by Sarah Rayne
‘No one knew. He made sure of it. He kept me,’ said Christian, savagely, ‘hidden from the world.’ He studied her, the moonlight shining on the mask, so that his eyes glittered coldly. ‘And now, of course, you really will have to die,’ he said. ‘You do see that, don’t you? And it’ll have to be Rossani’s way. Now that you know who I am you’ll have to die like all the others died – Leila and Mia Makepiece and your father—’
Because there’s a primitive belief that safety is interdependent with identity, my dear . . . Because the dwarf’s power will be broken if once his name is discovered, my dear . . .
‘It’s unavoidable, Fael,’ said Christian, staring at her but not making any move yet. Gilly, listening closely, still trying to see a chance of escape for them both, was unable to tell if it was hatred that held him in its grip, or passion. Does he hate her violently or does he love her just as violently? Or is it both? Does he hate her because he loves her? This is all too deep for me, thought Gilly, uncomfortably. The night’s all filled up with complex emotions and too-fierce feelings – it’s seething and boiling with them – and I don’t understand them. I don’t want to understand them. I wish I was a thousand miles away, thought Gilly, still frantically feeling around for a sharp stone that might make some impression on her bonds.
‘I’ll give you to the leanan-sidhe,’ said Christian, still speaking in the same soft tone. He glanced towards the black, jagged cliffs where spumy spray rose up from the foot. ‘I’m sorry about it, but it will have to be done.’ He came towards her, and Gilly caught a snatch of Rossani’s music, hummed very faintly. Her skin began to crawl with terror.
Rossani’s a-prowl and he’s looking for fools;
He’ll grind down your bones and he’ll shred up your soul.
Grind down your bones, thought Gilly, in horror. He’s sticking to the grisly song. Or is it Rossani who’s doing that? But he is Rossani. And that’s what’s going to happen on those rocks below the cliff. We’ll be ground to pulp.
Fael was staring at the masked figure in fury, and when she spoke, Gilly thought: Oh good for you, Fael! You’re still fighting him!
‘You’re an evil, twisted bastard!’ shouted Fael, and the wind snatched her words and tore them into harsh ragged splinters.
‘I’m no bastard, Fael,’ said the Shadow, and incredibly there was faint amusement in his tone.
‘Well, you won’t do it,’ said Fael, defiantly. ‘I don’t believe you’ll really do it.’
‘That’s because you keep losing sight of one important fact, my dear.’ He reached up to his face, his movements slow and deliberate, and peeled off the face mask, flinging it away from him. ‘You keep forgetting that I’m the villain,’ said Christian, and bent to pick her up again.
The light in the sea tunnel seemed to have grown as strong as it was going to grow. Flynn thought this might be because he was nearing its source, and he was torn between burgeoning hope that the tunnel was about to open out into freedom, and dread that he was about to come smack up against a dead-end. He had lost all sense of time and his wristwatch appeared to have stopped. He supposed this had happened when Roscius overpowered him on the hillside and cursed all over again.
But looked at logically it did not matter if he had been imprisoned for half an hour or a couple of days. On balance he thought he had been in the underground room and the well shaft for no longer than three or perhaps four hours, and he thought he had been in the sea tunnel for about twenty minutes. He had left Flaherty’s Bar just after eight p.m. so that if his estimation was right, it was coming up to midnight. None of which made any difference to his situation if a dead-end was ahead.
He had arrived at this conclusion when, without the least warning, he was confronted with what appeared to be a solid wall of rock. Well, so I was right, thought Flynn, staring at it in bitter anger. It’s the dead-end I was fearing, may the devil rot its black Protestant soul!
He stepped back and studied it. But I can still hear the sea, he thought, suddenly. In fact I can hear it more strongly than ever. That might be because it’s on the other side of that rock, of course. But the light’s still trickling in – it’s a bit fuzzy, but it’s coming in from somewhere. And then he saw that the rock wall was in fact a jutting spur, and that behind it was a narrow opening.
