Burns Night

by Amy Hoff

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CALEDONIA INTERPOL

  Leah touched her palm to the red sandstone of Interpol. The portal opened, and she walked down the staircase as tiny bright creatures giggled to themselves among the leaves. She continued down the dark archway leading to the office, while Fludge gripped her shoulder and made soft snorting sounds next to her ear.

  ***

  The two Interpol receptionists, Leezie Lindsay and Aoife, were in the kitchen for their tea break. Dorian had descaled the kettles and regardless of the previous night’s events, the women wanted tea.

  Aoife poured the boiling water into two mugs while Lindsay nattered on. She had been shaken by her experience the night before but was secretly glad of it. Her baby – their baby – would be the first demigod humans had known in generations. So she wasn’t really bothered at all; her boyfriend had been an utter cunt, anyway.

  Lindsay was a pixie, another creature humans had dreamt up over time. They didn’t exist beyond the Victorian era but in popular human imagination. That meant Lindsay was far younger and considered more of an intern than anything.

  “So, I finally got a date with Morag.”

  “Oh?” asked Aoife, not really listening. “What species?”

  The awkward silence that followed made Aoife pay sudden attention.

  “Lindsay,” said Aoife. Lindsay tried to look innocent.

  “She’s an Old God,” the pixie confessed.

  “Lindsay! Again?” Aoife exclaimed.

  “She’s different, Aoife!” Lindsay protested. “She’s reformed! She even works at Lidl!”

  “You know what they’re like,” said Aoife in a big-sister voice, or an I’m An Entity Far Older and Wiser Than You voice. “One minute responsible creatures with jobs, next minute eating cities and driving humans to the brink of madness! Besides, they never call after the first few dates and you can’t get the green out of the carpet.”

  Lindsay made a moue and wrinkled her button nose.

  “Oh, don’t be so speciesist!” she said. “Morag’s different. I’m sure of it.”

  “That’s what you said the last two times,” muttered Aoife under her breath. Lindsay’s eyes narrowed.

  “Can’t you just be happy for me for once?” she asked.

  “I would be, it’s just that last time, with the giant albino penguins–”

  “That was so not the same–”

  Aoife suddenly stood stock-still.

  “Aoife?” asked Lindsay. “What is it?”

  She pointed at the wall, where the tallies for The Deeps, Interpol’s prison, were kept.

  “Prisoner escape,” she said.

  Lindsay turned to look.

  “Escape?” she asked. “But how? Nobody’s escaped from there in – well, not since I’ve been here.”

  “Cell 11845,” Aoife read out.

  “That’s Sebastian Bloodworth’s cell,” said Lindsay urgently.

  “What?” demanded Aoife. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” Lindsay affirmed. “I’ve been studying the cell blocks as part of the training. That is definitely Sebastian.”

  Aoife set down her mug, grabbed a stack of paperwork, and ran out of the kitchen.

  ***

  The main hall of Interpol was the usual hive of activity. Things were even busier than usual and the place was teeming with creatures and people. High above, dark clouds warned of a storm. Whether it would be rain or snow remained to be seen, but there were enough places to take cover within the office that it didn’t matter so much. The employees of the police station seemed determined to work anyway.

  Leah found Chief Ben looking harried behind an absolute mountain of paperwork.

  “Leah,” he said, looking relieved to have a distraction. “So, did you find him?”

  “No,” said Leah. “And now Robert’s gone missing too. The city’s in chaos, Chief.”

  “Tell me about it,” grumbled Ben. He stared at Fludge, who was gently bobbing up and down on Leah’s shoulder. “What’s that you’ve got there?”

  “No idea,” said Leah. “I found it under my bed. I don’t know where to look for Dorian.”

  Leah rubbed her head, wishing the pressure there was from a hangover. She’d been painfully sober most of the night. Something about being surprised mid-dream about her handsome poet friend, by said poet friend, had woken her right up. She wanted a drink, but now was not the time.

  “I’ve called in Nour to help,” Ben offered. “She’s usually out on her beat, and she knows the city better than anyone.”

