A Hollow in the Hills (3 page)

Chapter Four

In The Mist

S
ince the summer, the notice board outside the Maths room had turned into the most uncomfortable place in the entire school. They meant well. Izzy knew that.

The photograph of Mari dominated it. One of those perfectly posed school photos that Mari had excelled at sitting for. She looked like a model. Once, she’d said that was what she wanted to do for a living. Dylan had laughed at her and she hadn’t spoken to him for days.

But she had been so very beautiful.

Smiling, her eyes bright, eternally alive, eternally beautiful and unchanged.

There were notes pinned to the board, fluttering coloured pieces of paper, upon which most of the girls in the school had written some lines of farewell. Or good wishes. Or something anyway. Izzy hadn’t. Neither had Clodagh. Neither of
them knew what to say.

Marianne had been their friend and now she was gone. There were no two ways about it. She’d died because of Izzy.

No, she had been killed, had been
murdered
, to send a message to Izzy. But it amounted to the same thing.

Holly had a lot to answer for.

Izzy frowned at the picture and the notes. A breeze made them flutter like pastel petals, drawing her attention from the photo. Irritated, she forced her gaze back to Mari’s perfect smile. She was glad she hadn’t seen Mari’s corpse. She could still remember her like this.

Vain, shallow, callous, laughing,
human
Mari.

‘Did you know her?’ asked an unknown voice. Izzy turned to see the new girl, Ash, standing beside her.

Izzy scowled. ‘Of course I did. We all did.’

‘Izzy and Mari were friends,’ said Clodagh, coming up on the other side of her. ‘Izzy, you remember Aisling?’

‘Ash,’ the girl said in a flat tone, as if she had to do it all the time. ‘Not Aisling. I’m not actually Irish at all.’

‘Where are you from then?’ asked Clodagh.

The girl waved her hand dismissively. ‘All over. My family moves around.’ She had that look – London or New York, more than sleek and polished, slightly unreal, and her accent carried whispers of other places. Lots of them. Her dark skin tone didn’t come from a bottle or a sunbed. It was all natural. Izzy had just assumed her name was ‘Aisling’, like everyone else, and hadn’t noticed her cosmopolitan looks. She could
come from anywhere. She studied Izzy with hazel eyes framed by thick lashes, so dark she’d never need mascara. The heavy plait reached the small of her back and little butterfly clips held back any strands from her face.

Some of the transition year students went by, talking loudly about a party or something for Halloween – who was dressing up as what, who was going to be there, how late they’d be and how they’d get the alcohol inside – and one peeled off, heading for the loo.

As the girl opened the door, Izzy felt a chill between her shoulder blades, a shiver from the tattoo at the top of her spine that snaked all the way down. It appeared the moment the door opened and vanished the moment it closed. But it was there. Distinctly there.

Bad sign. Really bad sign.

But here in school? They wouldn’t. They couldn’t!

She sucked in a breath and caught Clodagh’s eye. ‘I’ll just be a second.’

Clodagh’s face turned pale, her eyes hardening. Izzy wasn’t entirely sure what Clo knew and didn’t know and she didn’t dare ask. Especially since Clo and Dylan were the only close friends she had left. Clodagh, however, was no fool, despite the outward façade she sometimes projected. She gave a brief nod and stepped closer to Ash, starting a long and detailed story about Marianne and that time in Dundrum when she’d argued with the security guard and ended up getting complimentary shopping vouchers for all of them, while Izzy stepped
away. She laid the flat of her hand on the bathroom door and the shiver came back.

Definitely something going on. And she didn’t like it.

She stepped inside, letting the door swing closed behind her.

Mist filled the room, mist so thick and heavy she could barely see anything. The utilitarian green and white tiles looked washed out and the fluorescent bulbs overhead hummed, feebly illuminating the room. Not enough to see further than a couple of feet though. Her breath misted in front of her face as the temperature around her plummeted, joining the mist, becoming part of it, enforcing and empowering it.

‘Hello?’

