Chapter Forty-Two

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

Two years ago

ERIN

The pregnancy test shows up positive.

She does another one, then another. She stares at the lines on the tests for a long time, her whole body numb. She has no reaction at all. It is as though her brain won’t compute the result, won’t calculate the next steps.

She tells Senna.

“Oh my God,” she says when they meet up in a café. “Are you okay?”

“Not really, no,” Erin says with a nervous laugh. “You’re the only person I’ve told.”

“How far along are you?”

“Well, I’ve only had sex once with a guy this year. So I’d say I’m a month along?”

“Still time to get an abortion, then.”

“Yeah.”

“Is that what you think you’ll do? Get rid of it?”

“Probably. I don’t know.”

Senna’s head tips to the side and she fidgets with the sugar packets.

“Do you…mind if I speak to the Brother about this?”

Erin bites her lip. A voice in her head asks her why she is telling Senna instead of a GP, booking in for a termination. Or perhaps her mother. The answer is there, though difficult to accept—she needs the Triskele’s approval before she acts. She needs their guidance. This baby was conceived while she was crossing the Boundary, after all. And she asked them for guidance about everything now, because they had the Truth. Life was one long maze, and the Triskele was like the watchtower, with a view over the maze.

They know the way out.

A week later, Erin meets with the Brother at a derelict castle in the Trossachs.

“The baby is a very, very special being,” he tells her while they are walking through the old drawing room. “A child has never been conceived during the Beltane ritual, and a child born to someone living beyond the Boundary is incredibly gifted.” He turns to her with his big soft eyes and his bushy Santa Claus beard and takes her hands in his.

“I’m so happy for you, Erin,” he says. “So, so happy.” She melts. It’s not a sexual thing. Rather, she wishes he’d adopt her.

“So I’m to keep it?”

“Yes. Definitely.”

“What about Arlo? Should I tell him?”

“That’s entirely up to you.”

They walk toward one of the windows, where a tree has grown through the frames, all the glass long gone. The enormous stone mantelpiece was still intact. It makes her think of her grandparents’ cottage on the Isle of Mull, where she’d often curl up in the inglenook fireplace and her grandmother called her a little bean. Her grandparents died within three months of each other, both of them, when she was nine. Her mother’s parents. Her paternal grandmother lives in Australia and her grandfather is an even bigger asshole than her dad.

A voice in her head tells her, You’re too young to have a baby. The other says, But it means you’ll have a bigger family.

“I want to remind you of two things,” the Brother says, turning back toward the front entrance of the castle.

“What’s that?”

“The Triskele is your family.”

She looks up sharply, her heart burning inside her. Did he just read her mind?

Another gentle look, and that fatherly smile. “We are here for you, and this baby.”

Erin sighs deeply, a sob rising to her throat. “Thank you,” she says, her voice breaking.

“Secondly, I want to extend an invitation. Remember I told you about the dark book?”

Erin tries to recall. Her training had covered a lot of things, a lot of mystical stuff. She nods anyway.

“This is no accident, Erin,” he says, taking her hand and pressing it between both of his own. “You conceived on Beltane! This is your destiny. Your child is a fire god or goddess of the natural world. You’re amazing, Erin. This is your journey to the Truth!”

She opens her mouth to say something enthusiastic in response, but just then he says, “I have something I want to give you.”

“What is it?” she says.

“Remember the book with black pages?”

She nods. “Yeah?”

“I’m giving it to you for safekeeping.”

He walks her to his car and opens the boot. There, wrapped in a blanket, is the book. She glances at the Brother and notices he seems nervous.

“Take it,” he says. “Please.”

She finds herself lifting it out of the boot, and the look of relief on his face is striking. She shivers.

“What do I do with it?” she says.

“You just hold on to it,” he says. “It’s a valuable item, as you know. And you’ve been initiated, and now you’re carrying a child conceived on Beltane! It’s only right you should have it.”

She wants to say that there are plenty of Triskele members who have been initiated.

“Can’t someone else take it?” she says. “I’m pregnant and this looks fragile, and…”

He shakes his head. “You got your scholarship for free, Erin. The least you can do is take this thing out of my fucking hands.”

She reels at the sharpness in his voice. He’d been so kind, so jolly a moment ago, like a big friendly bear. A father figure. And now he is all sharp edges and brittleness. She tightens her hold on the book and nods.

“Okay,” she says.

“It’s yours,” he says firmly. “Okay?”

She nods. “Okay.”

He smiles, but it’s an odd, broken smile.

“Good luck, Erin.”