Aoife cried, ‘I saw a little girl!’
‘There you are then.’
‘I thought I’d imagined her.’
‘No, that’s the way we all get called back. They send the human child up for us.’
She stared at Ultan in horror. ‘Sheógs are human children?’
‘The very ones we got swapped out for in the first place.’
‘The babies which we . . .? Our parents’ own . . .?’ She felt like she was going to be sick with the shock. The tiny girl in the bog had been the real Eva, and Aoife had left her there – had cruelly abandoned a lonely, frightened child. ‘What happens to the sheógs? Oh God, this is horrible!’
‘Stop, don’t be panicking. I’m sure they just make their way back down. There’s enough of them around – the supply doesn’t seem to dry up at all. And the banshees really love them. There’s times when you see them pass by with a whole cartload of the little tinkers, off on some jaunt.’
Aoife still felt shaken to her core. ‘Are you definitely sure? Did you ever find the little boy you were swapped for?’
‘No, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t here. All toddlers look the same, don’t they? I don’t have any picture to go off, and I didn’t get a good look at him in the mist out on the bog.’ Ultan added with a rather forced brightness, ‘If I do ever find him, I might bring him home – then my parents would surely be glad I’d run away.’
‘Ah, they wouldn’t . . .’
‘They would if they had their real son back again. I was an impostor, wasn’t I? It wasn’t like they intended to adopt me.’
Aoife would have liked to tell him about the Mass card; the thirty anniversaries over which he had never been forgotten. But that would mean telling him that his father was very old and his mother was dead. And although there might come a point where he found out the truth, it seemed too cruel to blurt it out – especially as she had no actual proof to show him. ‘I’m sure your parents loved you a lot.’
Ultan pulled a face. ‘Truth, they were always so good to me I wonder did they realize I wasn’t their own, and that they’d lost their real son to the fairies. Then if I did find him and leave him home on their doorstep, secretly like, would they know him for who he was? Would they understand it was the child they’d lost as a baby? Would they understand that no one gets any older in Tír na nÓg? Maybe he’d end up in care or something.’
‘I’d know my sheóg if I saw her. My parents had a whole drawer of photographs of her, hidden away.’
‘So they knew all along that you were a changeling?’
‘Yeah. My dad . . .’ Aoife paused. Not her dad – the human man who had brought her up. She tried again: ‘James . . .’ But that sounded ridiculous and wrong. She could picture him so clearly, his silver-grey hair, brown eyes blinking owl-like behind his glasses, reading aloud to her beside the fire. ‘My dad had a ton of books about this place. I thought he was just into old stories.’ While all the time, he was doing serious research – trying to build a picture of where his human child was now. Convincing himself there were no dark things in paradise. He was so wrong about that.
The murderous cat slept on, swinging from side to side as the four of them ran steadily down the woodland path. The noise it had made earlier could have been a growl. But – and Aoife found this idea much more disturbing – she suspected it had been a purr. Would they ever reach the lake and be able to set the beast down? They must have been running like this for over half an hour now . . . Automatically she pulled out her mobile from her hoodie pocket. Still destroyed, of course.
‘What’s that you’ve got there?’ Ultan was looking at the mobile phone.
‘Crappy old Nokia. I wanted to check the time, but it’s not working.’
‘Funny-looking clock.’
‘What? Oh . . .’ Of course, Ultan was from the eighties – which explained the shell suit. He would never have seen a mobile phone. She pushed it back into her pocket.
Just in front of her, Shay was showing no sign of tiredness. Just as well, as Caitlin kept giving him odd lingering looks like she still had her doubts about him. Yet fit as he was, surely no human could keep up this changeling speed for much longer. Even Ultan was breathing hard; he was feeling his stomach with a cautious faraway expression. And suddenly the trees opened out onto a sandy beach, and there it was – a shining lake, with flocks of white water birds drifting on its silk-blue breast like snowy islands.
‘Got to go!’ announced Ultan abruptly; he dropped his end of the pole and disappeared among the trees.
‘Serves him right for eating all those apples,’ said Caitlin as they lowered the cat onto the beach. She scanned around her and said, clearly relieved, ‘Ah, boat’s gone. Probably some pooka took it. Or it floated off and sank.’
