, apparently, and had been the only issue in their otherwise perfect home. She groped around for the torch, patting her hands over the corner shelf until she felt it. The pokiest room in the house was flooded in white light, making the prevailing darkness beyond its open door seem even more ominous. Ciara shone the torchlight over the fuse box, already reaching to pinch its switches. But they were all set in the correct positions that John had showed her.
‘Any other ideas?’ she whispered to him. ‘Because that’s all I got.’
Ciara returned to the sitting room where the flaming coals kept her company. She could feel the unease rising within her. As sore as the coop’s light had been on her eyes, at least she always felt safe when it was on. Coming home alone was a bad idea. Where was Mina? Didn’t she say she would come stay with her? Ciara sat on the edge of the couch, fanning the torchlight around the room, scattering the darkness into its corners, never letting it settle. She picked up the phone, deciding that now was the right time to call her parents. She stabbed its every button with her thumb, but the tone stayed the same. Hadn’t John once told her that the electricity and the phone weren’t connected to one another? How else would he have phoned his cowboy electrician that night when they lost power?
A bright light fanned across the curtain. Ciara listened as the front gate groaned open, and quick footsteps were heard sploshing through the chippings on the driveway. She shrank deeper into the couch. Somebody was out there, behind the glass. There was always something behind the glass.
‘Ciara,’ Mina’s voice called out, ‘it’s me! Let me in!’
‘Oh, thank God,’ she muttered, holding her hand to her heart.
Such was her excitement that she almost fell out of her slippers as she lifted off the couch. As Ciara passed into the hallway the doorbell started to ring rapidly. Why did Mina have to make so much noise?
‘I’m coming,’ Ciara called out, skidding across the floor. Everything was going to be okay. Mina would know how to get the power back on. Or maybe she had brought Madeline with her. She was even sharper when it came to fixing things. Her smile fell as soon as the door opened; when she noticed the panic on Mina’s face. She had the parrot in its cage on the front step. She really did take the yellow one everywhere she went.
‘You’re okay!’ she said to Ciara, breathless, looking her up and down.
‘Of course, I am. Mina, what’s happened?’
The headlights panned across the wall and Mina turned back towards the taxi. It had already reversed on the road and was beginning to drive away. The parrot began to screech from all the commotion; a sound Ciara had secretly missed, like the familiar voice of an old friend.
‘No, no, no,’ Mina shouted, waving at the oblivious driver. ‘Come back.’
‘Mina,’ Ciara said, waiting for her to calm down, ‘what’s wrong?’
‘It’s fine,’ she replied,
stepping inside with the cage. ‘We can just call for another one. Are all of the doors locked?’
Ciara nodded. She had never seen Mina like this before, even during the worst of the woodland’s horror. They were safe, weren’t they? All she knew was that they certainly weren’t calling for another taxi.
‘You’re sure that everything is locked?’ Mina restated, holding Ciara by her shoulders.
‘Yes,’ she replied, feeling suddenly less certain. ‘I locked all the doors before I took a bath.’
Mina rested her back against the door and looked around her. ‘Why are all the lights off?’ she asked, squinting against the torchlight.
‘The power just went out,’ Ciara replied. ‘Tell me what’s wrong, Mina?’
‘It’s Madeline,’ she said.
‘What about her?’ Ciara asked. ‘Did she come back?’
27
Mina
The taxi had rumbled down country roads so narrow that the driver had input Ciara’s address a second time, doubting his all-knowing GPS. Its arrow didn’t change, neither did the man’s disbelief. The distance remained, with no lights ahead but the stars. Theirs was the only road on the screen; a testament to how far they had drifted from the shores of civilisation.
It all felt eerily familiar – the parrot on the back seat, the engine’s hypnotic hum, the sheer absence of everything outside of the headlights. Mina couldn’t keep from fidgeting. She had expected the car to die at any moment.
When eventually they reached Ciara’s house and she saw it all in darkness, Mina assumed the worst. She panicked, thinking she was too late. She threw her money at the driver, snatched her parrot from the back seat and ran without even closing the door behind her. Of course he drove off. She would have done the same.
Ciara had led Mina into the sitting room, where the coals still smouldered. She treated her like a patient, remarking how ghostly pale her face looked beside the fire. Ciara probably assumed that the loneliness had bested her, so inured had they become to each other’s company. The truth was that Mina hadn’t spoken because she didn’t know where to begin. It almost felt cruel to tell her – to spoil their ending – but she needed to know.
Mina sat on the coffee table facing the fire while Ciara went around the house, lighting candles. She could hear her plodding up and down the stairs, pausing here and there, striking matches to wicks. The coals ticked quietly in their bed. The parrot was beside her, entranced by the amber glow glinting across its cage.
‘You tried to tell me, didn’t you?’ Mina whispered to it.
Eventually Ciara returned, all smiles and energy, her slippers skating across the floor. She set two tea lights on the table and squeezed Mina’s shoulder. The power cut didn’t seem to faze her anymore. It almost seemed like a novelty to her now that she had company, a chance to huddle together by the fire. That would soon change.
‘I need to tell you something,’ Mina said, calmly as she could. ‘It’s about Madeline. You’re not going to want to believe it, but you have to.’
‘Did something happen to her?’ Ciara asked, holding a hand to her lips with worry.
‘No, it’s nothing like that. I just need you to listen to me for a moment, okay?’
