He wiped the blade over the side of my throat. It was cold, a slight sting, that was all. Perhaps he was right and it would be easy. Easy not to fight. Easy to accept. I looked up at the sky. I really should have taken the time to learn the constellations. The stars would be the last thing I would see and I didn’t even know their names.
A warm thread ran down my neck.
‘There, that doesn’t hurt, does it? All I have to do is make another cut, a little further, a little deeper, and your own heart will do the rest.’
Maybe it was the moonlight, but as he spoke his eyes and his skin seemed faintly luminescent. And there was something in his expression. I thought I saw another face in his, the hollow eyes, the traced grain of the wood on the face that I had carved.
‘It doesn’t take long. You’ll start to feel weak, then sleepy. A few minutes, that’s all, and you’ll simply drift away.’
As he bent over me the blade glinted in the cold light and a fallen angel looked out through his blue eyes. I turned away and looked towards Liam. He hadn’t moved.
Then I turned my face to the sky and waited.
The world exploded in a flash of yellow fire.
I thought my head had burst. Jason fell against me then rolled away, a large stain spreading across his chest. He looked up at the stars now, but his eyes saw nothing. The ringing in my ears was so loud I barely heard the clatter of the knife as it bounced off the stones.
It was Sullivan.
He stood not far from where Liam lay. Liam’s gun was in his
hand and his face was whiter than the moon. A sudden gust of wind caught the branches of the trees. They gasped and swayed and turned away in despair. We were a tableau, the four of us, against the backdrop of the night.
I don’t know how long we would have remained like that if Bramble hadn’t returned. She snuffled up to Liam, tail wagging, and slapped his face with her tongue. He turned his head and moaned softly. It was the sweetest sound I’d ever heard.
Sullivan heard him too and shifted his gaze away from his son.
‘Connors? Connors, can you hear me? Are you OK?’
‘No, I’m bloody not. What happened? Where’s Regan?’
‘I’m all right. I will be.’
‘Connors, can you get to your feet?’
‘I think so. Give me a minute.’
Liam rolled over and sat up, shaking his head and wiping his face with his hands. Bramble wandered over to Sullivan who stroked her head, scratching behind her ears. He still held the gun.
‘Connors, get her down from there.’
Liam struggled to his feet and staggered over to the stone, held me for a moment, then looked in confusion at the ropes.
‘There’s a knife,’ I said. ‘It’s on the ground somewhere.’
He managed to retrieve it and sliced through the strands. We both retreated and checked each other’s injuries. The bleeding from the split on Liam’s head had slowed to a sticky oozing. The cut on my neck was only a scratch but the rope burns hurt like hell.
When we looked back to the stone, Sullivan was bent over his son, touching his face, his hands, as if he might wake.
‘I’m sorry lad,’ he whispered, ‘I should have done something sooner. It wasn’t your fault. It was never your fault.’
He looked up at us.
‘I wanted everything to be right, you see. I thought that after
Sarah…I hoped for more than this. But there’ll be no more Sullivans now. It ends here.’
The two men faced each other and it was the way they looked, as if something passed between them from which I was excluded.
‘Come on, we’re going now.’ Liam grasped my wrist and pulled me towards the path.
‘Wait, don’t you think—’
‘No, I don’t. Bramble, here girl, come on, quickly, back to the truck.’
For the second time I was being dragged along that path and, though I was grateful for my life, I wasn’t going to be ordered about like that.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
‘Leaving. I’ve got the keys, found them in the ignition on the way up. Get in the truck before—’
A second shot split the night.
Heartbeats passed by while birds scattered from their roosts in a shrieking cloud and Liam and I turned to stone. I knew what had happened, what Jason’s father had meant when he said there’d be no more Sullivans.
‘Liam, quickly,
do
something!’
I turned to run back up to the stone but Liam caught my wrist and pulled me back to him.
‘Leave it! It has to end somewhere.’ He wrapped his arms round me, very tightly. ‘Just leave it now. Let’s get back to the truck.’
P
OOR
Badger had been abandoned back at the woolshed, so we had to go there first. Liam was still concussed from his encounter with the rock, so I drove. This time we went in together. Under the electric light we were able to get a better look at the damage.
