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Other books by Ed:
Death of a Kingdom (Book II of the Norothian Cycle)
The Wind from Miilark (Book III of the Norothian Cycle)
Eddie's Shorts — Volume 1, 2, 3, and 4
Song of the Banshee
Heather Marie Adkins
Belinda stared into the bottom of her glass, admiring the way the melting ice distorted the whiskey. It looked like oil suspended in water rather than on top, which of course was a conundrum because oil couldn’t do that. The effect was rather beautiful, though. And if she swiveled the glass to the left, the swirls almost looked like a cat. Or a tanker.
“You shee thish?” She leaned over, shoving her rocks glass in front of the dour man beside her. “D’you no’ think it’sh an oracle?”
The man pulled away from her, wrinkling his nose. He was large—his long, khaki coat couldn’t hide the bulge of his midsection. His chin was nearly nonexistent and his eyes were framed by thick, rolling fat. He sneered at Belinda. “Excuse me?”
Belinda sighed. “An oracle. Like the half-naked’un in that shexy movie. What’sh it called? 800?”
The man rolled his eyes and motioned for the bartender with his sausage fingers. “Check, please.”
“You’re leaving, then? Why?” Belinda hiccupped, and then gripped the bar tightly with both hands as she swayed. Wooden walls and wooden floors swiveling, booths sliding and people turning into squiggly lines. The room was doing the cha-cha around her. Belinda had not given it permission to do that.
“Because I’m not pissed enough to deal with the likes of you,” the man said. With that, he dropped a twenty on the bar and waddled out on his three-hundred dollar loafers. He hadn’t bothered waiting for his check.
“Are you quite sure you left enough?” Belinda called after him indignantly. “If not, you’re shtealing!”
The only answer was the howl of the wind before the door slammed behind him.
She was left to stare mournfully into her whiskey once more.
*
It was cold outside when Belinda left the bar—not abnormal for Dublin in January, sure. It was also an hour past last call, and she’d spent the past thirty minutes arguing with the bartender on the perils of closing too early.
McCarty’s was just one more pub in a city of pubs; Belinda wasn’t even sure why she picked it. Mediocrity, maybe. The need to blend in. In a city the size of Dublin, even a woman as beautiful as Belinda stood out. It was always the less fancy of the pubs that ended up having the strongest drinks and the cheapest prices, anyway. She should know—she’d frequented them all.
Belinda stumbled over her thick, black boots and fell into the front of a hat shop, her head making a dull thunk as it connected with the glass. She didn’t break the glass—this time—but the hit gave her a slightly concussed feeling, made woozier by the fact she could blow up the Guinness factory if someone lit her alcohol-riddled body on fire.
She pressed her palms to the frosty glass and watched her breath dissipate on the night air as she waited for the spinning to stop.
Sure, but I should have worn something more substantial than jeans and a T-shirt , she told herself, turning so that her cheek rested against the glass. Closing her eyes, she took a few deep breaths, letting the chill infuse her with the strength to move again.
She lifted her face from the cool surface and stared groggily at her reflection. Her long, dark-red hair hung in shiny waves all the way to her lower back, and her pale skin shone in the moonlight. She had a heart-shaped face with a smattering of freckles across high cheekbones, and wide emerald eyes that were always a bit bloodshot. Even Belinda knew that she looked otherworldly, despite the red nose and cheeks that could be attributed to either freezing temperatures or drink.
Walk, she told herself wearily. Home. She shoved away from the shop front—thankful it was closed at the late hour and no one had been inside to see her miscommunication with the pavement—and aimed for the direction she thought might lead to home. She passed through the rest of the quarter of the city known as “Temple Bar”, where college students milled around in the night air outside the mainstream bars, finishing off the last of their drinks and smoking cigarettes. Belinda ignored them; she wasn’t a people person. Hell, she wasn’t a person to begin with, but she tried not to think about that.
