Dark River (22 page)

“My father’s on that island,” Gabriel said. “I know he’s out there. I can almost hear him talking to me.”

“Maybe that’s true. But we still don’t know why he came to Ireland. There has to be a reason.”

Gabriel turned away from the water. He walked over to the bench and sat down beside her. They were alone in the gloom, close enough so that she could feel him breathing.

“It’s getting dark,” he said. “Why are you still wearing your sunglasses?”

“Just a habit.”

“You once told me that Harlequins were against habits and predictable actions.”

Gabriel reached out and removed her sunglasses. He folded them and placed them beside her leg. Now he was staring straight into her eyes. Maya felt naked and vulnerable, as if she had been stripped of all her weapons.

“I don’t want you to look at me, Gabriel. It makes me uncomfortable.”

“But we like each other. We’re friends.”

“That’s not true. We can never be friends. I’m here to protect you— to die for you, if that’s necessary.”

Gabriel looked out at the ocean. “I don’t want anyone dying for me.”

“We all understand the risk.”

“Maybe. But I’m connected to what happened. When we first met in Los Angeles and you told me I might be a Traveler, I didn’t understand how it was going to change the lives of the people I met. I have all these questions that I want to ask my father….” Gabriel fell silent and shook his head. “I never accepted the idea that he was gone. Sometimes, when I was a kid, I would lie in bed at night and have these imaginary conversations with him. I thought I’d grow out of that when I got older, but now it’s even more intense.”

“Gabriel, your father might not be on the island.”

“Then I’ll keep looking for him.”

“If the Tabula know you’re searching for your father, they’ll have power over you. They’ll put out false clues— like bait for a trap.”

“I’ll take that chance. But that doesn’t mean that you have to come along. It would destroy me if something happened to you, Maya. I couldn’t live with that.”

She felt as if Thorn were standing behind the bench, whispering all his threats and warnings. Never trust anyone. Never fall in love. Her father was always so strong, so sure of himself— the most important person in her life. But damn him, she thought. He’s stolen my voice. I can’t speak.

“Gabriel,” she whispered. “Gabriel…” Her voice was very soft, like that of a lost child who had given up hope of ever being found.

“It’s all right.” He reached out and took her hand. Only a sliver of the sun remained on the horizon. Gabriel’s skin was warm to the touch, and Maya felt as if she would be cold— Harlequin cold— for the rest of her life.

“I will stand beside you no matter what happens,” she said. “I swear that to you.”

He leaned forward to kiss her. But when Maya turned her head, she saw dark shapes moving toward them.

“Maya!” Vicki called out to them. “Is that you? Alice got worried. She wanted to find you guys….”

IT RAINED THAT night. In the morning, a thick bank of fog lay on the ocean just outside the bay. Maya put on some of the clothes she had bought in London— wool pants, a dark green cashmere sweater, and a leather coat with winter lining. After eating breakfast at the pub, they walked over to the wharf and found Captain Foley loading sacks of peat and plastic storage boxes onto his thirty-foot fishing boat. Foley explained that the peat was for the convent’s stove, and the boxes contained food and clean clothes. The only water on Skellig Columba came from rain that trickled into rock catch basins. There was enough water for the nuns to drink and wash themselves, but not enough to wash their black skirts and veils.

The boat had an open deck for pulling in fishing nets and an enclosed cockpit near the bow that gave protection from the wind. Alice seemed excited to be back on a boat. She went in and out of the hold, inspecting everything, as they began to leave the bay. Captain Foley lit his pipe and puffed some smoke in their direction. “Known world,” he said, and jerked his thumb toward the green hills to the east. “And this…” He gestured toward the west.

“End of the world,” Gabriel said.

“That’s right, boyo. When Saint Columba and his monks first came to this island, they were traveling to the farthest place west on a map of Europe. Last stop on the tramline.”

They entered into the fog the moment they left the protection of the bay. It was like being in the middle of an enormous cloud. The decks glistened and drops of water clung to the steel cables attached to the radio antenna. The fishing boat glided down into the trough of each new wave, only to rise up again to splash through the whitecaps. Alice held on to the rail at the stern, then ran back to Maya. Looking excited, she pointed at a harbor seal floating near the boat. The seal stared back at them like a sleek dog that had just found some strangers in his backyard.

