Vengeance Child (26 page)

‘And millions have believed in blessings and curses for thousands of years. Here's a modern curse: “The Toilet Tissue Sting works surprisingly well. One: write your victim's name on a piece of toilet tissue. Two: flush it down the lavatory. Three: tell your victim what you've done. When you do, just watch the expression on their face.” Then you have blessings in the form of St Christopher medallions in taxicabs, breaking bottles of champagne over ships' bows. Generally, something like a horseshoe is a non-specific good luck charm. In Northern Europe metal frightened away evil spirits. So often a piece of steel would be put into a baby's cot to prevent goblins stealing the child and replacing it with one of their own.'

Victor nodded. ‘OK, type in changeling.'

Laura did so. ‘See, thousands more web pages. Belief in the changeling is about as universal as you can get. Globally, parents feared their child would be secretly exchanged for an evil spirit, goblin, demon, you name it. The child initially resembles the parents' child but it slowly changes in appearance, becoming ugly, behaving strangely and soon bad luck starts to dog the household.'

Victor read off the screen. ‘“Wales. In this ancient Celtic land the changeling child is known as
plenty newid
. Although the child develops physical beast-like characteristics it is noted for its uncanny wisdom. Parents would attempt to reclaim their own child by ill-treating the changeling. This offspring of goblins would be placed on a shovel before being held over a hot fire.” Extreme.' Victor rubbed his jaw. ‘Very extreme.'

‘Solomon told us that Jay isn't a changeling as such. He believed that the doomed refugees on the ship willed Jay into existence to become a Vengeance Child.'

‘And his purpose would be to curse people he came into contact with. First on a fairly random basis, and always one at a time. But now he's growing up, he's getting smarter. So now, the aircraft, and we saw what happened with the ship.' He grimaced. ‘Add to all that a mutant virus. He's learning new tricks, isn't he?'

‘But it isn't Jay that is evil,' Laura insisted. ‘An evil force is working through him. Because of this.' She typed
N'Taal
into the search engine. Straightaway, a website appeared. At first it appeared to be a tile pattern. However, each tile was the photograph of a man, woman or child.

‘It's a tribute site maintained by people who don't believe that this atrocity should be forgotten. Every picture here is of a person that died on the
N'Taal
.'

Victor read the banner across the top of the screen. ‘“Turned away from every port. No mercy. Three hundred and eighty lives lost. God help them. God help us for letting it happen.” You've looked for Jay's photograph?'

‘Solomon's right. He doesn't appear here. Also, his name isn't in the passenger inventories.' She clicked a loudspeaker icon. ‘This is a recording of the last radio message from the
N'Taal
.' From the surf-like hiss of static came the voice of the long-dead captain: ‘This message isn't directed at emergency services or to coastguard or navies of the Western powers. We have sailed to each of your nations, we have asked for sanctuary. You turned us away from your harbours. When we told you that we needed medicines and food for the men, women and children on board you gave us nothing. When I radioed that the ship had started taking on water we heard, by way of answer, only silence. We, the Cathdran, are poor people. But we are human beings like yourselves – something that you forget. Yesterday, our last pump failed, and water continues to leak through the keel. Today, the ship's engines are losing power. In a few short hours this ship will become our tomb. The passengers and crew belong to the same tribe with the same blood, the same beliefs. We have done with begging. We will not cry any more. Our last few hours of life on this earth will be devoted to our righteous and justifiable anger. Ours is the proud way of the warrior. Our ancestors marched with Hannibal on Rome. Even though we have been a persecuted minority for a thousand years we do know how to strike back. From beyond the grave if need be. Our thirst for vengeance is unquenchable. Our rage, eternal. As you've hurt us, so we will hurt you. We cry vengeance at you. Vengeance!' Victor wasn't sure if he imagined it but he thought he heard hundreds of voices, in a language he didn't understand, join that of the captain. From the speakers pulsed a single word over and over. Although he couldn't interpret it he didn't doubt its meaning: ‘
VENGEANCE . . . VENGEANCE . . . VENGEANCE!
'

Laura murmured, ‘“From hell's heart I stab at thee.”'