‘Is that it?’ Shay pointed to a black currach drifting a long way out on the water – almost half a kilometre away in the middle of the lake: tarred animal hide stretched over wood, the sort of homemade boat sometimes still in use out on the islands.
‘Ah, we’ll never get to that!’ Caitlin was mightily delighted. ‘Oh well, that’s life, so it is – we’ll have to just carry on as we are, on foot . . .’
But before she’d finished speaking, Shay had already dived into the water and was striking out across the lake with clean sideways sweeps of his arms.
‘Swimming?’ Now Caitlin was disgusted. ‘Are you sure that boy’s a real changeling? There’s something not right about him. I can’t put my finger on it . . .’
‘Of course he’s a changeling. I can swim – can’t you?’
‘Ugh, no, can’t abide the water. I always thought that was a general fairy thing. And that boat is an absolute eggshell.’
‘If you can’t swim, I could teach you—’
Caitlin snapped: ‘I can swim. I’m not scared of the water, I just don’t like it.’
The sun was roasting, and the sight of Shay swimming so casually and easily gave Aoife a strong desire to jump in the lake herself. She trotted along the bank and dipped her bare toes in the water. It was deliciously warm. She stripped off her hoodie down to her Nirvana T-shirt, jumped in and did a fast breast-stroke towards the boat; the water was so clear, she could see the flickering gold-silver-blue mosaic of stones far below. It felt like flying. Brown-spotted trout passed beneath her in arrow-shaped squadrons.
She was gaining on Shay. When she was still a few metres distant, she dived down deep and swam beneath him and rose out of his sight on the far side of the narrow boat. Aoife grabbed the starboard bow, and pulled herself half out of the water at the exact same time as he grasped the other side. Their eyes met across the currach, and he laughed. ‘Wahu. Fancy meeting you here.’
‘Oh, I often swim this way.’ Aoife rolled over the side, and sat panting on the floor, between two seats, with her back against the curved lathes.
Shay climbed in himself, and sat beside her. ‘Nice boat. Must be five, six metres long.’ He hunted around. ‘Damn. No oars. We’ll have to make some – or maybe they got left on the bank. Help me swim this to the beach.’
‘Hang on, give me a minute. Just half a minute.’ Aoife tilted her head back against the side of the boat, lifting her face to the sun. It was so nice just to lie here for a moment. The sun was warm on her skin, and she felt very tired.
‘Aoife?’
‘Mm?’
She opened her eyes and he was kneeling beside her, gazing urgently at her. He said, ‘You know, back in the real world—’
‘Hey, this world is real! It’s where I come from!’
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean . . . I mean, back home, when you found me on the cliffs, you were so sure you could fly. What happened when you jumped?’
Aoife sat up, folding her arms around her knees. ‘Well, I sort of flew.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes . . . Not, like, amazingly well or anything. The wind was so strong, and I would have got smashed into the cliff, only for the gulls helped me steady myself. A
nd when I tried with you, you were too heavy. All I could do was float a bit, just enough that we didn’t get killed.’
‘Then why not try again, now? There’s only a light breeze here, and flying would get you to Falias a lot faster.’
Aoife shook her head. ‘I don’t think it would work. Ultan said we only get one power, so maybe just a bit of gliding is all I can manage. We all seem to have a bit of fairy speed and lightness. Besides, even if I could fly, what’s the point? Like I said, you’re too heavy for me to carry.’
‘But that doesn’t matter. You could go on by yourself, let everyone know we’re all right, then I’ll come after you as soon as I get to Falias and find the road back.’
She said crossly, ‘I’m not leaving you here in this place by yourself – anything might happen.’
Shay shrugged. ‘Ara, I’ll be grand.’
‘Double standards! When I suggested you went without me, you practically lost the head!’
At first he hesitated like he wanted to deny it, then gave in and laughed. ‘All right, but truth to tell, it’s wasn’t so much I was thinking about whether you’d be safe without me.’
‘Oh? Then what was it?’
‘It was when you said you were planning on staying for a whole month. What I was thinking was, I’d be a lot older than you by the time you came back – eight years would have passed, and I’d be going on twenty-four. And I was thinking you wouldn’t be much interested in me then.’
