The Night Has Eyes
I hope you never know what crawls
In places of the soul
I keep under a shroud
Sean
“Elodie!” I try and warn her, but it’s too late. She lands with a thud beside me. I struggle as hard as I can – the creature’s fingers are wrapped around my ankles, and they’re pulling me under. My eyes meet Elodie’s; she is mute and staring as she too struggles to free herself. I see her reaching for the dagger she carries strapped to her chest. She manages to slip the knife out, but right at that moment the Surari pulls her down another inch, and the blade falls out of reach. I try to take a hold of the dagger strapped around my ankle, but I can’t quite stretch far enough. Maybe Elodie …
“My sgian-dubh!” I mutter, my hands grabbing at the frosty leaves, at the soil, trying to hold on to something, anything. I spit blood.
Elodie understands at once and lifts herself up on her arms, kicking back as hard as she can. She twists herself at an impossible angle and reaches towards my legs. She must have freed one of her ankles, because I see her leg is bent behind her. Her heavy breathing is in my ear as she grabs at my knee, my calf and finally my ankle – I feel her fingers working around the strap, but the demon pulls down again and both my feet are buried deeper. I’m slowly being buried alive.
“I lost it!” cries Elodie. Her head jerks backwards, and I realize the demon must have both her ankles again and is pulling her down too.
“Back. Soil,” says the rasping voice again. It’s coming from underground, somewhere between Elodie and me. I can sense the thing’s head just there, under a shallow layer of earth.
I dig with one hand, under the leaves, under soil, until a mop of black hair appears. I pull at its hair as hard as I can, and the creature growls in anger. I look over at Elodie, and our eyes meet – she knows at once what I’m trying to do.
I feel the ground frantically with my hands – Elodie is being wrenched further and further underground. “Sean!” she calls. It’s dark, but her face is so white it’s glowing.
Please don’t let Elodie die like this.
Rage burns through me, and with a sudden burst of strength I grab at the black hair again, yanking and ripping until the creature does what I want it to do – it comes to the surface with a jump, in a shower of leaves and earth. Elodie is free – she scrambles to her feet as quickly as she can, panting.
I have a split second to take in the Surari’s face, its sickly white skin that has never seen the light of day, the unseeing eyes, the mouth crowded with black and broken teeth – and then Elodie is on it, with a roar you wouldn’t believe could come from a woman so slight. She lands on the Surari’s stomach, sinking her knees into its chest.
Right at that moment, a second soil demon hauls me under.
Shit.
Almost immediately I’m up to my waist in wet, cold earth, kicking against the weight of the sodden soil. I can only watch as the Surari grabs Elodie by the arms and throws her off. She’s up again in a second, her arms stretched out to take hold of the Surari again, but it’s quicker than her. It has its hands on her hips and its mouth open to take a bite of her stomach.
I don’t have a blade – my fingers will have to do. I lift my hands and start tracing, whispering the secret words, hoping they won’t desert me when I need them most. I try to ignore the dragging at my heels. The exposed Surari moans and squirms for a moment, as if confused, then turns its face towards the source of the pain. I close my eyes and trace harder, whispering as fast as I can without jumbling the words. I can see a red light through my closed eyelids – it’s just for an instant, but it’s definitely red. A car’s tail-lights? A farmer’s tractor lights? I don’t allow myself to open my eyes as my movements get faster and faster – the runes have taken over, carrying me with them. The soil demon growls – I stab and stab again without touching it, and the creatures howls in pain.
All of a sudden, I can’t breathe anymore – my mouth is full of soil. Muffled sounds, my lungs exploding – there’s no air, no air. It can’t be. I can’t die like this, buried alive. I can’t.
“Elodie …” I try to say, but as I open my lips soil gets in my mouth and down my throat and I begin to suffocate. I cough. My chest is in agony.
Who’s going to look after Sarah?
There’s only darkness around me, and cold, and I can’t even move a finger. A thought hits me, as clear as ice: I’m dead. I’m dead.
But there’s another jerking movement, less hard this time – and different. Different because it pulls me up towards the surface and not down towards a wet, black tomb.
“Sean!”
