The Stolen: An American Faerie Tale (3 page)

“Thanks.” Brendan looked around the room. His eyes found Caitlin's and held them for a split second. He looked like he wanted to say something, but instead he turned away. “Bit of an emotional one, I know. I think for the next, maybe something a wee bit easier on the heart.”

The band began an instrumental, Brendan staring intently at his guitar strings.

“Caitlin? Are you okay?” Casey asked.

Caitlin struggled to find words as her friends shared a concerned look.

“Why don't we sit down?” Janet said.

They led Caitlin back to the small table and resumed their idle chatter while keeping a watchful eye on her. She struggled to put the weird happenings aside or explain them away, but soon it all combined with the beer, the music, and exhaustion from too many sleepless nights. She reached her limit.

“I need to go.”

Her friends looked at her, then over her shoulder at Brendan.

Casey put her hand over Caitlin's. “Go home, kiss Fiona goodnight, and get some sleep.”

“Thanks, I'll make it up to you, I promise.” Caitlin hugged each of her friends and made for the door.

Outside the air was brisk and, after the events of the night, she could describe it only as delightfully real. She breathed it in and leaned against the wall. Once calm, she headed to her car. As she rounded the corner, she fished out her keys and was about to unlock her car with the fob when fear hit her like a sledgehammer and it felt like her heart went into ventricular fibrillation.

This was the same feeling she'd had in the parking garage, only now it was amplified. This wasn't a normal, everyday fear that she could push aside. This was a soul-­freezing, primordial dread that spoke to an ancient part of her psyche, a part born from staring into the darkness and knowing that in its depths there are creatures born of nightmares.

“It's not safe for a pretty girl to be out this late all by herself,” a soft, melodic voice said from behind her.

The voice was beautiful, almost hypnotic, but very, very cold. Gooseflesh erupted over Caitlin's entire body, and every instinct told her to run. Instead, she closed her eyes and let her logical, rational mind wrestle the panicked, screaming part into submission. Her heartbeat slowed to something slightly less than a scared hummingbird's and her muscles eased their tension, reluctantly giving control back to her.

She shifted her keys into the spiked fist configuration again. “Well, I'm just about to my car, so . . .” She let the sentence trail off as she started walking away.

Laughter erupted from behind her, and it hit like a physical blow. It wasn't jovial or even a forced chuckle. It was a derisive, mocking laugh. It made her think of kids at recess encircling some poor outcast, everyone pointing and jeering.

Then the laughter wasn't just behind her. It came from the shadows ahead of her, too.

Her heart dropped and her body tensed.

“You're not going anywhere,” the voice behind her said.

The knot in her stomach began to tighten, but she thought of Fiona and her resolve hardened. She clenched her jaw and turned, ready to fight.

“Leav—­” Caitlin stopped when she saw who'd been speaking to her.

An eerily beautiful boy, perhaps thirteen, looked at her with more confidence than anyone that young should have. His skin was white—­not just pale, but unreal, alabaster white. His hair was sheer black, as were his clothes and fingernails, and he must've been wearing some kind of special contact lenses, because his eyes were all black, no whites at all. He was thin and not much over five feet tall, just about her height.

He smiled, showing his teeth. Every single one, upper and lower, came to a sharp point.

Caitlin felt the blood drain from her face and her heart skipped a beat.

The boy's eyes narrowed and he looked at her for a moment before he smiled wider. “Boo!”

Caitlin flinched and he laughed again. She could feel his black eyes bore through her. This child exuded evil. She tried to slow her breathing or bring her heart rate back down, but nothing worked. She couldn't even cry out for help.

“Listen to her heart pound,” purred a voice from behind Caitlin, this one more feminine. “Oh, I think you scared her, dear brother.”

Light footsteps sounded on the concrete as whoever it was drew closer and the screaming part of Caitlin's brain kicked the rational side to the ground and locked it in a closet.

“Now,” the voice said, this time in her ear. It was soft, almost seductive. “While we'll enjoy you trying to fight, in the end it will only be worse for you.”

The breath was as icy as the voice it carried was alluring. Soft fingers ran along her neck, sending waves of pleasure through her, and she found herself enthralled by the cold touch and voice.