‘That cut looks worse than I thought.’ I reached up and rummaged among his hair. ‘I think it needs a stitch. We should get you to a hospital.’
‘While we’re there we’d better get someone to look at your chin. You should see the colour of it.’
‘Yes, I think I might have a tooth loose. And my neck feels really bad. How are we going to explain this to the medical staff?’
‘Lovers’ tiff?’
We were both able to smile for the first time, and we leaned against each other for comfort. Then Liam said, ‘I wasn’t much help up there, was I? How did he put it, it takes a certain refinement to be a hero?’
‘I’ve never been so scared. I really thought he’d killed you. Strange, that’s exactly what Fleur said would happen. She said there was one who would come to my aid but he might not prevail. She saw it in the cards.’
‘Really? What else did she say?’
‘Well, she said there was a sacrifice. And one of the cards was a tower with bodies falling from it, the end of a dynasty. None of it made sense at the time.’
‘These things often don’t.’
‘She said it would end in death and fire.’
I felt Liam’s arms tense. He pulled away from me.
‘Now that’s a thought, isn’t it? Wait here.’
He went through the connecting door that led to the main part of the building, returning within a moment and carrying a can of petrol.
‘Come on, let’s get Badger shifted.’
Minutes later we were pulling up outside the cottage. Liam uncapped the can and went inside. I could hear petrol splashing the floorboards. The smell was overwhelming. He called out something.
‘What’s that?’
‘Matches? Do you have any?’
‘In the kitchen drawer.’
Then he reappeared, backing towards me and spilling fuel across the deck as he went. When he came to my workbench he stopped and looked at me, the question in his face. I looked up at the covered figure. For all its horror, it was the most remarkable work I’d ever produced, but there was no hesitation. I nodded and Liam soaked the cloth in fuel.
We both stood well back from the steps as he tossed the match. The material blossomed with fire, quickly disintegrating to reveal the face beneath. The features seemed to writhe beneath the flames. Then a section of burning cover fell to the floor and a yellow and red serpent sped across the deck and into the building. There was a soft whoosh of air and all the windows turned to gold.
We dived for the truck, the dogs already safe inside. I slammed my foot to the floor and sped along the lake and up into the pines, not stopping until we reached the crest of the hill. Only then did we turn to witness what we had done.
The cottage was a crimson and gold flower dancing on the edge of the lake. Already flames were beginning to spread to the trees around it.
‘Oh, Christ, I think we’ve started a bush fire.’
‘That’s no bad thing,’ muttered Liam, ‘this land is soured. Fire is a great cleanser.’
‘What about the animals?’
‘No, they’re way over in the paddocks, safe enough for now. Look at the colour of that sky, it’ll be seen for miles around. Help will be here soon enough. We’d better make ourselves scarce.’
So that’s what we did.
And that was the last I saw of the place before we turned down towards the gate and the road home. By morning there would be nothing left of the cottage.
And the mirror? Would it burn? I’m not sure. For all I know it is still there.
But then, that’s the strange thing about wood. In a way it never dies.
Not completely.
Extract from Elenor Gill’s
Miriam’s Talisman,
now available as an e-book.
M
IRIAM WAS
dead.
I tried saying it over to myself: Miriam’s dead—she died—her death occurred at…It made a flat, jagged sound that lost more of its meaning each time I said it.
I stood alone on the city street where the morning split the air in shafts of sharp, lemon light. The crowds parted and moved around me. Nearby a man sat on a wall eating a sandwich and reading his newspaper, just as if nothing had happened. The glare of the sun stung my eyes, already red and gritty from lack of sleep. I don’t think I had been crying; I didn’t believe it enough to cry. I can remember feeling a sort of detachment, as if an invisible mantle separated me from the rest of the world. Everything seemed distant and subdued: the voices of passers-by were muffled, students cycled past on silent wheels, cars droned and purred. A bus rasped a sigh of air brakes as it swished along the kerb, causing the few, early-fallen leaves to skitter across the pavement. I stood, hovering on the edge of the city, holding onto a deep emptiness for fear that something more dreadful would take its place.
