Death’s Shadow

Maybe Dervish doesn’t see me. Perhaps to him I’m not a real person, just a mouthpiece for Bill-E. I doubt that he can imagine me doing anything other than talk about the boy I replaced. There’s nothing malicious in it. I just don’t think it’s crossed his mind to regard me as an independent human being.

Eventually, two hours later, Dervish dismisses me. He’s had enough for now. He waves me away, not bothering to even say goodnight. I leave him staring at his crossed hands, thoughts distant, a sad wreck of a man, more lost in the past than I ever was when captive in the cave.

→ I love walking, exploring the countryside between the house and Carcery Vale. I like it in the forest. The land was covered in trees when I first lived. I almost feel like I’m in my original time when I leave the roads and paths of the modern world and stroll through woodland. Sometimes I’ll pluck a leaf and set it on my tongue, to taste nature. I try to trick myself into believing the new world doesn’t exist, that the natural balance has been restored.

Of course that’s fantasy and the sensation never lasts long. These trees have been carefully planted and the undergrowth is nowhere near as dense as it was back then. There are still rabbits and foxes, but they’re scarce. No wolves or bears. The smell of the modern world is thick in the air, a nasty, acidic stench. But if I use my imagination, I can believe for a second or two that I’m in the forest near my rath.

Sometimes, in the night, I truly forget about the present. In my dreams I’m still Bec MacConn, learning the ways of magic from my teacher, Banba. I wake up in a cold sweat, heart racing, crouched close to the wall, wondering where I am, why there’s a hole in the wall and what the clear, hard material stretched across it is. I feel trapped, as if I’m back in the cave. I swipe my fists at imagined phantoms of this new, scary world.

The confusion always passes swiftly. After a minute or two I remember where and when I am. My fists unclench and my heart settles down. I find it hard to sleep again on such nights, and lie awake in the dark, often curled up on the floor in a corner, remembering those I knew, all long dead and decayed. I feel lost and alone on such nights, and tears often fall and soak my cheeks as I tremble and miserably hug myself.

But it’s day now and I feel more relaxed. I move through the forest, humming a tune the world hasn’t heard in more than a millennium, pretending that I’m back in my own time. I come to a bush of red berries. I’m reaching for a berry to examine it when I spot a car and realise I’m close to a road. I still feel uneasy around cars, even after six months. I haven’t been in one yet, although I’ve been on Dervish’s motorbike a couple of times, when he took me to a nearby town to get clothes.

Cars frighten me. They look vicious. Growling, screeching, fast-moving assassins. I know they’re not living, thinking creatures, but I can’t help myself. Whenever I see a car, I expect it to race after me, chase me through the trees and mow me down.

I wait for the noise of the engine to fade, then edge over to the road. I’ve explored all the area around Dervish’s home and can pinpoint my position within half a minute, no matter where I am. One look at the road, the trees by its side and the bend to my left, and I know I’m a five-minute walk from Carcery Vale, the nearest village.

I haven’t been to the Vale often. The people there make me nervous. I keep quiet and don’t interact with them. I feel out of place, afraid I’ll say something to give myself away. I’m not truly part of this world and I can’t shake the feeling that our neighbours will eventually unearth my secret.

My first week here was mad. We’d just saved the world from a demon invasion, but there was no time to take pride in our achievement. Beranabus – as Bran now calls himself – left the day after our showdown with Lord Loss. We’d glimpsed the demon master’s superior in the cave — a huge, mysterious, shadowy, powerful beast. Lord Loss said our hours were numbered, that we’d only delayed the day of reckoning.

Beranabus was overwhelmed by my reappearance. I was the only person he’d ever cared about, and my return brought happiness back into his life. But the ancient magician is practical above all else. He wanted to stay and spend his last few years by my side. But there were demons to fight and a world to save. There was no time for selfish pleasure.

He took his assistant, Kernel Fleck, and Grubbs Grady – another of Dervish’s nephews – with him. Grubbs is very powerful, but he hates fighting demons. He’d spent his life hiding from his responsibilities, but Bill-E’s death seemed to settle him on his path. As reluctant as he was to leave Dervish, as scared as he was to face the Demonata, he went anyway.

