The Shadows (30 page)

I didn’t hear him. Eventually, I straightened and went up the stairs, and then I remembered that he had waited for me in my room once. I could not keep him out if he wanted to come in. The thought terrified me. Terrified and . . .
Don’t be there, Derry, please. Please leave me alone—

“Grainne Knox, what exactly is the meaning of this?”

Mama. I turned to see her standing at the bottom of the stairs, the oil lamp in her hand.

“We lost track of time,” I said dully. A terrible lie, but in my confusion I could think of nothing better. My palm tingled. My lips burned. I wondered if she could see how well I’d been kissed. “But Rose’s stableboy walked us back, so there was no need to worry.”

She eyed me carefully. I knew she thought I was lying, and I hoped she wouldn’t press it. I didn’t know what I would do if she did. “What’s that on your face? On your cheek?”

I touched my cheek. “Dirt?” I guessed. “I don’t know. It’s . . . it’s very dusty outside.”

“Patrick Devlin sent a messenger while you were gone,” she said in a voice that told me how angry she was. “To ask you to supper tonight.”

My heart flipped. “Oh.”

“Yes. Oh. I think perhaps you should find an excuse to see him tomorrow, Grace. And reassure him.”

“I will. I’ll send him a note first thing in the morning.”

“Good,” she said.

She was going to let my lie stand.

“Good night, Mama,” I told her, and then I went into my
room. It was empty. I walked over to the window that overlooked the street, pushing aside the curtain to see into the yard half lit by a nearby streetlamp, staring down into the shadows.

He was gone.

I let the curtain fall back into place. I went to my trunk and the mirror above. I lit the stub of candle pooling in a dish, and I saw what my mother had seen: a slash of something dark over my cheek. I put my fingers to it and leaned closer to the mirror to see.
Blood.

I looked down at my wrists. One of them was streaked with blood as well. Blood that had been on his face and on his hand. Blood from a boy who died in the dust outside a tenement on Mulberry Street.

I poured water from the chipped ewer into the basin and picked up the cloth I kept there, scrubbing at my cheek, at my wrists, scrubbing at the blood that stayed until I thought it would never come off, that it would mark me forever, so that everyone who looked at me would know what I’d done, how I’d let him kiss me until I felt the pulse of him in my blood, how I’d kissed him back—a gang boy, a boy who glowed, a boy who’d lied to me and tricked me.

I dropped the cloth into the bowl and put my face into my hands.

TWENTY-ONE

Diarmid

T
he girl was impossible. A sharp tongue and too-quick temper. She rarely smiled. He’d only seen her laugh twice—and the second time was today, in fact, when she’d laughed with Oscar and Goll and Keenan, and he’d gone mad with jealousy. When was the last time he’d felt such a thing? Never. Not once. Or . . . perhaps once, in those years after he’d died, when his foster father had brought his soul into his body now and again so they could talk awhile, and he’d learned that Finn had taken Grainne as his wife and that she’d gone to him willingly—
“Take me away from him, Diarmid. I can’t marry him. I love you. Save me from him.”
And then the moment Diarmid was dead, she’d turned around and married the man that he’d ruined his life to save her from.

But even then his jealousy hadn’t been as strong as that he’d felt today. And he’d never felt such cold and penetrating
fear as when he’d seen Grace run. He didn’t think she knew how close she’d come to tragedy—which he’d saved her from, by the way, and all he’d got in return was her anger.

She was maddening. He couldn’t get her out of his head, and the whole side of his face hurt because she had a fearsome right hand—she was stronger than she looked, which he might have admired any other time. But not now when she had his blood racing and his whole body just . . . humming. That kiss . . . his elation when he realized she was kissing him back, that she wanted him, too, and with it that burning, consuming fire . . . He’d never felt anything like that. Never. Not even with Grainne.

Cursed, tormenting girl.
Filthy gang boy
, she’d called him. Diarmid Ua Duibhne. The pride of the Fianna. No girl had ever refused him, whether she’d seen the lovespot or not. And she had
slapped
him, and it had hurt and stung his pride and done nothing, not one single thing, to keep him from wanting her.

He was more than half in love with Grace Knox, and that might be the most foolish thing he’d ever done in a life that had been full of foolish things. And almost every one of them due to a girl.

Stay away from her,
he thought.
Do what she wants. Leave her alone.
It would be better for both of them. Her life didn’t include who he was now. A stableboy.
Filthy gang boy
.

He was at the tenement before he knew it. Dim light from windows sent the yard below into shadows, but still he knew
the evidence of the fight had been cleared away. The police left the gangs alone for the most part unless they were pressed into action by public outcry. It was best not to antagonize them. The bodies of the Black Hands—not just the one he’d killed, because the others had done their share—
and she hadn’t complained about the two Finn had killed in those first minutes, had she?
—had been hauled away. They would be found squirreled in hidden alcoves throughout the city or floating in the river. None close enough to implicate the Warriors, though the Irish would know they’d done it.

The moment he stepped inside the flat, he saw what was happening—the cards spread, Cannel’s formation, and in the middle Grace’s handkerchief, stained with ale from mopping up Oscar, the purple and yellow silk threads of the pansies glimmering in the sputtering lamplight.

He’d forgotten the reason he’d brought her here.

“She’s the
veleda
,” Finn said to him.

Diarmid just stood there staring blankly.

Grace is the
veleda.

