Portraits of the Forsaken

by E. E. Holmes

  “Well, thanks,” I said, raising my own voice as well. “Thanks for dropping it by.”

  Fiona gave me a wink and a nod, to acknowledge my participation in… whatever this was. “Don’t expect me to make a habit of it. I can’t be expected to be making house calls on the regular. I’m too bloody busy up at the castle.”

  “No problem,” I said. “So…” I widened my eyes at her, looking for some kind of direction. “Any feedback?”

  “I’ve left it all here for you, in the notes,” Fiona said, opening up the portfolio and tapping the stack of paper she’d tucked inside on top of my spirit drawings. “I’ve got suggestions in there for you on clarifying spirit intent, so be sure to read it carefully.” She widened her eyes at me again.

  “Okay, I will. Thanks,” I said.

  “All of it, now. No skimming,” she added, quietly.

  “Every word,” I promised, wondering as I did so, why the hell she was being so cryptic. I could feel my nerves beginning to tense.

  “Right. And don’t bring me any more of your work until you’ve implemented that advice,” Fiona barked, standing up suddenly and knocking back the rest of her tea like it was a shot of something much stiffer. “I don’t want to suffer through another load of tosh like that.”

  “Are you leaving already?” I asked, standing up as well, and knocking my portfolio to the floor in my haste. “You just got here.”

  “I’m not here for a cozy catch up, Jess,” Fiona cried. “Didn’t you hear me say I’m busy?”

  I just stood there, waiting for her to give me something—anything—that would clue me in as to what the hell this was all about, but she just rubbed at her knees a bit, hobbled over to the door and said. “I’ll see you ‘round, then. Stay out of trouble, now.”

  I followed her to the door mumbling words of goodbye. Just as I opened the door for her, she reached down and grabbed a blue umbrella that was leaning against the wall. She leaned her face in close to me and whispered. “Read it all. And then destroy it.”

  I stared at her, too stunned even to stop her from stealing my only umbrella as she turned and stomped down the stairs. Feeling as though I were floating through a kind of waking dream, I shut the door and stood with my back to it. My eyes found the portfolio where it lay on the floor and I stared at it, as though it were going to jump up from the floor and finally give me an explanation.

  It didn’t.

  I listened carefully for any sound from the flat next door. All I could hear was the television blaring dully in the background. Not willing to take any chances, I crossed the room, scooped the portfolio up off the floor, and carried it with me into my room, closing the door behind me.

  I attempted to take a deep breath, but my lungs didn’t cooperate, so I gave it up. I cursed Fiona under my breath as I picked at the knot in the ribbon—no matter how many times I sent it over to her tied in a bow, she always sent it back tied in the kind of knot that suggested she never wanted the contents to see the light of day again. Finally, after several minutes of muttering obscenities at my shaking fingers, I managed to pull the two pieces of ribbon apart and lay the portfolio open. Meticulously, I pulled each sheet of paper out of the pockets and laid them out across the floor of my room. Each drawing had several sticky notes taped to it—every time I told her that sticky notes didn’t need tape, Fiona just used more tape.

  I felt into the corners of the portfolio’s pockets, then tossed it aside, turning my attention to Fiona’s nearly illegible scrawlings. Drawing by drawing, I read carefully through the notes, finding absolutely nothing unusual. This was the same kind of feedback Fiona always provided: critiques of perspective, suggestions for shadow work, telling me over and over again to think about the “movement” inherent in a still image, blah, blah, blah. Was I supposed to be finding some kind of hidden message in these perfectly ordinary comments? Mystified, I picked up the fifth sketch and gasped.

  I hadn’t drawn it. But I knew who it was.

  The figure in the picture was in midstride, walking away from the artist. The broad shoulders were slightly hunched, as though the figure were leaning forward as he walked. The hands were thrust into the pockets, balled up into fists, so that they tugged the coat away from the body with the force of them. The long, dark hair was tied back into a ponytail, secured with a length of worn leather cord. I could see just the merest suggestion of a strong, square jawline…

  Finn.