There was probably nothing more useful than a water-filled cavern on the other side of the rock, and by this time it seemed to Flynn perfectly possible that he was trapped down here for ever, and doomed to wander the tunnels for the rest of his life. I’ll probably end up as a leading character in the folklore of this bloody place, he thought, and people in Flaherty’s Bar will whisper fearfully about me, and tell tourists how, on moonless nights when the wind’s in the right quarter, they can hear me moaning beneath the sea-bed, trying to find the way back up to the world again . . . Or maybe I died back there in the well shaft, and this is purgatory, and never mind that it’s nothing like the priests told, because I’ll be stuck here until I’ve expiated every sin I’ve ever committed. Well, if that’s the case, I’m due to be down here for a devil of a long time!
Still, here I go, he thought. Will I get through or not? God, it’s a tight squeeze. Probably designed specifically for penitents in the last stages of starvation, or those inhuman things carved into the rock back there. Only I don’t think I’ll think about those carvings until I’m free. If I ever am free. No, it’s all right, I’m going to get through. Praise every saint in heaven.
Beyond the rock spur the tunnel widened and there in front of him was an expanse of night sky, with, beneath it, the dark wastes of the ocean. And it might be the Atlantic, thought Flynn, in immense relief, and it might be cold and bleak and stormy, but at the moment it’s as fine a sight as ever Homer’s wine-dark sea was.
The stinging night wind whipped in and out of the cavern, and Flynn gasped as it struck his face like a blow, and then breathed in enormous lungfuls. The wind tasted cold and clean and salty, and nothing had ever felt as good anywhere in the entire world ever. His eyes prickled from the cold, and he was suddenly filled with huge affection for the entire world. I’m free, he thought, leaning against the side of the cave, tasting the salty wind on his cheeks. I’m out of that hell-spawned place, and I’m unhurt except for a few stretches of skin that Roscius’s ropes tore away. What now, I wonder? And where exactly am I? The tunnel was behind him, and directly ahead was a broad shelf of rock. And beneath the shelf—
Flynn inched cautiously to the edge and looked down. At once his stomach lurched with panic and his mind tilted with vertigo, and he retreated to the shelter of the cave. The cave opened out on the side of the black cliffs he had seen when he drove to Maise earlier on. He was partway down the cliff-face, and immediately outside the cave was a sheer, hundred-foot drop. At the bottom the black, angry waters of the Atlantic pounded unceasingly against the craggy Moher rocks, throwing up great clouds of spray. Flynn was drenched within minutes, and he moved farther back into the cave and sat down to consider. To climb down the cliff was impossible and unthinkable: it was too far and he would almost certainly fall and be dashed to pieces on the rocks below. But how far was it to the clifftop? He went out again and looked upwards, waiting for the scudding clouds to race across the face of the moon and give him a little more light. Surely it was no more than twenty feet to the top? The thought of climbing up was terrifying, but Flynn could not see anything else to do. Down into the well and now up the side of the cliff, he thought. It’s not a nightmare I’ve fallen into or a black fantasy, it’s a bloody nursery rhyme!
In the event, it was easier than he had dared hope. The cliff was not as sheer as it looked; Flynn thought it might have been eroded or even worn back by the constant onslaught of the wind and the sea-storms. But it had not been worn smooth; there were footholds and handholds, and there were even clusters of toughly-rooted plants. Flynn climbed determinedly up, not looking down, trying not to think about the hundred-foot drop below him, certainly trying not to think wh
at would happen if he missed his footing.
The wind tore at his hair as he climbed, and several times he thought he caught the sounds of strange cries inside the wind, and of keening creatures who beat enormous wings on the night and mocked him.
You’ll never escape . . . You’ll never get free . . .
Oh, won’t I! thought Flynn, grimly. I’ll get to the top of this damned cliff, and I’ll go after that accursed Roscius. The top of the cliff was within arms’ reach now, and he grasped at the tiny stunted plants sprouting out of the rock, and hauled himself thankfully up. Made it! He lay on the cold ground, recovering his breath, staring up at the night sky, giving thanks to whatever powers might be appropriate that he had escaped.
