A Hollow in the Hills

‘Who is he?’

  ‘My Lord Amadán,’ said Silver, her voice clear and delicate. She didn’t appear alarmed as she glided towards them. Everything about her was calm and collected. ‘I’m so delighted you could make it. And thank you so much for returning Dylan and his friend to us.’

  Amadán swung towards her, Clodagh on his arm, which put her between the two Magpies. Out of their reach.

  ‘Delighted to attend. Especially as the nature of the invitation was so urgent. And my boys found your touchstone in a spot of bother.’

  ‘So I see.’ Silver reached out for Dylan’s hand, threading her fingers through his. Izzy didn’t like the possessive glint in her eyes. ‘And you also brought … um …

  ‘Clodagh.’ Dylan finished for her when the pause went on too long. His voice sounded flat. Annoyed. Silver didn’t appear to notice, but Izzy did. She knew that tone. It was the one Dylan would use when Mari was being a bitch but he wasn’t quite ready to engage.

  Strange to see the same expression echoed on his face now.

  ‘Clodagh, yes …’ Silver tilted her head. ‘Let her go, my Lord. She doesn’t have a part in this. She shouldn’t even be here.’

  ‘Ah, Silver, but she’s so pretty. Such a sweet, mindless little thing.’ He smiled at Clodagh and she giggled, as if proving his point. ‘I thought I might keep her. I do like my pets.’

  But Silver didn’t return the smile he graced her with. Her face turned still as stone. ‘You asked for our help with the Fear. We complied. I sent Jinx to you. Don’t return a favour with a slight, Lord Amadán. Let her go.’

  Amadán paused for a moment, his expression one of speculation. Finally he sighed and pulled Clodagh close, planting a kiss on her forehead. ‘Bless you, little one, you’ll need the luck. Go on then.’

  He twirled her away, releasing her and Clodagh spun free, all grace and elegance for a moment before his spell wore off and she stumbled. Ash caught her, steadied her.

  ‘What are you—?’ She looked around, dazed and confused. ‘Ash? Where are we?’

  Ash shushed her, drawing her gently back and away from the Sídhe, but Izzy didn’t move. She folded her arms and the Amadán looked her up and down.

  ‘Well now,’ he said. ‘You’re David’s girl, no mistaking that. Where is he? And where’s his charming wife, eh? I haven’t seen her for an age.’

  The filthy snickering of the Magpies swooped around them, but Izzy ignored it. She couldn’t let them get to her now. Thoughts of Mum made her heart race. Where was she? Was she okay? And what had Dad done in the meantime to try to get her back. She only hoped he had succeeded.

  ‘He’s coming,’ she said calmly. And this time she prayed she was right.

  ‘Come, Lord Amadán,’ said Silver, her voice soft and placating. ‘Later Dylan may be persuaded to play for us. You’ve never heard music like it, I promise you. Let me find someone to attend you.’ She beckoned three Sídhe towards them. ‘There are refreshments—’

  A scream broke the quiet, terrible and desperate, filled with agony. It made them all turn, all the power games forgotten.

  It was Jinx.

  Izzy jumped up as if dragged by wires, her eyes wide in panic. She ran from her friends across the Liberty, blindly, until she reached the blue tent where she had left Jinx earlier. And suddenly, terrified by the new silence beyond the thin walls, she hesitated.

  She pushed the flap aside with a hand that shook so much she could barely use it.

  Jinx sat on the edge of the trestle bed, his head in his hands, his eyes closed. His shoulders hunched up, tight and painful.

  Reaper looked up as she entered, but Brí didn’t. She knelt at Jinx’s side, one hand on his tense arm, all her attention on him and him alone.

  ‘It’s going to be all right,’ she said in a strangely gentle voice, not the voice Izzy expected to hear from Brí, especially not to Jinx. ‘There is a way. No matter what, we will help you. I swear this, Jinx. I will find a way.’

  That meant something, Izzy knew, something serious. A Sídhe oath could not be broken.

  ‘Grigori,’ said Reaper. It might have been by way of greeting but it was fractionally too late. It sounded like a warning, the tone not lost on Izzy. Brí fell abruptly silent and then looked up at Izzy. ‘He is awake at last.’

  ‘I know,’ she replied, though she didn’t step further inside the tent. ‘I heard the screams.’

