Wolfsbane: 3 (Rebel Angels) (6 page)

At least it was summer.

But it was Scotland. And I hadn’t brought my jacket.

My immediate future was something I had to think about, so I started to walk. I’d got as far as the corner when Marty’s car turned into his home street. Catching sight of me, he
slewed the car up onto the kerb, forcing me to stop.

‘Oy! Where you going, Hannah?’

I folded my arms, glared at him.

He swung the car door wide, rose from the driving seat, and grinned amicably at my tits. He shifted his stance.

‘In trouble again, love?’

I bit back what I wanted to say. ‘She’s kicked me out.’

‘Ahh.’ He slung an arm round my shoulder and I felt his warm murmur in my left ear. ‘Sheena’s upset about Lauren. I know the kid’s annoying but you did overreact
there, love.’

I said nothing. Too busy grinding my teeth.

‘I’ll have a word with her, lovey, but I don’t think it’ll help. You know Sheena when she makes up her mind.’ Drawing back, he twinkled at me like a little
star.

‘Right.’ I hesitated. I wanted to kick him in the bollocks but I needed him, briefly. ‘Can you get me my jacket from the house?’

He slid a hand round my waist. ‘No need, pet. You’re not sleeping outside. Here. Get in the car.’

‘What?’

‘I’ll let you into the office.’ He jerked his head in the rough direction of town. ‘You can stay there till she calms down. Get in the car.’

I thought furiously. It seemed like a better deal than the gutter. ‘Thanks, Mart. I can walk. Give us the keys and I’ll let myself in.’

‘Don’t be daft. We’ll get a pizza on the way. I mean, I’ll get you a pizza on the way.’

I didn’t like the way the strong bulk of him was edging me towards the car. He wasn’t fat but he was big and sturdy, and his fingers were tighter on my arm than they’d been a
second ago.

‘Come on, Hannah love. I’m the only pal you’ve got right now.’

‘Except for him.’ I nodded at the nearest lamppost, and when he twitched his head up anxiously I wrenched myself out from under his arm.

He snatched my sleeve, yanking me back. I slapped at him, then kicked wildly, missing his groin by a mile; but he had to swerve. Once again I tore away, and this time I ran.

‘Sleep in the gutter for all I fecking care!’ His echo of Sheena was all I made out as I skidded and almost fell, pelting round the corner and out of his sight.

I couldn’t go back there or I’d kill him. Sheena too. I’d kill them all, and that would be bad when the police showed up for our chat. I didn’t know
what I should do, so I kept walking.

I say I didn’t know what I
should
do, but I knew fine what I
wanted
to do. The Screaming Urge was back, and it wasn’t all to do with extended-family homicide. I
came to a halt at the bus stop and stared up at the timetable. Last bus. Nothing coming back at this hour.

D
o it. What’s to lose?

I had to practically step in front of the bus to make it stop – you’d think my criminal record was common knowledge, the way drivers ignore me – but at the last moment he
braked and let me on. He did give me a very funny look as I got off at the Cantray stop. I couldn’t blame him; this was ridiculous. I had no idea what I was thinking. I couldn’t get
into the main castle, couldn’t even get a comforting glimpse of my painted psycho. The sky was that heavy pewter colour that isn’t far off night, and though the loch shone silver it
only made the clouds seem darker. The light would go off it any minute now. Any minute. It had already slid from the castle walls, leaving them bleaker than winter.

It still seemed like a better option than The Paddocks.

Yes. Even the empty coldness, and the mournful quietness when the bus disappeared: even that was better than The Paddocks, and its locks, and its sterile comforts, and its central heating. And
Marty. Yes.

It was better here, despite the whispering summer trees, and the lonely cry of a curlew, and the slow lap of the steely water at the loch fringes. And the rustle of grasses. And the long looming
shadow of the castle.

And the crunch of a footstep RIGHT AT MY BACK.

I shrieked and stumbled as I turned.

‘Oh, there you are. Finally.’

I glared at the blond boy, who stood there smiling inanely, until my thumping heart calmed down. ‘“Finally”?’

‘I had a feeling you’d be back.’ He blew a lock of pale hair out of his eye.

I shook my head in disgust and strode away towards the castle fence.

‘Where you going, Red?’ He jogged to keep up.

‘Strawberry blonde.’ I gave him a weary look. ‘Aren’t you in trouble? Shouldn’t you be getting home?’

‘I’ll put that off as long as I can, thanks. Where are you going?’

‘I suggest you just go and get it over with.’

‘Ha. You haven’t met my dad.’

‘Indeed, and I’d rather I didn’t. Your dad sounds like he ought to be locked up.’

He gave a snarky giggle. ‘I’d like to see anybody try.’

‘Get your mother to do it.’

‘She’s dead. Ages ago and I don’t remember her, so don’t start apologising.’

‘Okay.’ I turned with an air of finality towards the castle fence. ‘Mine’s dead to me and all.’

‘Really?’ Sympathy started to dawn on his face.

‘No. Not
really
. She ran off with a session musician. Apparently she owed it to herself to find herself, but I expect she’s still looking. She wasn’t that
bright.’

‘I see.’ He caught up and walked peaceably at my side. I looked at him askance.

‘Can I, uh.
Help
you with something?’

He stopped, nonplussed. ‘Well. No. Not really.’ Awkwardly he slewed his eyes aside, then he brightened. ‘I’m bored.’

‘And I’m not your frigging Xbox. Stop following me.’

He didn’t go away. The sky was duller, its layer of cloud sheened with dying sunlight, and I wanted to break into the café for a beer and an uncooked panini before I found a quiet
place to sleep. Also, I felt like I wanted to curl up and have a decent cry about various aspects of my life, and I wasn’t going to do that in front of the village idiot.