  “So,” she said wearily. “What do we know so far?”

  “Subway and trains have stopped running,” Ben said. “People are just standing in the streets or in their houses, staring at nothing. The news is still being reported, so anyone who isn’t hypnotized is glued to the TV or the Internet.”

  “Fantastic,” Leah sighed.

  “Oh, here’s Nour,” Ben said. Leah turned to see the beautiful phoenix woman walk through the door and greet them with a jaunty wave.

  “Don’t you think a police constable is a little less, uh,” said Leah, making a gesture with her hands, “qualified than we need right now, Chief?”

  Chief Ben looked at Leah as if he had secrets she would never know. He probably did.

  “Everyone else is missing,” said Ben.

  “What about, I don’t know, Yoo Min?” asked Leah. “She’s a detective, and – and good with a blade.”

  Leah felt bile rise in her throat; Yoo Min’s daily carved roast lunch of Magnus Grey’s liver had never been palatable to her, especially when she brought it to work in a lunchbox and nibbled on it merrily between debriefings.

  “Hi Leah!” chirped Nour. “What are we going to–”

  “Chief!” shouted Aoife, who had just burst into the hall. “It’s Sebastian! He’s escaped containment and he’s getting away!”

  Ben looked at Leah and Nour.

  “Go!” he commanded. They didn’t need to be told twice.

  ***

  Outside, in the darkness, a light rain was falling.

  Chief Ben brought up the rear as they ran up the staircase and burst out into St. Enoch Square.

  Sebastian ran full-throttle into them. Leah and Nour grabbed him.

  “You’re under arrest!” they shouted in chorus.

  Ben took a step back.

  “There’s something strange about this–” he began.

  Suddenly, bright white light flooded the square. Startled, Nour lit herself on fire and Fludge roared flame.

  The crowd of newspeople standing there with lights and cameras were shocked into silence.

  “See? They are monsters!” crowed Sebastian. “They’re the ones letting your nightmares into this world! All those things you fear, the things that keep you up at night! It’s their fault! I know how to stop it, so you can go back to your lives!”

  He stared into the cameras with a simpering look.

  “I’m human, just like you,” he said. “I barely escaped! Save me from these creatures, please!”

  Leah let go of Sebastian and shoved him toward the crowd.

  “Get inside!” she commanded.

  “But Sebastian!” wailed Nour. “We’ll lose him! Again!”

  Leah rounded on the phoenix.

  “I’m not going to stand here and watch while the torch-and-pitchfork brigade destroy you!” she hissed. “Get inside!”

  Leah backed against the red sandstone building and slammed her palm onto the stone. The door appeared behind her. Nour ran beneath Leah’s outstretched arm as the crowd caught Sebastian. Leah ducked into the doorway at the last minute, and she could hear the startled gasps of the crowd as the portal disappeared behind her, leaving nothing but smooth stone in her wake.

  Leah stood for a moment in the silence of the leaves and faerie lights, the only sound the small creatures giggling in the underbrush. The last thing she saw before the door closed was Sebastian turning to her.

  He caught her eye and ga
ve her a slow wink.

  Then, the door was up, and the crowd had vanished beyond the portal.

  Outside, in the crowd, Sebastian grinned.

  ***

  Leah caught up with Ben and Nour on the path at the bottom of the staircase beneath the ivy-covered archway. Fludge had curled his tail protectively around her shoulders.

  “Thank you, Leah,” murmured Nour.

  “It had to be done,” Leah replied. “No need to thank me.”

  “You do realise that you’ve put yourself in danger,” Ben said. “You could have distanced yourself. You’re human.”

  Leah nodded.

  “But those people weren’t human,” she reasoned. “Or they weren’t behaving like they were human, anyway, and sometimes they’re more the monster for it. They weren’t individuals. They were a mob. And that never ends well for anyone.”

  “Sebastian’s in control of what’s happening now,” Ben said. “He may not like it when the mob turns on him, too. That’s the problem with mob rule. Do we have any idea how to stop this yet?”