  All the air seemed to have left the room. I stared hungrily down at him, as though the force of my gaze could pull him from the paper and into reality beside me, or, at the very least, make him turn, just so I could see his face. Then, I was overtaken by a violent wave of molten fear. Was this a spirit drawing? Was it possible… could Finn be…

  I blinked away a film of tears that was clouding my view, and my eyes fell on the single sticky note taped to the image. It contained only seven words.

  He is posted at the Skye Príosún.

  I read them over and over again, letting wave after wave of relief wash over me. I couldn’t say for sure why relief was the strongest emotion. After all, the Skye Príosún was hundreds of miles away, as remote a location as I could imagine, meaning that Finn was just as unreachable in reality as I had feared he was in my nightmares. But at least I knew where he was. At last, after months of wondering, I finally knew where he was. Perhaps now I could stop accosting random strangers on the street in the vain, desperate hope of running into him.

  Skye Príosún. What did I know about it? Not much, admittedly. I knew that it was where the most dangerous criminals of the Durupinen world were housed. Lucida was imprisoned there, as were the Necromancers who had survived the siege of Fairhaven. Mackie had also told me once that the place had cells that were specially Warded to contain spirits instead.

  “We trap spirits on earth?” I had asked, horrified. “Isn’t that… like… against everything we stand for?”

  “Don’t forget that we can only Cross willing spirits,” Mackie had reminded me. “We can’t force a spirit to Cross, no matter what kind of havoc they are wreaking in the living world. That’s why some spirits have to be trapped and contained, until such time as they can be convinced to Cross.”

  “And if they can’t be convinced to Cross?” I had asked.

  She had shrugged and grimaced. “Wards have no expiration date. If they so choose, they can remain imprisoned indefinitely.”

  The thought at the time had sent a shiver down my spine, but the harsh reality of it hadn’t set in until I had met Eleanora Larkin, the Shattered spirit who had unknowingly wreaked such havoc at Fairhaven the previous year. Eleanora had been imprisoned while she was still alive for the crime of daring to be born a Caller. The bone-deep terror that all Durupinen harbored for Callers meant that she was not only locked away like the very worst of criminals, but she was also left to die when the príosún had burned nearly to the ground. And then, as if her fate hadn’t been harsh enough, her spirit couldn’t escape the príosún even after her body had perished. It was not until Lucida managed to Call her out of her bonds more than a hundred years later that Eleanora was able to break free of the príosún at last, only to be Shattered when Lucida tricked her into thinking she could Cross. Hearing her harrowing story had long given me a strange, creeping feeling any time I thought about the príosún and the prisoners—both living and dead—who were held there.

  And now, I would be forced to imagine Finn among them, standing guard in such a dark and lonely place. I sucked in a long, shuddering gasp. Here I was, comfortable in a cozy flat in the center of bustling London, allowed to carry on with my life, free to go where I pleased and choose my own path, while he was forced into a thankless post in the middle of nowhere.

  For the first time since we’d been separated, I considered the possibility that he might hate me. I wouldn’t blame him. I hated myself for daring to complain.

  I stared down at the drawing again, suddenly glad his figure wasn’t looking at me, dread
ing what I might see in his eyes and expression. My thoughts turned to Fiona. I had never once spoken to her about Finn being reassigned. I mean, she could hardly fail to notice that I had a new Caomhnóir, but I had never once, in all the time I’d known her, confided anything about our relationship to her. So how, then, did she know? Had Celeste told her? That seemed unlikely, unless Celeste had hoped to enlist her help in keeping an eye on me, to ensure that I wasn’t trying to get back in touch with Finn. Perhaps Fiona, like Milo and Hannah, had simply been more observant than I had given her credit for, and had figured it out for herself that Finn and I were in love with each other. In either case, she had risked a great deal to pass this information along to me. She obviously knew that Ambrose couldn’t be trusted, and she didn’t want to risk trying to speak to me about it when we were both at Fairhaven.