“But if you just go along with us . . . ,” the voice cooed, “oh, it will be so much better.”

Caitlin had a flash of all the horrible things that were going to befall her. As desperation set in like a raging river, she found a handhold in steely resolve. She wouldn't go without a fight, if not for herself, then for her daughter. Her parents had left her at an early age. She wasn't going to leave Fiona. She gripped the keys in her sweaty fist and spun to see the female counterpart to the Goth boy, clad in Doc Martens, fishnet stockings, and a black dress.

The girl gave her a pouty look. “Uh-­oh. She's mad now.”

Caitlin set her jaw.

“I don't think she likes us.” The boy laughed and stood next to his sister.

“Get out of my way, right now.” Caitlin began to plan where and how she would strike if it came to that. Part of her hoped it would.

“Tisk, tisk,” the girl said, then gave a disapproving look, a shake of her head, and even a wag of her finger. Black eyes, like her brother's and just as empty, locked on Caitlin's, and the girl bared her sharp teeth in something closer to a snarl than a smile. “I tried being nice.”

Caitlin had to swallow before she could find any words. “Don't, don't make me repeat myself.” Her muscles went tight, ready to strike.

Both sets of black eyes blinked at her, turned to each other, and looked back to Caitlin.

The girl's look went back to the haughty sneer. “Well then, if that's how you'll have it. Brother, would you like the pleasure?”

The boy moved much quicker than Caitlin expected, but she'd been waiting for something to happen. She punched with all the strength she could muster, and her fist connected hard with the boy's neck, the metal keys sinking into his white flesh.

His eyes went wide as he staggered back a step.

When she pulled her hand back, it was coated with a cold, black sludge.

“That hurt, you bitch,” the boy said through gritted teeth. He licked the pad of his thumb and dragged it over the wound. When he was done, the punctures were gone.

Caitlin's brain locked up trying to process what she'd just seen.

The boy rotated his neck as if stretching it, causing it to crack a few times before he leveled his gaze at Caitlin. “Just for that, I'm going to take you slow.” He bared his teeth and drew back.

“That's a
skawly
idea there, Tinker Bell,” said a familiar voice at the corner.

Caitlin turned. James? No, it couldn't be.

Brendan stepped out of the shadows and folded his arms over his broad chest. “Best you and that oíche-­bitch let the
cailín
go on her way.”

“Mind your own—­” The girl stopped midsentence when she saw Brendan. Her eyes moved from his scarred face to his kilt pin. “The Fian!”

The boy's mouth turned up into a wicked grin. “Oh, I could go for a piece of that as well.” He held his arms out, extended his fingers, and his nails grew to sharp claws.

“I'm about to lose me head here, bucko.” Brendan smiled. “And if I do, then you'll be losing yours. Let her go. Mind, if I have to be asking again, I won't be nearly so polite about it.”

“He's mine!” the girl said, then leapt at Brendan.

Brendan drew a large, curved knife out from behind his back. It glittered in the streetlight as he stepped to one side and slashed.

If Caitlin had blinked, she would've missed it. The blade cut across the girl as she flew past, and when she fell to the ground, shrieking in pain, Caitlin could see what looked like thick black smoke filled with tiny motes of light wafting away from the wound.

Caitlin's mouth opened, but the boy went for her again. She punched with the keys, this time hitting his face and one eye.

He grunted in what sounded more like annoyance than pain.

She kicked his groin, but he didn't crumple. He just grunted and sucked in a breath.

She swallowed hard and stumbled as she tried to back away.

“You're starting to piss me off,
a bhitseach dhaonna
!” The boy glared at her with one good eye as black fluid poured down his cheek. He rubbed his injured eye, and when his hand came away, his eye was whole once more. A streak of black across his face was the only evidence of her punch.

Reason stopped banging on the door and decided it was nicer in the closet. “What are you?” Caitlin asked.

The boy lunged again.

Caitlin punched, but he caught her fist in one hand and took her by the throat with the other, lifting her off the ground as if she weighed nothing at all.