Trinity’s campus was quiet and dark when she passed. Saturday nights were downtime for the students—they were all at the pubs, drinking away their Da’s money, while Belinda stumbled past the wrought-iron fence that separated the riff-raff from the smarties. Belinda hadn’t bothered with college, though sometimes she wished she’d had that experience. If only for the booze involved.
But. Her future was decided for her.
She continued on Grafton Street and passed into darker city blocks, aiming for Stephen’s Green and her apartment. It was nice living in such an affluent area, even if the homeless had more money than she did. She warily skirted the Molly Malone statue—creepy in the daytime, even creepier at night. Belinda hated the way its eyes followed her in the dark, illuminated from the side by the lights over the Korean grocery. It made good ole Floozy Molly’s face appear animated, sinister.
Belinda hurried down the sidewalk, her combat boots clunky on the concrete. She shoved her hands in her pockets and turned her head down against the biting wind—though nothing could be done for her bare arms—following the curve of Grafton as it opened onto the Green.
She waited for a lone car to travel past before she crossed the street and took to the pavement that bordered the park. A dog barked in the distance: Someone walking their pooch at this hour of the night? Belinda shook her head. Two a.m. was meant for drunks and hobos.
Belinda cut down the path, beneath the stone Fusilier's Arch that commemorated Dublin soldiers from the Second Boer War, and through the center of the park. Her apartment was on the opposite corner from Grafton Street, and it made more sense for her to save time by cutting through, even though the park was eerie at night.
She felt the familiar tingle as she was passing the fountain of the Fates, near the exit that would lead her home. It began at the bottom of her spine and tickled its way upwards until it nestled firmly at the base of her skull.
“Oh, no,” she muttered, stumbling against the fountain’s edge. She dropped heavily to the small, stone ledge that surrounded the empty pool, her vision swimming with black dots. The Fates gazed at her serenely. Ironic bitches.
It always felt like a hand, gripping that lizard sense that lived inside her as it twisted her to its will. Belinda’s fingers went even colder as her blood thickened. She stared down at her palms; they flickered with a pale, creamy light, like a dying lamp trying to hold on to life. The sensation inside her mind was worse with the high content of alcohol drifting through her soggy veins.
The change took her swiftly, and she faded to black.
*
When Belinda opened her eyes, she stood on a dusty dirt road with nothing but grassy plain to her left and a small, meandering river to her right. She couldn’t see the ocean, but she could smell it. The wind was stronger here, and warmer. It whipped around her body, tangling her long, white dress around her legs.
Across the river, a small thatched cottage glowed warm and bright in the night. A steady wisp of smoke trailed from the chimney, dancing in the sea breeze and into the stars.
I’d no idea those still existed, she thought, eyeing the expertly done thatched roof. It was expensive; a dying art. A hundred years ago, they were a dime a dozen. In the present day, most of them were owned by the government’s preservation society. The fact that she could pull those inane facts from her store of infinitely useless knowledge meant she was stone-cold sober.
Grief flooded Belinda. She hated being sober.
She also hated the way the change put her in an ankle-length dress that was as pale as her skin—both of which shone like a beacon in the dark. If anyone were to look out the windo
w of the cottage, Belinda would be a freaking 747 coming in to land.
The information began to pour in. County Clare. Patrick O’Brien. 92. Pneumonia. There were five family members present in the bedroom with the dying, and he was safely ensconced in the dream world that came before death.
Belinda took a deep breath and walked down to the riverbank. She braced herself—always worried she’d fall through even though it was unlikely—and stepped onto the water.
Halfway across the river, Belinda wrapped her arms around herself and began to wail.
From conversations with other girls in passing, Belinda had learned that the keen was like a banshee’s fingerprint—unique to each woman. Some of the older women Belinda had met said their wails were like fingernails on a chalkboard or guttural screeches that made dogs howl. Belinda, however, fell into the category of a beautiful, haunting melody. A song for the dying.
As such, it was never really long before the dying came for her. She felt Patrick reach for her almost immediately, and she held out her arms, beckoning to him. Underneath his determination to go, she felt the usual unwillingness to leave his family. It was common, though the only time Belinda felt the love of a family herself was while sharing it with her Souls. Patrick’s family was particularly close.