‘Those people must have been born holding a grudge.'

‘If we were in their position, their children effectively sentenced to death by uncaring governments, wouldn't we do the same? If we could?'

Torrents of air made ghostly sighs through the window. It didn't require much to believe that phantoms from the
N'Taal
, lying at the bottom of the Atlantic, had found their way to Siluria aboard the westerly winds. For an instant, Victor thought he saw shadowy faces peering down through the clouds.
They want their vengeance. Now they're close to getting it . . .
He remembered what Wilkes had told him, that he'd seen Jay repeating ‘Laura' over and over. The boy clearly loved her; maybe, however, his compulsion to wreak revenge on behalf of the doomed passengers of the
N'Taal
was stronger. Victor wrestled with his conscience. Should he tell her? Would it benefit her to know? After all, they say that the impact of a curse is psychological . . . if one believes that it is real . . . He watched her closing the laptop. On her face, an expression of pure determination. Should he really tell her that Jay had uttered her name? Maureen died in a road accident after hearing Jay say her name. Max had gone berserk with fear. Fearing her reaction might be one of panic, he nevertheless took the plunge. ‘Laura. Mayor Wilkes told me he'd seen Jay in the street. Jay was repeating your name.'

Swiftly, she turned to fix her eyes on his. Had he done the right thing? What if she panicked? This was tantamount to a death sentence.

‘Victor.' She sounded shocked. ‘You told me that five minutes ago. Don't you, remember?'

Waves of fatigue dragged at his senses. He struggled to keep his eyes open. ‘I told you that Jay repeated your name?'

‘Yes. You really can't remember saying that at all?'

He shook his head. ‘Second stage, I guess. The symptoms are kicking in faster than I'd hoped. Still: work to be done: a goal to be reached.' He breathed deeply as his mind spun. ‘Whoa . . . vicious little bug, huh? Just when I thought I was getting over it.'

Laura touched his forehead. ‘The fever's back. You need to be in bed. I'll fetch the doctor.'

‘No.' Reaching up to where she rested her cool palm against his brow, he took her hand in his. ‘We've got to see this through to the end. If I keep myself active, I'll be fine.' He smiled. ‘I never could stand being cooped up in stuffy rooms.' He shot a longing glance at the outdoors.

‘What are you going to do, Victor?'

‘Solomon told us how to deal with a changeling.'

‘Victor. Not only is it illegal, but Jay's a little boy. He—'

‘Please, listen to me, Laura. I don't have long. You know it, I know it. I'm entering second stage of this infection. In a few hours I'll have lost whatever wits I had. Then after that, coma. Then end stage . . .' He shrugged. ‘I just wanted to tell you that you do mean a hell of a lot to me. Only when I get close to someone I start thinking about Ghorlan.
I can't stop thinking about her.
Deep down, I still know I didn't do enough to find her. The thought of her lying at the bottom of the river, it—'

‘It's not your fault.'

‘The evening she went missing she called me. My phone was switched off because I was giving a lecture. It was only after she'd disappeared that I realized she'd left a message. It was this: “Never mind, Victor. I'll catch you later.” There was something about her tone. She wanted to tell me something important. That “never mind” was loaded with so much emotion. Never mind? Never mind! Those seven words she left behind haunt me. It's worse when I meet a woman and start getting to know her.
Never mind, Victor. I'll catch you later.
See, there I go again, being obsessed with Ghorlan.' He sighed. ‘Now . . . I'm going to tell you something, Laura. Although I'm not sure if I told you a minute ago and forgotten. It's hard to keep a grip now. Second stage? How can something as devastating as having your mind erased have such a banal name?'

‘What did you want to tell me, Victor?' She regarded him with a gentle, caring warmth.

‘I like you. I like you a lot. Lou told me I was stupid. I've told myself I'm stupid not to follow up that first night we had together with a long heartfelt discussion, where I should have said you are the most wonderful person to come into my life in the last ten years. That I want to see you again. And try . . . try as hard as I can to develop a relationship with you. You might have decided I'm a lunderhead, then told me to take a hike. But at least I would have put the past behind me, so I could have the opportunity of making a go of it with you.'