  Jinx lifted his head and stared at her, his expression hollow, haunted by pain. His eyes gleamed even more silver than normal.

  ‘Izzy.’

  It sounded like a prayer. She couldn’t think of anything else now. Brí and Reaper might not have been there. All that mattered was him.

  She stopped, the image of him kneeling at Holly’s feet too keenly etched into her mind. It shook her but she couldn’t move.

  ‘We need to speak to Silver,’ said Brí.

  But Izzy didn’t move. ‘Tell me first.’

  ‘Isabel—’ she began, impatiently.

  Izzy folded her arms across her chest. ‘Tell me, mother. What did Holly do to him? What is she after?’

  Brí stared at her, open mouthed, her eyes blazing with anger. But she still didn’t say anything.

  ‘Wild magic,’ said Jinx, so quietly. She couldn’t resist the lure of him anymore, but crossed to his side, kneeling down where Brí had been a moment before. He was still shaking, but struggling to control it. He looked wretched, like some kind of junkie, thin and wrung out, sickly pale but sheened with sweat.

  ‘What is?’ she asked.

  But with her so close, he couldn’t seem to form words. He hid his face again and his shoulders tightened.

  Silver arrived, throwing the door back as she entered. Dylan followed and Clodagh and Ash came after him. The little tent was suddenly very crowded.

  ‘What happened?’ Silver asked.

  ‘Jinx dreamed. The Púca appeared to him.’ Brí brushed her hands together, as if wiping off something distasteful. ‘It showed him what Holly wants. And it isn’t good, but then, we didn’t really expect it to be if your sainted mother is involved, did we?’

  Silver glared at her, but said nothing. Brí smiled nastily.

  He wasn’t telling them everything. Izzy wasn’t sure how she knew that exactly – something in his eyes perhaps? Something in the way he wouldn’t quite make eye contact. There was more to this. ‘What does she want from Jinx?’ Izzy interrupted, sick to death of their games.

  Jinx himself answered, his voice hoarse and broken. ‘She wants me for the Shining Ones. I saw myself drowning in their light. They’re things of wild magic, of the first magic. She thinks the spells she wove on me will make it possible to control them.’

  ‘What are the Shining Ones? What do they want?’

  ‘The highest of the orders,’ Brí answered for him. ‘Beings with power beyond anything we wielded. Thousands died in order to bind them. Tens of thousands.’

  ‘And why did they need binding?’ asked Dylan.

  Brí tilted her head on one side, studying him. ‘Have you ever seen a creature that’s seen too much death and killing? A soldier perhaps, or a dog from a fighting pit? Something that has seen too much horror to ever be able to function in normal society. They were the Seraphim, the Shining Ones, our very own nuclear option. They tamed the chaos. But when the war was over, when they were no longer needed …’

  Clodagh snorted. ‘So they were discarded. Lovely.’

  ‘Not discarded,’ said Reaper in an apologetic tone that didn’t sound wholly sorry. ‘Decommissioned perhaps. Put out of harm’s way.’

  Izzy tightened her hand on Jinx’s. ‘Out of harm’s way? Under a mountain in Ireland?’

  Brí barked out a laugh. ‘To be fair, there was nothing here at the time. An empty island. A rock in the ocean. And then a prison. It was the only reason we were allowed to come here, so that we might do some service even in exile. And apart from the rare occasion where people stumbled on to the wrong place at the wrong time,
when they lost their mind or their way … There was never any need, until now. But this is our duty, those of us who were exiled, those of us with the strength. Whether we like it or not.’

  Izzy stood up, turning to face her birth mother, feeling stronger with Dylan and the girls here. She didn’t want another lecture on duty. It was all she ever heard of these days, from both her families. ‘Is Jinx okay?’

  They both looked down at him, which Izzy couldn’t decide was a good or a bad sign.

  Thankfully, Jinx answered for himself.

  ‘Yes. I’m okay.’ He got to his feet, spread his arms out wide. He breathed in deeply and then exhaled. ‘Or at least I think I am.’

  Izzy couldn’t help herself. Relief broke over her like another blow robbing her of the strength she’d been relying on to keep going. She threw herself at him, wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him against her. Burying her face in the warm scent of him, she felt her whole body shake.

