The Glass Mountain (Faerie Book 2)

by Jenna Grey

  “Anything is possible where the Black King is concerned,” Connor replied.

  “There aren’t even any lights on in the back or upstairs. I think that the power is off in the whole village, which could account for the darkness, but why the empty shelves?”

  “None of this is right,” Connor said, and he suddenly looked very afraid.

  “So what do we do next?” Lily asked, real fear taking a hold of her as well now.

  Connor let out a long sigh, his shoulders sagging.

  “Take each minute as it comes, and see if we can work out what’s going on.”

  He suddenly stood quite still. It was the kind of stillness that no human could achieve. The fey could immobilise almost completely, freezing into position as if they were statues. It was a way for them to protect themselves against being spotted by humans. In forests and woodlands, they could blend in with the foliage, staying so still that humans would think they were just part of the tree or bush. Lily knew that Connor was listening for something.

  “I can hear chickens,” he said. And as soon as he said it, Lily realised she could hear them too.

  “Eggs,” they both said together, and headed in the direction of the clucking. It seemed to be coming from behind the old public house, the Fat Cow. The pub was a quaint higgledy piggledy building, comprised of old oak beams, daub and wattle, and was hundreds of years old. It was more or less the centre point of the village ‒ the hub of the community. The local legend was that the foundations had been laid a thousand years ago, just after William the Conqueror had invaded England and it was haunted by a mysterious red monk. Lily’s foster mother, Claire, would often go there with her friend Sonja and the place was always impossibly busy, the whole of the village using it as their main place of meeting. Now the building seemed totally deserted, even though it should have been bursting with life at this time in the evening.

  “Let’s get those eggs and get out of here,” Connor said. And although Lily could tell that he was doing his best to hide it, she could also tell that he was very afraid.

  They made their way around to the back of the pub, and as they got closer, Lily became aware of the soft growl coming from somewhere the darkness. Connor put his hand on Lily’s arm to stop her.

  “Guard dog,” he whispered.

  They moved forwards cautiously and found the growl’s owner. A large, rather scrawny border collie, sheltering inside his kennel that was situated right at the entrance to the hen house. He was chained, but it was a long enough chain for him to reach to most places in the garden and Lily wouldn’t like to say much for the chances of any human trying to steal those eggs.

  “He won’t hurt us,” Connor said, “No animal will hurt one of the fey.”

  The dog watched them with cautious eyes, but it did nothing, simply yawned and lay back down to sleep.

  “Good dog,” Lily said, eyeing it a little distrustfully. It didn’t seem to have the slightest interest in them, so they moved past him to the coup.

  The hen coup was quite a large building, which should have housed a lot of chickens, but most of the nests were empty. There were still a fair number of chickens, but as Lily and Connor went inside, they immediately sensed that something was wrong, just as it was wrong everywhere else in the village. The chickens all looked scrawny and unkempt, their feathers ruffled, and even their clucking sounded despondent. Their thoughts were so basic that they came over to Lily as almost like a gentle hum, but she could still tell that something was definitely not right with them. When they looked there were very few eggs, and those there were seemed small and malformed.

  “I feel bad about taking these,” Lily said. “From what we’ve seen out there, we could be depriving someone of their only food.”

  Connor hesitated, looking down at the egg he’d just picked up and putting it back again.

  “You’re right. We’ll just take two each. I know it’s not much, but we can’t take the food out of someone else’s mouth.”

  Connor carefully handed the eggs to Lily, who tied them in her soggy sweat shirt to keep them safe.

  “Make sure you lock the hen house after we’re finished, I don’t want a fox getting in,” Lily said as he ducked his way out again. “If there are any left alive.”

  “I just put a blessing on the hens, so they’ll lay twice as much from now on,” he said.

  Lily looked back at the sorry collection of hens and said:

  “I’m pretty certain you’re just undoing the Djinns’ dark magic. None of this is natural, but anything we can do to work against this dark magic is worth doing.”