‘Lunderhead?'

‘Old Silurian word.' He paused in thought. ‘I was a complete, blithering lunderhead to retreat into my shell and risk losing you. It's important I tell you this now. Because by tomorrow I don't know if I will be capable of even stringing a sentence together never mind telling you how I feel.'

‘Thank you.' Laura's smile suggested something had opened in her heart. ‘I did want to hear that. Because I like you, too, Victor. The truth is, I find it hard to trust people. And, despite myself, I found I trusted you. When you kept your distance I thought I'd left myself overexposed and downright foolish. Now this feels like starting over.'

The door burst open. ‘Oh, sorry, I didn't know you were here with Victor.' Lou eyed him with a fair amount of suspicion.

‘How are they?'

‘Less volatile, but I'm worried about Archer and Jay.'

‘Archer's always been the most sensitive. If I speak to him alone I'm—'

‘No, not that, Laura. Both Archer and Jay are missing. I've checked the garden. We've looked in the streets nearby but there isn't a sign. Neither hide nor hair.'

Laura shot Victor a telling glance. Then she turned to the woman, who stood wringing her fingers in the doorway. ‘Don't worry, Lou. You keep the others occupied. I'll find Archer.'

Victor nodded. ‘You leave Jay to me.'

After Lou vanished back through the door Laura caught Victor's arm. ‘When you find Jay, what are you going to do to him?'

‘Whatever happens, just remember we didn't have this conversation about Jay today – and especially not anything about what Solomon told us.'

‘Victor?'

But Victor ran downstairs without looking back.

Thirty-Four

Archer marched purposefully through the wood in the direction of the castle. Mayor Wilkes followed. Archer had decided to show the mayor where the car was hidden, if he could. Jay had taken the boy there using his weird witch powers. The car had been locked up inside some kind of cellar, the dead woman in the back. But if he explained to Mayor Wilkes where the car was then maybe they could find another entrance. The car, he decided, would be far more important than some old bracelet.

OK, so the bracelet was a clue that would be useful to the police; the car, though, with the corpse in the back, would be big,
big
news. Archer imagined himself being interviewed on TV. ‘Yes, I went into the cellar. I got into the car, even though it had cobwebs and blood, and the dead body, all bashed in. No, sir, I wasn't scared.'
Just picture the other kids' faces when they see me talking on television!

‘Much further?' asked Mayor Wilkes.

‘Nearly there.'

‘Aren't we on the path to the castle?'

Archer nodded. Mayor Wilkes would be so amazed when he saw the car.

The man walked alongside the boy. ‘You found a bracelet. That's connected to the castle, isn't it?'

Archer suddenly shivered. Why had Mayor Wilkes decided that the bracelet and the castle were connected? It didn't make sense.

They continued walking up the slope toward the ruin. The big tower punched at the sky; a stone fist bruising the cloud. Now, gales had torn rents in the cloud. Sunlight fell through on to the river and the green back of the island. To Archer the beams of sunlight were blades that knifed the ground. Stab, stab, stab. Archer began to perspire. A taste as bad as dirt filled his mouth. Now he wasn't so sure about Mayor Wilkes. The man had seemed nice. But now he glared at Archer like Max did before he started nipping his neck. Archer glanced round. They were alone here in the forest. Where was Laura? He needed Laura.
This isn't nice. I don't like this grown-up. I know he wants to hurt me.
A beam of light sliced through the forest canopy. Archer screwed up his eyes at the intensity of the glare. Pain shot through his head. In his imagination he followed the beam that shone down like a searchlight. For Archer it pierced the ground with the intensity of a laser to sizzle tree roots, and scare rabbits in their burrows. Then it would slice through the mud until it reached the castle. There it would illuminate the vault that entombed the car. A great big pulsing explosion of light that would illuminate every detail of the dead lady lying on the back seat. ‘A car that's been hidden to conceal the murder victim.' Archer mouthed the words as if he was a television detective.