After a moment he sat up and looked about him. He thought he was some way off the main highroad, partway down a half-slope that broke the terrain between the road and the start of the cliffs proper. He thought Maise was somewhere over to his right, but he had lost all sense of direction and it was too dark to be sure of anything. I don’t want to go back to Maise, he thought, but if I could see the turning to the private road I’d at least know where I was. Wouldn’t you have expected Roscius to provide a bit of light for wayfarers trying to reach his nightmare mansion, the miser? thought Flynn. Some villain, who won’t light the path for his victims!
He stood up, brushed himself down, and set off up the grassy slope. Once on the main highroad, I might get to a phone, or even flag down a car. Oh sure, he said to himself sarcastically. And what cars do you suppose will be driving out here at midnight on a wild night like this? He spared an angry thought for his own car, presumably within a few minutes’ walk, but the steering snapped and useless.
It was then that he saw headlights coming down the road towards him. Someone was abroad in the storm after all. And I suspect, thought Flynn, narrowing his eyes, and keeping well back in case the headlights picked him out, I rather suspect that that car’s coming from the direction of Maise.
The car was about two hundred yards away when it slowed down, and then turned off the road. The headlights swung around, illuminating the grass verge and the start of the cliff. Flynn made out the rearing, monolithic stone he had noticed earlier on, and then the headlights were switched off.
Roscius, thought Flynn. Or is it? Mightn’t it be a couple out for a bit of illicit screwing on the back seat? No, it’s Roscius, I’m sure of it. No one else would be abroad in this storm, and no matter how sexed-up you were, you’d never park on the edge of a cliff.
Keeping to the shadows, he set off towards the car.
No one in Flaherty’s Bar had taken Flynn Deverill’s remark about sending in the cavalry after forty-eight hours precisely seriously; you could tell he had been making a joke, and in any case, wasn’t it precisely the kind of thing they would have said themselves, setting off for such a sinister old place?
No one was really worried when Flynn did not return, although Flaherty’s daughter was disappointed, the shameless creature. She said crossly it was nothing to do with being shameless; it was only the waste of work. Hadn’t there been the large front bedroom all made ready, and lavender-scented sheets on the bed, never mind a fire lit in the grate and fresh towels and hot water put out.
But what with all the to-ing and fro-ing of the evening, and what with a grand, spirited argument starting up in the public bar and everyone joining in and one or two tempers getting frayed, nobody thought any more about Flynn for some time. It was only when Flaherty was calling for them to get off to their homes – Did they think he wanted to fall foul of the gardai? – and when he and his daughter were surveying the pile of dirty glasses and saying wasn’t it beyond belief how much washing up piled up of a night, that they realised Flynn had not come back. Seamus and Sinead O’Sullivan had stayed to give a bit of a hand with the clearing up, which they often did, and Liam had stayed as well on account of being enamoured of Flaherty’s daughter, which was an arrangement that would suit all parties, and was therefore being enthusiastically encouraged. Father Mack was still there as well, half dozing by the fire, which could be forgiven on account of him having said early Mass in two parishes that morning.
And so what with one thing and what with another, it was nearly midnight when Flaherty finally finished, and then Father Mack woke up and they all had a tot of whiskey to keep out the cold for the homeward walk. Seamus was just saying wasn’t it a wonderful thing that the power had held up, what with the storm and all, and the O’Sullivans were getting ready to go, when the lights flickered and went out.
They were all used to power cuts – although it was admittedly startling to get one so bang on cue as you might put it – but it was only now, in the flurry of finding candles and hurricane lamps, and looking out a good torch to lend the O’Sullivans for the walk home, that Flaherty’s daughter tripped over one of Flynn’s suitcases and they realised he had not returned from Maise.
And it was now midnight.
They sat round the fire talking it over, and the lamps burned low and the fire burned low as well, and the storm lashed against the windows. Liam, who was apt to be fanciful, said wasn’t this the way their ancestors used to sit: huddled round a peat fire by lamplight, fearful of a number of enemies – the press-gangs or the English, or the demons out at the house that they had known as mera. And now it was himself up at Maise they were discussing, said Liam, and they were all just as fearful.
