Darkest hour aom-2

by Mark Chadbourn

  "So what do you think's happening?" Church asked.

  "Aye, well," the old man rubbed his chin, "that's the question. Like I say, at the moment it doesn't seem too bad. Oh, there's a few things you can't seem to get in the shops, but there's talk they might be rationing petrol-"

  "Oh?" Church glanced at Veitch, both aware of the problems that might arise if their ability to travel was hampered.

  "Aye. So they say. Could be shortages. And the phone's off more than it's on. It's awful hard trying to find out what's happening in the next village, never mind in the cities." He looked at Church and Veitch with a tight smile. "Reminds me of the war."

  Church glanced out into the main street at a boy cycling by lazily. "I bet you get a lot of your income round here from tourism. What's going to happen if that dries up?"

  "People will find a way to get by." The old man took out a pipe that looked as ancient as he appeared and began to feed it with tobacco from a leather pouch. "They always do, don't they? The Blitz spirit. People find a way."

  They all gathered in the bar at 6 p.m. to eat. The food was plain but filling and it was even more comforting to feed on something they hadn't prepared themselves on a Calor Gaz stove. The atmosphere in the place seemed so secure and easy-going after their nights on the road that even Laura's usual complaining seemed half-hearted.

  After they ordered drinks, they assessed their situation and considered their plans for the future. Ruth and Shavi were bank-rolling them as the others had all run out of funds, but the two of them still had enough savings to keep them going. They discussed the possibility of fuel rationing and agreed to top up the tank first thing and, if possible, get some large diesel containers they could keep in the back. None of them discussed their prospects for success, nor did they mention Balor by name, although his presence hung oppressively on the edge of the conversation.

  Apart from a few minor points, it was the severed finger that concerned them the most. During the day its obscure symbolism had set unpleasant reso nances deep in their minds, triggering images which they couldn't recognise; the lack of obvious meaning made them feel hunted and insecure.

  "The Fomorii wouldn't have resorted to such a subtle tactic," Tom noted. "They would have been upon us in an instant. But they don't care about us any longer. We're no longer a threat. In their eyes, we have failed in our primary mission."

  "Losers," Veitch said with obvious irritation. "At least if they're not watching us we can come up on their blind side."

  Church was heartened to see the fatalism which had infected them ever since they came together was slowly dissipating; now there seemed no doubt that they could do something, however little that might be. Against the allpowerful forces lined against them, that was a great victory in itself.

  "It has the hallmark of someone working alone," Shavi noted. "In this new world, perhaps we inadvertently antagonised something. Trespassed on land it presumed was its own."

  "But who did the finger belong to?" Ruth asked.

  "Some poor bastard," Church muttered.

  "Let us hope it was a warning not to go back there," Shavi said, "and that it has not decided to pursue us for recompense."

  The hotel was holding its weekly ceilidh that night and by 7:30 p.m. the regulars began to drift in to the large lounge next to the bar. The band had already started to set up; it was the fiddle player's intense warm-up which had attracted Church and the others. They wandered in with their drinks and were welcomed with surprising warmth. The old man Church and Veitch had met in the bar earlier was there and gave them a wink as they took a beer from the barrels lined up on a table at one end of the room.

  At 8 p.m. the dancing began. The moment the fiddle player launched into his reel the lounge turned into a maelstrom of whirling men and women of all ages, skirts flying, heels flicking, grins firmly set on faces. A girl of around seventeen grabbed Shavi's arm and dragged him into the throng. He took to the dance with gusto.

  Veitch backed off in case anyone pulled him in. "Bleedin' Scottish dancing. Not my scene, mate," he muttered.

  The drink was flowing as fast as the music, with every glass of beer followed by a chaser of malt. In that atmosphere of wild abandon and life celebration it was impossible not to become involved, and soon Church and the others had lost all thought of the stresses and tensions that assailed them.

