A Hollow in the Hills (14 page)

The last time she had seen him before today. The last time … just after the hospital … Just before he’d completely vanished
from her life without as much as a whisper of farewell. What had Dad said to him? Her stomach tightened, her breath hitching in her throat. He couldn’t have. He wouldn’t have …

But neither of them answered. That horrible silence muffled all her senses, smothered all her feeling in despair. Jinx, par for the course, barely offered her a goodbye. Dylan promised to ring later, but seemed as perplexed as she was by it all. And then they were gone.

Once they were alone and the door firmly closed against the night, Izzy turned on her parents.

‘What happened
last time
?’

Mum sighed. She looked exhausted, wrung out. ‘Your dad was worried, that’s all. Things had moved so fast. And you’re so young.’

With dawning horror, Izzy backed away from them towards the stairs.

‘You didn’t. Dad, tell me you didn’t.’

He pursed his lips and then gave her a defiant look she was pretty proud to wear herself at times. Like father like daughter. Everyone said that. And she knew what she’d try to do if she thought there was even a chance someone might hurt someone she cared about. She knew.

‘Izzy, I had to do what was best for you. You’re my daughter first and foremost.’

‘Did you warn him off? Did you pull some sort of Grigori superiority thing on him and tell him to leave me alone? Dad, tell me you didn’t?’

‘I had to.’

It felt like a punch to the stomach. And here she’d been blaming Jinx all along. Poor Jinx. Of course, said a small defiant voice of her own, deep down inside her, he could have ignored her father and come to see her anyway. He could have arranged stolen moments and secret meetings. It might even have been romantic, sort of
Romeo and Juliet
without the gory bits and the grisly end. But that wasn’t what either of them were like. And Jinx, all bound up with Cú Sídhe honour and duty – it would have destroyed him.

‘You knew he’d obey you,’ she said, unable to keep accusation from sharpening her voice. ‘Because he’s Cú Sídhe.’

‘It’s what they do. I know Brí’s pack and Jinx is still one of them at the core. Even Silver agreed. She said it was safer for you and for Dylan if you had nothing to do with any of them until you have to, when you’re older. I know them. I knew Jasper, Izzy. He was a killer, an assassin. Did Jinx share that with you?’

‘No one seems able to let Jinx or me forget it. So his father was a killer – Jinx isn’t! He’s done nothing but protect me.’ Okay, so that strictly wasn’t true but they’d worked that out, hadn’t they? And now, now … Now Dad didn’t want a Cú Sídhe hanging out with his daughter because of what his father might have been?

‘What is it, Dad? Isn’t he good enough for me or something? Eochaid says I’m promised to him – is that something you want to share? Do we have to keep the bloodline pure?
Oh no, wait. You were happy enough to fuck Brí when it suited you.’

A stunned silence crashed down around them. Izzy couldn’t believe she’d said it, but the words were out, like a physical assault on her parents’ marriage.

Mum sucked in a breath. Her voice shook wildly, but it was loud and firm. Not to be argued with. ‘Go to bed, Isabel. We’ll talk in the morning.’

The enormity of what she’d said slapped Izzy in the face. She needed to explain, to apologise. She’d meant to hurt Dad, not Mum. She’d meant to show him what a hypocrite he was. She never meant to hurt her mother. ‘Mum, I—I didn’t—’

‘Get out of my sight! Right now!’ Mum’s voice broke as she shouted the last words and Izzy turned, fleeing up the stairs and slamming her bedroom door behind her. She fell, sobbing, onto her bed, burying her face in the pillow to smother the sounds, hating herself, hating them, hating everything in her life. And hating being Grigori more than anything else.

Chapter Fifteen

Shades and Regrets

D
ylan wasn’t sure if Jinx walked with him to be companionable, to make sure he actually went home, or for some other reason he didn’t know. Perhaps Jinx didn’t have anywhere else to be. Perhaps he didn’t know what to do now. After all, Silver had sent him to the Gregorys’ as a surety, a hostage. What was a hostage to do when he wasn’t wanted?

They walked in the shadow of what had happened, and the brewing storm they had left behind.

‘Did he really warn you off Izzy?’ Dylan asked at last.

‘Yes.’

‘And Silver?’

Jinx gave him a long look, a do-you-really-want-to-do-this look, but when Dylan didn’t back down, he answered. ‘Silver said it was for the best. That you’d both be better off without us in your lives. So we stayed away. You didn’t though.’

‘No. I didn’t. But I’m the pushover, not Izzy.’

‘A pushover?’ He looked genuinely shocked at the thought someone would say that about themselves. Or maybe, that he would say it about himself. Which left Dylan a bit surprised. Jinx didn’t think of him as a pushover. That was somewhat gratifying.

‘Yeah. When you vanished, it devastated Izzy, but she’s proud. She wasn’t going to run after you. Whereas I needed some explanations for what was happening to me. The magic, whatever it is, ended up in me, that makes me the touchstone … You saw, didn’t you? I don’t know how to control that. It’s like… like it’s leaking out of me.’

