Now he slunk closer to the shack; holding his hand over his nostrils against the loch-stench. It was so alien to him. He wanted exhaust fumes and concrete, that boy. He needed more shops than could ever get to know his face; a big, swarming jungle to hide in.
I blinked. How would I know that? I wasn’t even interested. It was as if there was so much of him, it spilled over and leached into me; a strong mind but an ill-controlled one.
All right, now I was curious. And arrogant, of course, arrogant as I ever was. And there was time to kill, and another human mind to invade, and trouble to forestall or to provoke. Could I help it if, centuries into my erratic exile, I still got bored?
Oh, to hell with honour and privacy and my brother’s moral scruples. Like pulling on a coat that was only a little too small, I slipped inside the boy’s mind.
He shoved open the plank door, grabbing it to stop it banging, and had to stifle a yelp when a splinter pierced the base of his thumb. That hurt me as it hurt him; give me a hand of my own and I’d have slapped him.
But I wasn’t him. I could feel him, hear him, I was tangled up in him, but I wasn’t... him. I was still separate, somehow, as if I was hanging onto the side of a speeding car and I’d fall off if I lost my grip. Something was wrong. Gods, I was confused.
Still arrogant, though. Still too nosy to leave.
He eased out the splinter with his teeth, tasting blood. Smelling it, too, and suddenly he was ambushed by a sense that the loch too was all black blood, clotted and still and stinking. I felt his cold fear, his hatred of the water, and I didn’t like it.
Stop that, child.
He obeyed without knowing it. Shaking off a tremor, he searched the shack. Nothing. He wanted to spit at the waste of time, and I felt much the same. Nothing but a plastic-and-steel chair that looked like it had come off a landfill, and a rickety formica table, and a couple of empty beer cans, and half a supermarket loaf, and a few grey blankets. And that pile of rags in the corner.
As he reached to unravel those his hand was shaking, and he growled under his breath. Stupid, to be scared of shadow and silence. There were worse things in the world; I knew he knew it. Annoyed enough to be careless, he lifted the rag-bundle and shook it, and something clattered dully to the floor.
It glinted. Through his eyes I stared at it, mildly curious, while he began to panic.
His thoughts were quick enough, I grant him: the loaf was ready-sliced, and the blade was long, too long for gutting fish. Its honed edge caught all the light there was, a lethal intense glow. The handle was mottled with thick dark stains and when he touched it, a sensation shivered up his arm.
This was a boy who knew what bloodstains looked like.
The thought of the police flitted through his head as he turned the knife with a fingertip. It only flitted, though, and was gone. Forget it. He couldn’t tell the police, he couldn’t tell anyone. He’d forget he’d seen this, forget he’d ever come in here—
Something behind us creaked. His breath caught in our lungs. Both of us knew the door had opened, even before the cold night air hit his shoulder blades.
He didn’t want to turn.
Oh, Jesus.
But he had to. I made him do it. Very slowly, he turned.
His breathing was the only sound in the place. He couldn’t seem to do it silently. He sucked it in as a high whine and it came out the same way.
The blade’s light bounced off the tramp’s glasses, obscuring his eyes. But just for a moment, the man looked stupefied.
We each took our chance: I was out of his head like a bolt of lightning, back to watching from the darkness; the boy just bolted. Shouting with terror, he barged full-on into the tramp, making him stagger aside. Shoving, scrabbling away, he stumbled out into the dank air and ran.
He blundered through the trees, unable to find a path. I should have stayed with him, helped; but I couldn’t. Not now the tramp was back. I had my own agenda; the boy was on his own. Clumsy and hopeless, he slipped, stumbled up through twining grass and sucking water.
And all the time, he knew it was coming
I sucked in a breath. What? I wasn’t in his head, but I knew what he was thinking.
Any moment now: the clutch of a hand and the bite of a blade
Gods, I’d got too close, I knew his mind. I put my hands over my ears and tried to block him out.
He wouldn’t hear the tramp coming
There’s nothing to be afraid of, I wanted to scream. Leave me alone. Run and be safe. Get out of my sight and my life and my head...