So what was I supposed to do next? There were things I ought to do, but I was too exhausted even to think about then. Then suddenly I was aware of the day. She always loved this time of year, the thinning of the summer sun into a paler light, the subtle pungency of decay in the cooling air. But this time she would not be sharing it with me. This was my first day without Miriam, and the first time I saw
him.
I’m making this sound as if it all happened a long time ago and it feels almost like another lifetime, but in reality it’s only been a few weeks. Early September it was, and the leaves had started to turn from gold to flame. Even now the last of their kind, the most determined, are still clinging to the trees. I’m trying hard to keep the image of that day in my mind. I must take all the memories, polish them clean like pebbles, collect them safely in a secret place. But already the picture is fading. I suppose that must be part of it, some sort of enchantment that steals away every memory that would lead me to him.
And I wonder how much, if anything, he’ll remember of me.
Just a few steps away there was a small, French-style caf and a rich miasma of freshly ground coffee thickened the air. Miniature orange trees in wooden tubs stood on either side of the swinging doors. The fruit must be plastic. Oranges wouldn’t grow on an English street, would they? This piece of trivia took on such heightened significance that I found myself walking towards the doorway to investigate. Yes, they were plastic, but the menu in the window was handwritten. At that moment I doubted I could ever eat or drink again, yet I walked inside and sat down, studying the grey and white swirls of the marble tabletop. Coffee was placed in front of me, even though I could not recall ordering anything. I lifted the spoon and traced lines in the creamy foam.
The three of us, that is how it had always been. Miriam is—was—my grandmother, Hannah her daughter and my mother, and then there was me, Chloe. Mother, daughter, child. Three slivers of brittle glass, edging and grinding away at each other. And then there was him, although up until that moment I didn’t know he existed. He must have known some of it. And Miriam? Of course Miriam knew everything. What about Hannah? I’m still not sure how much she was aware of.
I, of course, knew nothing. They’d all made sure of that.
My hand was hurting. I found it grasping the pendant, holding onto it so tightly that red and purple marks were scored across my palm like stigmata. My eyes were hot and sore and I could feel tears pricking the corners, but I was determined not to cry. Grief is a private matter, Hannah would say. My mother never approved of public displays of emotion, would never be seen to lose control. Miriam pitied her for that and many other things. A strange thing to feel for one’s own daughter—not love or pride, but pity.
There was flurry near the door, a swirl of brown and black, a long dark coat, ebony hair slicked back and caught into a smooth tail, the scraping of a metal chair against a tiled floor.
‘You won’t mind if I join you.’ It was a statement, not a request for permission. I wished he would go away. Instead he sat down opposite me, the hem of his coat sweeping the floor, and leaned his head down sideways to peer up into my face.
‘It is, indeed, a beautiful morning. You are Cliohna, aren’t you? Though of course you prefer to be called Chloe.’
I swallowed back the tears. My voice came out in a broken whisper. ‘Yes. Do I know you?’
‘Miriam, I know…I knew your grandmother, Miriam.’ I looked up into eyes that were more gold than brown, a sweep of black lashes, and black brows arched like wings on a pale forehead. He could have been my age, early twenties, but it was difficult to tell: his age seemed to change from moment to moment. He lowered his eyelids, his mouth pulled taut. Like me, he seemed to be bearing the sorrow of a loss and struggling to maintain a public face.
‘I don’t know you, do I? I don’t think we’ve ever met.’ I knew we hadn’t. He wasn’t someone to be overlooked. ‘You say you knew Miriam?’
He looked directly into my eyes and nodded. ‘Yes, I have known her a long time. A long time.’ Then his gaze drifted to the window and he was silent for so long that I thought he’d forgotten about me.
Suddenly, without looking back but in a voice so clear that I was startled, he said, ‘You could say that through her I have known you, also.’
‘Oh,’ I scratched around for something to say. ‘Perhaps she spoke about you. I’m afraid I don’t remember. I’m sorry, this is embarrassing. You seem to know who I am, but I don’t know anything about you.’ To be honest, I didn’t care who he was; I just hoped he would go away and leave me alone to nurture my misery. I thought that if I maintained a cool politeness it would somehow sustain the distance between us, but this strategy failed.