Gradually, the fog began to burn away and they could see patches of sky overhead. Seabirds were everywhere: shearwaters and storm petrels, pelicans and white gannets with black-tipped wings. After traveling for an hour or so, they passed an island called Little Skellig that was a nesting ground for the gannets. The bare rock was colored white, and thousands of the birds swirled through the air.

Another hour passed before Skellig Columba emerged from the waves. It looks exactly like the photograph Gabriel had seen at Tyburn Convent: two jagged peaks of a submerged mountain range. The island was covered with brush and heather, but Maya couldn’t see the convent or any other structure.

“Where do we land?” she asked Captain Foley.

“Patience, miss. We’re coming in from the east. There’s a bit of a cove on the south side of the island.”

Keeping wide of the rocks, Foley approached a twenty-foot dock attached to steel pilings. The dock led to a concrete slab that was surrounded by a chain-link fence. A prominent sign with red and black letters announced that the island was a protected ecological area off-limits to anyone who had not received written permission from the Kerry diocese. A locked gate had been installed at the edge of the slab. It guarded a stone stairway that led up the slope.

Captain Foley cut the engine. The waves pushed his boat up against the dock and he threw a loop around one of the pilings. Maya, Vicki, and Alice climbed up to the concrete slab while Gabriel helped Foley unload the storage boxes and sacks of peat. Vicki went over to the gate and touched the brass padlock that held the latch. “Now what?”

“No one’s here,” Maya said. “I think we should get around the fence and walk up the ridge to the convent.”

“Captain Foley wouldn’t like that idea.”

“Foley brought us here. I gave him only half the money. Gabriel isn’t going to leave until he learns about his father.”

Alice ran across the platform and pointed up the slope. When Maya stepped back, she could see that four nuns were coming down steps that led to the dock. The Poor Clares wore black habits and veils with white wimples and neck collars. The knotted white cords around their waists had been inspired by the Franciscan history of their order. All four women were wrapped in black woolen shawls that covered their upper bodies. The wind whipped the ends of the shawls back and forth, but the women kept moving until they saw that strangers had appeared on their island. They stopped— the first three nuns grouping together on the steps while the tallest nun remained a few steps behind.

Captain Foley carried two bags of peat onto the platform and dumped them near the gate. “Don’t look good,” he said. “The tall one is the abbess. She runs the show.”

One of the Poor Clares climbed up the staircase to the abbess, received an order, and then hurried down the steps to the gate.

“What’s going on?” Gabriel asked.

“End of story, boyo. They don’t want you here.”

Foley removed the knit cap from his bald head as he approached the gate. He bowed slightly to the nun and spoke in a low voice to her, then hurried over to Maya with a surprised look on his face.

“Excuse me, miss. My apologies for all I said. The abbess requests your presence in the chapel.”

THE ABBESS HAD disappeared, but each of the three nuns grabbed a sack of peat and started to climb up the staircase. Maya, Gabriel, and the others followed them while Captain Foley remained with his boat.

In the sixth century, the monks led by Saint Columba had built a staircase that ran from the ocean up to the summit of the island. The gray limestone was veined with white slate and spotted with lichen. As Maya and the others followed the nuns up the slope, the hushing noise of waves disappeared and was replaced by the sound of the wind. Wind blew past conical pieces of stone and rippled through scurry grass, saw thistle, and sorrel. Skellig Columba resembled the ruins of a massive castle with fallen towers and shattered archways. All the seabirds had disappeared and were replaced by ravens, which circled above them, cawing to one another.

They reached the top of a ridge and descended to the north side of the island. Directly below them were three successive terraces, each about fifty feet wide. The first terrace was occupied by a small garden and two catch basins for the rainwater that flowed down the face of the rock. On the second terrace were four stone buildings built without mortar; they resembled enormous beehives with wooden doors and round windows. A chapel was on the third terrace. It was about sixty feet long and shaped like a boat placed upside down on the beach.