‘Silver is Leanán Sídhe. You couldn’t have stayed away from her if she’d locked you up behind iron bars herself.’

Dylan laughed, in spite of himself, surprised to find the sound still in him. He wouldn’t put it past Silver. There was little he’d put past her if she was determined enough. She was terrifying. And more dazzling than anything he’d ever seen. She was addictive and dangerous. He’d do anything if she asked. And that was the most frightening part of all. ‘True.’

‘She wanted you to be free to study your music.’

Dylan stared at him. ‘Really? I thought she just—’ That she’d just done it to get rid of him, in the hopes of distracting him. Until she needed him, of course. He hadn’t imagined that she’d talked about it much, let alone to Jinx. Mind you, who else did they have to talk to? They didn’t trust anyone else, that much was clear. ‘I didn’t know.’

‘I would have liked to study,’ said Jinx. ‘History. I like history.’ It sounded like the type of admission he didn’t make very often. And the mental image of Jinx sitting quietly in a lecture theatre, making notes on the Renaissance, or the French Revolution didn’t form easily.

‘You would have studied history? Human or Sídhe?’ Jinx didn’t answer and another thought struck Dylan. He’d heard Jinx play, knew what his guitar meant to him. He’d recognised the raw talent that ran throughout the Cú Sídhe when he’d played in Silver’s club so long ago. ‘What about your music?’

Jinx hesitated, and instantly his shields went back up. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s never going to happen. Holly had plans for me, but it wasn’t an education.’

‘What sort of plans?’

He shrugged, and his eyes had that hooded look. ‘I don’t know. Don’t want to know either. But she planned everything. Always did. Nothing has changed. I still think … no, I
know
, she’s just waiting. Everything she planned will still unfold as she intended. She was always like that. She planned far in advance, every eventuality covered. We should never have discounted her. It was stupid. So stupid.’ He rubbed his neck as if trying to get rid of an ache he couldn’t quite touch.

They walked on in silence again, down the hill, through the orange glow of streetlamps.

‘So Izzy’s dad really warned you off?’ Dylan asked again. ‘I can’t believe he’d do that. He’s a nice guy … usually.’

Jinx’s mouth tightened to a hard line. ‘Maybe you’re just
more what he was thinking of when it came to a mate for his daughter. Or maybe no one will be good enough. I’ve heard that of the fathers of daughters.’

Dylan remembered his dad’s face whenever Marianne turned up in the mini skirt and high-heeled boots she loved. Or when she’d wanted to go to some club that had been on the news for a riot the night before. Compared to his sister, Izzy was an angel. The right kind of angel.

But Mari was dead now. And he still blamed himself and wondered if his parents did too. He was there. He hadn’t saved her. If anything he’d led the banshee to her. Silver could be right, that he and Izzy were better without the fae in their life.

Too late now. Far too late. Mari was dead. Izzy was half-fae anyway, on her birth mother’s side and he … he couldn’t have left Silver for anything in the world. The idea that Jinx could have given up on Izzy so easily was beyond belief.

They turned into his road and he saw the porch light still on. They’d been waiting up for him again. Only they weren’t. Not really. It just looked that way to everyone else.

They weren’t waiting for him to come home at all. He was eighteen, an adult, by all standards. He’d even seen death. He’d been there when it happened, and he’d let his sister die.

‘Dylan?’ Jinx’s voice sounded far away. ‘What is it?’

Dylan hadn’t realised he’d stopped walking. He stood there, unable to take another step. ‘Nothing.’

But it wasn’t nothing.

Bathed in the silvery light of the blub in the porch stood
the figure of a girl. She was waiting for him, her hands on her hips, her chin up, itching for a fight, as she usually was.

‘Mari?’ he whispered. And he thought he saw a smile flicker over her ghostly face.

A knowing, satisfied smile.

‘Jinx, do you see her?’

Tell me I’m not going mad.

‘Who? Where?’

Dylan glanced at the Cú Sídhe, confused, but saw only blank incomprehension. When he looked back to the house, Mari was gone.

Dad sat on the end of the bed and Izzy ignored him.

‘We’ll have to talk eventually.’

She rolled over, glaring at him. He’d do this all night if he had to. Stubborn, that was the problem.

‘No, we don’t.’

‘I beg to differ. Well?’

‘Why did you do it?’

He sighed, a deep sigh, full of regret and dismay. ‘Because … because I didn’t want you hurt.’

Hurt? She wasn’t just hurt. She’d been hurt. Now it felt like something had ripped her chest open and dragged out every iota of pain she’d managed to lock away.

‘Yeah. Great job there.’

‘I thought you’d get over it.’

Tears stung her eyes again. ‘This is worse, Dad. This is so much worse.’ He just nodded, but didn’t say anything. She thought of Mum’s face, of the pain and anger there, the long-ago agony of knowing her husband was with someone else, of agreeing to raise Brí’s daughter, of having that thrown in her face. ‘Is Mum … is she okay?’

‘She’s upset. Do you blame her?’