Beranabus should have taken me too. When Grubbs, Kernel and I unite, we become the Kah-Gash. We have the power to destroy a whole universe. Beranabus should have kept us together, to experiment and use us.

He left me behind for two reasons. The first was personal. I’d suffered sixteen hundred years of imprisonment and he didn’t want to thrust me into the demon’s universe to fight immediately. He felt I deserved a few years of peace and wished to spare me the awfulness of my destiny as long as he could.

But he was scared as well, and that was the main reason. Beranabus had been searching for the Kah-Gash most of his life, hoping to destroy the Demonata with it. But he’d never been sure if he was chasing a mythical Holy Grail or an actual weapon. When he saw it in action, doubt crept in.

Was he right to put the pieces together? What if we fell into the hands of the Demonata and they used us to annihilate the human world? Or maybe the Kah-Gash would work against us by itself. We hadn’t intentionally taken the universes back in time. The Kah-Gash did that, having manipulated Grubbs into helping the demons open the tunnel in the first place. It had a mind and unknowable will of its own. Perhaps it had saved us by accident.

Wary of the weapon, Beranabus split us up. He should have left Grubbs behind to comfort Dervish, and he would have if not for his love of me. Dervish went into a rage when he woke to be told Grubbs had slipped away in the middle of the night. Grubbs and Bill-E were his nephews, but they’d been like sons. Now he’d lost them both. He cursed Beranabus, the demons… and me. He blamed me for Bill-E’s death, accused me of conspiring against the boy, tricking him so that I could take over his body.

It was the first day of my new life. Everything was confusion and uncertainty. I was awestruck, afraid, not sure what to say or how to act, delighted to be alive, but terrified. Unsure of myself, I let Dervish curse and scream. I didn’t flinch when he jabbed a finger at me or lifted me off the ground and shook me hard, only prayed to the gods that he wouldn’t kill me.

In the end he stormed off. He ignored me for days, and would have ignored me for longer – maybe forever – if not for Meera Flame, one of his oldest friends. In the middle of his depression, he rang her to tell her about his loss. Meera came to him immediately. After doing what she could to console Dervish, she asked if I needed anything, if I wanted to talk about what I’d been through.

Meera was wary of me. Like Dervish, she wondered if I’d led Bill-E to his death, so that I could take control of his body. Through floods of tears I convinced her of my innocence. When she realised I was just a lonely girl, as scared of this new world as I was of demons, her heart warmed to me and we were able to talk openly. I told her about my life, my centuries in the cave, the force which compelled me to take Bill-E’s body.

“I didn’t want to bring the corpse back to life and change it,” I sobbed. “It just happened. It was lying there, good for nothing else, and I had the power to make it mine. In those first few minutes, I wasn’t thinking about living again. I could see that Lord Loss was going to kill the others. I just wanted to help them.”

Meera believed me and managed to convince Dervish of the truth. She also dealt with the difficulties of Bill-E’s disappearance and my sudden existence. She got Dervish to pretend Bill-E had gone to live with relatives. Through her contacts, Meera faked the necessary paperwork and arranged for officials in high positions to throw their weight behind the lie if anyone (such as Bill-E’s teachers) made enquiries.

Those same contacts forged a birth certificate and passport for me. I became an illegitimate niece of Dervish’s, whose mother had recently passed away. In the absence of any other living relative, I’d been sent to Carcery Vale.

It was too coincidental to pass close scrutiny. A boy’s grandparents are brutally slaughtered… the boy takes off without saying a word to anyone… his best friend also disappears… and a girl nobody has ever heard of moves in with the man who was like a father to both boys. The people of Carcery Vale aren’t stupid. I’m sure they knew something was wrong.

But Meera and her allies covered their tracks artfully. Police were assured by their colleagues in other districts that Bill-E was safe and the girl’s story was on the level. In the face of such carefully contrived evidence, our neighbours could do nothing except watch suspiciously and wait for the next bizarre Grady family twist.