  They crouched down outside and unwrapped the parcel. Connor closed his hand around each egg in turn.

  “How do you want them cooked, hard or soft boiled?” he asked. Lily’s mouth was watering so much she would have eaten them raw.

  “Hard,” Lily said, “Although I doubt we’ll be going to the toilet for a week afterwards.”

  Connor closed his eyes and after a few moments handed the egg to Lily.

  “Try it.”

  She cracked the shell and found a perfect hard boiled egg. She practically crammed it into her mouth, whole, still too hot to eat, and she made huffing noises to try and cool it in her mouth. The eggs didn’t fill her up much, but at least her stomach wasn’t making so much fuss that she couldn’t ignore it and concentrate on anything else.

  “We need to find shelter, soon, the temperature is dropping by the second,” Connor said, giving a violent shiver.

  Then he stopped dead. The dog suddenly began whimpering and backed further inside its kennel, making small keening noises of terror as it hid in the darkness. Lily opened her mouth to ask what was wrong, but Connor raised a hand and cocked his head on one side, listening again. Lily instantly heard what he was hearing. It was a strange sound, like a rushing wind, only softer somehow, it sounded like the last breath of a dying man and it sent a chill through Lily from one end to the other.

  “What is that?” she asked in a whisper, even though she already knew the answer.

  “Djinn,” Connor hissed back. His eyes narrowed, his body stiffened and Lily could feel his whole mood change, turning from bewildered fear to battle readiness.

  “But it’s not even night time yet. It’s not possible for them to come out in daylight, even daylight as undaylight as this is,” Lily protested.

  And yet, there was no mistaking it. Lily could feel their dark malevolence approaching, coming closer by the second. Lily and Connor moved forwards cautiously, peering out from their hiding place. The narrow high street still seemed deserted, but then two people, a man and a woman, Lily thought, although it was hard to tell, came running from out of an alleyway, no, not just running, fleeing, from some horror behind them. The air was suddenly filled with terrified screams and pleas for help as their pursuer caught up with them. The woman dropped to her knees, to the Djinn, her hands held up in front of her, wringing them in supplication and begging for mercy.

  Lily and Connor watched in petrified horror as a dark shape came swooping down on them. It was a Djinn, but nothing like Lily had ever seen before. It was far more solid, more horrifyingly substantial, a great winged creature that looked as much like a demon as anything she’d ever seen. Its huge wings batted the air, as it hovered over them, enjoying the couple’s torment. Lily could feel its malice, its delight at seeing these two poor souls in mortal terror, knowing that they were going to die, with no chance of rescue. The woman dropped, still clinging to the man’s hand and dragging him down to the ground with her. The Djinn, as solid as any living thing, totally engulfed them, wrapping around them like a shroud. There were terrible screams, agonised shrieks from the two humans, and Lily had to clamp her hand over her mouth to stifle her own scream. All she could see were slashing talons and all she could hear were the screams of the two victims and the hideous screeches of the Djinn. The darkness hung over the two people for long moments, and the screams eventually stopped. They watched, transfixed as the d
arkness pulled away, and what Lily saw there made her stomach cramp and she struggled to keep the contents in place.

  “Oh dear God,” Connor murmured, his voice quavering.

  Where there had been two human beings, a pile of bones and slurry smeared the tarmac ‒ road kill. What was left of their corpses was spread across the road; the Djinn had literally torn them apart. A skull lay just a little way from what was left of a body, mostly denuded of flesh, but still with remnants dangling from it, one eye hanging from the socket and lying on the cheek bone. An arm lay detached, several feet away, the fingers still gripping the severed hand of their loved one.

  From the darkness more shapes came ‒ this time not supernatural beings, but flesh and blood ones. A pack of wild dogs, all shapes and sizes, some still wearing collars, crept furtively from a smashed in doorway and fell on the remains, grabbing what they could and running off with it, back to their lair.

  “This can’t be happening,” Lily said ‒ a ludicrous cliché for something that really was outside the outer limits of her imagination. “How can the Djinn physically touch people? Those people were awake, and the Djinn just can’t do that!”