He wouldn’t hear the tramp—
He did, though. As he fell against the wire, tore his flesh on the barbs, he heard the roar of the tramp’s laughter, as loud as I did. When he dragged himself over the fence and fell hard to the roadside, the boy picked himself up and ran again, and ran, just like I told him.
And I knew, because I heard it too. For far too long, I went on hearing it. Until he stumbled, crying, to his own home, the laughter echoed in his head like the last thing he or I would ever hear.
Was I scared, or fascinated, or both? I hated to think it was the former, but I’d never felt a full-mortal mind like that one: all random aggression and fear, spiking like bolts of static, untamed, and so out of control it could leak into mine without permission. I wanted to know where that mind came from. And not being one to fight my urges, I decided to postpone my trip through the watergate, and find out.
Nothing changes, especially not me.
He’d walked a long way from home, and he ran much of the way back. I didn’t know if that was an achievement or not, because it was hard to tell his age. He had the face and the frame of a child, no more than twelve or thirteen; but his eyes were ancient and wary, and his mouth was a tight line. I wondered which of the peaceniks at the disused base had fathered him.
They put the airbase there for the big open skies and the clear northern weather. I knew it during a war, when Shackleton bombers lumbered nightly into the sky. Later, when the world grew fatter and more complacent and less fond of wars, it acquired its own peace camp. The hippies must have liked it better than the air force did, because when the base closed and the planes were decommissioned, they bought their piece of land from an apathetic Ministry of Defence and turned it into a ramshackle settlement: the kind of place where they grew their own lentil casseroles and knitted their clothes out of cat hair.
It wasn’t much to look at: some caravans, some eco-homes with grass roofs; a tiny pottery studio; children’s swings and a climbing frame. They got their power from small wind turbines and solar panels, and that was interesting enough for me to make mental notes, though not so interesting as the people. They sold driftwood sculptures and dreamcatchers and Tai Chi classes, but they lived mostly off money brought in by discontented rich kids in search of fun and meaning. That was all I knew about the place when I followed the boy there in the darkness.
In theory the community members were equals, but you could spot the first among them straight away. He was a big man, broad as well as tall, with wild dark hair and a greying beard and high colour on his prominent cheekbones. His physical presence wasn’t all that gave him away; most of them that warm night were clustered round an open barbecue, drinking beer, and it was the big man who sat at the apex of the semicircle. He was first to help himself to bottles from the crate, and the others glanced at him constantly, smiled for his approval, deferred to him.
I thought the boy was heading towards him, at first, but no: there was a woman at the big man’s side, and he sat down on the sandy ground beside her. I liked her immediately: a mischievous face, a wide smile, and long blonde hair that reminded me nostalgically of Orach. The big guy wasn’t touching her, but she leaned towards him and his arm lay proprietorially across the back of her low canvas chair.
Never let it be said that I walked away from a challenge.
On the surface at least the group was famously easygoing, and its members changed and moved on constantly. T
hat made it easy enough to sidle into the semicircle of drinkers and act like I’d been invited, like I’d always been there. Anyway, I wasn’t noticeable. I didn’t stand out. It was the big advantage of the Veil, or one of them.
So I had to wonder why the big man’s brilliant eyes fixed on me straight away.
I blinked, smiled, laughed at a joke from the girl on my left as if I’d known her for at least a dozen years. I raised my bottle in deferential salute to the big guy. He didn’t react, but went on watching me for long seconds, then turned casually back to the blonde.
I didn’t like him.
He seemed reluctant to detach himself from her. Still, he can’t have thought me much of a threat, or he wouldn’t have stood up to take a walkabout through his people like some bulletproof autocrat, and he wouldn’t have let himself be distracted by a conversation with a tall skinny man whose face I couldn’t see. But by that time I was on my third beer: just enough to give me an even bigger sense of entitlement.
The boy took no notice of me as I sat at his mother’s side, and I didn’t encourage him. There was still something intriguingly strong about his mind, but he was tired, and he didn’t know what he was up against. His perceptions were easy to deflect, and not many minutes later he got to his feet and went off with some other kids to do what kids do. Take drugs, break windows, whatever. The blonde blew him a kiss as he left, laughing when he blushed and tried not to grin back. Such an effortless mother-child bond.