FIRST CONTACT

→ From the spot on the road in the forest, I make the five minute walk to Carcery Vale, but keep to the edge of the village, circling the houses and shops. I look on enviously at the ordinary people leading their ordinary lives.

Dervish is supposed to be tutoring me at home while I recover from the loss of my mother. Meera has supplied us with school books and equipment. Of course, Dervish hasn’t once sat down to help me with schoolwork, but I’ve been doing it by myself. I complete the necessary exercises so that Meera can show them to the relevant authorities and keep them happy.

I enjoy the homework. I never did anything like this before. I learnt how to do practical things in my rath, like cook, wash and sharpen weapons. I memorised lots of stories and Banba taught me magic. But I never studied books — they didn’t exist then. I knew nothing about global history, geography, science, mathematics.

It’s fascinating. I know a lot already, courtesy of Bill-E’s memories, but I’m discovering much more. Like most people, Bill-E didn’t retain all that he learnt, so I only have access to the bits he remembered. But my own memory is perfect. I have total recall of anything I see, hear or read. By devouring the books Meera gives me, and watching scores of television documentaries and the news, I’ve pieced together many of the facts of this brave new world. Ironically I probably know more about it than most of the children who are natives of this time.

I’d love to go to school and learn from real teachers. I study as best I can at home, do my homework, watch educational programmes and surf the Internet. But that’s no substitute for being taught by another person. There’s so much more I could do with my brain, so many things I could uncover about the world, if I only had someone to instruct me.

But I’m not ready to mix with other people yet. What would I say? How would I mingle and pass as one of their own? I’d have to guard my tongue, always afraid I’d say something that gave away my past. I have nothing in common with these folk. I know much about their ways, from Bill-E and what I’ve read about them and seen on television. But in my time girls married when they were fourteen. Warriors fought naked. Slavery was a fact of life. There was nothing odd about eating the heart of a defeated enemy. We worshipped many gods and believed they directly influenced our day-to-day lives.

As I brood about the gulf between me and these people, someone coughs behind me. I’m instantly on my guard — in my experience, if somebody sneaks up on you, they’re almost certainly an enemy. Whirling, my lips move fast, working on a spell. There’s virtually no magic in the air, so my powers are limited, but I can still work the odd spell or two. I won’t be taken easily.

It’s a girl. A couple of years older than me. We’re dressed in similar clothes, but she wears hers more naturally. I haven’t fully got the hang of shoes and laces, soft shirts and buttons. Her hair looks much neater than mine and she wears make-up.

“Hi,” the girl says.

“Hello,” I reply softly, putting a name to her face and letting the spell die on my lips. She’s Reni Gossel, the sister of a boy Bill-E hated. Grubbs liked this girl. Bill-E did too, although he never said, because he didn’t believe he could compete with his older, bigger, more confident friend.

“I’m Reni,” she says.

“Yes.” I think for a moment. “I’m Rebecca Kinga.” That’s the fake name Meera provided me with. “Bec for short.”

Reni nods and comes closer, studying me. There’s a hostile shade to her eyes which unnerves me. This girl has no reason to dislike me – we don’t know each other – but I think she does anyway.

“You’re Dervish Grady’s niece,” Reni says, circling me the way I was circling the village a few minutes before.

“That’s right,” I mutter, not turning, staring straight ahead, shivering slightly. This girl can’t hurt me, but I’m afraid she might see through me.

“Grubbs never said anything about you.”

“He didn’t know. It was a secret.”

“A Grady with a secret.” She smiles crookedly. “Nothing new in that.”

“What do you mean?” I frown.

“Dervish has always been full of secrets. Grubbs too. We were close but I’m sure there were things he wasn’t telling me, about his parents, his sister, Dervish.” She stops in front of me. “Did you meet Grubbs?”

“Just once,” I answer honestly.

“Strange how he moved out just as you moved in.”

I shrug. “He was upset. When Bill-E’s grandparents were killed, he wanted to get away from here. It reminded him of when his parents were murdered.”