Shadows (5 page)

The lookout is at the top of our street, around a bend: a small viewing platform, perched on the edge of the cliff. It’s not a tourist spot—underage locals come here after dark. There are no trees or houses close by, and the dropoff overlooking the town is dizzying. It’s a dead end. I’ll be able to see anyone coming.

There’s a gentle breeze, and it carries a hint of the cooler weather not too far away. The sky is hazy but the sun bright and comforting. It takes a few minutes to reach the lookout and I’m really feeling it by the time I ease myself onto the bench there. I brush my fingers over familiar scratchings in the wood railing:
AA 4 SL 4EVA, Rat 1986, Pan Beach sux.
The town sits below me, nestled between the rainforest and the ocean. Looking at it relaxes me. I’ve always
felt safe up here. It’s the closest I’ve felt to being grounded.

Something tells me Rafa might not be lying about my life before the accident. There is something prickling at the edge of my memory. It’s not just the photos on Rafa’s phone, or even what happened last night. It’s that my memories of my life before Jude’s death have never been clear or sharp. Any time I’ve tried to concentrate on a particular moment, the memory skitters away. It’s like a speck in my eye: there at the edges, out of focus.

A residual effect of the crash, I thought—either because of the trauma or some brain injury the doctors never found. But now…

Now I have to go back to Rafa and find out what he knows. Maybe, if it is the truth, this hollowness I carry around every day will ease.

‘Hey.’

I turn so fast I almost fall off the bench. A tall redheaded girl is walking towards me. She must have come up the road while I was staring out at the sea. Two days ago I didn’t bat an eyelid at strangers—Pan Beach is full of them—but now I’m gripping the bench like it’s the only thing keeping me from tumbling over the cliff.

She’s about my age, dressed like Taya in dark jeans and a t-shirt. Her skin is fair, her arms toned. She studies me intently as she comes closer.

‘You okay?’ she asks.

I nod. ‘I didn’t hear you coming.’

She’s watching me closely. Her face is freckled, friendly. ‘Mind if I join you?’ She points back down the road. ‘Tough hill.’

There’s only one bench. I hesitate, and then nod. She leaves room between us when she sits down. Most people who climb our hill end up red-faced and dripping with sweat. She doesn’t even look puffed.

‘Nice spot.’

I shrug, forcing myself to let go of the bench.

‘Are you staying around here?’ she asks.

I run my tongue across my teeth so my lips will work. ‘Just passing through.’

‘Good place for a break.’ She looks out over the town and ocean. Her chin-length hair is styled straight, and moves with the breeze. ‘It’s gorgeous here.’ She twists her bottom lip between her thumb and forefinger. ‘This is so weird.’

I stay completely still. How am I going to protect myself if she can fight like Taya?

‘The view?’

‘No, you having no idea who I am.’

I have zero chance of playing this cool.

‘Or that you’re so wary of me.’ Her smile is sad. ‘It’s just…wrong.’ She hasn’t made any move to attack, but that could just be a trick. Goatee started out friendly too. But
this girl’s wearing ballet flats—surely nobody heads off for a fight in those?

‘I heard what those two idiots tried to do last night. If I’d known you were really alive—’

‘Did you know Jude?’ I blurt.

She blinks, and then nods, slowly.

‘Did he and I fall out?’

‘Yeah. For about a decade.’

I stare at her. A
decade?

‘What has Rafa told you?’

I don’t answer. A decade? How is that possible?

She shakes her head. ‘So, you don’t know anything about yourself? Or the Rephaim?’

A
decade?

‘And you don’t know what happened to you and Jude?’

She has my full attention again. ‘Do you?’

‘Nobody knows, Gabe, that’s the point.’ She brushes her fringe back. ‘You don’t remember who you are, but you know an awful lot about what happened at the Rhythm Palace.’

‘The what?’

‘The nightclub blood-fest Mya’s crew got into a few years back with a pack of hellions. Absolute debacle.’

I’m trying to digest this, but it’s just too big.

‘I know you weren’t there, because you were with us in Morocco.’

The image of a decapitated monster flashes in my mind. ‘It’s all real?’

The redhead regards me. ‘This is a freaking tragedy, Gabe.’ She swings a leg over the bench so she’s straddling it, facing me. ‘Listen, I can’t stay long. We’re in lockdown, so someone’s going to notice I’m gone, but I had to come and see you for myself.’

‘Why?’

She blinks. ‘Because you’re my friend.’

‘I don’t remember you.’

‘You will. I don’t know who’s done this to you, but we’ll find a way to fix it.’

Who says I need fixing?

I rip a splinter from the bench. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Daisy.’ She smiles. She’s got tiny dimples. ‘I know. But it’s better than the one I started out with.’ She laces her fingers together and turns them inside out, stretching her arms. ‘You need to keep your head down. Nathaniel will send others, and god help us when Daniel gets back and finds out.’

Who are Nathaniel and Daniel? I don’t get a chance to voice the question.

‘Has Rafa called for back-up?’