The air crackled, charged, the smell of ozone hanging heavy.

There was no answer. The world was curiously still and quiet, as if something beyond the door muffled or smothered all sound. Izzy swallowed hard, aware that her heart was suddenly the loudest thing in the room. A hum like electricity, bright and sharp, trembled through the air. The mist swirled around her, curling where she moved, folding back from her as if to avoid her touch. Or maybe it was playing with her. It seemed too aware, almost alive.

Something shifted inside her. She had the uncomfortable feeling of being a target. It wasn’t avoiding her, but circling her. This was a game and she didn’t want to play.

‘Hello? Anyone in here?’ The other girl had to be in here. She hadn’t left. There hadn’t been time. Izzy could see only
whiteness, mist everywhere, like someone had left a shower on with the boiler overheating. But there were no showers here. Not to mention the arctic temperature. And in the mist … movement, shapes, forms half made.

A small whimper came from the left, in one of the cubicles. Izzy turned towards it, but she still couldn’t see anything. This was impossible.

She conjured a small flame, a flicker no larger than her fingernail – about all she could manage – even though Dad and Gran had been absolutely specific on the restrictions about doing so. Not in school, not in public – never, if she could avoid it. But magic drew on magic. It needed something to feed on and she had no doubt that what was happening here was magic. It had to be. Might as well take advantage of it.

Though all she could manage was a tiny flame, golden light filled the room, tempering the whiteness, and with a violent hiss, shadows moved, shadows made of mist instead of darkness. Figures stretched too far, too long, wisps of smoke and tangles of fog.

Izzy swallowed down a cry of alarm. They peeled away from her, writhing back like ghostly vines from the flames, like living things, revealing the girl. She slumped against the cubicle wall opposite, her eyes vacant, staring at the ceiling, and her mouth stretched wide in fear. She’d scratched her face, blood dark under her broken fingernails, gashes on her cheeks, but all the fight was gone from her now. Mist trailed over her skin, curling from her mouth and nostrils like cigarette
smoke. Her skin looked pale and puffy, her lips blue as if she was suffering from hypothermia. For a moment, Izzy couldn’t breathe. Was she dead? Jesus Christ, had she left it too long?

The girl whimpered again, a sad mewling sound, but she didn’t blink or otherwise move. She just slumped there, eyes too wide, her arms and legs twisted at odd angles. Her breath sawed in and out of her chest, too fast, too desperate.

Izzy edged towards her, trying to keep an eye on those misty shadows. The cold was growing again and her heart was beating louder and louder, as if it was calling them. She’d thought to use their magic to strengthen hers, but that wasn’t the case anymore. Who was taking advantage of whom here? She cursed silently, words she couldn’t quite force out. She hadn’t thought that her magic might make them stronger too. And there were more of them …

They whispered now, following her every move. The humming in the lights overhead was becoming painful, like a wasp loose inside her skull. The fire in Izzy’s palm was dwindling as her own fear paralysed her. She reached out, touched the girl on the floor. Her skin felt like ice and she breathed shallowly. She needed help and fast.

The creatures laughed and whispered and pressed closer. Tendrils of icy mist drifted towards her, floating on the chill air. Only a foot away from her. And Izzy couldn’t quite catch her own breath. She couldn’t force words from her mouth, couldn’t stop her heart from racing, thundering against the
inside of her ribs. The mist swirled, drifted together, apart, together again. A hand formed – too smooth and lacking in any actual features, just a hand formed of mist. It reached out to brush icy fingers down Izzy’s cheek. Like a lover. An unwanted, terrifying lover. Energy crackled on her skin. Static lifted her hair, sent shivers down her spine.

‘
Daughter of Míl
,’ whispered a sibilant voice. ‘
How long I have waited to see you? How long I have waited
…
Will you come to me, Grigori? Will you come
?’

Then a face – an impression of a face – born out of nightmares, thin, too thin, blue-grey and lined like old sea-washed oak. His eyes gleamed like stars in the night’s sky of his sockets. His mouth drew up into a cruel smile.