The voice is muffled. Something is grabbing at my fingers, hard, and is yanking me upwards with a scream of rage and terror and a voice that belongs to Elodie.
I can make out the words. “Niryana prati Surari!” the voice is saying. “Niryana!” I recognize it as one of the battle cries of the Secret Families, in the ancient language. Whatever had been wrapped around my ankles suddenly lets go – and the blessed, blessed hand that pulls me upwards grabs my wrists – my lungs are bursting, exploding with pain – how long can a man survive without air? Not much longer. And then, with a final terrible effort, a million stars explode over my head and I’m staring at the night sky, and breathing, breathing deeply, painfully, like a baby who breathes for the first time.
“Sean! Sean!” Elodie’s hands are brushing the soil away from my eyes.
I splutter and cough, and turn my head to throw up soil and bile. I gulp in fresh air at once, then spit some more and inhale some more, until my head stops splitting and my lungs stop screaming.
“Are you OK? Sean, are you OK?” Elodie says over and over again – she’s terrified, I can hear it in her voice. So much to lose. So much more than when there were hundreds of us hunting – now every loss is a disaster to humanity.
“I’m fine. I’m fine.” I wipe my mouth with my sleeve. I’m covered in mud, and wriggling little creatures fall out of my hair as I sit up.
“That was close,” she whispers.
“Did you see someone? Did someone see us?”
“What do you mean?”
“I saw a red light. I thought maybe a car.”
Elodie shakes her head. “There was no car. It was you. Your runes. There was a red light.” She waves her slender fingers in the air. “Like a ribbon.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about, and no time to ponder. “The soil demons?”
“One is dead.” She points to a lifeless bundle lying not far from us – it’s curled up in a ball, its white skin gleaming feebly. Its lips are blue. Elodie has poisoned it. Black liquid is pouring from where I’d stabbed it with my runes.
“The other?”
“I don’t—”
A hand spurts out of the soil like a monstrous root, and another, fumbling at her legs – and then a head, growling and sniffing the air for flesh. But this time I’m ready – I slip my sgian-dubh out of its strap and start tracing the runes once more.
The Surari lifts itself up in fury and leaps at me – I raise my dagger, placing an invisible barrier between us. The creature growls and holds its throat where I have slashed it open, black liquid spurting from the severed flesh.
“You buried me alive, you bastard!” I scream. What am I doing? Speaking to the Surari, like Sarah?
“Back soil … Me … back soil.”
“Niryana!” yells Elodie again.
“Elodie! No!” But it’s too late. She’s thrown herself on the demon, as agile as a cat. But she is no match for it. The Surari grabs her hair, its mouth is open.
I have no choice. I launch myself towards the creature to stop it biting Elodie.
But there’s no need. Before I can reach it I see Elodie’s lips, black as the night, touch the Surari’s rotten, pale ones. Its arms, posed to claw the flesh off her bones, flail and fall to its sides. The demon clutches at its throat as its mouth darkens, a blue-black tinge slowly spreading over its face. It collapses, squirming on the ground, and I’m shocked, I’m speechless as I see something on its face.
A single tear, rolling down its cheek.
“It’s OK,” says Elodie. “I can handle this.”
Makara
The seventh wave
Is the one that carries my heart
The Atlantic Ocean
Niall was clutching the rusty metal rail so that the wind wouldn’t sweep him into the ocean. He wished he could jump off the cargo ship into the water and swim all the way back to Ireland, back home. But he knew that wasn’t an option. He knew he had to save his own life. Going home was simply impossible. Not yet, anyway. Since the Enemy had risen and started the slaughter of the Secret heirs all over the world, all Niall was allowed to think of was survival.
“Planning a swim?” Mike was beside him suddenly, shivering in his bright red jacket, his arms wrapped around himself. He hated the cold. They could barely hear each other over the roar of the wind.
“Hopefully soon,” Niall replied. There was a gust of wind so hard that he thought it might blow him into the sea – and he would have loved that, he would have loved to feel the seawater on his face, around his body. But the cargo ship was too fast – he would lose them. It was only that thought that stopped him from jumping. It didn’t worry him that the Atlantic is cold and deep and vast and that they were in the middle of it, because Niall didn’t have reason to fear the cold, or the depth of water. He was a Flynn, and Flynns can’t die in water.