  I wondered how she had found out where Finn was. It was possible she had just overheard the information, but somehow I didn’t think so. She had gone to such extraordinary lengths to get the information to me, that I couldn’t help but think that she had actively sought the information out in the first place. It was unlikely that I’d have much of chance to ask her any of these questions, and, knowing Fiona, she’d be unlikely to answer them. She probably wouldn’t even accept a thank you.

  Now, what did I do with this knowledge? Was there anything I could do? I knew where Finn was now, but I was not any closer to finding my way back to him. I couldn’t very well go anywhere near the place without a valid reason, and getting arrested and thrown in jail was not exactly in my game plan. I could try to find out what I could about the príosún, but even with more details, what could I actually do? I was grateful to Fiona for letting me know, at last, where he was, but all she had done was assign a latitude and longitude to my loneliness. Now I could fixate my heartbreak onto a spot on the map, instead of scattering it aimlessly wherever I went. I didn’t know if this was better or worse, but for the moment, I was just relieved that at least one of so many questions had been answered.

  On sudden inspiration, I closed my eyes and felt my way out into my connection with Milo.

  “Milo? You there?”

  A snap, a pop of familiar, crackling energy. “What kind of question is that, sweetness? Where else would I…” He stopped suddenly as my energy mingled with his; I wasn’t doing a very good job of suppressing the avalanche of emotions I’d just experienced. “Hey, are you okay? What’s going on?”

  “I’m fine,” I said. I felt his skepticism skipping over the top of our blending energy, like a flat stone on a smooth lake. “Honestly. I’ll tell you all about it when you and Hannah get back.”

  “Do you need me to come back now?” Milo asked. “Hannah’s still finishing up her committee junk, but I could—”

  “No, no, seriously. It can wait. But I do need you to do something for me while you’re still at Fairhaven.”

  “Are you finally going to let me tell off Celeste?” Milo asked eagerly.

  “No,” I said firmly. “Don’t go anywhere near Celeste. In fact, make sure no one but Hannah knows about this request.”

  Milo sighed sulkily. “Fine, what is it?”

  “Ask Hannah to find out everything she can about the Skye Príosún,” I said. “I don’t want her to ask Council members or Caomhnóir—that would raise too much suspicion.”

  “Too much suspicion about what?” Milo asked, but I cut him off.

  “Just have her check it out in the library. The Scribes must have documentation that can shed some light on the place. It might not hurt to ask some of the spirits around Fairhaven, too. Some of them might have had firsthand experience.”

  “Yeah, but why—”

  “Just ask her, Milo, okay? I promise I’ll tell you guys everything when you get home,” I said.

  “I… okay, fine. I’ll let Hannah know, and we’ll see you tonight,” Milo said recognizing defeat and giving up with a sigh.

  “What time do you think you’ll be back?” I asked.

  “Not sure. Probably not before nine or ten, I’d say. These meetings are brutally long.”

  “Right. Well, let me know when you’re on your way. And tell Hannah I’m ordering Indian food, so I’ll save some for her.”

  “You got it, sweetness,” Milo said, and popped out of the connection.

  I sighed and looked down at the drawing again with a pang of regret. It would be incredibly foolish of me not to destroy this drawing immediately, along with the Post-it Note. The only problem was that the thought of doing so made me feel like there was a boulder on my chest, pressing all the air out of my lungs.

  At that moment, as though to knock some much-needed sense into me, Ambrose gave a loud, hacking cough from next door, which penetrated all the way through the walls and through my emotional fog. I couldn’t keep the drawing. Not only would it get me and Finn into trouble if anyone ever found it, but it could mean trouble for Fiona as well and I couldn’t do that to her, not when she’d gone to such lengths to help me. Before the sight of him could change my mind, I crumpled up the sketch of Finn into a tight ball and jumped to my feet. I marched straight to the kitchen, pulled out a frying pan and lid, and plunked it onto the stove. I put the ball of paper in the pan, turned on the burner, pulled a match from the drawer, lit it from the open flame, and dropped it into the pan. I watched with grim determination as the paper quickly caught fire. There was a brief moment, as the paper unfurled and burned, that the fire illuminated the curve of Finn’s cheek and neck, but then it was gone, consumed by the hungry little leaping flames. Within moments, the entire sketch had crumbled to ash. Quickly, before the smoke could spread, I smothered the little bonfire with the cover to the pan. A little while later, when the ashes had gone cold, I would wash them down the sink and smile good-naturedly through Tia’s joking comments about my pathetic attempts at cooking.