  ‘I thought you were gone again,’ she told him. ‘I thought I’d lost you.’

  His arms enfolded her, his touch unsure. But when it was clear she wouldn’t pull away or mock him, that this wasn’t some sort of elaborate trick to make a fool of him, his embrace tightened. He kissed the top of her head, folding himself around her, his breath warm and gentle on her as he sighed.

  ‘I’ll never leave you again,’ he whispered as quietly as he could. ‘Not unless … unless you make me.’

  She gave a bitter laugh. ‘Why on earth would I do that?’

  But Jinx didn’t join in, didn’t laugh, bitter or otherwise, and there wasn’t even a smile in his voice. ‘Holly planned all this. And Holly’s plans are rarely flawed. You may have to, love. You may not have a choice. The Púca is a ghost, a spirit that knows far more than it should. And more than it told me, I’m sure.’

  Izzy stared at Jinx. He’d called her ‘love’. Did he even realise he’d said it? But before she could even begin to see what she felt about it, another blow fell.

  ‘Like Mari,’ said Dylan. ‘Like her ghost.’

  Jinx nodded. ‘Maybe. The dead are stirring, there’s no doubt about that. It’s Samhain, but it’s more than that. Whatever Holly has done has stirred them up.’

  Dylan ignored him. ‘She said we had to go to Donn’s hollow.’

  ‘Don’t even think that,’ snapped Silver. ‘It’s too dangerous. If anything happened to you—’

  ‘You’d lose everything!’ he shouted. ‘I know that. But you don’t own me, Silver.’

  She glared at him, her eyes narrow slivers of light, dangerous. ‘What does that mean?’

  Dylan jutted his chin forward, but kept his teeth clenched tight together, glaring back at her.

  ‘Young love everywhere,’ Reaper murmured. ‘It’s so sweet. And tragic, of course. Doomed, one might say.’ He gave a bow to Brí and Silver. ‘I should go. I’ll be needed elsewhere soon. Lady Brí, an honour to work with you, as ever.’

  She didn’t reply, but watched carefully as he turned towards the door, moving like a ballet dancer, not quite right for someone just walking.

  The tent door fell back behind him. ‘What is he up to now?’ Brí murmured.

  The air seemed to suck out of the tent, poised for a moment and then, like a silent explosion, a concussive force slammed through the space around them. The earth shivered underneath them, hummed with warning.

  ‘No,’ Jinx gasped, his eyes wide, fixed on Brí. ‘Izzy, you have to go. You can’t be here for this.’ He waved a hand towards Clodagh and Ash. ‘Get them to safety.’

  ‘For what?’ she asked, still holding him close.

  All around them alarms began to ring, some shrill wails, others booming claxons, air raid sirens and inhuman screeches.

  Silver cursed, pushing by the two of them and heading for the door. ‘They wouldn’t dare!’

  ‘Oh, they would,’ said Jinx. ‘You know they would. Especially now.’

  Silver ignored him. Brí, on the other hand turned to Izzy, her face like stone. ‘Isabel, keep him in here, whatever happens. Can you call your father? I fear we will need him.’

  ‘My father?’ She stared at the matriarch, as if she had gone out of her mind. Of all people, Brí wouldn’t want to see Izzy’s father, or admit that he was needed. Izzy knew that. ‘But why?’

  ‘He is the Grigori,’ she replied. ‘And a Sídhe stronghold has just been breached. They’ve broken the Compact and they’re inside.’

  ‘Who are?’

  ‘Angels,’ said Reaper, as he struggled back inside the tent. ‘The angels have invaded Sídhe grounds. They’re here.’

  Dylan’s hands trembled and he stared at them, willing them to be still. Nothing happened. They shook again and he couldn’t control it, couldn’t stop it. And it was happening more frequently. Was this what he had to look forward to? Was this what would happen?

  They’d been lucky. Or Amadán was playing with them all. He wasn’t sure which and neither thought was comforting. Not to mention what he’d seen in the club, the way the Fear had fallen on the audience and spilled out into the city. What were they doing?

  But with Silver making demands like that, with her possessive nature to the fore, he couldn’t concentrate. Anger made the magic inside him seethe and coil. Her magic, reacting to her and her anger.

