"I found Alex."
"I know. Unfortunately whoever has her now knows that too. You might as well have painted a big arrow in the sky and pointed it at the house with a sign saying
I Am Here
."
I looked at the flickering cloud. "Sorry."
"It's my fault," he said. "We've spent all this time on your physical training and no time at all on your power. Not that it would have done any good. Still, we have to get you and Blackbird and as much stuff as we can carry out of here before anyone arrives to see what caused the storm."
"There's nothing that important here. We can just leave."
"We can leave, but Blackbird can't."
I had forgotten. Blackbird had no power. She couldn't travel down the Way from the clearing in the woods like the rest of us. She had to travel by mundane means.
"Couldn't I take her down the Way?"
"That might be possible for her, since she has magic that is dormant, but the baby has no power and never had. It's connected to her and part of her, and it might be OK…" He let the sentence tail off.
"And it might not," I finished. "We can't risk that."
"I know. I have a car coming to the village in about an hour to collect her. She will walk into the village with Tate and wait for the car. They'll keep a low profile until it turns up. Until then we have to get as much down the Way as possible. I'm not leaving any clues."
He turned and walked back into the house to begin ferrying boxes out to the clearing in the wood where the node-point of the Way was. At a loss for anything else to say, I helped him.
We got into a rhythm. One of the team would hold something up and shout, "Yes?" and either Blackbird or I would yell back, "Yes" or "No". A yes meant it went into a box or a bag, a no meant it was tossed aside. Within ten minutes we had cleared everything that was important from the house. While Garvin supervised shipping of things down the Way, Blackbird and I went through each room in turn collecting anything remaining that had value for us. It was a small house and it didn't take long. As soon as that was done, Garvin ordered Tate to take Blackbird to the village.
She came to me and I held her close. "Be careful," I told her.
"I will."
She put her arms round my neck and pulled me down to her, pressing her soft lips to mine. "Try and stay out of trouble," she said, then turned and walked with Tate down the tree-covered drive to the lane. I watched her leave, looking small and vulnerable beside Tate. She was looking up at him, saying something. Garvin joined me.
"Will she be OK?" I asked him.
"She's with Tate."
It was answer enough.
"Are we leaving now?"
"Have you got everything?"
"Yes. Everything that matters." I glanced back at the lane.
"Give me your mobile phone."
"My phone?" I fished in my pocket and handed it over.
"Any other phones, devices, toys?"
"No. Blackbird has hers."
"No, she doesn't. Amber?" He turned to the slim figure who walked calmly from the wood, unhurried and coldeyed. He passed her my phone and Blackbird's. "Burn it all."
She didn't even look at me. She walked up to the house and tossed the phones inside, then shut the front door. As it banged closed, she pressed her hand to the woodwork. There was a chilling of the air, an echo of what I had done earlier. The breeze stirred and then there was a whoosh. The windows downstairs burst outwards as flames pulsed through the glass. Long licks of flame began to curl languidly up the walls. The thatch, which should have steamed damp and slow, caught immediately and within seconds I was standing back from the waves of heat while Amber still held her hand to the door. The heat intensified until she nodded and turned her back on the burning cottage. Another cloud was forming over the house, piling smoke into a tower that slanted with the wind out over the woods, following the thunder.
Garvin spoke to Amber. "See if you can help at the other end. Niall and I will be a few minutes." She nodded and walked back into the wood. Garvin turned and followed her track.
"Are we waiting to make sure it burns?" I asked him.
"There'll be nothing left," he said, walking on.
I followed him into the trees. Amber had already gone. I noticed that even though we had all made multiple trips across the grass and down this path, there was barely a sign of our passing. Someone had removed the tracks as thoroughly as Amber had torched the cottage.
"Wait," said Garvin.
We stood in the clearing while the sliding crashes and steaming pops of the burning house filtered through the trees. The smell of burning thatch filled my nostrils and tendrils of smoke curled around between the trunks.
"Listen," he said.
There was a sound above the roar of the flames, a low buzzing that grew harsher until it opened out in a Doppler drone as a helicopter banked over the house and curved away over the trees.
"They get faster every time," he said.
The helicopter circled the wood, staying wide of the column of smoke. It slowed and then hovered out over the lane.
"They're looking for somewhere to land. Time for us to leave," said Garvin. "You first."
I stepped into the clearing where the node-point of the Way was. The presence of the node was one of the reasons this little house had been chosen for us, that and the trees Blackbird loved. I had loved the place initially, but now it was filled with too many memories. I took a last glance through the trees at the burning shell of the house. The thatch had collapsed inward and flames flickered in the column of smoke.
Then I turned and stepped on to the Way. The deep blue-black of the void answered my call as it swelled beneath me and carried me far from the smoke-tinged clearing to a room beneath a house filled with random piles of our belongings. I arrived a refugee. Our things were stacked higgledy-piggledy around the room, black sacks on boxes, pans holding plants. I noticed an empty vase that wasn't ours and had been in the house when we arrived. Never mind, it would have only been burned if it had stayed.
Garvin appeared after me in a swirl of twisting air. He looked around, surveying the debris of my life.
"I'll ask Mullbrook to find you rooms here for the moment," he said. "Most of the house isn't used very much."
He addressed Fellstamp and Amber. "Try and stack this lot in the corners, if you can. We may need access to the Way and I don't want anyone tripping over. Niall, you're with me."