  “It seems they can,” Connor said. “We need to find out what the hell is going on. We have to do something...”

  Lily could sense Connor’s helplessness, because she felt it too. They should have done something to help those people, but it had all happened so fast they hadn’t had time to think, hadn’t had time to react. They should have done something.

  “Those poor people, “Lily said, looking back at what was left of the remains. “What the dogs haven’t taken they’re going to have to scoop up with a bucket and shovel.”

  Lily felt the eggs coming back up and she struggled to keep them down.

  The Djinn hadn’t gone. It had only circled around and was coming back along the High Street again, looking for more victims. The Angel of Death. It reminded Lily of the Bible account of Moses and the Exodus, when God sent the angel of death into the Egyptian city, seeking out the firstborn of every family to destroy them. Only the Israelites were saved because they had taken steps to protect themselves from the purge. The Djinn was passing over every house, an amorphous form, just shadow and smoke, seeking out life so that it could snuff it out. If there were any people hiding in the shadows, surely to God, no-one would risk coming out again after what they had just witnessed. No-one would be that stupid, would they?

  But someone was.

  The someone, a tattered creature that looked more like a scarecrow than a human being, had been hiding in an alleyway between two of the tiny village shops, and they had obviously thought they would try and make a run for it before the Djinn came back again.

  Connor leapt to his feet.

  “Not this time,” he yelled. “Not this time.”

  “Connor!” Lily called, but he had already gone, rushing down towards the Djinn and the terrified huddled figure. The Djinn saw him and turned, hovering in the air and hissing at him. Lily ran down after Connor and as she got closer she could see more clearly what they were facing. It was a dreadful creature, a gargoyle with great bat wings and taloned hands and feet. It glared its malice at them, its fierce green eyes just pinpoints of violence within its darkness.

  “Get away from her!” Connor ordered.

  “So, the little King wants to show his how brave he is,” the creature hissed. It weaved in front of Connor and Lily, taunting them, tossing a curse at them in a language the Lily didn’t recognise and lashing out at Connor, but only in idle threat. Connor stood his ground and Lily could see him tensing, ready to do battle. Lily stood beside him, terrified beyond measure, ready to aid him. She had hardly ever used her offensive magic, and had no real idea what she was doing; she only knew she had to do something.

  “It doesn’t take courage to step on cockroaches,” Connor called back.

  Below the creature, the huddled heap of rags sobbed in terror, strange gasping sounds that hardly seemed human, curled into a foetus ball, hands over his or her head, as if that could protect them from the terror hovering above.

  The creature just regarded Connor and Lily with furious malevolence, but Lily could sense its fear. Power, real power was roiling around Connor now, great swirls of green light that lit up the darkness; Lily could feel it pulsing from him in waves, and then realised with something like wonder that it wasn’t just coming from him, it was coming from her as well.

  The Djinn hovered in the air for a moment, uncertain, feeling the sudden burst of power beating against it, and realising that it was seriously outmatched. It turned to flee.

  Connor lifted his hand and Lily watched in awe as a great blast of green light shot from his hand, hitting the creature in the back of its head as it tried to escape. The world lit up with brightness, a blinding light that dazzled Lily for a moment. There was a dreadful cry of agony from the creature; it writhed and twisted in the air, leaving great trails of black smoke behind it, and it began to change, morphing through various forms, trying to hold itself together. Lily watched as it became dog, a man and a spider, one after the other, each form losing integrity within a second or two. It finally gave a fearful shriek and exploded in a cascade of black jewels, tiny jet pearls of Djinn that vanished into nothingness. All that was left of the creature was a residue of pale smoke hanging in the air.

  Lily bent over the terrified figure to help her up and realised that it was a woman. She tried to get her on her feet, but the woman was a boneless heap, completely overwhelmed by her terror.

  “We have to get out of here,” Lily said, “Come on, pull yourself together, you’re safe now.”