Alice and Vicki remained with the nuns as Maya and Gabriel climbed down the steps to the chapel and went inside. An oak floor led to an altar at one end: three windows behind a simple gold cross. Still wrapped in her cloak, the abbess stood in front of the altar— her back to the visitors, her hands clasped in prayer. The door squeaked shut and all they could hear was the wind whistling through gaps in the rock walls.

Gabriel took a few steps forward. “Excuse me, ma’am. We just arrived on the island and we need to talk to you.”

The abbess unclasped her hands and slowly lowered her arms. There was something about the gesture that was both graceful and dangerous. Maya immediately reached for the knife strapped to her arm. No, she wanted to scream. No.

The nun turned toward them and flung a black-steel knife through the air, burying it in the wood paneling a foot above Gabriel’s head.

Maya stepped in front of Gabriel as her own throwing knife appeared in her hand. Holding the blade flat on her palm, she raised her arm quickly, and then recognized the familiar face. An Irish-woman in her fifties. Green eyes that were savage, almost crazy. A wisp of red hair pushing beneath the edge of the starched white wimple. A large mouth sneering at them with complete disdain.

“It’s clear that you’re not very alert— or prepared,” the woman said to Maya. “A few inches lower and your citizen friend would be dead.”

“This is Gabriel Corrigan,” Maya said. “He’s a Traveler, like his father. And you almost killed him.”

“I never kill anyone by accident.”

Gabriel glanced at the knife. “And who the hell are you?”

“This is Mother Blessing. One of the last remaining Harlequins.”

“Of course. Harlequins…” Gabriel said the word with contempt.

“I’ve known Maya since she was a little girl,” Mother Blessing said. “I was the one who taught her how to break into buildings. She always wanted to be just like me, but apparently she has a lot to learn.”

“What are you doing here?” Maya asked. “Linden thought you were dead.”

“That’s what I wanted.” Mother Blessing removed the black shawl and folded it into a little square. “After Thorn was ambushed in Pakistan, I realized that there was a traitor among us. Your father didn’t believe me. Who was it, Maya? Do you know?”

“It was Shepherd. I killed him.”

“Good. I hope he suffered a great deal. I came to this island about fourteen months ago. When the abbess died, the nuns made me their temporary leader.” She sneered again. “We Poor Clares live simple but pious lives.”

“So you were a coward,” Gabriel said. “And you came here to hide.”

“What a foolish young man. I’m not impressed. Perhaps you need to cross the barriers a few more times.” Mother Blessing walked the length of the chapel, pulled the knife from the wood, and slid it back into the sheath that was concealed beneath her robes. “See the altar near the window? It contains an illuminated manuscript supposedly written by Saint Columba. My Traveler wanted to read this book, so I had to follow him to this cold little chunk of rock.”

Gabriel nodded eagerly and took a few steps forward. “And the Traveler was…?”

“Your father, of course. He’s here. I’ve been guarding him.”

** CHAPTER 20

Gabriel felt a surge of anticipation as he looked around the chapel. “Where is he?”

“Don’t worry. I’ll take you to him.” Mother Blessing removed some bobby pins and pulled off the nun’s veil. She shook her head slightly to release her tangled mane of red hair.

“Why didn’t you tell Maya that my father was here on the island?”

“I haven’t been in contact with any Harlequins.”

“My father should have asked you to find me.”

“Well, he didn’t.” Mother Blessing placed the veil on a side table. She picked up a sword held in a leather scabbard and slung the strap over her shoulder. “Didn’t Maya explain this to you? Harlequins just protect Travelers. We don’t try to understand them.”

Without further explanation, she led Gabriel and Maya out of the chapel. One of the four nuns, a very small Irishwoman, was waiting on a stone bench. Clutching some wooden rosary beads, she silently recited her prayers.

“Is Captain Foley still down at the dock?” Mother Blessing asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Tell him that our guests will remain on the island until I contact him. The two women and the girl will sleep in the common room. The young man will sleep in the storage hut. Tell Sister Joan to double the food available for dinner.”

The small nun nodded and hurried away, still holding the rosary beads. “These women can follow orders,” Mother Blessing said. “But all this praying and singing business does get annoying. For a contemplative order, they talk a great deal.”