‘He said Hunters searched the house a few months ago. Deborah overheard them saying something about the “incompetents at the Council”. They had a feeling that you had escaped.
‘He asked what they did to you and where you were kept. I told him that I didn’t know. I told him you were well.’
‘Thank you. You didn’t tell him about the tattoos?’
‘No. You said not to.’ She takes a breath and tries to smile. ‘I asked about Annalise too.’ Ellen’s tone isn’t promising. ‘He’s never spoken to her since you left. Even at parties and weddings he and Deborah aren’t allowed near her. He heard that she had a small Giving ceremony.’
She was seventeen last September. ‘She still goes to school, doesn’t she?’
‘I didn’t ask that. I got the feeling he didn’t like talking about her.’
‘Yeah, well. He disapproves of me and her.’
‘Why?’
‘He thinks I’m asking for trouble. Her family are very White, brilliant White. Pure as they come. Involved with the Council … Hunters.’
‘She doesn’t sound your type.’
‘She’s not like them.’
And she is my type, very much my type.
‘You’re not thinking of going back to see her?’
I think about it a lot, though I know it would be stupid.
Ellen says, ‘I told Arran where I live in London. He said we should meet up, maybe. I thought that I could get messages to him for you. I’d be like the go-between.’
I don’t know. It might be better if I never contact them again. But if anyone could do it Ellen could.
I say, ‘Ellen, I don’t want to get you into trouble with the Council.’
‘Ha! Too late for that.’
She gets out her mobile phone. ‘I took a photo of Arran. And a short video.’
I tell myself I’m not going to cry, not in front of Ellen, and I’m OK at first. Arran looks a little older, but his hair is the same. He’s pale but he looks good. He tries to smile and doesn’t quite manage it. He tells me a little about what he’s doing at university, and about Deborah and David, and then he tells me how he’s missed me and wants to see me but knows it’s impossible. He hopes I’m well, really well, not just physically but inside myself too, and says he’s always believed in me and knows I’m a good person, and he hopes I can get away, that I must be careful who I trust and that I must leave them all behind, how he and Deborah will be fine and will be happy knowing I am free and that is how he’ll think of me, happy and free, always.
I have to walk away for a bit after watching it. And I so want to see Arran for real and be with him and I know I can’t. I can’t ever do that.
Later I thank Ellen for helping me. I’m not sure what else to do. I offer her some money but she doesn’t want any, so we have fish and chips and sit in the park eating them. I tell her she has to go back to her dad and she complains, but not much.
She selects a chip and asks me what I’m going to do next.
‘Get three gifts.’
‘You’re going to find Mercury, then.’
And I wonder about Ellen. ‘What do Half Bloods do, Ellen? Do they have Givings? Do they have Gifts?’
‘They don’t have Givings unless the Council allows it, which only happens rarely and also means working for them in exchange for them allowing the ceremony. I’ll never work for the Council; they despise us. All witches do. But I’ve heard of a few Half Bloods in the past who have had Givings from their witch parent and have found their Gift. My gran’s too terrified of the Council to even see me; she’ll never help me.’
‘So? What are you going to do? If you can’t get three gifts from your gran or the Council?’
‘I don’t know yet. There’s always Mercury. But she’s the absolute last resort.’
‘What do you know about her?’
‘She’s a nasty piece of work. Rumour has it she makes slaves of little girls. So I’m not racing over for her help just yet. You shouldn’t trust her.’ Ellen picks a fat chip.
‘I’m not a little girl.’
‘She doesn’t make slaves of little boys; she eats them.’ Ellen pops the chip into her mouth.
‘You serious?’
Ellen nods and swallows. ‘That’s what I heard.’ She selects another chip and looks up at me. ‘Not raw. She cooks them first.’
part five
gabriel
geneva
Geneva Airport. The journey here was stressful: working out how to get a flight, flying and worst of all standing at passport control. Though my passport worked fine.
The instructions on the piece of paper Trev gave me say to be at the revolving glass doors at 11 a.m. on Tuesday. There are people walking in and out of the glass doors. People of all ages: business people with mini wheeled suitcases, air hostesses with micro wheeled suitcases, pilots with black-leather wheeled cases, holidaymakers with huge wheeled cases. Everybody is moving quickly, not really rushing, not in bad moods, just getting to where they are going.