Ides of the May (Children of the May 2 - updates weekly)

Chapter Two: Arrivals and Departures

I heard the first of the new arrivals before I saw him. He was screaming at the top of his voice as he climbed the steep stone bank from the water up to the first rise of the cliffs. The hoarse rattle in his voice suggested he was very much used to shouting.

‘EEEEEEEEEEEVIL! I SENSE EEEEEEEEEEEVIL IN THIS PLACE. GOD THE FATHER SAVE ME! GOD THE SON PROTECT ME! HOLY SPIRIT LIGHT MY WAY WITH RIGHTEOUS FIRE!’

He appeared over the ridge. He looked as wild as his voice, tall, bearded, and dressed in ragged robes. Around his neck he wore a heavy metal cross on a thick chain. His head snapped south and then north, looking for the evil he sensed. He turned back to the harbour.

‘GIRL!’ he screamed at someone behind him. ‘GIRL, WHERE IS THE EEEEEEEVIL IN THIS PLACE? WHERE WILL I STRUGGLE FOR MY LORD?’

‘I will show you, Nacien,’ said a lovely, strange voice from below. It spoke British in a small range of tones, with an odd music compared to the way we natives speak it, but it sounded no less beautiful for that – more lovely, even. I left my hiding place and ran towards the harbour’s lip, my heart leaping in my chest.

She appeared over the ridge as I approached, every bit as beautiful as when we had stood together on the harbour before she sailed the others away. The same black, straight hair, the same brown eyes and dark skin. Nacien pointed to me as I approached, but I dashed past him, and in a moment Palomina was in my arms. I lifted her up, and span her around – I was quite a bit taller than her now – and kissed her mouth.

‘EEEEEEEEEVIL!’ screamed Nacien in my ear. ‘FALSE DEVIL!’

Through the touch of moisture on Palomina’s lips I felt her joy at seeing me again. There was something dark lurking below the surface of her mind, but for the moment her thoughts were as dominated by delight as mine.

‘I told you I would come back,’ she said as I put her down. She looked up at me. ‘You became tall these last months.’

I realised then that my glamour was still on. It had become second nature to me to wear it by this time and I rarely took it off, even when I was sleeping.

‘I grew,’ I lied.

‘And your speech?’

‘My stutter just went away one day. I don’t know.’ I swept back my hair. ‘I haven’t been talking to myself all that much, I promise.’

Nacien shoved himself between us. ‘BEHIND ME, GIRL!’ he screamed. ‘I WILL PROTECT YOU FROM EEEEEEEEEEVIL!’ His breath gave the impression he existed entirely on turnips.

‘No, Nacien,’ said Palomina, pulling back on his shoulder. ‘This is my friend, the Christian I told you about. The one you’re here to replace.’

The man’s eyes burned at me. He didn’t move. I fixed on the cross around his neck.

‘Our Father, who art in heaven,’ I said gently, reciting the prayer I had learned from the book by Matthew.

He looked baffled at first, but by the time I reached the part of prayer that says lead us not into temptation, he was hugging me to him like a brother. His clothes smelled as bad as his breath, stale and overworn. It took me a while to extract myself from his arms.

‘WHERE IS THE EEEEEEEEEVIL, BOY?’ he screamed in my face.

‘That way.’ I gestured down the coast in the direction of the castle.

He strode off ahead of us, and Palomina grabbed my magically-shaped arm, pressing herself against me.

‘He’s here to replace me?’ I said.