  “Sebastian’s power has always been limited to people with broken hearts,” mused Leah. “We know he hates monsters, and that he unwittingly became one. Other than that, we’ve never really known his motivation. If he’s behind this, I have no idea what on earth he’d be getting out of it. Or if he’s just an opportunist using the confusion to bring people over to his side out of plain old human fear.”

  “Well, we’ve never seen anything like this,” said Ben. “Not on this scale, anyway. There’s no way to fix it as far as we know, since it’s completely unknown to us. Dreams and nightmares sound like magic to me.”

  “That’s the thing,” said Leah. “I don’t think they are dreams and nightmares, not technically. You know Faust?”

  “Sure,” Ben said, and Nour nodded.

  “Wishing for things isn’t always the best idea,” said Leah. “They come back wrong. Be careful what you wish for, that sort of thing. But these things are more like…insecurities, feelings of loss, anxiety. Dreams and nightmares, sure, but in the more nebulous definition of those words.”

  Recognition dawned in Nour’s eyes.

  “Give us a second, now this I’ve heard about before,” she said. “A city in thrall to its fears? That’s a story I know. I’ve been a part of it.”

  “How’s that?” asked Ben.

  “Oh. Years and years ago, in Egypt,” Nour said, “there was a city – a town, really, I suppose – that was slowly taken over by a creeping dread. Everyone shared this strange sensation that things were about to go wrong at any moment. The place froze up, everything came to a standstill. It’s amazing what anxiety can do to an entire population.”

  “But it wasn’t like this?” Leah prompted.

  “Not quite?” Nour mused. “These experiences seem a lot more specific to each individual, if you take my meaning. I don’t think anyone in that city started seeing their own history or their nightmares in real life. Nothing like that.”

  “And all of the things we’ve seen so far have had to do with individual love and loss,” said Leah.

  “Sebastian’s broken-heart magic could be involved, then,” Chief Ben offered.

  “Maybe,” said Leah. “But the thing that really puzzles me is that it’s taken hold of people and creatures who I know don’t have hearts, like Desdemona. Nour, do you know what happened to that city in Egypt?” she asked.

  Nour nodded.

  “Yes,” she said. “I fixed it. I’m not sure the cure would work here, because the situation isn’t quite the same.”

  “Couldn’t hurt to try,” said Ben. “I’m missing most of my staff as it is, and this kind of chaos opens Glasgow to attack. Has anyone checked on the Guardians?”

  “Not tonight,” said Leah. “But I can give Dylan a call, I’ve got his number in my phone.”

  “The thing is,” Nour said, “back then? What I did, what I’d need to do – it’s dangerous, it might not even work, and if we want to try it, the city streets would need to be empty of humans.”

  “How are we going to do that?” asked Leah.

  “Call Dylan,” Ben suggested, as they walked into the main room of the station. “The Guardians have work to do. And you still need to find Robert and Dorian.”

  “Right,” said Leah. “Then I’d better get back out there. See you later, Chief. Good luck, Nour.”

  Nour nodded to her, a fire kindled in her eyes.

  “Thank you, Leah Bishop,” she replied.

  Nour hoped to bring that light to Glasgow, its warmth and comfort to the people there.

  And she remembered another time, long ago, in another city – a place of light in the darkness.

  ***

  “What is this, Nour?” Desdemona asked cautiously. Nour laughed, a wild, bright sound.

  She was always laughing. Desdemona found it puzzling.

  “The festival of lights, silly!” Nour cheeped. “You’ve been around pretty much since the beginning of time, just like me, and you’ve never seen this?!”

  Desdemona shrugged. The lights were everywhere, floating in the sky, on the dark waters of the river, at dinner tables filled with laughter and love.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Nour asked, and Desdemona had to grudgingly agree.

  Nour swiped some food from a nearby stall, chewing away happily. There was powder on her nose and all around her mouth, but she didn’t seem to mind.