  “No offense, Jess, but haven’t you resigned yourself to a life of take-out yet?” Tia laughed.

  I watched the ashes turn the water gray and swirl away down the drain.

  “I know, right? When will I learn?” I said quietly.

  9

  Twisted

  HANNAH AND MILO were later than they had expected. I was dozing on the couch in front of a re-run of “Fawlty Towers” when they came in the door at last.

  “Sorry!” Hannah said, as I jerked myself awake and stared around confusedly. “I texted to let you know we were going to be late.”

  “That’s okay,” I said, squinting down at my phone. It was after midnight, and I did indeed have a message from Hannah waiting for me, along with a couple of missed calls from Flavia. I tossed the phone aside and yawned widely. “How did it all go?”

  Hannah frowned thoughtfully. “Good, I think. Well, we got through our entire agenda, which, as Siobhán says, is a miracle in itself.” She stopped and sniffed the air. “Did you try to cook something again?”

  The acrid smell of smoke still lingered beneath the scent of curry. “Yeah, it ended badly. There’s Indian take-out in the fridge,” I told her.

  Hannah groaned. “Excellent, I’m starving.” She tossed her coat and bag onto the table and began poking around in the take-out containers in the fridge.

  “So, what took so long?” I asked her.

  “We voted to stay and get it all done rather than reconvene for another session tomorrow,” Hannah said. “Not everyone was thrilled, but majority carried. I didn’t want to spend half my weekend in meetings.”

  “Thank goodness,” Milo said, drifting down onto the couch as though the meetings had left him physically exhausted despite the absence of a body. “The Fairhaven floaters are très dull. I can seriously only take them in small doses.”

  “Really?” I said. “I feel like you used to like hanging out with them.”

  “That was before I got to know the London deadside,” Milo sighed, gesturing wistfully toward the window. “It’s just a cornucopia of weird and quirky fabulousness out there. No wonder so many floaters hang ar
ound for so long.”

  “I stopped by the library for you on my dinner break,” Hannah said, “I found a few books on—”

  I flapped my arms at her and put my finger to my lips. She froze, eyes wide.

  “What’s wrong?” she mouthed.

  I pointed to Milo, to indicate we should use the connection to talk. Luckily, she caught on almost immediately. I opened up the connection and felt them both there, like a floodgate of confusion let loose inside my own head.

  “What is going on?” their simultaneous question hit me like a slap directly to the gray matter. I winced a little.

  “Easy there,” I told them. “It’s crowded in here.”

  “Sorry, sorry,” Hannah said, and I felt her energy shift, felt her rein back her anxiousness. “I just hate all the cryptic stuff.”

  “Did Ambrose hear you come in?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Hannah said, and I could feel her aggravation blending with my own. “You know how he is when one of us is out, even when another Caomhnóir is with us. I saw him at the window when we pulled up, and he watched us come in.”

  “I don’t want him to hear any part of this conversation,” I said.

  “I don’t think the walls are that thin, Jess,” Hannah said.

  “I’m not taking any chances,” I insisted.

  “But why?” Milo asked. “Just tell us what’s up!”

  And so, I did. In the quiet of the connection, I told them about Fiona’s unexpected visit to the flat and what she had brought for me inside the portfolio. Both Hannah and Milo were as shocked to hear about the sketch as I had been to see it.

  “How did she find out?” Hannah asked.

  “I have no idea. I didn’t have a chance to ask, and even if I did, I doubt she would tell me,” I said.

  “So, that’s why you wanted the information on the Skye Príosún,” Hannah said. “When you asked, I thought maybe it had something to do with Lucida.”