I leaned across and chinked my bottle against hers. ‘Hi.’
She smiled as she turned, a little startled. ‘Oh! I didn’t see you there.’
‘I know,’ I said. ‘I get that all the time.’
‘Can’t think why,’ she said, and bit her lip, and grinned.
So I knew I was in like Flynn.
We were last to leave the fire, or nearly. Opposite us a couple snogged heartily, but we might as well have been alone, and the boy hadn’t returned. Jed, his name was. It was one of the first things she told me. I suppose I faked an interest, though I was far more fascinated now by his mother.
‘You can’t have no family,’ I said.
‘I haven’t got one now. They don’t approve of me, and I don’t approve of them.’
I could relate to that, so I don’t know why it made me sad. ‘What about Jed?’
‘I’m enough for him. He’s more than enough for me.’
‘Really?’ I did the slow grin that worked on Orach.
She slapped my arm. ‘You’re all the same. I mean, Jed’s the only one I want around all the time. The rest of you, you’re too much trouble.’
‘You have no idea.’ I leaned back on my elbows. I liked her sudden smile. ‘What about the big guy?’
‘Who, Mack? He’s all right. He doesn’t own me. That’s not how we are here.’
‘So he’s not – y’know. Your boy’s father?’
She shrugged. ‘No.’ Yawning, she reached back to scratch between her shoulder blades. I took my chance, sat up: scratched the spot for her, quite idly. Her tiny shiver was barely perceptible.
My thumbnail went on scratching lightly. ‘He looks like he thinks he owns you. Your man Mack.’
‘No. He’s okay. You don’t know him.’
‘I know your type, though,’ he said behind me.
We both looked round. I’d known he was there, and the skinny sidekick in the darkness beyond him, but I tried to look surprised. I raised an eyebrow, wondering what made the big guy stare at me like that. Besides the obvious, I mean. I was shamelessly hitting on his favourite blonde, but still.
‘Who’s this, Mila?’
‘This is Seth.’ She smiled openly up at him, and I decided she was a little erratic in her judgements. The man owned her whether she knew it or not.
‘Is it, so? I’ve seen your kind before.’
A little trip-trap trip-trap down my spine: an echo from the past. So long ago, I couldn’t remember.
‘You’re Mack, right?’ I wasn’t going to stand up. Not that the height difference would threaten me, but scrambling to my feet would feel undignified. ‘Mack who?’
‘Mack nothing.’ He was confused that I still sprawled there, vulnerable and kickable, or apparently so. ‘John MacLeod.’
‘Oh,’ I said.
There were a lot of them about – MacLeods – but that was beside the point. I could see the family resemblance now. Physical resemblance, anyway. Centuries must have diluted the memories to nothing, and he wasn’t about to remember any ancestral promises anyway. But no wonder he could see me.
They say he has the blood himself. Old Ma Sinclair about the MacLeod I’d known, and both of them long dead. Not his bloodline though. That wasn’t dead.
I wasn’t entirely foolish; I’d been long enough in the otherworld. Besides, beer on an empty stomach had made me feel slightly sick. I got to my feet.
‘I’ll be going,’ I said.
‘I think that’s a good idea,’ he said.
I wanted to punch his smug face, and slap away the skinny pal’s twitching smirk, but I didn’t have to. I’d seen the disappointment in Mila’s eyes.
Live to love another day, I always say.
It was never easy, tugging the Veil aside, keeping a full-mortal’s focus and fascination, but Mila made it as straightforward as it could ever be. She wanted to see me, after all. Hell, within a day or two she wanted to see me all the time.
It was mutual. I liked her. The boy was a nuisance, but we didn’t see much of him. He didn’t go to school, and I wondered how he got away with that, but he seemed to have plenty to occupy him. Robbing shops, probably, while we lazed in the sand and watched rig supply ships move eastwards on the horizon.
‘I home-school him,’ said Mila.
‘That so? I’m surprised they haven’t arrested you.’