  As the night drew on, they made new friends and drifted from conversation to conversation. Shavi seemed particularly popular with the young women and Ruth with the men; she surprised herself by revelling in the attention she was getting, a liberating experience after the oppression of the previous few weeks.

  Sweating after a vigorous dance, she adjourned to the bar area where she found Laura lounging against the wall, sipping on a glass of neat vodka.

  "Keeping all the boys happy," Laura said coolly.

  Over the weeks, Ruth had learned to ignore Laura's baiting, but with the drink rushing round her system, she found herself bristling. "I can understand how you'd be jealous of someone who's popular."

  "Jealous? Look in the mirror, Frosty."

  "What do you mean?"

  "You know what I mean."

  Ruth did, and that irritated her even more. "If you think I'm bothered about you and Church-"

  "It's pretty obvious you've been trying to wrestle him to the ground since you met him. But he's got about as much in common with you as he has with Shavi. Face it, the best woman won." Laura smiled tightly, but her eyes were cold and hard.

  Ruth could feel her anger growing, which made her even more angry. She hated to lose control, but somehow Laura knew how to punch all the right buttons. "Do I hear desperation in your voice? Now you've got him, you're afraid of losing him, aren't you?"

  Laura thought about this for a moment. "We're right for each other."

  "What you mean is, he's right for you. You've finally found someone strong enough to carry the weight of all your emotional baggage." Ruth caught herself before she said anything more hurtful.

  "What do you know about emotions? You're an ice queen." Laura tried to maintain her cool, but she knocked back her vodka in one go.

  "That shows how much you know."

  "All I'm saying is, stay away from him. I saw you talking to him the other night, trying to wheedle your way into his affections-"

  "I wouldn't dream-" Ruth caught herself as her defiance suddenly surfaced. In the background the music was raging and she had to raise her voice. "And what would you do if I did?"

  Laura turned and stared at her for a long moment with eyes impossible to read and then walked away through the crowd.

  Veitch and Shavi had got into a drinking competition, knocking down shots while they were egged on by a cheering crowd. But all paused as Tom stepped onto the small, makeshift stage and whispered something to the fiddle player. A second later the musician handed over his instrument which Tom shouldered before beginning to tap out a rhythm with his right foot. And then he started to play, a low, mournful sound that made everyone in the room stop what they were doing and stare. The tune was mediaeval in construction, the melody filled with the ache of loneliness, of love never-to-be-found, of yearning and failed desire; Church felt a cold knot develop in his chest, but Tom's face was impassive, his eyes icy. And then, as if he had suddenly awoken to the fact that he had dampened the mood, Tom began to pick up the beat, slowly at first, but then quicker and quicker, until he had developed the melody into a rampant jig. A couple down the front began to clap, and the sound ripped back through the crowd until everyone was joining in, physically driving the mood back up. Within a couple of minutes, everyone was dancing again and Tom seemed to be having the time of his life.

  As Church sipped on his glass of malt, his head woozy from drink, feeling uncommonly happy for the first time in days, he felt a strange sensation prickling along his spine, as if someone was watching him. In the days since he had first encountered the unknown under Albert Bridge he had learned to be attentive to his in
stincts. He turned quickly. There was no one behind him, but the door to the corridor which ran down to the hotel entrance was open. For a second or two, he weighed his options, then crept over to the doorway and peered out. The corridor was empty.

  He had just about convinced himself it was nothing but his imagination at work when the door out on to the street swung open slightly, as if it had been buffeted by a breeze; as it did, he thought he heard a faint, melodic voice calling his name.

  His heart picked up a beat, but after all he had been through, he still didn't feel wary. There was something… a feeling, perhaps… which seemed to be floating in the air from the direction of the door and it was overwhelmingly comforting. His first reaction was that he was being summoned by the spirit of Marianne, as he had been twice before, but it felt different this time. He finished his whisky, left his glass on an ornamental table in the corridor and walked towards the door.

  The main street was completely still, although it wasn't late in the evening. The streetlights were bright, but not so much that they obscured the glittering array of stars in the clear sky. The night itself was balmy with the promise of summer just around the corner. He looked up and down the deserted street until he saw something which caught his eye.