“Only a few days to go before we arrive. Look at those clouds! Oh, man. If they come our way we’re in for a choppy sea.” Mike shuddered, imagining the worst.
“Those are not a problem.”
“No?” Mike looked at Niall, puzzled.
Niall smiled, took a deep breath, and sang in the ancient language. He sang the clouds away. Slowly but surely they moved, the gale weakening ever so slightly, then more and more until it was just a breeze blowing softly their way. Mike stared at Niall, his eyes big and round.
“There you go,” said Niall with a satisfied grin.
“Niall. How did you do that?” Mike asked, still stunned.
“That, my friend, was the power of Song.”
“Seriously?”
Niall shrugged his shoulders. “All Flynns can do it. My little sister is great at it. She could sing the wind when she was in her pram!”
My sister, Bridin. And Cara, a year younger than Bridin. Hiding in Dublin. I don’t even know if they’re safe. I don’t know if my parents are safe either. They would not leave Ireland. Niall would have gladly stayed too, but he couldn’t. It was his duty as a firstborn Secret heir to survive and fight.
“You’re full of surprises, Niall.”
Niall shrugged. “I told you I had the power of Song.”
“Yeah, to kill demons.” Mike lowered his voice to an urgent whisper, swiftly looking left and right. “Not to change the damn weather!” He pointed at the corner of blue sky appearing where the black clouds had been only seconds earlier. His teeth were chattering.
“Yes, well …” Niall shrugged as if his powers weren’t that big a deal. “Let’s go inside. You’re freezing.”
“I am, yes. But I’ve spent forever on this boat, I have cabin fever!”
They walked down the narrow steps, and sat on the benches in the lounge where the crew went to chat and smoke and drink. Two crewmen were cradling a cup of coffee each, their waterproofs on. As soon as Mike and Niall came in, they got up and left, throwing them suspicious looks. They probably think we’re criminals on the run, thought Niall.
“You alright there?” said one of the other men. Anders, a Dane, was the only one who occasionally spoke to the two strangers on board.
Mike nodded. “Fine, thanks,” he replied briefly, as Anders too left the lounge. He took his woollen hat off and threw it grumpily on the table. “I can’t wait to be off this boat,” he muttered.
“Five days to Liverpool. We’re nearly there.”
“And then?”
“Another boat, I suppose.”
“Over my dead body,” growled Mike.
“Swim?”
“Ha ha.”
“Ah well, we’ll think of something. We always do,” said Niall good-naturedly. But Mike didn’t hear what Niall had said. His eyes were fixed on the waves out of the window, his coffee-coloured skin suddenly bleached with fear.
“Niall …”
Something in his friend’s voice made Niall’s heart quicken. “What is it?”
“I don’t know. I think I saw something. Out there.”
“Like what?”
“Like an eye.” Mike pointed to the porthole.
“An … Shit! I saw it too!” Niall rushed to get a closer look.
A grey mound had risen from under the waves, and a black eye as big as a horse was staring at them. They barely had the time to register what they’d seen, when the eye disappeared under the water.
“It’s not a whale,” whispered Mike.
Niall’s voice was shaking. “No. It’s not a whale. It’s a Makara.”
Mike’s eyes widened as he recognized the word from the ancient language: sea monster. “We can’t do this on our own. We need to tell the captain,” he said. His Gamekeeper training had kicked in. No time for panic.
“You go tell him. I’m going up on deck to try the Song.”
He’ll get killed, thought Mike despairingly. But he knew there was no choice.
They both knew they had no choice. There was no way they could fight the demon without Niall’s power.
Mike ran up the steep steps and barged through the heavy door, into the bridge. “Captain. You need to listen to me now. There’s something out there.”
Captain Young was examining a map and didn’t even turn around. He hadn’t been entirely happy about taking these two lads on board for the crossing but until now they hadn’t been much trouble. Still, he had no intention of making them feel welcome on board.
“I’m busy. Next time, knock,” he said coldly.
“Captain Young. There’s a monster out there,” Mike repeated, trying to keep his tone even. He knew that if he started shouting he’d be dismissed.