‘Don’t mind me,’ he said.

I came to a halt and turned on my heel. ‘Listen, where do you stay? Because you should be getting back.’

‘So should you.’

‘I’m staying here,’ I said.

‘You’re not,’ he said, and I didn’t like the confidence in his voice. Actually, quite suddenly, I didn’t like
him
. I didn’t like his happy smile or
his charm or the way his messy hair flopped over his glittering silver eye.

I took a step back. And funnily enough so did he. His hand clutched the air, tore at nothing, and I was so busy watching that, and fearing for his sanity and my life, I didn’t see his
other hand move.

I didn’t see him lunge for me, because he moved faster than anything I could hope to see. I only felt him seize my wrist and yank me, and I screamed and fell with his arms locked round me,
and we hit the cold ground together and the world went dark.

‘JESUS,’ I screamed. ‘What did you do THAT FOR?’

When the world and my vision cleared, I was sitting on top of the blond boy, which made it easy enough to pummel his ribcage with clenched fists. Not since I bit Lauren’s face had I wanted
to hurt someone as much, as physically, as I wanted to hurt him then. Clenched fists, in fact, weren’t cutting it; I began to tear at his eyes with my nails. ‘What do you
want?
Why did you
DO THAT?
’

He batted me away, shutting his eyes tight, snatching for my hands.

‘Because you WOULDN’T HAVE COME, you
silly cow.
’

‘I’m not GOING ANYWHERE.’

‘You already HAVE.’

In an instant he was limp and unresisting beneath me, blinking up and biting his lip with a sweet uncertainty that looked well-practised.

I had a horrible feeling, then. I couldn’t go on hitting him when obviously I didn’t have to. ‘What?’

Once again he moved so fast, I didn’t know what happened. Only that I was the one on the ground, I was the one winded by a knee in the solar plexus, I was the one staring in breathless
astonishment at a grey sky as the boy Rory frowned and chewed one fingernail. His other hand gripped my throat in a very un-amateurish way.

‘Ucch,’ I rasped.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘Just look.’

I rolled my head to the right, as far as his grip allowed. It must have been tighter than it felt, because my vision was distorted, obscuring my view of the castle. The air seemed torn, like I
was seeing double, and I started to panic.

‘Don’t kill me,’ I squeaked.

‘Don’t be such an idiot.’ He rolled off me and stood up, dusting himself down.

Staggering up, rubbing my throat, I backed away from him. ‘I’m going now. Don’t follow me.’

He smiled. ‘Where you gonnae go?’

My breath hurt high up in my throat. I swallowed and made myself breathe more deeply; then, trying to keep one eye on him, I turned a full, slow circle. I wasn’t seeing double any more,
but I wasn’t seeing anything familiar either.

I’d been right. The castle looked a lot better as a forbidding ruin, and I wondered who could have imagined interactive keyboards and overspill car parking in this context. The chain link
fencing was gone, and so were the signs. The loch at my feet was a black menacing stillness. I could have been in another place entirely. The illusion was perfect.

‘How did you do that?’ I whispered.

Rory chewed his lip. ‘I’m not supposed to, of course. But what’s the point of being able to do something if you never get to do it?’

I was sure we’d done that one in Ethics, and I believe the moral dodginess of stage hypnosis had actually come up. Sadly I couldn’t remember the upshot of the discussion, since
I’d bunked off the second period for a fag.

He grinned. ‘I
knew
I was going to get on with you.’

I gave him a sidelong suspicious look and sat down heavily on the nearest rock. I decided I wouldn’t indulge him by asking.

‘Impressed?’ he prodded. ‘Bet you don’t know anybody else who can tear the Veil. What’s your name, Red?’

‘Hannah Falconer,’ I snapped. ‘Call me Red again and I’ll rip out your throat. Now. Shut up and let me think.’ I thought for all of two seconds. ‘Click your
fingers.’

‘What?’

‘I have to get home. Click your fingers. Isn’t that how it works?’

‘No. How what works?’

‘Hypnosis.’

‘It’s not hyp – it’s not that.’ He blinked. ‘Don’t be mad.’

‘Don’t piss me about or I’ll tear your pretty head off.’ I thought hard and wished I had a cigarette. I glanced over my shoulder and saw the shimmer in the air, and the
fleeting glimpses of car park beyond it. I moved my head. The car park disappeared. And reappeared.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I thought you’d be okay with this. And I do know the safe places.’

I moved my head again, and shifted my mind sideways while I was at it. I wondered what had been in that beer. ‘The safe. Places. There are places that aren’t?’

‘Well. There’s a war on, after all.’

My eyes darted to the derelict castle, the deserted moor, the louring sky and the black forbidding loch. Rory and I might be the only human beings in a hundred miles, except for the sliver of
car park that was starting to blur and fade. As I watched, it vanished altogether, and that was when I remembered the curtain that never was, the curtain he’d drawn back and shuffled behind.
The one I’d explained to the enraged Sionnach when he returned looking for Rory; Sionnach, who had called me inventive names but who had never once accused me of lying. Who had, with what I
had considered outrageous gullibility, believed every word I told him.

I felt sick. Invisible curtains, homicidal horses, a landscape from a hundred years ago. The beer had finally got to me; either that, or this was for real.

Yet when I tried to be surprised I found I couldn’t; it was like I’d always known about this, somewhere in the back of my mind, and I’d just forgotten.

‘So,’ said Rory, and blew his hair out of his eyes. ‘Want to come home with me?’