  Across the road was the park that rolled down to the river. During the day it had been filled with the whoops of children racing around the adventure playground and the jeers of teenagers hanging out next to the log cabin where the refreshments were served, but at that time it was deserted and unnervingly quiet. He crossed the road and leant on the wall, searching the paths that wound among the waving, fluffy-tipped pampas grass. Something moved. His rational mind told him it would be ridiculous to venture down into those wide open spaces, but his instincts didn't register anything that worried him. He steeled himself, then opened the gate.

  Away from the streetlights, he was uncomfortably aware of the wild presence of nature looming away in the dark, but the splashing of the river prevented the silence becoming too oppressive. Whatever had brought him down there seemed to be leading him. Every now and then he would catch sight of a movement ahead, steering him down the paths until he was following the course of the river back towards the heart of the town. Eventually he came up to a brick bridge with an old churchyard next to it. It was an odd, triangular shape, the jumbled mass of markers mildewed, with some so timeworn they resembled the ancient standing stones of Gairloch. The grass among them was thick and along the walls age-old trees were so gnarled and wind-blasted they looked like menacing figures daring him to enter. It was so eerily atmospheric in the quiet that he almost did turn back, but after another movement on the far side, he took a deep breath and swung open the green, iron gate that hung ajar.

  Cautiously, he moved among the white and grey stones muttering, "Stupid, stupid, stupid," under his breath, but the truth was, he still didn't feel any sense of threat. And then he reached the far side and the shape that had been luring him was no longer insubstantial.

  Before him stood the woman he had encountered in the Watchtower floating between the worlds, the one who had visited him on the edge of dreams as a child, and freed him from the Fomorii cells, claiming to be his patron. She was one of the Tuatha De Danann, infused with the beauty which permeated that race. It was almost as if her skin was glowing with a faint golden light. Her eyes, too, were flecked with gold, and her hair tumbled lustrously about her shoulders. She was wearing the same dress of dark green he remembered from before; its material was indeterminate, but it clung to her form in a way that was powerfully appealing.

  She was smiling seductively, her eyes sparkling. At first Church felt as entranced as he had the first time they met as adults, but gradually a mix of other emotions surfaced: suspicion, sadness and then anger.

  "You tricked me," he said. The anger took shape, hardened. "You and all your people. You had Marianne killed. So I could be shaped into your slave to set your people free in your hour of need. You discarded a human life-" he snapped his fingers "-just like that."

  There was no sign in her face that she had been offended by his words. "There is little I can say to put right the hurt you feel." Her voice remained gentle. "There is tragedy stitched into the fabric of the lives of all fragile Creatures and sometimes my people, in their endless, timeless existence, forget the suffering that comes from a simple passing." For a surprising second, he thought he saw real tenderness in her eyes. "I have been close to you all your life, Jack Churchill. I watched when you were born, when you played and learned. And when you were old enough, I came to you on the edge of sleep to see if you were the one who fitted the eternal pattern. The true hero infused with the glorious essence of this land. I saw in you…" She paused and, for the first time, seemed to have trouble finding the correct words. "… a nobility and passion which transcended the nature of most Frail Creatures. The Filid will one day sing tales of the great Jack Churchill."

  "That's not-"

  She held up her hand to silence him. "My part in this was small. I guided the destinies of the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons, but the decision to shape you in the crucible of death was taken elsewhere. It was never my intention to see you hurt, Jack."

  There was something in her words, in the turn of her head and the shimmer of emotion across her features, that made him think she was saying something else beyond the obvious. Her eyes were so deep and numinous he felt swallowed up by them; he couldn't maintain his anger towards her.

  "If not you, then someone else is responsible. They'll have to pay. I can't forgive and forget what's been done to me, to all of us."

  "Nor would I expect you to."

  "Then who arranged it? And who carried out the act? Who killed Marianne and the others?"