The voice echoed on and on, repeating the phrases like they were malformed or mangled poetry. Others joined it, over and over, and in her mind’s eye Izzy saw something, an image that shouldn’t be there. A cross on a headland above the sea, stark against the sky. She knew it, but couldn’t quite grasp it, not now. She choked on the next breath and the image blurred and twisted, changing to become a bleak grey ruin on a hilltop, lit by a bonfire, with stars exploding in the air overhead. Just for a moment, as if the creatures from the mist had pushed it into her head with their clammy insubstantial fingers.

She couldn’t help it; she screamed, the noise loud and shattering, breaking off the ceiling and the mirrors, thundering around the cubicles to fill the room with echo on echo. The
guttering fire in her hand flared up in a column of incandescent light and the mist shadows flung themselves away from her, sliding through the cracks in the tiles, under the skirting boards and away. Light drained from the room with them, and the cracks all glowed for another moment and went dark.

An alarm screamed, louder than anything she’d ever heard, a long wail that went on and on.

The flames she had called snuffed themselves out, burnt away in panic. But the fire alarm went on and on.

The door behind her was flung open; Ash entered first, closely followed by Clodagh and half a dozen girls who had been in the hall when Izzy came in. And then all the noise of the world burst upon her. Voices babbling, calling for help, someone shouting that they had to get a teacher, someone else yelling the name of the girl on the floor.

Ash caught Izzy’s shoulders and pulled her back gently. ‘Are you okay? What happened?’

‘I just … I just found her like this.’ It was sort of true. She had to keep her head now. No one would believe in shadows from the mist and blinding fear.

‘We have to get out of here,’ said Clodagh. ‘The fire alarm—’

But Ash wasn’t listening. ‘Izzy, are you sure she—?’

‘Of course she’s sure,’ Clodagh interrupted, her voice uncharacteristically harsh. She linked her arm with Izzy’s, pulling her away. Ash let them go, watching like a hawk. ‘C’mon, evacuation time. You look like you’ll either puke or pass out.
Hell of a time for a fire drill.’

Grateful that Clodagh had come to her rescue, Izzy didn’t argue. Her stomach knotted in on itself and she couldn’t stop shivering. The thought of that thing touching her, of the image in her mind … ‘Thanks, Clo.’

The alarm went on and on, everyone heading for the exits in a stream.

‘Just keep walking. They’re going to be all over you when the panic’s died down. What happened in there?’ said Clodagh.

‘I just found her. Passed out.’

‘Do you think she was on something? Do you think she took something?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe?’

The poor kid was going to be grilled. Izzy didn’t envy her. But while she saw supernatural activity, probably fae in nature, she knew the human world would see drug abuse or psychiatric disorders. She only hoped someone would help the girl – indeed, that she could be helped.

At least she was alive. Or at least, Izzy hoped she was still alive. Oh God, what if she wasn’t alive, if Izzy had been too late?

‘Did you set off the fire alarm?’ asked Clodagh.

‘Er …’ There wasn’t an alarm in the bathroom, was there? Or maybe there was. A sensor. There’d been that time one of the fifth years was smoking and the fire brigade turned up. At least once. A sensor then, but not a way to trigger it. So how could she explain setting it off? ‘Um … maybe?’

Clodagh sighed, the heaviest world-weary sigh she could manage.

‘Only you! All that shit during the summer …’ Clodagh said cautiously, glancing around to make sure no one was near enough to overhear. ‘That crazy club and Mari …’

To be honest, Izzy was surprised Clodagh even remembered it. She’d missed most of it and she’d got pretty much wasted on her one trip to Silver’s hollow. They reached the hockey pitch, standing a little bit away from the main huddle of their class who were all talking animatedly, like birds after worms.

Clodagh’s tone was unusually firm. ‘She told me everything, Mari did.’

But Mari knew bugger all as well. Right up until it cost her life. Izzy took a deep breath. ‘Clodagh, I know you think you’ve got some sort of handle on this, but really—’