‘Not that I’ve seen.’

‘Oh, you’d see those posers if they were around. So, he’s still on his own? That’s interesting.’

I stand up and move away from the bench. Maybe if I can get some distance, her words will make more sense.

‘I don’t know what Rafa’s game is,’ Daisy continues, ‘but you’re safe enough with him for the moment. He can be a dick, but he’ll look after you—for Jude’s sake if nothing else.’ She springs to her feet. ‘And tell him to get some balls and explain the facts of life to you.’ A smile, wider this time. ‘I wish I could be there for
that
conversation.’

‘Why don’t you just tell me?’

‘Trust me, you’ll have a mountain of questions, and I have to get back. Plus, it won’t kill Rafa to do something useful for a change.’

I manage a small laugh. ‘He seems to enjoy watching me stumble around in the dark.’

‘I bet he does. But the longer he screws with you, the more trouble he’s going to be in when you get your memory back—and he knows it.’

A gust of warm wind blows my hair across my face and I push it back without taking my eyes off her.

‘Listen,’ Daisy says. ‘Give me a few days, and I’ll come back. We’ll work this out.’ She pulls a piece of paper from her jeans and holds it out to me. ‘Don’t lose this.’

‘What is it?’

‘My number.’ She steps clear of the bench. ‘God, Gabe, it’s so good to see you.’ She regards me for a few seconds, and then runs to the edge of the cliff and jumps off.

I scramble to the cliff. There’s no sign of Daisy below. The rocks are clear.

‘What the…?’ I don’t even bother finishing the question. It’s too ridiculous. About as ridiculous as the idea hellions exist and people fight them with swords. In nightclubs.

Maybe I’m losing my mind. But I wasn’t on my own last night, so that at least must have been real. I walk back towards the house. I don’t want to be out here alone anymore.

Maggie is at the kitchen bench, hunched over my laptop. ‘That was quick,’ she says, barely raising her head. When I don’t answer, she takes a longer look. Her fingers stop moving on the keyboard. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I met this girl. Daisy. One of them.’

I tell her what happened but not what Daisy said about Jude, only that she knew him. I write down the names she said: Nathaniel, Daniel, and something about Mayans.

‘She really jumped off the lookout?’

I hesitate. ‘Yeah.’

Maggie bites her lip, shakes her head, and goes back to typing. I can usually read her, but I’ve got no idea what she’s thinking right now.

‘What are you doing?’ I ask.

‘Research. What was the name that girl said last night?’ She closes her eyes in concentration. ‘Samyarzi?’

I get goosebumps down my arms, even though the room is warm. I remember it clearly: ‘Semyaza.’

She types and clicks a few times. ‘Check this out.’

I pull up a stool. ‘Wikipedia? Really?’

‘Just read it.’

She points to a section titled ‘Sins of Semyaza and his associates’.

In the Book of Enoch he is portrayed as the leader of a band of angels called the Watchers, who are consumed with lust for mortal women and become Fallen Angels.

And Semjâzâ, who was their leader, said unto them: ‘I fear ye will not indeed agree to do this deed, and I alone shall have to pay the penalty of a greatsin.’And they all answered him and said: ‘Let us all swear an oath, and all
bind ourselves by mutual imprecations not to abandon this plan but to do this thing.’

I take the mouse and scroll back up to click on ‘Watchers’. Another page appears.

The Watchers, or Grigori, are a group of fallen angels told of in Biblical apocrypha who mated with human females, giving rise to a race of hybrids known as the Nephilim… According to the Book of Enoch, the Watchers numbered a total of 200 but only their leaders are named.

‘That can’t be what she meant,’ Maggie says. ‘Maybe we misspelled it.’

‘Or it’s someone else with the same name.’

‘Or we heard it wrong.’

I click on ‘Nephilim’. A new page appears. This one says that the hybrids were wiped out by a flood. I keep reading. I’m not sure what I’m looking for until a highlighted word jumps off the screen.

Rephaim.

It’s something Daisy said:
So, you don’t know anything about yourself? Or the Rephaim…

It’s not how I would have spelled it, but here it is, on a page detailing the story of fallen angels and their offspring.

‘What?’ Maggie says.

‘Rephaim.’

She frowns as she reads it. ‘This says they were a race
of giants in early biblical times, maybe descended from the Nephilim. I’m confused.’

‘You’re
confused?’ I rub the scar on my neck, wait for the pieces to fall into place. They don’t. ‘Have you got a bible?’

Maggie blinks. ‘No.’

‘You’re still Catholic, aren’t you?’

‘About three times a year.’

‘Do you remember a Book of Enoch?’

She frowns. ‘Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus…’ She counts them off on her fingers. ‘I can’t remember what comes next. There could be an Enoch in there somewhere.’

‘Your mum would have one, right?’

‘I am not going home to ask for a bible. It’s taken me two years to get her used to the idea I’m not going to Mass anymore.’

Maggie stopped going to church after her father died. The closest she gets now is the cemetery.

