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Children of the Veil
by Colleen Halverson
 
Copyright © 2016 by Colleen Halverson. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
 

Chapter One

The whiskey nestled in my belly like a hibernating animal. Despite the blizzard raging outside, a trickle of sweat beaded on my forehead. The press of warm bodies slammed me against the bar, and the smell of patchouli and hipster BO filled my nostrils, the blast of retro 80s music echoing across the black walls of the club. I raised my shot glass into the air, and the bartender nodded with a sly wink, his hand palming a bottle of Jameson. A few drops of whiskey landed on my palm as he sloshed it into my glass before moving on to another customer. I licked the spicy alcohol off my hand and gave the side-eye to his weak pour.

Erika smiled at me as I threw back the shot. “Hitting it pretty hard tonight?” she shouted over the din of the club.

I winced, rubbing at the sweet ache in my chest. “I’m going to see my father tomorrow. Need to work up to it.”

The synthesized ring of some one-hit wonder bled into my ear, the kaleidoscope lights flashing over the roving packs of revelers as they splashed beer on the chipped linoleum dance floor. A tangled mass of limbs moved in time with the pounding bass, and I blinked as the room dipped out of focus for a moment, the dancers turning into a writhing monster.

My heart skipped, my aisling powers flooding through my arms. I clenched my fists, letting the fizzy, electric-spark feeling subside. Maybe I should have stayed at home, but Erika had showed up at my doorstep, took one look at me, and dragged me out into civilization. Good thing, too, because tomorrow I planned to say good-bye to everything and hop on a bus to DC to find my dad. I could have used my powers to travel there, maybe save a few bucks in the process, but since returning from Tír na nÓg, I needed to get back to some sort of normal, even if normal meant doing shots with my best grad school pal, Erika.

I raised my hand in the air again, motioning to the bartender for another drink. Erika glanced at the tattoos lacing my wrists. She hadn’t asked questions when I showed up on her doorstep a month ago. Just took one look at me standing shivering in the snow, ushered me into her living room, and offered me a beer. This is why I loved Erika. She took all comers.

She nudged my shoulder. “Are you sure you want to leave?”

Buzzed, I blurted out, “The bar?”

She laughed. “No. Grad school. The Celtic Studies Institute. It’s a shame about what happened with Dr. Forrester, with the accident and all, but…”

The accident. Somehow the Fianna had made the brutal attack on my advisor look like a fiery car crash, hiding all traces of the way the monstrous creature had pumped his body full of venom and torn him apart. I still hadn’t visited his grave. I couldn’t bring myself to.

As for The Celtic Studies Institute, I had only returned once to clean out my study space, pick up a few personal belongings, and make sure Candace, the intern, was all right. Someone mentioned she had transferred to another school, and she hadn’t left a forwarding address. Erika was my last connection to St. Brendan’s University, and the blunt pain of closing that chapter of my life felt raw and final. I once had so many dreams for my future, but they now lay crumpled with the rest of my papers and notes at the bottom of the recycling bin in the reading room of the Institute.

I waggled my fingers in the air, trying to make eye contact with the bartender. He had a lumberjack beard and a tattoo of a bicycle on his neck. Hot hippie heaven. He caught my stare and smiled, lifting his large hand in a gesture of patience. Those hands would feel good around my waist or palming my breasts. I bet he preferred the lights on, the amber beads around his neck tracing a seductive line down my abdomen as he settled his scruffy face between my legs. He was a giver. You could tell. The next day he would make me vegan pancakes with a side of kale and tofu scramble. My stomach rumbled, and I realized I hadn’t eaten that day. Kale. Tofu. Didn’t matter. Nothing tasted good anymore. Since the day I left Finn in that tower, all I wanted was the burn of whiskey on my tongue and a random warm body to replace the ache he left behind. I gripped the edge of the bar, a plan forming in my head about the most tactful way to ask the bartender when he would get off work.

I turned to Erika. “I’m done with Celtic Studies. No jobs there anyway.” I cupped my hand on the top of my shot glass, creating suction before letting it clatter back to the bar. “I want to find out more about my mom.”