I followed him upstairs, though the hall with the grand staircase and into a room which must once have been an elegant salon, a place for receiving guests. Now covers shrouded the chairs and the curtains were drawn against the daylight. Garvin pulled a curtain back slightly, letting a wedge of sunlight stripe the room.
"Sit," he said.
I flopped on to a two-person sofa, the covers inflating in a puff of air and dust. He turned an armchair around to face me and sat on the edge of it, his hands braced on his knees.
"Tell me everything you can remember. Start from when I left you."
He watched me while I told him what I had found out. He didn't interrupt, he just let me speak. When I reached the part where I could hear Alex struggling, I stopped.
"They were hurting her, Garvin. I could hear her yelling for them to stop."
"Finish the report, Dogstar. Then we'll talk about what we know."
Obediently, I finished the tale, ending with him telling me to get dressed.
"So" – he sat back in the chair – "we know they have her but we don't know where."
"Who has her, Garvin? Who would take my daughter?"
He clasped his hands together in his lap, then leaned forward again.
"The Feyre and humanity have lived alongside each other in peace for centuries. Peace is a relative term, though, and occasionally there are problems. When there are problems on our side, we deal with them. That is part of what the Warders do. On humanity's side, though, things are more complicated. Most humans aren't even aware that the Feyre exist, and that's the way they like it. Occasionally, though, things spill out. People can come into their gifts unexpectedly. If the gift is weak, it isn't usually an issue. Those people can live on the edges of society. They are the psychics, the faith healers, the fortune tellers."
"You think Alex has come into her gifts?"
"We know something happened. They said that three other girls died at the scene. As far as we know, Alex is the only survivor."
"So what happened to Alex? Where is she now?"
"They will have her safe, somewhere. She will be cared for."
"What do you mean, 'cared for'? What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that not everyone comes into their gifts cleanly. For some, the leap is too great. Their bodies know what power is, but their minds…"
"She's not mad, Garvin."
"She may be very frightened. If she can't control it, she may be a danger to herself and everyone around her."
"She's just a girl."
"A girl with a potentially lethal talent."
"They did things to her, Garvin. They were hurting her."
He took a deep breath. "You may… may, I said… be able to get her back. But the person you get back may not be your daughter."
"She'll always be my daughter."
"You may not like what she's become."
"I'm her father, Garvin. What do you expect me to do? I can't leave her there. What if she's hurt, or frightened, or lonely?"
"What if she's all of those things and much worse besides? Can you do what needs to be done?"
I stopped. "What are you talking about?"
"If she's not their problem, she's ours. That's what the Warders do, Niall. They clean up the mess."
"You're talking about killing her. You can't kill my daughter. She's just a child."
"If it comes to it, can you?"
I closed my eyes. I couldn't lie to him. "No."
"Then maybe she's better off where she is."
"But they're hurting her."
"They only hurt her when you spoke to her. If you leave her be, she could be fine. She might be able to have something close to a normal life."
"What kind of a life would that be, Garvin? Drugged up, half awake, frightened, wondering if it's the drugs that's making her see things? Is that the life you're talking about?" I was shouting. I hadn't meant to shout.
"Sometimes it's kinder to let things be," he said quietly.
"They took her from me. They snatched her from right under my nose. Christ! I even signed the consent forms. They had a truck waiting outside. I thought it was strange at the time. There was a tinge of cold iron about it. Cold iron, Garvin: the antithesis of power and utterly poisonous to the Feyre. Is that the kindness with which they are treating my daughter? Is that the care they're lavishing on her?"
"Do you want me to deal with her?"
"What?"
"If you ask me, I'll find her and deal with it. I would do that for you."
"No! I don't want anyone to deal with her. I want her back. I want my baby girl. Surely you can understand that?"
"And if she isn't anyone you would recognise?"
"Then I'll care for her. Her mother will care for her. Oh, God, what am I going to tell Katherine?"
"You're not going to tell her anything."
"But she's her mother. She thinks she's dead."
"Then let her grieve once for her daughter. Don't dangle hope in front of her and then snatch it away, Niall. Once is enough."
"You really think she's dangerous?"
"She killed three other girls. This was no accident. The biological contamination they were talking about was your daughter. She was the biological contaminant. They cleaned up after her. They dealt with the families of the dead
girl’s
the same way they dealt with you. They reassured you that nothing could have been done and they made sure she couldn't hurt anyone else. That's all they can do. The only other option is to put her out of her misery."
"Put her out…" I couldn't say it.
"It's what we would do. The Feyre don't nurse their sick."
He let that sink in.
"Think about it, Niall. She's safe for the moment. She's probably got the best care that can be provided as things are. Maybe you need to think about what's best for her."
I shook my head. I couldn't believe what he was telling me. He slowly stood and patted my shoulder. Then he left me to think. I sat until the light faded from the gap in the curtains and I was just another outline in the shrouded twilight. It wasn't until Blackbird found me that I stirred.
"Niall?"
"I'm here."
"What are you doing?"
"Thinking."
She stood over me, a vague figure in the gloom. "What are you thinking about?"
"Nothing. Just something Garvin said."
She nudged my knee with hers until I shifted along the sofa, leaving room for her to slide in beside me. She sat on the edge, capturing my hand between hers, twining her fingers into mine.
"Niall, am I a burden to you?"
"What?"
"Because if I am, you don't have to stay with me."
"What are you talking about? Of course you're not a burden to me."
"Then why don't you talk to me anymore? Ever since Alex died… since you were told she had died… you haven't said a word to me."
"I have. I've been busy, that's all."