‘Who else do we know who would have one?’

She breaks into a knowing smile. ‘How about the library?’

‘You’re a genius.’ I climb off the stool.

‘Come on, we’re not going now. It’s Sunday. Let’s just google it.’

I grab my staff swipe-card off the bench.

‘Gaby, you’re exhausted. And you need a shower.’

I smell my shirt. ‘Yeah, fair call. Back in a minute.’

I’m wrestling my damp hair into a ponytail when I come back into the kitchen, still trying to figure out how a myth about fallen angels relates to me.

‘Hey, do you think—’

I stop. Jason is at the bench, reading over Maggie’s shoulder. So close they’re almost touching.

‘You’re back early.’

‘I called him,’ Maggie says, before he can respond. ‘You won’t make it down and up that hill again today, and you shouldn’t be alone in case you get another visitor.’

‘You told him about Daisy?’

She nods, measuring my mood. ‘All of it.’

I grab a bottle of water from the fridge. ‘I’ll be fine. Don’t waste your day.’

‘It’s no trouble,’ Jason says.

‘Then just drop me off.’

‘It’ll be quicker with three of us.’

‘Plus,’ Maggie adds, ‘we want to know what’s going on as much as you do.’

I seriously doubt that.

I weigh up what I need more right now: efficiency or privacy. Rafa said more people would come for me. Efficiency wins out.

In the reference section the sun throws rectangles of light across the carpet. I grab the first bible I come to, the New King James, and run my finger down the names of the books listed under the Old and New Testaments.

‘There’s no Book of Enoch.’

Jason is further along the stack. ‘Try the apocrypha.’

‘The what?’ I slide the bible back onto the shelf.

‘Books written by prophets and other people, not kept as official Jewish or Christian texts.’ He grabs a hardback, checks the contents and then turns the open page to me. ‘See, Book of Enoch.’

‘How do you know this stuff?’

‘I studied religion for a year.’

‘You did not.’

He flicks through the pages, head down. ‘I got mixed messages about religion when I was younger. I wanted to find out a few things for myself. A year was enough. It’s not like I went into the seminary.’ He gives Maggie a quick smile. ‘It was just a couple of subjects at uni.’

Maggie is sitting on one of the tables, swinging her legs. ‘I think it’s sexy.’

‘Wow,’ I say. ‘Religion as foreplay.’

They both blush.

‘Anyway…’ I gesture to the book.

Jason skims the page. ‘This says the Book of Enoch is an ancient Jewish text. Enoch may have been Noah’s
great-grandfather… The Ethiopian Orthodox Church is the only church that includes it in its official canon.’ He flicks through the pages. ‘Here.’ He hands the book to me, pointing to where I should start.

I read aloud:

And the Lord said unto Michael: ‘Go, bind Semjâzâ and his associates who have united themselves with women so as to have defiled themselves with them in all their uncleanness. And when their sons have slain one another, and they have seen the destruction of their beloved ones, bind them fast for seventy generations in the valleys of the earth, till the day of their judgment and of their consummation, till the judgment that is for ever and ever is consummated. In those days they shall be led off to the abyss of fire: (and) to the torment and the prison in which they shall be confined for ever.’

I toss the book on the table next to Maggie. ‘Noah’s
great-grandfather
wrote that? Seriously?’

Maggie clicks her fingernails on the table. ‘Noah, as in Noah’s Ark?’ She frowns. ‘Wasn’t there something about Nephilim and a flood in that stuff we read online?’

‘Yeah. Some theory about God sending the flood to kill them as well as the wicked.’

‘Who is Michael?’

‘My guess—the archangel,’ Jason says.

‘What’s an archangel?’ I ask.

‘From memory’—Jason squints in concentration— ‘they’re part of the upper echelon of heaven. I think Michael was the most important.’

Maggie’s forehead creases. ‘Do you think this is all real, about the fallen angels?’

He picks up the book, rubs his thumb on a corner. ‘I think there’s more to the world than what we can see.’

‘But they’re just stories. Aren’t they?’

‘Most stories are based on something real.’

I go over to the window. A couple is walking past on the esplanade, away from the beach, carrying plastic buckets and shovels. Two young girls skip along behind them, laughing. They’re sunburnt, and trying to eat gelati before it runs down their sandy arms.

‘But what’s any of that got to do with me?’

‘I have no idea,’ Maggie says.

I go back to her and Jason, tapping my finger along the reference shelf. I can work this out. I just have to get my head around it.

‘All right. Let’s pretend I have this whole other life I know nothing about. And that angels really were kicked out of heaven because they couldn’t keep it in their pants. Why would I be looking for their leader if he and the rest of them are in hell?’

‘That story is a couple of thousand years old,’ Jason says. ‘Older even. Maybe that wasn’t the end of it.’

‘Do you seriously think a story about fallen angels has something to do with me?’

Jason shrugs. ‘Hard to say. But we all know who can shed some light.’

All roads lead to Rafa. There’s no getting around it.