Jack of Ravens (47 page)

‘One door. Like death, once you pass through it you’re changed for ever.’

Reluctantly, Church turned his horse around and headed back down the rise. Tom followed. ‘So how am I supposed to do this without Shavi and Laura?’ he said. ‘And Ruth?’

3

Ruth lay on the sofa with her iPod on, eyes shut and drifting close to sleep. Aimee Mann was singing about someone looking like a perfect fit, for a girl in need of a tourniquet, and Ruth felt tears spring to her eyes without any understanding of why they were there.

Like Peter Pan, like Superman, someone would come to save her, the song said.

She wanted to make the most of the music because there was something wrong with her iPod. Her downloads kept disappearing into the ether every time she found a song that touched her heart. They were wiped from her PC, too, and CDs vanished, there on the table one minute, gone the next. She was increasingly convinced that her flimsy grip on sanity was fading by the day.

The flat smelled strange, too, as if something had crawled into her wardrobe and died. Ruth felt sick and sad, and couldn’t shake the feeling that she too was dying, slowly but surely.

As she sank down into the music, dreams, half-memories and fractured images rose up to meet reality. There was Albert Bridge again, shrouded in mist. Why did it prey so heavily on her mind? There was fire, but not the kind of fire you see in autumn gardens. And somewhere she was calling, ‘I’ll love you … always,’ and her sadness felt like a deep, dark pool.

And then, strangely, she dreamed she was lying on the sofa listening to her iPod, only there was someone in the room with her. At first she thought it was an owl flying here and there, but then she realised it was a man pacing the floor, except he had features like an owl. As he walked, his head swivelled unnaturally, his big, round eyes constantly surveying her. Ruth felt that he wasn’t particularly pleasant, and probably extremely dangerous, but for now he had allied himself with her.

After a moment, he bent over her so that those eyes filled her entire vision. ‘You must wake from your slumber,’ he said in a harsh voice. ‘You are the most powerful.’

‘I can’t wake,’ Ruth replied dreamily. ‘I’ll never be able to find my CDs if I do that.’

Ruth could smell his breath and that jarred her reverie.
Are there aromas in dreams?
she thought absently.

‘Shake yourself,’ he pressed. ‘You must Craft a message, spell out your intent, unpick the fabric and weave new words of wonder. Fly again. Dream again. Tear out your heart and show it to another. Only a shared heart beats in time. Do it now, now, now. Two-day, for two is one, and one makes five. Do it now. Not on the Sun-Day or the Moon-Day, not on
Woden’s Day or Thor’s Day or even Freya’s Day. Do it today, the Satyr’s Day.’

‘I can’t.’ Ruth began to cry again.

‘There are others who can help you. Your brother and sister. And more, four more. The Knight and his combat honey. The Broken Woman. The Warrior-Shaman with bloody clothes.’

‘I don’t know what you mean!’ Ruth called out.

The front door burst open with a tremendous crash. The owl-man retreated to the window as a dark shape that looked like a million tiny shapes joined together rushed towards him.

Ruth felt a huge weight on her chest preventing her from moving, but she was aware obliquely of a raging fight, flickering light and sucking shadows.

It ended suddenly and Ruth found herself being shaken gently awake. Rourke was sitting on the sofa next to her.

‘You were having a bad dream,’ he said with a reassuring smile.

Ruth gently pushed him away. ‘I don’t know … it was so strange.’

He put his arm round her shoulders and leaned in to kiss her.

‘Don’t,’ she said.

Rourke pressed on. ‘I thought we might go to bed. You’ve been teasing me along for ages …’

Ruth’s cheeks flushed. ‘I have not.’ She wriggled out of his grasp and stood up. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know how to say this, but … I don’t really want a relationship right now. I thought I did, but I don’t.’

Rourke looked more surprised than hurt.

‘I know I’ve not been fair to you,’ Ruth continued, ‘and I did agree to all those dates, but …’ Her thoughts were moving too fast for words to express, faster than they had moved in a long time. ‘I’m just very sorry.’