Belinda flooded him with images of the Other Side, showing him with her mind something of what awaited him. The old man wrapped around the information, thoughtful, vestiges of his aura clinging to Belinda as she paused on top of the water. Her glow reflected from the river beneath her; she drew power from the liquid like a vampire to blood. She waited on her Soul to make his decision—it would be made, no matter what, it was only a matter of how long—and gently pulled strength from the water for the journey.
Just as she felt Patrick’s final resolve to go with her, a rectangle of light fell across the grass in front of the cottage as the front door was thrown open. It hit the stone like a rifle crack, and a silhouette appeared. It was big, burly, and definitely not the man she’d come for. Belinda paused in her keening, taken aback by the swiftness of the appearance.
And then he lunged.
Belinda had heard of it happening. Every so often, she would run into another of the girls who would have a lovely horror story of a family member gone mad. The stories had sent chills down Belinda’s spine, and she’d hoped it would never happen to her.
Are you daft?, Belinda would tell the girl. The Irish fear us!
And hate us, would be the quick—and apt—response.
So, Belinda knew about it.
It had just never happened to her.
Until now.
The man seemed to fly the short distance from the bank to where Belinda stood on the river, his body horizontal in the air. Her wail was cut off as the young man’s bulk fell squarely against her chest. The breath whooshed from Belinda as they landed in a tangle of limbs in the shallows of the river, and she briefly disappeared underwater.
Belinda’s senses were cut off and she inhaled a mouthful of water before strong hands gripped the front of her dress, yanking her out. She sputtered, wet hair plastered to her face and eyes, and yelled, “What the hell is the matter with you?”
“You canna have him!” a deep voice answered. His brogue was thick, west Irish, and it boomed over the water like thunder. He shook her as he spoke, either to emphasize his point or rattle her brains, Belinda wasn’t sure.
She was finally able to snake a hand up through his arms and swipe at her wet hair. His face was shadowed from the moon behind him, but the information came anyway. Patrick O’Brien’s grandson. Kellan O’Brien. Twenty-nine. Farmer.
A farmer? Are those still about? Damn, I’m out of touch. Belinda would have given anything for a shot of Jameson’s. As it was, she barely managed to get her feet underneath her.
“I’ve no choice in the matter, ye idgit!” Belinda struggled against his grasp, nearly landing on her butt back in the water when he promptly let go. She righted herself, stumbled once, and poked him in the chest with a finger. “I take them when I’m called by their impending demise. I’ve naught to do with the death itself.”
Kellan threw his hands in the air and turned his back on her. “I care not, bean sidhe. You still can’t have him. Get off my family’s property,” he said as he sloshed through the water towards the shore.
“You tackled me, you hulking oaf!” Belinda said incredulously. She stepped forward—the water was up to her knees. Her dress was soaked. “I can’t believe you tackled me!”
He didn’t bother looking at her as he answered. “You deserve it, and more. Keep the hell away from my gran’da.”
Belinda splashed out behind him, slipping a couple times in her flats on the muddy bottom before she broke free of the water and stomped across the grass. “Hey! You can’t just attack me and leave!”
“Watch me.”
Belinda rushed across the yard to catch up with him, tripping over her dress as the soaked material tangled her legs. She grabbed his arm and tugged. “Kellan.”
He whirled, his face like stone.
Belinda held back a gasp as she got a better look at him in the light from the cottage. He was beautiful: Enormous blue eyes under shaggy black hair, and skin darkened by work in the sun. His shoulders were broad, the arms under his Henley shirt were thick. Belinda’s heart did a little dance, but she squelched it immediately. No time for that, now.
Men were off-limits unless she was guiding them to death. And that would certainly ruin a relationship.
“Kellan,” Belinda said softly, letting go of his arm. “Your gran’da…he’s slowly drowning in the fluid in his lungs. His body is already shutting down. This is his time to go.”