Flaherty went round with the whiskey again, and Father Mack said hadn’t they in common humanity to make sure Mr Deverill was all right, and Seamus said that was all very well only it was Maise they were discussing. Liam said for Christ’s sake hadn’t they better do something instead of sitting here on their bottoms, and Father Mack reproved him for blaspheming.
Flaherty’s daughter held by the opinion that Mr Deverill had intended to return, and then Flaherty remembered the sum of money Flynn had left by way of deposit for the room, which had been generous and wholly unnecessary. You did not do things like that and then vanish. And if the vanishing was intended, you did not do it without taking your luggage.
Flaherty’s daughter and Sinead were all for the men going off up to Maise there and then, which, as the men pointed out, was all very well for them: they would be safe and snug here while the rest of them were entering the lion’s den.
‘Or the demons’ lair,’ put in Liam, and was told to hush.
‘There’re no demons inside Maise,’ said Flaherty’s daughter. ‘I’ve been up there a dozen times, and never spied sight nor sound nor whisker of a demon, or anything else. Sinead’s been there with me.’
‘We’ll go along by ourselves if you’re scared,’ said Sinead. ‘We’ll take the four-wheel drive – Seamus is in no fit state to drive anyway – and we’ll just take a look to see if your man’s there or if there’s been an accident on the road along the way. Has anyone thought of that?’
Nobody had thought of that until now, but Sinead’s words decided the matter, because none of the men was going to be bested by a woman, and that woman Sinead O’Sullivan. After more arguing, it was decided that they would take Liam’s truck, with Liam driving, and Seamus and Flaherty in the rear, leaving Father Mack to travel in the passenger seat with the dignity befitting a man of God.
‘Pray for us,’ said Father Mack as they set off.
‘Did he mean that literally, do you suppose?’ demanded Sinead.
‘He did.’
Chapter Thirty
Look in the chronicles . . .
The Taming of the Shrew, William Shakespeare
Fael was as unable to close her mind against the appalling face, as she was unable to shut out the mad agony that streamed from Christian’s mind into hers.
As he lifted her in his arms, the wild night and the shrieking wind that held the voices of strange inhuman beings blurred and began to spin in a dizzying maelstrom. This is it, she thought. I’m going to die – we’re both going to die – and it’s going to happen now. I’m about to be thrown onto t
he rocks in a warped sacrifice to creatures out of an ancient legend, and if I’m not smashed to bloodied splinters on the rocks, I’ll drown in the freezing Atlantic Ocean. And no one will ever know what happened to me, and I’ll never know what it feels like to walk normally again!
As he carried her towards the cliff edge the clouds moved across the pale moon, as completely as if a black curtain had been pulled down. I’m going to die in this darkness, thought Fael, struggling in vain against the iron grip that held her. This is unbearable. But it won’t happen – it can’t. Something will stop him! He won’t kill me, not when it comes to it – I don’t believe I meant nothing to him. With the thought, came the memory of the strange, dark passion that had blazed between them, and to Fael’s astonishment she heard her voice say softly, ‘So I was just to give you a child, was I? Come on, admit that’s not true.’ She felt him pause, and as he did so, the moon began to slide out from behind the clouds. Light, pale and uncertain, began to sprinkle the Self-Bored Stone.
‘Admit it,’ said Fael, meeting the beautiful eyes in the appalling face unflinchingly.
‘I admit to nothing.’ But he did not move.
‘Tell me your name. Your first name. You owe it to me. And where’s the harm any longer?’
For a moment she thought he would refuse, and that he would simply walk to the cliff edge and throw her over. But then he said, ‘Christian.’
‘Christian. Yes, of course,’ said Fael. ‘The soldier of light, the force against the principalities of darkness. She called you that deliberately, didn’t she? Your mother, I mean? As a safeguard.’
‘No.’ It came out violently, as if it was forced from him. Fael heard the blurred undisciplined note and knew that control was slipping from him. Is that good or bad? Will it make it easier to keep him talking or not? Oh God, what’s the point of keeping him talking? I’ve probably got about three minutes before I die!