‘Oh my God, Shay Foley, the cheek of you – who says I’m interested in you now?’
His eyes widened, and he flushed. ‘Ah, I didn’t say that . . . I’m sorry, I wasn’t meaning . . .’
Aoife couldn’t stop laughing at how mortified he looked. Reserved, cautious Shay Foley, who would always rather listen than talk, had been utterly caught out speaking his thoughts aloud.
Her laughter was lightening her blood, making her fizzy. She jumped up and the currach swayed delicately beneath her feet. It had been drifting towards shore while they weren’t looking, as if caught by a current, and the bank was much closer now. ‘Let’s see can I make it to land without falling in . . .’
She stretched out her arms and ran forward and sprang up, and the spring did take her high into the air, and the warm breeze cushioned her slow descent – but it was only what Ultan called lepping about like a giant rabbit, even if Caitlin had referred to it as flying. She splashed down into the lake halfway between the currach and the shore and swam back, hauling herself over the side again, rolling her eyes.
‘Annoyingly crap.’
‘Still, pretty impressive.’ Shay was smiling, though still slightly flushed across his cheekbones from her teasing; not looking straight at her, he glanced up at her sideways from under his dark lashes. And suddenly Aoife remembered. Out on the cliff, when she’d touched his lips with her finger, and he’d kissed it, and the bolt of sweet lightness had poured through her blood . . .
‘I flew when you kissed me,’ she blurted without thinking.
Shay’s smile widened, flattened the curve in his lip. ‘Kissed you?’
And then it was Aoife reduced to blushing awkwardness. After all, what she was calling a kiss had been a mere nothing, the lightest closing of his mouth on her skin. ‘I don’t mean a proper kiss. I mean . . .’
‘Aoife, I know what you mean. And like you said, it wasn’t a proper kiss.’
‘I know, I know.’ She scrambled to her feet – she needed an excuse to go ‘lepping’ out of the currach again. ‘We’re nearly there now – I might just get back in the water and swim the boat to the bank.’
Shay stood too, and pulled her to face him. ‘Or maybe you should fly.’ His eyes were on her face, but he was no longer smiling. ‘Aoife . . .’
‘What . . .?’
‘Maybe if I kissed you properly.’ He put his hands on either side of her jaw, and stroked her lips very lightly with his thumbs. ‘Aoife . . .’ His curved mouth drew close to hers.
‘NO! STOP!’ Caitlin was leaping up and down on the bank in huge ridiculous bounds, waving her arms.
He murmured, ‘Ignore her—’
‘NO! DON’T! STOP! DON’T!’
Aoife pulled back. ‘What if something’s wrong?’
‘I’m sure everything’s fine—’
‘NO! DON’T! STOP! DON’T KISS HIM! I KNOW WHAT HE IS! DON’T KISS HIM! YOU’LL GROW OLD AND DIE!’
CHAPTER SIX
Caitlin flung the rope with the grappling hook, using it to drag the currach the last bit of the way to land while all the time screaming at Aoife: ‘Get out of the boat! Don’t let him kiss you!’ and even more dementedly at Shay: ‘Don’t even touch her!’ She gave one last mighty jerk to the rope; the stern smacked into the beach.
Aoife made a grab for Shay’s arm, to keep her balance. To her shock, he raised his hands and stepped away from her, saying flatly, like all the joy had been knocked out of him, ‘Best do what she says.’
‘Oh my God . . . What are you on about?’ She stared in confusion from him to Caitlin. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Move further back! I know what you are!’
Still with his hands raised, Shay stepped back over the plank seats in the centre of the currach. ‘Calm the form – see, I’m not even touching her.’
‘But you were going to, weren’t you? You couldn’t help yourself, could you? You have a grá for her! Just as well I realized in time, before you turned her into a wrinkled old crone!’
Aoife flipped from being mystified to badly wanting to collapse in hysterics. She didn’t dare catch Shay’s eye – he clearly felt the same way, because he had sunk down on the small seat in the bow, his face buried in his hands. She said to Caitlin, trying her best not to laugh, ‘Chillax, it’s grand – give us a hand with the cat into the boat.’