‘I don’t understand—’

‘I don’t either, really. I just know I’ve been acting like some sappy loser. For a long time. And I’m not like that. I don’t
need
a boyfriend, but I thought I did, and you were around … I sound awful, don’t I?’

‘You’re saying you don’t want to see me any more?’

A slow sound echoed through the flat. Ruth was sure it was her wardrobe door opening just a little, perhaps stirred by a breeze. Suddenly she felt unaccountably frightened.

‘Can’t we just be friends?’ Rourke was saying. ‘You know I love your company, Ruth.’

‘Okay,’ she replied hesitantly. ‘Sure. Why not?’

The feeling of dread subsided. Ruth went to the window and found herself looking into the night for a dream-owl. ‘What day is it Two-Day?’ she asked dreamily.

‘Today? Saturday.’

‘Satyr Day,’ she whispered. Mist was drifting along the dark street,
reminding her of Albert Bridge, where she thought she had first met somebody special. And despite the dark, and despite the mist, it felt as if the sun was coming out.

4

Shavi inhaled deeply and tasted the night, the grass, the stones. A dangerous, uncertain future lay ahead, but he felt more at peace than he ever had.

‘You’re a bloody idiot.’ The Bone Inspector sat on one of the fallen menhirs, clutching his staff like a weapon. ‘Coming to Stonehenge on a fool’s errand when we could be hiding out in Callanish. Do you want to get us both killed?’

‘There is something here.’

‘Because some graffiti on a toilet wall says so? The wind must blow right through your head.’

Shavi checked his position and began to pace out the distance.

‘I tell you, Stonehenge’s dead. As dead as Avebury. There’s a thin bit of power in the ground, enough to keep us hidden, but that’s it. And if you’re looking for something buried, forget it. The bloody archaeologists have been all over the place with a fine-tooth comb.’

‘All of it?’ Shavi found his spot and dropped to his knees to tear at the turf with his fingers. Eventually he found the stone Church had buried more than 150 years earlier.

On it was carefully painted the legend: ‘To Shavi. Laura DuSantiago, Sister of Dragons, is in a burger bar in Northampton. Ruth Gallagher, Sister of Dragons, is in an old people’s home in South London. Church.’

‘Church,’ Shavi read out loud. It was a name, and it felt oddly familiar to his lips.

5

Laura stood at the window and looked at the sun baking the rooftops. The air was filled with the stink of cheap burgers on the griddle and a high-pitched whine as the electric carver cut slices off the puce, fat-seeping pillar of doner meat.

‘Modern life is shit,’ she said. ‘It looks like shit. It sounds like shit. And it smells like shit.’

‘You’re right at home, then, aren’t you?’ the burger bar owner said.

Laura served the three customers waiting without saying a word, and then turned to the two at the back. One was a rangy old man with a sour
face and dirty clothes, but the other was a handsome Asian man with gleaming shoulder-length black hair and a pleasant, peaceful expression.

‘Laura?’ the Asian man said.

She studied his face for a moment and then said, ‘Yep. You just hit the jackpot.’

6

‘You trawled around every burger bar in Northampton looking for me?’ Laura said incredulously as they sat at the back of the cafe in the main shopping area. ‘And you did it because a stone told you to. Okay. Sanity-challenged or drugs?’

The café was crowded and noisy, but it still felt like a refuge from the Sunday afternoon browsers in the street outside. Shavi smiled and Laura felt a brief tingle; he had sex appeal to spare beneath his aura of calmness.

‘I cannot explain it,’ Shavi said, ‘but there are many mysterious things happening at the moment.’

‘Tell me about it.’ She tried not to think about the incident with the rapidly growing vegetation.

‘Are you sure about her? She doesn’t look like much to me.’ The Bone Inspector had barely taken his piercing eyes off Laura.

‘You want to be careful you don’t break a hip or something,’ she said.

He smiled darkly.
‘You
want to be careful
I
don’t break something.’