She giggled. ‘They don’t know he exists. I never registered his birth.’
‘How about his grandparents?’
‘Don’t know he exists either. They disowned me. Fine by me; I don’t need their money any more, do I? I’ve got this place. We help each other here.’
I was uneasy in the role of Voice of Reason, so I didn’t comment, but I didn’t think giving all her money into Mack’s keeping was altogether smart. To stop myself lecturing her, I put my arm over my eyes to shield them from the sun, and pretended to be asleep.
Her lips touched mine, making me smile. She tasted of sea; her skin was still damp and seawater-cool. By contrast I felt sunburnt and sweaty, but I didn’t want to move to go swimming again. I laced my free hand into her hair and pulled her face back to mine, muffling her giggle. Her foot, gritty with sand, hooked round my leg and rubbed my calf muscle.
‘Gods’ sake, woman,’ I mumbled. ‘I just got dressed.’
‘It’s not like you’re wearing much.’
‘Fair point. And you’ll catch your death. Let’s get you out of that wet shirt.’
‘MIL-AAA.’:
We both jolted up. Her eyes widened with horror.
‘Shit,’ I said.
‘MILA!’
‘He’ll kill you.’ She clambered on hands and knees to the edge of the sandhill, peering through the grass.
‘I’d like to see him try.’ But there was a time and a place, and this was neither. I grabbed her hand, and we bolted.
Funny how we’d given up the pretence that he didn’t own her, I thought as we scrambled up the dunes, dodged into the trees, and ran. All the same, we were both laughing, which made it harder to catch our breath. As we skidded down a rough grassy slope between pines, we paused, hearts thudding. Her eyes on mine were wild and excited more than scared.
‘I can handle him, you know,’ I said. ‘If you want.’
She shook her head. ‘No, no, no. Please. No trouble.’
‘Bit late for that.’ I grinned.
She sucked in a gasping laugh. ‘He’s coming!’
‘Down to the sea. Round the rocks. We’ll lose him.’ We ran again.
It might have been smarter to head deeper into the woods, make our way round the base and come back to the camp by the main road, all innocence and ice cream. But I wasn’t thinking straight, and there was something else anyway: more sounds of pursuit, and coming from the trees. There was something odd about it; I knew that even at the time. But I didn’t stop to think. I was having too much fun.
Where the sand ended, we plunged through water and up onto the black rocks, slowing to edge round the crags. Mack was in sight now, running across the hard sand beneath the dunes. It hadn’t been him in the trees, then. I sprang from one slab to another, skidding on weed but not falling, catching Mila as she leaped to join me. Mack was barely ten yards behind us, flushed with fury and humiliation. I grabbed a spur of rock, swung up to balance on a narrow ledge, reached down a hand for Mila.
She lost her footing, slipped back. Mack snatched her ankle.
I roared at the same time he did, Mila caught between us, but my hands and feet had had centuries of practice clinging to rock. I released her hand swiftly to seize her armpit, and when I tugged hard, her foot slipped like a fish from his grip. She gave a yelp as she reached the ledge, half fear and half hysteria, and I caught her in my arms to stop her falling back.
No-one stopped Mack. His feet could find no purchase on the green wet rocks, and he was sliding, slipping, flailing crazily. Hopeless. His backwards tumble into the water below was almost graceful, but the splash was gigantic as a wave swallowed him.
I held my breath, fearful and guilty just for an instant. Mila’s hands were over her mouth.
Then he was staggering to his feet, soaked, coughing and spitting saltwater, his beard full of sand. The water was only up to his thighs, till another wave hit him, and he was knocked forward onto all fours again. Once more he hauled himself up and dragged himself back through the rocks and onto the beach, cursing us with every choked gasp.
I didn’t shout back. I was still trying to control my hilarity, though Mila had suddenly stopped laughing and was trembling in my arms. Mack was still shouting something at us, something I was glad I couldn’t hear; but I wasn’t watching him anyway. I was watching his skinny friend, who was striding nonchalantly across the sand, hands in pockets, hailing Mack. He came from the direction of the trees.
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