‘
Her
? No.’ She glared at him until he looked away, guilt carving lines in his face.

‘The past is the past, Izzy. It has to be.’

‘Someone ought to tell it, because it keeps coming back to bite us all in the ass. This Eochaid thing …’

‘I’ll go talk to your grandmother tomorrow. She might be able to shed some light on it. You can come if you like.’

‘No, thanks.’ She didn’t say she’d rather learn to kick herself repeatedly in the head.

‘Izzy, please understand—’

‘You keep saying that, but there isn’t any sign of you extending the favour to me, is there?’

A loud crash downstairs brought them both up to their feet. The kitchen, pans clattering on tiled floors and then, nothing.

‘Mum?’ Izzy yelled, but Dad was already out of the room and down the stairs. She followed, using the bannisters to propel herself forward. Their argument forgotten, the two of them sprinted across the hall and Dad flung open the door of the kitchen.

Mum stood in the centre of the room, very still, her shoulders hunched awkwardly, her eyes wide with terror.

Shadows coiled around her, twisted in and out of the mess of cake tins, saucepans and shattered plates all over the floor. The biscuits and cakes she’d been baking were strewn all over the place, mangled crumbs and sticky burnt messes on the countertops and tiles.

She opened her mouth, a thin, frightened breath escaping as she stared at them both, her eyes huge, her pupils dilated wide. But she didn’t say anything. She couldn’t.

Shades filled the kitchen. They clung to the walls and dripped from the ceiling. The demonic servants coiled around her, holding her in a tight embrace. But they hadn’t taken control of her, not yet. Izzy remembered the empty eyes of those she’d seen at the hospital last summer, possessed and beyond help. Mum was still Mum.

‘Well now, we have a predicament,’ said a familiar voice.

Azazel stepped out of the shadows, brushing wisps of darkness from his long black coat. His dark and endless eyes fixed on the two Grigori and he smiled.

‘What are you doing here?’ asked Dad in the coldest, calmest voice imaginable.

‘It’s a matter of leverage really. We have a stake in this matter too, you know. The Fear, the Shining Ones … Oh, it has been most enlightening. Lili may be an idiot, but she got on the trail fast enough. She just doesn’t know you like I do, Gregory. She doesn’t know what buttons to push.’

Mum gasped again as the shades around her tightened their grip. They coiled about her body, creeping up towards her mouth, threatening to smother and consume her in an instant if anyone made the wrong move.

‘Let her go.’

‘In time,’ the demon said, his voice still sweet with reason. ‘But I want something in return.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Little Izzy here is going to face Eochaid. She’s going to put him back down in the ground for once and for all. Just her.’

‘She can’t do that, she’s just a child.’

It stung, but at the same time, she agreed with him. This was crazy talk.

‘Oh you’d be surprised what she’s capable of. I’ve seen her stop angels while you were tucked up in bed. Eochaid is trouble, you know it. That psychopath can’t be allowed to go free. And if you do it, David … well, there will be untold consequences. Very angry angels, for example. Not to mention what might happen to you, and to poor Rachel here. No, Izzy does it. She’s strong enough.’

‘Except I don’t know what to do.’

‘Better find out then, hadn’t you? If you want to see mother dearest again.’

‘You want me to kill Eochaid?’

‘Did I say that? Kill Eochaid and you defeat the Fear, but you know what else will get out. That’s the thing with Old Magic. It’s tricky.’

‘You’re talking about the Shining Ones?’

He laughed. ‘
The Shining Ones
, such a fae name. Call them something pretty and maybe they’ll be flattered and leave you alone. The fae worshipped them, you know? But I suppose some people will worship anyone if they’re frightened enough. There were other names too – Crom Cruach, Crom Dubh and Crom Ceann. They fed on blood and death. We had names for them too, didn’t we David? The angels have names for them you pray you’ll never hear. But look to your legends and see if you want them back.’

Crom Cruach, she knew that name. A dark god, a drinker of blood. Old stories of saints and sacrifice. The others didn’t sound much better. Three demon gods who were defeated long ago.

‘They’re the Shining Ones? But … they talked about Seraphim, about angels higher than angels …’

‘Like I said, call them something flattering and they might just leave you alone. Seraphim—’ He said the word like he was naming a plague, ‘—they never had a sense of proportion.’

‘And what do you want me to do?’

‘What you were born to do, Isabel Gregory. Isn’t that obvious? Stop this, contain them, by whatever means necessary. Even if it means giving yourself up to Eochaid of the Firshee.’

‘No,’ said Dad suddenly. ‘Izzy, don’t listen to him.’

‘I’ve never lied to her, David. Unlike you.’ He reached out and stroked the back of his gnarled fingers along the side of Mum’s face. She squirmed, her whimpers muffled. ‘We’re
going to be going now. But these are my demands. David Gregory, you stay out of this. You keep the angels out of it. And Isabel, you go and find the Fear. You put them down by whatever means necessary before Samhain lets them take full form. Or you take their place. Whatever happens, the Shining Ones cannot be released.’