She sat on the floor in front of Mina like a child being read a bedtime story, her smile steadily dissolving as she listened, until only terror and disbelief remained. Mina told her everything, and Ciara listened without once interrupting. Of that she was grateful. She didn’t have the answers to her questions. All she had were fears and facts. As unimaginable as it was, somehow it made sense. Madeline wasn’t one of them. She was something else. For months they had lived side by side with something else.
Ciara believed all that Mina had told her. That much was evident from the way she shivered beside the coals, sniffing as though she had caught the truth like an illness.
‘Are all of the doors and windows locked?’ Mina asked her again, only now the answer carried some consequence.
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Everything is locked.’
‘When did the power go out?’
‘Not long ago,’ Ciara replied, ‘maybe ten minutes before you arrived. Why? You don’t think that Madeline…’ The thought was enough to cut her short. ‘We’re safe in here,’ she said as she reached for the brass poker on the hearth.
‘What are you planning on doing with that?’ Mina asked.
‘I’m not sure.’ Ciara shrugged, holding it like a toy sword. ‘Do you want it?’ she offered, holding it towards her.
Mina fanned it away. If only Ciara had seen her front door. Nothing could keep Madeline out. The coop had been designed to withstand her kind. Its glass was fortified. A bullet probably wouldn’t break it. The door was heavy and lined with locks, and its walls were thick. Ciara’s home was like any other. Every room had its windows, and all of them could shatter with no more than a snap of Madeline’s fingers.
Mina’s memories were of a woman. Despite her tenacity, she was malnourished and vulnerable, just like the rest of them. Madeline was forever tugging that blanket around her cold shoulders. Her joints creaked and cracked. The woman’s skin was brindled with stains and blemishes, and her hair clung to her shoulders like wet silk. She was tall but she was weak, and in those moments when Mina would catch her staring at her own reflection in the glass, she even looked sad. She even looked human.
But what monstrous body had she hidden out of sight? How tall did she stand when that shawl was dropped from her shoulders? And could those long fingers spring claws?
Ciara gripped the poker in both hands, flexing her fingers around it. Did she honestly think that they stood a chance at stopping what was coming? Mina didn’t have the heart to tell her. She would find out soon enough.
‘Did you hear that?’ Ciara’s shrill voice whispered.
‘Hear what?’ Mina asked.
‘Shush!’ she replied, raising a finger, both eyes fixed on the curtains. ‘There’s someone outside. I just heard them step on the gravel. Didn’t you hear it?’ she asked. ‘I swear I heard something.’
Mina hadn’t heard anything. But this was Ciara’s home. She knew its nuances – its spaces and sounds – and now wasn’t the time to doubt the girl.
‘She’s here,’ Mina whispered. ‘Come on, quickly, upstairs.’
Ciara couldn’t pry her attention away from the curtains. The glass behind them was thin, the kind that shakes in a storm. Even she could smash it. The horrible realisation dawned on her in the darkness – they weren’t safe. Madeline was out there, somewhere. A watcher had followed them home.
The yellow one beamed at Mina as she stood up, roused by the prospect of being moved elsewhere, such was the theme to its day. But she couldn’t take him with her. Not this time. The bird always screeched whenever Madeline approached it. They might as well ring a bell to announce where they were hiding.
‘Keep an eye out for her,’ Mina said softly, touching the bars of its cage. ‘I’ll be back soon.’
She gestured towards the torch that Ciara had picked up and shook her head. No, she was shouting without saying a word. Don’t you dare turn that on!
During their escape from the forest, Madeline had demonstrated the keenness of her senses. She was the first to hear the river’s distant flow, even before they had reached open land. She had heard the bus before it broke the horizon. No sound within the house would elude her, and no light would go unnoticed.
‘Follow me,’ Ciara whispered, and together they stole out of the room, much to the dismay of the yellow one watching them from the coffee table.
A jarred candle by the front door lit the way. Its cinnamon scent sang of the Christmas they had missed. Hot port in cold hands, and sparkling trees above every shop front. Atop the stairs, another wicked flame could be seen on the landing table. If the silence hadn’t been so sacred, Mina would have praised Ciara for lighting so many. Without the candlelight they would both be bumbling around in the dark.
Ciara led the way.
Her slippers touched each step with fitting care, as though their wood could crumble from the slightest press. Slow and steady was the order. Mina followed close behind. One step was followed by another. They counted maybe fifteen to the top. It was midway – on the seventh stair – that the most harrowing creak sounded. They both flinched and ceased their climb. The maple wood of that single step cried out in protest from the weight of Ciara’s foot. She might as well have stepped on a cat’s tail.
‘Keep going,’ Mina whispered, shooing Ciara upward, half-expecting the front door to blast in behind them.
Atop the stairs, Ciara steered them to the left. The high ceiling and wooden floors seemed to heighten the silence. Through their open mouths they breathed so lightly that they barely breathed at all. To the right was the candle on the landing table, its wax liquefied and warm. Shadows and shapes quivered across the walls like an oily, restless stream.
With the light behind them, they crept onward, towards the corridor’s end, where the door to Ciara’s bedroom was ajar, and through it – brooding ominously in the sky – Mina saw the moon. It was bright enough to distinguish a double bed amidst the dark, and the chest of drawers beside it, aligned by the window. They entered on the tips of their toes. Mina closed the door after them, stealing one last glance at the candle standing guard at the top of the stairs.
Ciara approached the window and peered outside. When Mina noticed her touting their whereabouts, she stormed over and whipped the curtains shut. She felt like snatching the poker from her hand and beating her over the head with it.