  "I cannot say."

  "You can't or you won't?" He tried to keep his voice stable in case he offended her. Despite her demeanour, he sensed great power and unpredictability just beneath the surface.

  She pressed her hands together, almost as if she was praying. "From your perspective, we may seem untrammelled by responsibility, as fluid in our actions as our natures. But we are bound by laws in the same way that you are, in the same way as the mountains, the seas and the wind. No one is truly free. I cannot tell you what you wish to know."

  "I'll find out."

  She nodded, said nothing.

  Once he had got that out of his system, he became more aware of the situation. "Why've you come to me?"

  "To renew our acquaintance. To show you that I have no desire to abandon you, even though my people have achieved their desire."

  Church was troubled by the complexity of the emotions running through him. He felt drawn to the woman, but he couldn't tell if that was an honest feeling or simply a by-product of her manipulation of him over the years. "What are you saying? That you want to be an ally?"

  "That, and more."

  "How, more? A friend, then?"

  She didn't reply. Her smile remained seductive.

  Church felt a shiver of attraction run through him, fought it. "If we're going to be friends, then you ought to tell me your name."

  "I have many names, like all my brethren."

  He waited, refusing to be drawn by her game-playing.

  Her smile grew wider. "I have been known as the Queen of the Waste Lands."

  This raised a spark of recognition in Church, but he couldn't remember where he had heard it before.

  "Of the many names I have been called when I last freely walked your world, the one most used by your people was Niamh."

  "Niamh," he repeated softly. A gentle dreaminess seemed to encircle them both; when he looked away from her, the surroundings shimmered and sparkled. "So you're royalty?"

  "In the hierarchy of the Golden Ones, I hold a position of privilege." She held out a hand to him, and he didn't think he could resist it even if he had wanted to.

  Her fingers were long and cool. They closed around his and gently pulled him towards her. As he moved in, the scent of her fi
lled his nostrils, like lime and mint. For a moment they seemed to hang in stasis, their eyes locked; Church felt he was being pulled beneath green waves, deep, deep down to the darkness where miracles and wonders lived. And then, slowly, she moved her face closer. He felt the bloom of her breath on his lips; a tremor of anticipation ran through him down to his groin. When her lips touched his, he almost jolted from a burst of energy that could have been physical, emotional or psychological, but it left his head spinning. Her lips were as soft as peach-skin and tasted of some fruit he couldn't quite place. Her tongue flicked out and delicately caressed the tip of his own. And then the passion rushed through him, driving out all conscious thought, filling him up with insanity, and he was kissing her harder and feeling his hands slide around her slim waist to her back. And the sensation was so beyond anything he had experienced before he was suddenly tumbling through a haze into blackness.

  There was darkness and then awareness that someone was summoning him. Church thought instantly: I'm dreaming, although he knew in the same instant that it wasn't a dream. From his vantage point at the centre of an inky cloud he saw Ruth's owl circling and at first he wondered obliquely if it was hunting. Then he realised its movements were frantic, as if it was disturbed by something attacking it.

  "What's wrong," he called out; his voice sounded like it had come from the bottom of a well.

  The owl drew nearer, and then, suddenly, it was not an owl, although he wasn't quite sure what it was. It had the shape of a man, yet certain characteristics of an owl around its face, and batlike wings sprouting from its back which flapped powerfully. There was something so terrible about it that he couldn't bring himself to look it full in the face.

  You must go to her. The creature's voice sounded like a metal crate being dragged over concrete. She is in great danger. I can do nothing.

  "Who?" Church asked.

  Blood. Its voice was almost threatening. Blood everywhere.

  Church woke on the ground so disturbed he instantly jumped to his feet, as if he were under attack. An overwhelming sense of dread flooded his system. At first he couldn't fathom what was happening to him, but as he frantically looked around the deserted churchyard it started to come back. There was no sign of Niamh. And with his next thought he recalled the odd dream of the owl-thing and suddenly he understood his feelings.