Caitlin clawed with her free hand at the vise of flesh and bone squeezing the life out of her. Her back slammed into a wall, hard, her head bouncing off brick. Her vision began to spin and fade to blackness as she tried to draw in a breath that wouldn't come.

No, please, God.

“Mind yourself!” Brendan shouted, but it sounded far away, or like it was underwater.

The hand came loose and Caitlin fell to the ground. Cool air rushed into her lungs as her vision, though still blurred, opened back up. Sharp pain lanced through her head as she gulped air and struggled for any kind of coherent thought, but each just slipped away.

Brendan crouched down and lifted Caitlin's face by her chin so he could look her in the eyes. “You all right there, love?”

He glanced over, and Caitlin followed his eyes. The girl was gripping her side and grunting as she struggled to her feet, the black smoke still seeping from between her fingers. Behind Brendan, Caitlin could see the boy clear on the other side of the street, also getting to his feet.

“Are you all right?” Brendan asked again.

“I, I think so.” She put a hand to her head and kept blinking, waiting for this all to make some kind of sense. “What's going—­” She stopped.

“What?” Brendan asked.

“My purse!”

“Go, Brother!” the girl shouted through clenched teeth.

“No, you don't!” Brendan spun in his crouch and threw his knife at the boy. It turned end over end as it sped to its target, the blade flashing in the streetlight.

The boy jumped several feet up to grab an overhang, swung himself up into the air, and landed on the roof of a ten-­story building.

The knife passed where the boy had just been and stuck in the bricks.

Caitlin stared, openmouthed, hoping that any moment she'd wake up.

The boy turned and ran, vanishing into the darkness, his laughter fading behind him.

“You fecking coward!” Brendan screamed.

Caitlin's heart was trying to escape her chest, then her vision snapped into clarity as she saw the girl charging Brendan. The warning moved up her throat, but she knew she couldn't say it in time.

With one hand, Brendan snatched the girl out of the air like a lobbed softball and, with a grunt of effort, drove her into the wall. The girl's skull made a cracking sound as it hit the bricks.

Caitlin gasped and reflexively turned away, eyes closed tight. She covered her ears with shaking hands, desperate to deflect the sounds of the girl's struggle. A nightmare, this had to be a nightmare. Nothing this bad could be real. It had to be bits from a horror movie she'd seen as a kid that her subconscious had dredged up and formed into this.

The girl screamed in pain. Caitlin pressed her hands harder against her ears, but the shriek pierced into her brain. She wanted to scream, or vomit, but instead she chanced a glance and saw the girl pinned to the wall by a knife in her shoulder. Darkness, not smoke, Caitlin realized, poured from the wound, and again tiny white lights danced in it. She jerked back around, closing her eyes and bending near double to shield herself from this horrific scene. Why was no one coming? Someone had to have heard all this. Where the hell were the cops?

Brendan said something, but Caitlin couldn't hear it over the wailing. The girl screamed back in that glass-­shattering shriek, and while Caitlin couldn't understand the language, there was something familiar about it.

There was the sound of metal against stone, followed by another scream. Caitlin heard the unmistakable sound of splintering bone, and the girl's voice became a pathetic gurgling sound.

Caitlin pressed her head against the brick wall beside her and drew in deep breaths to try and keep the sudden dizziness at bay. This wasn't like the things she'd seen at the hospital. That was always after the fact, always insulated from the actual violence. She'd never been in the midst of it. Now she was drowning in it.

The gurgling finally stopped, and the sudden silence was overwhelming. Caitlin turned and opened her eyes in time to see the girl disappear into a cloud of darkness sprinkled with lights. In moments, the cloud had dissipated, leaving only a knife handle sticking out of the wall.

Brendan knelt down beside Caitlin. “You still with me, Áin—­” His breath caught in his throat. “Uh, love? Did they hurt you?” He looked at her arms and face, his gentle hands moving over her neck and shoulders.

Caitlin's mind was grasping for anything that even resembled normal, but she couldn't find it. She still felt dizzy, and nothing seemed to hold in her mind, until finally, a single thought rose to the surface of the maelstrom when she looked at the knife still in the wall. She kicked at Brendan. “Get away from me!”