Cannel frowned over the cards. “Though there’s something else here too. I don’t quite understand it, but . . .” He lifted one card, moved it about.

Diarmid cleared his throat. “Are you sure?”

The Seer nodded. “And you’re all around her, as always. But here are two cards I don’t understand.”

“What do you mean?”

Cannel held up one—illustrated with a full moon and
dogs howling. “This card, where it’s come up, means vision, but it’s removed from her. Separate. And this one—” Another card lifted, this one painted with a winged, horned creature and a naked couple. “Terrible power.”

“Terrible power,” Diarmid heard himself saying. “As in, she has terrible power?”

“Of course she does,” Ossian said. “She’s the
veleda
.”

“Yes. It’s just the placement is odd. Again, it’s removed.” Cannel met Diarmid’s gaze. “But she
is
who you’re looking for. And you surround her, just like in the first divination.”

You surround her.
Pressing her against that wall. Feeling her breath and the beating of her heart against his chest. Burning to cinder with her kiss. Diarmid closed his eyes and squeezed the bridge of his nose.

“Well, now we know who she is, and we can proceed,” Finn said with satisfaction.

“We don’t even know who called us or why,” Diarmid objected.

“Whatever the task, she’ll have to choose eventually. Which reminds me—we’ll need the incantation for the sacrifice. The
veleda
should know it. Do you think she does?”

Diarmid laughed miserably. “She doesn’t know
anything
, Finn. Not what she is. Nothing. Whatever the
veleda
was supposed to know . . . it’s all been lost.”

Finn’s confidence didn’t waver. “Question her again. Perhaps she knows something she doesn’t realize. Even if we don’t know who called us and why, we must persuade her to choose us. So start persuading her.”

“She told me tonight that if I came around again, she’d call for the police. Perhaps Oscar should try.”

Even Diarmid heard the despair in his voice, and he saw by the way Finn looked at him that his captain hadn’t missed it either.

“You have a weapon Oscar doesn’t have,” Finn said. He looked at Diarmid’s forehead. “Use it.”

To them it was easy. Shake aside his hair, show Grace the lovespot just as he’d done with Lucy. He’d never hesitated before, and they wouldn’t understand why he was so reluctant now. And the truth was that he wasn’t certain he understood it himself. Except that he heard her voice in his head:
“Can you change the world?”
Except that for the first time he had harbored a hope—foolish yes, especially after tonight, but there nonetheless—that she could be the one who might love him for himself. And the thought of seeing the spell in her eyes, watching her bend to him, wanting to do whatever he asked, the fire in her muted—

It startled him to realize how much more he wanted. And that he wanted it from her.

Finn’s eyes narrowed. “Or would you rather
I
try to persuade her?”

Diarmid’s whole body tightened.

“I didn’t think so,” Finn said in a tone that stung. “Women choose where they love. If she loves you, then that’s one thing in our favor. We need the advantage, Diarmid. And ’tis best that you win her anyway. Then she won’t hesitate to bare her throat to your knife when the time comes.”

’Tis you who must kill her.

“Well?” Finn asked. “Will you do this?”

Diarmid saw them watching him. All of them. Waiting for his agreement, which he must give, because the
veleda
must choose them. And he must kill her in order to release her power to them, and it must be done on Samhain or they would fail and die. Gone forever. No return.

It was more than just his life at stake. He was Fianna. His brothers were counting on him. Finn was counting on him. And he knew already what it felt like not to be part of them, to be separate. He didn’t ever want to feel that way again. Not because of a girl. Not because of anything.

Diarmid nodded. His voice when it came was hollow, but it was there. “Aye. I will.”

TWENTY-TWO

Grace

I
tossed and turned all night, restless and yearning, falling asleep only to find nightmares of fire and ravens and my brother’s voice—
Listen to me, Grace. Don’t go!
—as purple lightning forked through dark skies. And then I was lying beneath Derry, and I felt breathless and alive as he kissed me, his fingers dragging at the drawstring of my chemise, and then . . . the flash of a knife above me. A scream, and there was only terrible pain and . . . darkness.

I woke in a cold sweat. Why were these things happening to me?

I had never been so afraid. But now I knew what I must do.

It was a betrayal, of that there was no doubt. Lucy would never forgive me. Then again, she hadn’t seen that boy collapse or Derry’s hand red with blood. Derry was dangerous, a liar and a thief and a murderer. He belonged in jail. Lucy would survive it. She’d been through more “loves” in a summer than
most people had in a lifetime. And as for me . . . I was afraid of him—yes, that was true. I was afraid of the bloodlust I’d seen in him. Afraid of the wariness I’d seen in those boys who’d had me cornered and how quick they’d been to release me to him. I was afraid of the ruthlessness with which he’d plunged his knife into that boy.

But mostly I was afraid that I would forget all that if he kissed me again.

I sent a note to Patrick asking to see him, and the relief on my mother’s face convinced me that this was the best course. I took breakfast to my grandmother, murmured soothing words to her as she muttered “They’re coming” and “That boy,” and then I woke Aidan, who was sprawled across his bed wearing yesterday’s clothes and smelling of a distillery, and told him that he must chaperone me.

He moaned into his pillow. “Take Mama.”

“Mama’s not well. Which you would see if you cared to look. And Grandma’s getting worse. Mama needs to watch over her.”

“I’ll watch.”

“You can’t do it from your bed or a tavern. Get up, Aidan. Give me an hour, and then you can go off wherever you like.”