“Are you drunk?” the captain growled, turning to face his visitor.
“No. You must call your men—” Mike couldn’t finish the sentence. The boat made a sudden jump, as if something had hit it, and then kept rolling on the crest of subsequent waves.
“What was that?” yelled the captain. He moved across to hang onto the brass rail that ran along the inside of his cabin.
“It’s a sea creature. A big one.” Mike swallowed. He knew it must sound like something out of a children’s fantasy novel.
Captain Young’s eyes widened. “I knew you were trouble,” he whispered, but as the ship pitched and rolled, he realized that whatever his feelings about the boy, the ship was in trouble. He strode towards a low cupboard. Inside were several guns. He threw one to Mike and kept one for himself. They made their way downstairs, struggling to stay upright on the swaying boat.
There was an eerie silence on deck, men standing in clusters, some of them armed, holding onto the rails and waiting for orders. And then Niall started singing, his head to the sky, his eyes closed, the words of his ancient song sounding soft and sweet like a lullaby. Mike blinked – was that a song of war? Because it didn’t sound like it.
The boat was still undulating violently, but there was nothing to be seen, nothing emerging from the waves. The men were staring at Niall – what was the daft Irishman doing? Singing? At a time like this?
Suddenly something grey and vast burst out of the water, soaking them all. “Shoot!” screamed the captain and his men let rip with a volley of bullets.
Niall opened his eyes at once, and the song nearly choked him. He had been trying to soothe and stun the Makara until they were ready, but the men had started shooting too soon. Now the Makara’s tentacles, thick as cables and covered in suction pads, were flailing around in a terrible dance, as the Surari was hit over and over again. Sprays of seawater were everywhere, and screams echoed across the vessel – then those tentacles hit the boat blindly, smashing skulls and breaking bones. Crewmen were falling all around, and the guns were ripped out of their hands, rolling down the deck as the ship tossed in the water and then overboard into the sea.
Mike watched in horror as a man fell just beside him, hitting his head on the deck with such violence that something white and sticky began pouring out of his ears, immediately washed away by a spray of frothing seawater.
Mike was thrown backwards against the metal cargo containers piled up in the middle of the deck, his breath knocked out of him. Slowly, he dragged himself back onto his feet, holding onto the handle of a container, trying to remain upright in the chaos. A shout resounded in his ears, above the screams and moans of the hurt crewmen. “Help!”
It was Anders. He had fallen overboard and was desperately holding onto the handrail, his legs thrashing above the frozen waters – above the mass of tentacles. Mike let go of the handle and made his way, wavering and slipping, towards the rail. He knelt before it, holding onto the bars, and looked into Anders’ terrified face. Mike tried to reach him with the hand that wasn’t holding the gun, but he was just out of reach. Mike attempted once more to take hold of Anders’ hand, as the crewman’s body was thrown around by the roaring sea, but it was no use. In a split second, he made a decision: he let go of the gun.
The ship undulated again, hit by the waves born under the Makara’s enormous flailing body, and Mike watched the weapon slipping away across the wet deck, away from his grasp and into the sea. Anders’face was contorted with terror.
“Don’t let me go,” he mouthed.
“Grab my hands!”
“I can’t!”
“You have to!” Mike implored, desperately trying to close his freezing fingers around Anders’ wrists. All around them there was panic, men shouting and bodies falling, but Mike couldn’t hear a thing, he couldn’t see a thing; he was hypnotized by Anders’ frightened eyes, and he couldn’t look away.
What happened next seemed surreal, like a bad horror film. In a massive effort the Makara lifted itself above the surface of the water and opened its body up in a fan, its tentacles like a huge, dripping crown around the black centre. In the middle of its body, just above the opening that was its mouth, there was a bony beak bigger than a human being.
The next few seconds were so horrific that Mike could never quite describe what happened. All he knew was that Anders was still holding onto the deck, even without a head. And then his decapitated body fell into the bloody waters and disappeared as the Makara closed its tentacles around him.
Mike felt his gorge rising as the full horror of what had just happened sank in. He looked around, just in time to see another crewman lifted by a flailing tentacle and thrown against the containers, his chest crushed and smeared against the metal boxes, suspended in the air in a strange crucifixion. And then the man fell in a heap, like a broken doll.