  “Nobody’s safe,” the woman mumbled, but did scramble to her feet, letting Lily help her across the road. Lily saw the woman look back over her shoulder at the vile remains of the Djinn’s other two victims smeared across the road and let out a little sob.

  “I promise, it’s dead. Just try to focus and help us get you away from here.”

  The woman seemed to galvanise herself at the news the creature was dead, and let Lily lead, or rather half drag and half carry her towards the shadowed shelter of a doorway. They huddled as far to the back as they could, trying to shut out the moonlight that threatened to betray them. It took Lily a moment to realise that they were in the porch entrance to the small Baptist church.

  “Churches aren’t safe,” the girl mumbled, still huddled in the corner like a terrified child, whimpering.

  “No, probably not.”

  Lily cast a glance at Connor, because the woman’s words had told Lily and Connor far more than she might have imagined. Up until now the church had provided sanctuary against the Djinn. Any place of benign worship, anywhere that had witnessed the prayers and devotion of the righteous, of any denomination, would have kept a human safe from them, protected by their faith. Where were the Djinn getting this new power from?

  “Where do you live?” Connor asked. “We’ll get you home.”

  There was a chilling laugh from somewhere inside the bundle of rags.

  “I don’t live anywhere, they burnt my house down, killed my parents,” the woman said. And Lily suddenly realised who this woman was.

  “Bryony?” Lily asked.

  The woman looked up then from under a bush of tangled hair. It was Bryony, one of Lily’s old school friends, the old ‘friend’ who had kidnapped Lily and thrown her down a water filled well to die, who had once been possessed by the Black King to serve him, who had been her arch enemy for most of her life.

  Lily was horrified to see how desperately ravaged her face was. This couldn’t be the Bryony who had modelled herself on Beyonce, with her pristine blonde hair, and inch thick make-up, whose one aim in life was to be a top stylist in one of London’s West End beauty salons? She looked ten years older, her face almost grey, grimed with dirt, her eyes glassy with fear and what looked like years of mistreatment.

  “What the hell has happened to you?” Lily asked. “I don’t understand.�
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  “Lily?” Bryony’s voice was little more than a rasped whisper. “I thought you were dead.”

  “So did I. Bryony what’s going on here? Why has the whole world turned into this nightmare?”

  Bryony pulled herself up a little, tugging her tattered coat around herself as if it could protect her somehow. She was shaking so badly her teeth chattered. Lily put her hand to Bryony’s face and stroked the tangles back, tears prickling the back of her eyes. She gave Bryony as much healing as her weakened state could manage and the girl did seem to perk up a little. She looked at Lily with bewildered eyes.

  “You don’t look any different,” Bryony said, as if she hadn’t heard Lily’s question at all. She sounded so lost. Lily’s heart broke for her. Despite everything that had happened in the past, despite everything this girl had done to Lily, nobody deserved this. It was obvious that Bryony had no memories of the time she had been possessed by the Black King and forced to do terrible things against her will. She had tried to murder Lily, but Lily could hardly hold that against her if she had no knowledge of what she was doing. All she could do was pity her. Now she looked at Lily with something like awe.

  “Bryony, what’s happened here? Why has everything changed?” Lily asked again, pronouncing each word carefully. Bryony looked back at her then, and there was a faint glimmer of resistance in her eyes now, some of that old arrogance. Lily was actually glad to see it.

  “The shadows came,” was all Bryony said. “Why don’t you know that?” She sounded almost angry with Lily, staring at her as if she thought Lily was the crazy one.

  Realising that she wasn’t going to get much sense from Bryony, Lily reached into Bryony’s mind to try and pull out the information she needed. She felt Connor’s spirit join with hers and within an instant they found themselves in a past world, a world that was so very different from this one.

  It was still summer, a normal, bright summer, the sky blue, the air filled with birdsong. And then the darkness came, black shadows over the land, blocking out the sunlight and stealing life from the world. Inch by inch the world began to die, and there was chaos, riots, looting, a world driven mad by fear and a desperate need to survive.