  “Think you’re supposed to pay for that,” muttered Desdemona. Nour shoved the food at her.

  “Here, try it!” she chirped, “This is the best year for it, I made sure we came to the right one!”

  Desdemona took a bite. Whatever it was, it was delicious. She smiled, a little.

  Nour clapped her hands for joy. She also, suddenly, lit on fire.

  “Glad to see I made you happy,” said Desdemona.

  “Oh, you are so grumpy,” she trilled, “But you always make me happy, Desdemona! Come on, let’s go see the festival!”

  Stupid bird, thought Desdemona.

  “I heard thaaaat,” cried Nour in a singsong voice, but laughed and continued down the road.

  “What is it with you, Nour?” asked Desdemona, a while later, while they sat watching the festivities. “You, of all people, are aware of how horrible the world is, and the horrific things that happen in it – what people do to each other. All you show me is...light. Happiness.”

  Nour turned to Desdemona, a laugh on her lips, as always. Eternal. Joyful.

  “You are a creature of violence and pain,” said Nour, “and yet we are friends. You know about the violence. Everyone knows about the horrors. Fire is not only destructive, it is healing. Purifying. Warming.

  I show you the light because far too much emphasis has always been placed on darkness. They say it is so much easier for humans to believe in hell than in heaven. Nobody needs a reminder about the darkness, Desdemona, but they often need a reminder about the light.”

  “Especially me, you didn’t say,” said Desdemona.

  “Did I need to?” she smiled.

  ***

  In the room beyond time, such bright memories had little to do with the conversation.

  And yet Nour was determined that some of her light would prevail.

  “What are the stakes?” Desdemona asked her.

  Nour’s eyes flashed dully, a flame barely discernible in the centre of her pupils.

  “I thought you weren’t interested in the city,” she said.

  Desdemona reached out towards the table, to touch a chess-piece. Nour’s eyes sparked, and Desdemona’s flashed in return. Flame, the elder, the builder, the creator, if Nour’s claims were to be believed, roiling at the centre of the earth. Green, the green earth, the green of the sea, Desdemona claimed to be old as Nour if not older.

  They stared at each other over the table.

  Neither of them had ever touched a game-piece, not in all their history.

  “Him?” Nour said
, startled. “Desdemona – “

  The baobhan sith sighed.

  “Humans,” she said, “are such strange creatures.”

  “But why?” she asked.

  Desdemona dropped her hand.

  “Someone has to look out for him,” she murmured. “I can’t believe he hasn’t fallen into a hole and drowned by now, clumsy as he is.”

  “What is this?” Nour whispered, something very like fear in her eyes, and Nour had never feared Desdemona.

  “Play, little bird.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  NEW ROMANTIC

  Leah found herself sitting in the kitchen with her mum, drinking tea.

  She was certain that she’d left Interpol again, after checking to make sure the newspeople had lost interest in the weird creatures they had seen earlier in the night. St. Enoch Square had been mercifully empty, and she’d walked out the door with Fludge on her shoulder –

  and here she was, drinking tea with her mum in their kitchen?

  “So, I heard that you’re wanting to go into folklore,” her mum said, distracting her from her thoughts.

  “Yeah,” Leah replied. She stirred the milk into her tea absentmindedly, wondering where Fludge had gone. Then she wondered what she meant by Fludge.

  “Not a lot of money in that, is there?” her mum asked, the way all mums do everywhere.

  Leah blinked. Something was off.

  “No,” she said to her mum, “but it’s what I love.”

  “Well,” her mum replied, “as long as it makes you happy, dear.”

  Leah touched the side of her face. Smooth skin.

  That’s not right –

  “There’s my scar–” she began doubtfully.

  “Oh, honey, don’t start with that again,” her mum said. “You were attacked by the neighbourhood dog. Nasty thing.”

  “It was a monster, mum!” Leah snapped.

  “Leah, you’re too old to believe in things like that. What will the young men say?”

  “I don’t bloody care.”

  “Watch your language, young lady.”

  Her mum smiled, a sunny, unquiet grin.