Laura bristled. What is it with you, you old fucker—’

Shavi interrupted. ‘We have travelled far to find you because we fear you may be in danger.’ Seeing he had Laura’s interest, he continued, I was pursued by a man by the name of Rourke, who was not all he appeared—’

‘I know someone called Rourke.’ Laura watched as Shavi and the Bone Inspector shared an uneasy glance. Creepy tosser,’ she continued. Black hair …’ She tried to describe Rourke but found she couldn’t really put her finger on what he looked like. She settled for, ‘He’s got one of those faces you always forget. Bland. Just merges into the background.’

That sounds like my Rourke,’ Shavi said.

‘I don’t get how he could be with you, because the wanker never seems to leave me alone.’

‘Because,’ Shavi said cautiously, ‘he is not human.’ He proceeded to tell Laura exactly what Rourke was, or as close as he could surmise. Laura watched his face carefully. He didn’t appear to be lying, or a nut, but she’d heard numerous similar stories from those who couldn’t tell their bad trips from reality.

‘The Army of the Ten Billion Spiders,’ she said, recalling the graffiti
she’d seen everywhere. ‘Of course. Close allies of the Thirteen Hundred Daddy Longlegs. Nice one. Well, some of us have a life to lead. You know, in this world.’

As she stood up to go, the Bone Inspector grabbed her wrist. She fought to free herself, but his grip belied his appearance. Ignoring her vehement cursing, he pulled her slowly across the table to examine the tattoo he had spied on the back of her right hand.

He traced his finger around the circle of interlocking leaves. ‘You know what that is?’

‘Yeah, it’s a sign that any irritating old bastard gets a kick in the bollocks for touching it.’ She wrenched her hand free and rubbed the circulation back into her wrist.

‘It’s the Mark of Cernunnos. At least, that’s one of his names. You might know him as the Green Man.’

Laura tapped her head. ‘It’s a tattoo.’

The Bone Inspector smiled tightly. ‘He’s marked you. Given you his patronage.’ He jerked his thumb at Shavi. ‘This one here’s a seer … a shaman. You can tap into nature in all its power—’

Laura blanched.

‘You know, don’t you? You’re trying to pretend you don’t. Well, it doesn’t wash. The two of you have got a job to do, or everything goes to hell in a handcart.’

‘It already has,’ Laura snapped.

‘You know what? You’re right.’

His knowing smile was too much for Laura. She stormed out, knocking over a shopping bag that sent potatoes spilling across the café floor.

In the street she tried to laugh off the incident, but everything that had been said troubled her on some fundamental level. She weaved her way amongst the shoppers just in case the two of them followed her. She hadn’t gone far when someone grabbed her arm. She threw it off, expecting to see the old guy. It was Rourke.

‘Hello, darlin’,’ he said with a cheery grin. ‘Going somewhere in a hurry?’

Despite laughing off Shavi’s story, Laura’s blood ran cold. ‘You’re like a limpet, you are.’ She made to go, but Rourke caught her arm again.

‘You can’t be allowed to communicate with them.’ His tone had become almost mechanical. ‘You might wake further. The risk is too great.’ Nobody was paying any attention to them and Laura was strangely sure Rourke had made it that way. ‘There is no longer any choice.’

He clamped his hand over Laura’s mouth. She fought him, but he was too strong. The moment he touched her, her lips sensed the flesh on his palm moving as though something was squirming just beneath the skin. Then whatever was in there broke through. Small, hard objects forced against her lips, her teeth, prising them apart.

She couldn’t resist. As she opened her mouth, a mass of scurrying filled it to the brim, and Laura knew exactly what they were.

The scurrying continued down her throat and into her belly, hundreds of them, thousands. Although she wanted to vomit, she couldn’t. Finally the terror and the sickening sensation were too much and she blacked out.

7

Shavi was about to catch up with Laura when he saw Rourke attack. At first he thought one of the many shoppers would rush to Laura’s aid, but they all continued on their way, oblivious.

Rourke hauled the now-unconscious Laura down a side street. Shavi didn’t know what had been done to her, but he could see her mouth bulging and that her stomach was bloated.