Tears welled in the man’s eyes, ripping straight through her. He turned away, his jaw clenched.
After a moment, Kellan muttered, “How do you know my name?”
“I know all there is to know about your grandfather. It’s my job.”
He massaged his brow, eyes closed and face pained. “I’m not ready.”
Belinda sighed. She was a bean sidhe—not a therapist. What can I even say to this guy?
“Please,” he whispered, and he turned his big, sapphire eyes back to hers. Belinda didn’t know whether to kiss him or hug him or run screaming in the other direction.
But, she had a job to do, and no control over whether Patrick O’Brien lived or died. Like Belinda’s own fate, Patrick’s had been decided for him.
“Kellan, if I don’t take your grandfather, he won’t make it to the Other Side.” Blunt was always good. Especially sober bluntness; it was infinitely better than drunken bluntness, as she’d proved to herself time and again.
Kellan’s brow furrowed. “Heaven?”
“The Other Side,” Belinda repeated. “Name it as ye may, it is where he needs to go. And if I do not escort him, sure he’ll be stuck on this plane of existence. The wrong plane. Dead, but still here. A ghost. Woo woo.”
Real smooth, B.
She watched the emotions play across Kellan’s face. Horror, despair...acceptance. His sigh held the world. “Alright.”
That was too easy. But, she’d take it. Belinda half-turned to make the wet slog back to the river, when his voice stopped her.
“But—you have to come in and meet my family first.”
*
This is insane, Belinda told herself, staring wide-eyed around the room.
She stood in front of four disapproving faces—and a devilishly handsome smirking one. Kellan’s arms were folded across his chest and his shaggy hair barely hid the twinkle in his eye. He was propped against the door frame, blocking her only escape—unless she wanted to shove her lanky body through a porthole window.
The cottage was tiny—a single room that held all the family’s needs. From the information she’d gathered from Patrick’s mind, only he and his wife lived there at the current time, though it was where they had raised their children. One corner held a small kitchenette with a wood-burni
ng stove and a tiny icebox, as well as a sink that had an old-fashioned pump. Another corner held the big four-poster bed where Patrick lay in repose, the rattle in his chest pronounced in the silence. A small sitting area and a tiny, scarred wooden table was all the couple had in the world.
Kellan’s smirk irritated her. Belinda had never been up close and personal with the families of the deceased before. There was enough awkward in the room for a pre-teen girl to subsist on.
I’m going to take Grandpa Patrick over, and I’m coming back for Kellan, Belinda swore, narrowing her eyes at him. She could imagine all sorts of lovely things she could do to him. They weren’t all bad, unfortunately. Some of them were quite good.
Focus, Belinda.
“She’s a...bean sidhe, you say?” Grandma O’Brien spoke at decibels louder than Belinda’s wail—presumably because the woman was half-deaf in her old age. She was a thin, stooped lady with the same blue eyes as her grandson. She sat at the kitchen table, holding the hand of a pale, dark-haired woman who couldn’t have denied that Kellan was her child anymore than Belinda could deny she had a thing for Irish whiskey.
“Yes, Nana, she is bean sidhe,” Kellan replied. If it was possible, his smirk got bigger.
Belinda glared.
Nearby, a teen with a sullen face lounged against the white-washed stone wall: Margaret O’Brien. 16. Student. Snotty. Kellan’s younger sister. A man with ebony hair lurked near the window, the moonlight shining on a visage that had seen a lot of rough in his life. Timothy O’Brien. 37. Railway driver. Kellan’s uncle.
Belinda searched for any information on Kellan’s father and found none. Suddenly, Kellan’s bond with his grandfather was explained.
“Well, now, I guess it’s Papa’s time to go, isn’t it, Mary?” Nana looked at her daughter and smiled sadly. “We can’t fight the bean sidhe.”
“Your Nana’s a smart woman,” Belinda said under her breath to Kellan. He rolled his eyes, the effect somewhat diminished by the sadness that touched them. She felt again that weird combination of need to protect and need to kick ass.