Like figuring out which hidden dimension she’s holed up in.

Night after night for the past month, I threw my energy out into the world, searching desperately through the astral plane for her spirit. I knew she still lived, but she certainly didn’t exist in this reality.

She traced a snowflake design into the condensation on her pint glass. “Do you think you’ll go to Ireland?”

Flashes of my last trip to Ireland flooded my brain. Carolan’s death. Amergin’s prisoner. My marriage to Bres. My throat tightened and a shudder of anxiety rushed through me. My hands gripped tight around the shot glass, and I thumped it on the bar, beating a sharp tattoo in rhythm with a Psychedelic Furs song. I had to get ahold of myself.

I spied the bartender on the other end of the bar now lost in conversation with a manic-pixie dream girl, her gossamer maxi dress billowing around her barstool in light green waves. Who the hell wears a maxi dress in a goddamn blizzard? She threw back her head and laughed at a joke the bartender made. They snickered, their heads almost knocking together.

I raised my hand to grab his attention. “Excuse me!”

The hipster looked up with a slight eye roll before returning with the bottle. “You sure you don’t want to switch to something lighter, sweetheart?”

“You sure you don’t want to mind your own business?” I slapped a five-dollar bill on the bar. “Sweetheart?” He poured the liquor and moved on, crumpling the money in his hand. I laughed to myself, saluting the back of my would-be boy toy for the evening.

Erika eyed me nervously.

I gave her a bright, placating smile. “Sure, maybe Ireland. We’ll see.”

Erika’s fiancé John came back from the bathroom, and he brushed her arm and whispered something in her ear with a kiss. Then turning to me, he grinned, flashing a pair of dimples in his all-star quarterback face. “Cheers to you, Elizabeth. For having the good sense to get out of graduate school while you still can.”

I laughed and we clinked our glasses. Throwing back the shot, I let out a spluttering gasp as the liquor stole my breath. Swallowing hard, I closed my eyes, letting the warmth bloom in my belly. When I opened my eyes again, it took a moment for the room to stop spinning. Blinking rapidly, I peered into the speckled mirror behind the bar. Through the pulsing shadows and shifting lights, a pair of steely eyes bore right through me. My heartbeat raced, a spark of longing taking flame deep in my core. I slammed my glass and whirled around.

“Finn?”

I scanned the faces in the boiling mess of dancing forms, distorted and ghoulish in the black lights. I leaned against the bar, rubbing my forehead. Maybe it was a trick of the light. My subconscious piecing together his face because it was the only face I wanted to see in the reflection. I stared through the crowd, emptiness eating away my insides like napalm. The phantom ache seeped into my veins and down my arms, my hands clenching with the desire to touch Finn’s smooth skin, run my hands through his silky hair. Instinctively, my hand slipped inside my coat pocket where I stowed the small volume of Yeats poetry he had given me. My fingers traced the leather binding, its presence near my heart reassuring. Shaking my head, I turned back to the bar.

“You guys need another drink?” I said absently.

I turned, expecting to see Erika and John, but they had left for the dance floor. Instead, perched on a stool sat a heavily pierced and tattooed punk rock dude with spiky blue hair. His eyes swept over me and he cracked a devilish smile.

“No, but I can buy you a drink,” he said in an Irish accent, raising his hand for the bartender. “What are you having?”

“Um, Jameson,” I mumbled, my brain fuzzy as I spied Erika and John whirling around, a peal of laughter escaping Erika’s lips as John dipped her. I turned back to the blue-haired guy, memories of Finn still occupying my mind. With a deep breath, I shoved them back and focused on the punk rock hottie next to me.

“You’re Irish?” I said.

“I am.” He winked and pushed a shot into my hands. “And you’re beautiful.”

I snorted and slammed the whiskey, shuddering before setting the glass back on the bar. A wave of cheers swept through the club as the DJ put on “How Soon is Now?” Bodies flooded the dance floor, arms flying through the air as the familiar beat echoed against the low ceiling. Closing my eyes, the rhythm wrapped around my limbs, and I swayed in a fever, letting Morrissey’s crooning voice wash over me.