Mike looked towards Niall. Clearly, guns were nothing against this demon; their only weapon was his song. They had no other hope. Niall was still singing, standing with his arms open and his head thrown back. The tone of the chant had changed; it was cruel, hard, with words that spelled pain and hurt.
Mike winced as the Makara hit the deck to the left and right of his friend, in a desperate attempt to silence the sound that was hurting it so. By luck, or destiny, or simply because the creature was too damaged to fully control its movements, it kept missing.
Out of the corner of his eye, Mike saw Captain Young firing the last of his bullets into the creature, barely denting its thick, slippery skin, and then throwing the gun away in fury and despair. A tentacle hovered over him, ready to lower and crush him. Mike could hear a voice shouting.
“Captain! Move!”
That voice was his own. He ran, and his movements felt to him slow and frustrating, like trying to run in a dream, but he made it in time, throwing himself onto the captain just a second before the tentacle could crash down and put an end to the man’s life. Mike and Captain Young lay one on top of the other on deck, and their eyes met. Mike saw hatred in the captain’s gaze, and it wasn’t for the Makara: it was directed towards him. The man flung Mike aside violently and stood up.
“Shut up! Shut up!” Captain Young screamed and leapt on Niall, holding him by the waist and throwing him onto the deck with a thud. The song had been brutally interrupted, and the ship fell instantly and eerily silent. No more screams. There was nobody left to scream. Just silence, but for a deep underwater moan: the Makara wailing in pain.
“Let him go!” Mike yelled, breaking the silence and throwing himself at the captain. Niall was lying nearly senseless, in shock from having had his song interrupted. His body started convulsing, as he came out of his trance.
“Niall’s the only chance we have!” growled Mike as he grabbed Captain Young and flung him to the ground and into a puddle of blood and saltwater. Then he lifted Niall up by the shoulders and slapped him softly on the cheek. “Niall! Niall, wake up! Wake up!”
Niall groaned, his eyes unfocused. “I must … I must sing,” he whispered.
“Yes. You sing or we’re dead,” said Mike calmly. His words were accompanied by another deep, otherworldly moan coming from the watery depths.
“Help me,” replied Niall, leaning heavily on Mike. Mike supported him as Niall closed his eyes and started singing again. At first Mike was supporting most of Niall’s weight, but as the song took flight it seemed to carry Niall’s body with it, lifting him upright and throwing his head back once more.
As the song rose the Makara stirred again, agonized, its tentacles sweeping the deck blindly. Now its grey, thick skin was stained with black blood. With a terrible howl the Makara opened itself up again, its tentacles arranged around its centre like a crown – but now two of them were just stumps, and others were crumpled and bloody. Mike finally allowed himself to hope they had a chance.
But it took him just a few seconds to understand what the Makara was doing. It wasn’t surrendering. It was trying to open itself up again, to do to them what it had done to Anders. The Surari opened its black mouth, and its deadly beak was ready to strike. Mike knew he had to make a decision, and make it fast. Try to move away and interrupt Niall’s song, or stay put and hope the Makara would miss its target? As his mind struggled to choose, he felt a terrible pain cut through his head. Niall’s song, resounding right beside him, was beginning to hurt him too. It was as if two blades had been inserted in his ears and they were twisting painfully, cutting him inside. He pressed his hands against his ears, and he was not surprised when he saw that his fingers were covered in blood.
Mike was determined to stand firm in spite of the pain, ready to help Niall if he needed it. There was no way he could interrupt him again. The Makara went to lower its beak to attack, desperate to put an end to the terrible sound that was ripping it apart – but its movements were slow and jerky now, and its huge body fell sideways, in a splash of foamy water and black blood.
Mike felt Niall swaying. “It’s nearly finished. Niall, do you hear me? You can do this!” he whispered in Niall’s ear. Niall seemed to hear, because his song rose even higher, roaring like the sea and the wind. Mike moaned in agony and fell on his knees, holding his bleeding ears, while the Makara thrashed and flailed and flung itself from side to side, until finally its movements juddered to a halt and the huge body was still.