  With the arrival of the angels, it became a white-hot sheet of rage and terror, slicing through him. She risked spiralling out of control and the magic with her.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Clodagh asked.

  No. He wasn’t.

  Silver looked shaken, her hands trembling like his were, just from being near to each other. The anger was gone now, or had transformed to something else. Nothing petty or selfish. The situation had turned to one of grave seriousness. ‘Stay inside, out of sight. Don’t come out, understand?’

  They watched her return to Brí and Reaper, to the argument with Izzy and Jinx.

  ‘Oh, charming,’ said Ash. Clodagh sank on to the low divan, her complexion grey. Ash was the first one to her. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘Feeling? I’m not … I’m not feeling anything. I just … what did he do to me?’ Her wild gaze locked on Dylan. ‘What happened to me?’

  ‘They’re … they’re fae. He enchanted you.’

  ‘Can they do that?’

  ‘Well, duh,’ said Ash. She stood up and crossed to the door, gazing out through the gap. ‘What can’t they do?’

  ‘Apologise,’ he said, as if it was a joke. But it didn’t feel like one.

  The Sídhe were fighting.

  Silver’s voice rose over all the others. ‘I’m going to face them. Yes, of course I am. I called this meeting. They’ve no right!’

  ‘Something’s wrong,’ Ash said. ‘Can’t you feel it?’

  He tried to push the bleak thought out of his mind. Nine years, that was the deal. But everything was happening so quickly now. Maybe because he was a touchstone. Maybe because his luck was shot. Maybe because Silver didn’t know her own strength.

  ‘What is it?’ Clodagh asked. Only when she spoke, did he remember that he wasn’t alone, that Ash and Clodagh were both watching him.

  ‘Trouble.’ What other answer was there? Everything was trouble.

  The noise outside reached a crescendo of panic. Ash retreated, cursing under her breath and Silver turned back to them without a moment’s hesitation.

  Izzy got it first. She was always quickest.

  ‘Leave him alone!’ she shouted at Silver, beginning to move in front of Dylan, but Jinx held her back. Gently, perhaps, but with arms she couldn’t break free from. Immobilised, Izzy stared at Dylan desperately afraid. Appalled.

  And he knew what was going to happen. What had to happen.

  Silver’s voice hooked his mind, focusing all his attention on her instead. He couldn’t ignore her. ‘Dylan, I need you.’

  Maybe that hook was in his heart instead. More meat hook than fish hook.

  So much for foreplay. So much fo
r promises. His regret must have showed on his face and something flickered across her features – doubt and regret finely mixed. She felt it too then, the fear that he would never be more than a tool to be used. The guilt that went with it. She didn’t want this anymore than he did. There just wasn’t any choice left to them. Everything she said, every word, was true. He knew it before she spoke.

  ‘There’s no time. There are angels here. The Fear are on the loose and they aren’t the worst thing we can expect. Holly is trying to destroy everything and it looks like she’s going to succeed. I know what I said, but I need to be strong now and you’re my touchstone.’

  ‘What do they want?’ he asked, clenching his hands into fists to hide the trembling from her.

  How long until he became expendable? The treacherous thought in his mind laughed at him. The more he tried to push it away, the louder it got. How long until the power became more important that the vessel? And how long until she wouldn’t let him leave at all?

  He’d always known Silver was dangerous. He’d only tried to kid himself that he could handle that. Now he knew he’d been wrong.

  ‘I don’t know what they want.’ She stepped towards him, so close that they could touch at any minute, but she didn’t actually reach out and touch him. Her hands hesitated above his arms. In the skin beneath whorls of light started to glow, drawn out by her proximity. The power inside him wanted her, wanted her touch, wanted to be used by her.

  Even his body betrayed him.

  Dylan looked deep into her eyes, recognising the hunger there, like an addict looking for a fix behind her perfect façade. But knowing what he knew of himself, feeling what he felt, which one of them was the addict? Perhaps both of them were.

  ‘Have you tried asking them?’

  ‘Please, Dylan. I must protect my people.’

  That was it really, the difference he saw between Silver and the rest of the Sídhe who would throw anyone else under a bus the moment it suited them. Or just for laughs.

  Silver and Jinx. That was it. He didn’t care about the rest of them. Did such creatures even deserve to be saved?

  And who was he to be the judge?