A strong hand spread across my back, holding me upright. “Watch yourself!”

“What’s your name?” I slurred in his ear as he pressed me against his chest.

“Kent.” A wide smile cracked across his impish face. “And what do they call you, lovely?” His hand slipped over my hip, tracing an invisible oval up against my spine and down across my ass. I was far from caring about Mr. Grabby Hands at that point. If he could keep me from thinking about Finn for five minutes, he was a viable candidate for at least one evening.

Moving to the music, I traced the studs marking the lapels of his jacket, mumbling lyrics under my breath in reply.

“What?”

A giggle escaped my lips, and I doubled over with laughter, my power tingling in my hands, the desire to travel, to move objects, to smash wards bubbling up inside me. The guitar riff blurred in and out, and a surge of energy rushed through my body. I needed release, the pain of holding it in overflowing through me.

Kent leaned in closer, his lips brushing against my ear. He smelled like clove cigarettes, whiskey, and man. “You wanna dance?”

Any Fae can dance.

I flung my arm around Kent’s broad shoulders. “Yes!” But it sounded more like “Yesssh,” which only made me laugh harder.

Pulling me out onto the dance floor, he placed his hands on my hips and I closed my eyes, moving with the beat. One of his hands swept across my shoulders, and I shivered, the press of his fingers guiding me where to go, bringing me in close to him until I could almost taste the alcohol on his breath. His hips brushed close to mine, and a hot spring of desire uncoiled in my abdomen, the music moving our bodies in perfect rhythm.

The song ended and Nine Inch Nails blasted in my ear. Kent’s hands practically held me up, strong and capable. I could lose myself in those hands. Forget everything.

Erika danced over to me and whispered in my ear over the music, “He’s cute.”

“He’ll do,” I whispered back.

Kent disappeared for a minute and came back with a round of bright green shots for all of us. I slammed back the licorice-tasting alcohol and coughed, a wave of nausea rising in my throat.

“You okay?” Kent put a hand on my shoulder.

His words came from the end of a long dark tunnel, his face blurring in the strobe light.

“I…I think I need to sit down,” I said in a garbled string of consonants, my lips numb. I took a step toward the bar, but my feet tangled together. I stumbled, banging my knee on a table. Kent’s arms propped me up, leading me across the dance floor. The world tilted out of focus, and before I knew it, the cold January night hit my face, a door clicking shut behind me. A stream of snowflakes spit through the glow of a single streetlight.

“What…where…” My mouth was full of cotton balls, and my back slammed against cold brick.

“Shhh…”

Warm lips pressed against mine, someone kissing me, a hand inching up beneath my shirt. Finn’s face swam to the surface of my mind’s eye, his eyes staring at me through the mirror. This felt wrong. Wrong hands, wrong mouth. Revulsion bubbled up in my stomach, and I broke off the kiss, trying to push Kent away, but my arms felt like concrete. My consciousness crumbled away, my knees buckling.

“It’s too bad I have to kill you, aisling,” Kent whispered huskily in my ear. “I would have liked to have played with you a little.”

Aisling? Oh, right. That’s me.

I tried to form the word “no,” but darkness folded over my mind, leaving me paralyzed. Beneath the haze of too many shots, a burst of panic bolted through me. But my body felt buried under layers of a thick fog, pressing me deeper into a warm oblivion. Something cold and sharp trailed along my cheek, and my eyes fluttered open.

A knife. That’s a knife.

The pain triggered me back to consciousness, the freezing wind filling my lungs.

“No!” I threw Kent back against the alley with a blast of energy.

He slammed into the wall with a cry of pain. My body spent, I crumpled to the ground, in the snow, trying feebly to crawl away, the stench of garbage making me gag. Kent’s hands tangled in my hair, savagely pulling my head up to meet his gaze.

“Don’t…” But the word came out in the barest whisper.

A ring of steel and a scream echoed through the alley. Kent broke his hold, and I collapsed facedown in the snow, my nose burning from the icy sting. Blinking and shaking snowflakes from my eyelashes, I looked up to find Finn towering over us, his sword raised and dripping with blood.