Jude gentled his voice to a tone Maeve hadn’t heard before. ‘What do you mean by that?’
She shot him a look far keener than any previous. ‘Saint Jude. Don’t play with what you don’t understand.’
Maeve’s mouth felt full of cotton wool. Desperate, she looked around the pub. Tucked back in the corner as they were, none of the other villagers could see what was happening. Or if they could, no one seemed to care. Maybe Siobhan’s strangeness was commonplace.
A finger was suddenly in front of Maeve’s face, inches from her nose. ‘She has questions for the old girl. I can feel it.’
Jude laid his hand on Maeve’s wrist, pulling it forward. ‘Show her, Siobhan. What you showed me. On your scarf.’
‘Herscarf?’ Maeve asked. Her voice sounded very far away.
Siobhan shoved back from the table and leered over them. From the folds of her cloak, a pendant slipped free. Gold flashed in a rhythmic sway. Maeve had no choice but to look.
Two hands. A sun.
‘The Abbey,’ Maeve breathed.
‘No—’ Siobhan cried. Jude’s hands flashed forward to grip her flailing arms as she lurched backwards, stumbling on the leg of her stool. ‘Not them. Not them. No more. No more for the old girl,’ she blubbered like a child, fat tears falling down her wrinkled cheeks and off the tip of her reddened nose. ‘No more.Please.No more for the old girl.’
‘No more,’ Jude confirmed, his grip sliding down to curl gently around Siobhan’s frail wrists as he helped her back to her seat. ‘You’re safe here.’
‘Safe,’ Siobhan repeated softly. ‘No such thing.’ Her eyes flashed to Maeve’s as her voice hardened, growing more coherent. ‘No such thing. Not for the old girl. Not for you, daughter of memory.’
Maeve could do little more than stare, aghast.
‘Can you show her, Siobhan?’ Jude urged. His hands hadn’t left the old woman’s wrists, thumbs stroking circles on the translucent skin on the backs of her hands. ‘She needs to see.’
Siobhan stared at him for a long moment before dipping her chin in a jerky nod.
Trepidation swam through Maeve as the woman reached for one of the slender scarves wound around her neck. Each one wasn’t just a random pattern, but a picture. A story. The one she slid free started with the blues and greens of a sea before it shifted to what looked like a stained-glass window, to a lush forest before it ended in stacked rows of grey houses.
Siobhan’s hand was clammy and cold around hers as she extended Maeve’s arm. She began to wind the scarf from wrist to elbow like a bandage.
‘Don’t be afraid,’ Jude murmured.
‘Why would I be—’
Then, the pub melted away in a sickening slide of colour and light. The spinning behind Maeve’s eyes intensified with the touch, like the vertigo she’d experienced in Jude’s memory butworse. She fought for clarity, for control over her body as she fell forward—
Straight into a memory.
The first thing Maeve noticed was the smell, slightly sweet like apples left to rot. It coated every breath and stuck beneath her tongue. The golden haze obscuring her vision began to recede like a thick mist rolling off sea cliffs, leaving a rush of dizziness in its place as the world around her solidified. Dense forestland stretched out in every direction, an opening between the trees revealing a jewel-box town on the banks of a crystalline river.
The sheer beauty of it was like nothing she’d ever seen. A sense of peace washed over her like a wave, filling her chest until she wondered if her heart might burst. Maeve had heard of somewhere like this before, hadn’t she? Somewhere wholly perfect, where community flourished and prayers were answered. Somewhere meant as areward—
Suddenly, something hit her just between the shoulder blades, throwing her onto her knees.
Maeve yelped as thick mud met her hands, sluicing up her arms to splatter her face. The ground wavered, flickering like fingers banded over her eyes as the forest transformed into an endless stretch of churned black mud and back again, so fast it hurt to look at. She shut her eyes as she scrambled back to her feet. The earth sank beneath her, loamy and damp.
As soon as she righted herself, the scenery stilled.
She fought for air. Was there something wrong with Siobhan’s memory?
A metallic squeal caught her attention. She spun to look, her gaze alighting on a nearby tree. Each leaf was immaculate, a uniform oval quivering perfectly in time with its neighbour. The longer she looked, the worse the ache around her temples grew.
Look away, she commanded herself. It took effort, ithurt—
Maeve grunted, forcing her eyes from the leaves and down to a sign on the trunk.