‘I’m not getting in a boat with that one!’
‘It’s grand, he has his power under control.’
‘No, no, he can’t help himself!’
‘Really, it’s all right, he’s—’
‘Pooka! Pooka!’ Ultan came hurtling down the sandy shore, dragging up his shell-suit trousers as he ran, black smoke streaming behind him like he was a small plane. ‘We’ve got to get out of here!’ He flung himself full-length into the currach, and the fragile vessel lurched and water churned over the low sides as he floundered around on his knees, coughing, still in a mist of his own now-greying smoke, searching around under the seats. ‘Quick, row! Where’re the oars?’
But even without the oars, the boat was already moving away from the land as if whatever current had floated them in had suddenly reversed itself. The grappling hook trailed its long rope in the water. Caitlin, trapped on the beach, ran first to her left then to her right, eyeing the widening gap with horror, crying, ‘Come back!’
Aoife shouted, ‘We’ve no oars! Just grab the rope and we’ll pull you in!’
‘Oh, sweet Mary and Jesus . . .’ The changeling girl took a running jump and launched herself furiously into the air. Her distaste for the water gave her height – not only did she clear the gap – already a good eight metres; she was only saved from overshooting the boat altogether by Shay jumping up to steady her. The narrow boat rocked fiercely as the girl landed, and for a moment she clung to him. Then she pulled back with a shriek – ‘Don’t kiss me!’ – hitting him in the chest with her fists.
Still holding her by the upper arms as the currach slowly stabilized, he said in a low voice, ‘Keep the head, I’m not about to kiss you.’
She threw off his hands. ‘Just you don’t even think about it!’
‘Yeah, try and control the passion, man,’ said Ultan, highly amused. He looked a lot less scared now that there was a good stretch of lake opening up between the boat and the land. ‘I know it’s hard to resist her charms but be strong like me.’
‘Get lost, McNeal.’ Caitlin hopped back over the centre seats and joined Aoife in the stern, staring in disgust at the shore. ‘Oh for— Are we caught in a cur
rent or something?’ The beach was receding rapidly into the distance, the cat still lying trussed on the sand. Aoife’s hoodie, with the dud phone in its pocket, was in a small green heap beside it; everyone’s kitbag apart from Caitlin’s lay carelessly around. Caitlin reached over the side, paddling furiously with her hands. ‘Hey – help me get this turned round! We have to row back for the cat!’
Ultan said, arms stubbornly folded, ‘No way, I’m not going back to land with that thing around.’
‘We have to, or the zookeeper won’t let us in! How do you even know it was a pooka you saw? I bet you were after seeing an ordinary horse or something!’
‘It wasn’t in horse form, it was— There it is now!’ The beach was by now small in the distance, but the vast creature shuffling out of the forest was still terrifying to behold – horned, stooping, covered in black hair and with claws for hands. It went straight for the cat, picked it up in both hands and bit off the creature’s head. Yellow blood spurted up in a narrow fountain.
‘Aargh!’ Caitlin slapped her forehead with her palm. ‘This is a total disaster of a day. Weeks of tracking and nothing to show for it.’
Aoife knelt frozen in the stern, transfixed by the grotesque scene. The goblin was munching its way down the cat’s body, pausing occasionally to spit out shards of bone. In the depths of Aoife’s mind flashed up the dark intelligence of the cat’s eyes as it had gazed on her and purred; she experienced a brief, uncomfortable sorrow, as if there were something she should have done to save it from such a terrible fate.
Moments later, the beach had disappeared as the lake narrowed into a river, passing between hills covered in oak trees, heading straight towards the brilliant white mountains. Bulrushes and reeds lined the shallows, rustling with moorhens, and an otter sprawled on its back on the grassy bank – it had a fish in its paws, which it was eating up one side and down the other like a corn on the cob, much more dainty in its manners than the goblin devouring the cat.
Caitlin had retrieved her rope and grappling hook, rolling them up and stuffing them into her kitbag, and was now studying an ancient map drawn on the centre pages of her book. ‘I don’t believe it – this stupid river is taking us towards Falias.’
The Changeling Page 16