And just in time, because Niall was spent. He doubled over and fell soaked and trembling onto the deck.
Mike shook his head, trying to get rid of the high-pitched sound that still resounded in his ears. He stood up slowly, slipping once on the wet deck and rising again, head spinning and every bone sore. He looked around him. Niall, drained but alive; Captain Young, standing frozen, leaning against the cargo; one, two …five men lying broken, senseless. The others had disappeared.
Mike forced his shaking limbs towards the parapet, panting in fear. He wasn’t convinced that the Makara was dead, he expected a tentacle to rise from the waters at any second – followed by that bony beak, ready to take his head off as it had Anders’.
Step after step, in the surreal silence, Mike reached the rail and wrapped his shaking hands around it. He looked at the waters, now calm and black, with patches of red. The crewmen’s blood.
And then the eye appeared above the waves, and the mound of its enormous, battered body. Mike let out a gasp and fell backwards, then scrambled to his feet quickly, sliding on the wet deck as he tried to make his way back to Niall as quickly as he could. He had to protect him at all costs.
“It’s dead!” called a voice. It was Captain Young.
Mike stopped for a tenth of a second, but he still made his way to Niall, throwing himself over him, ready to take the coming blow.
“It’s dead!” The captain repeated.
The blow wasn’t coming. Mike let himself rise slowly and crawled to the rail again. His heartbeat was hammering in his ears.
The eye was still there – Mike breathed in sharply as he saw it, but stayed where he was. He noticed the white film over it, and how the grey mass rolled and floated, carried by the ebb and flow of the waves.
Captain Young was right. The Makara was dead.
And so were most of the crew.
Even without a crew, the cargo ship was still afloat, together with the giant squid’s body. The waves, gentler again, cradled them both. Mike would have felt compassion, had he not just seen fourteen men being dragged down to their deaths, cut in two by the Makara’s beak, or strangled by its tentacles. Quickly he and Captain Young checked the men lying on the deck, looking for a pulse. Only one was still alive. Captain Young shook uncontrollably, his teeth chattering and his hands covered in the blood of his men.
He turned to Mike. “Why are you alive?” he whispered in the ghostly silence.
“You’re in shock,” said Mike kindly, but urgently. “You need to get this boat back to harbour. Any harbour. Now.”
“I said, why are you – and your friend – still alive?”
“We have no time for this, understand me? Snap out of it, man! Take us ashore!”
“We need to get out of here,” Niall reiterated. He was slumped against one of the doors, still white and weak, but recovering. Next to him was the only surviving crewman. A pained moan came from him.
“Did you hear that, Captain? Your man needs a doctor. Get your ass back inside. We need to go.” Mike took a step towards the bridge.
“You’re not going anywhere,” the captain answered in a low voice, his face full of despair for his lost men. But there was something else there: fury. He pointed a shaking finger, first at Mike and then at Niall. “It was you who called that thing. With that weird song. I know it. I feel it in my bones.”
“Captain Young,” Niall began. His voice trailed away. The man was right. It had been them who had called the Makara to the cargo ship, in a way. But Niall couldn’t explain that had it not been for people like them, the sea would be full of Makara – and other things – and there would be no ships sailing safely across any of the world’s oceans.
“My men are all dead. Or as good as,” he added, gesturing at the injured crewman. “You shouldn’t be alive,” he said calmly, and without warning picked up his gun and pointed it straight at Niall’s chest. Without hesitation, Mike lunged forward, grappling for the firearm.
It was all so quick, as the sound of shots filled the air. There was blood on the deck and on Niall’s hands as he crouched beside the captain, who lay with his eyes closed.
“Captain Young! No! Mike, what did you do!”
“What do you think I did? Look, it’s just a graze.” Mike pulled back the Captain’s jacket to reveal a small wound.
“He’s unconscious!”
“He knocked himself out. He’ll be fine. Now, let’s get these men downstairs. Shit, how do you steer a big-ass cargo ship?” Mike ran his hands through his cropped hair.
“I’ve steered motorboats before, but nothing as big as this. I can try.”
“Take us ashore. Before another of those big-ass squids comes calling.”