the tiny cove. There, they washed away the blood in the sea and dabbed at their wounds, resting on the sand until their tension eased.
Once he had recovered enough, Church took out the Wayfinder for what he hoped would be the final time. Its flame pointed across the strait to a point slightly along the coast. He checked his watch; it was just past noon. 'If we hurry, we can find it and be prepared to make our stand by nightfall,' he said.
Back on the mainland they hauled their few possessions to the van and set off out of town along a winding coast road that ran through beautiful, unspoilt countryside. After a few miles, the lantern pointed them down a side road which picked its way through the sleepy village of Manorbier, where they bought sandwiches, packets of crisps and Coke. At the end of a steep, tree-lined lane, they found themselves in another secluded cove. They parked in a large but nearly deserted car park near to the stony beach where the flame finally resumed its upright position.
'Where now?' Laura asked.
Shavi pointed to a ruined castle which could just be glimpsed through the trees.
They ate lunch in the van and bantered with new-found vigour, buoyed by their success on Caldey. Church and Ruth led the way to the twelfth century castle atop a red sandstone spur, still partly occupied by its current owners. Inside the gates it was quite small, a lawned area the size of a football pitch lying at the heart of the crumbling battlements. Tom bought a guidebook from the tiny castle shop for reference, which he read while smoking a joint on a wooden bench. The others wandered around looking for a sign of the way forward.
Half an hour later, having futilely scoured the castle from top to bottom, they met up in the shade of the chapel. 'I knew it was going too well.' Church checked his watch anxiously.
'What do you expect-neon signs?' Laura said. 'These things are supposed to be near-impossible to find.'
'Except for us,' Church stressed. 'We're fated to find them, remember?'
Laura bristled. 'Nice line in patronising. When was your coronation?'
'Sorry.' The tension was making them all irritable; Church could see it in their faces, their body language. Unchecked, he was afraid it might tear them apart. 'We'll start looking again-'
'Maybe we're in the wrong place,' Veitch suggested. 'It could be buried under the car park.'
Church shook his head. 'This place fits the trend. It has to be here.'
Ruth looked to Shavi. 'You could do something. Like you did in Glastonbury.'
Shavi recalled uneasily how much the exercise in Glastonbury had taken out of him; there was one point when he feared he might have been consumed by the powers he was unleashing, but he didn't let the others see his thoughts. 'I seem to have an aptitude for certain shamanistic skills,' he agreed in response to Church's enquiring expression. 'In the right conditions, the right frame of mind, I can communicate with the invisible world.'
Veitch looked at him as if he were speaking a foreign language. 'Talk to ghosts?'
'Everything has a spirit, Ryan. People, animals, ghosts. Throughout history shamans have contacted them in search of knowledge.' Veitch sniffed derisively. 'I have always felt I had certain abilities, though unfocused, raw, but since the change that has come over the world they seem sharper.'
'I think we're all adapting,' Ruth said. There was something in her tone that made them feel uncomfortable.
'You're simply achieving your potential,' Tom said. 'That's why you've all been selected.'
'You have to survive to achieve potential,' Church said with irritation. 'Look, this isn't getting us anywhere. Shavi, if you can do something, anything, do it. If not, let's get searching.'
In the end, Shavi agreed he would find a quiet place to attempt a divination while the others continued the hunt. Accompanied by Church, they settled on an area where they were unlikely to be disturbed, in a secluded corner of the ruined hall where thistles and willowherb grew with abandon. It was a fencedoff, sheltered space under an overhanging stairway that ended in thin air.
'I normally do this alone,' Shavi said, taking a mouthful of mushrooms from a tightly wound plastic bag hidden in his jacket, 'but there is no time to recover from the trip. I fear I will be of little use to you for a while afterwards.'
'I don't care if we have to carry you round on a stretcher as long as you give us something we can use,' Church said. He sat on a lump of masonry while Shavi adopted a cross-legged position against the wall. 'This stuff really works, then?'
'Sometimes. Never quite in the way I hope, but enough to make it worthwhile. It is not scientific. If there are any rules, I have no idea what they might be.'
'That sounds like a mantra for this new age,' Church said wearily.
'It was always that way, Jack. Before, we lied to ourselves or listened to religious leaders and scientists who lied to themselves. Perhaps one of the good things that will come out of all this is that people will start searching for meaning within themselves.'
'You have a very optimistic view of human nature.' Church let his eyes rise up the cracked grey walls to the clear blue sky above. 'Sometimes I think there's no meaning in anything. Just random events impacting on one another. Chaos giving the illusion of a coherent plan.' But his words were lost; Shavi was already immersed in his inner world.
For half an hour, nothing happened. Church became increasingly agitated as Shavi sat stock-still and silent, his eyes closed. But just as Church was about to give in to the futility of the moment, Shavi began to mumble, barely audibly to begin with, but then increasingly louder; Church had the uneasy sensation that he was hearing one side of a conversation.
'Yes.'
'We are searching for something. You know what.'
'That is correct.'
'No. Everyone is to be trusted.'
'Why do you say that?'
'Everyone is to be trusted.'
'Yes, I am sure. Will you guide me to the item we need to find?'
'I will accept responsibility if things go wrong. Of course I will.'
'Yes.'
'And we will find it there?'
'Thank you for your guidance. Now I must-'
'What do you want to show me?'
'Oh.'
There was a long humming silence in which Church realised he was holding his breath waiting for the next part of the unsettling conversation. Shavi's lips seemed to quiver as if he were about to speak; Church leaned forward in anticipation.
Suddenly Shavi's eyes burst wide open and he let out a deep, strangled cry. Church leapt back in shock. 'I see it!' he gasped. Blood bubbled out of one nostril and trickled down to his lip.
Recovering quickly, Church jumped forward and grabbed Shavi by the shoulders, afraid he was about to have some kind of fit. 'Are you okay? I can get help.'
Although Shavi's eyes were open, he was not looking at anything Church could see; his pupils were fixed on a distant horizon. 'I see it!' he repeated. 'Coming across the land, like someone drawing a black sheet. They are here! They are everywhere!' He swallowed noisily. 'The city is burning! We walk over bodies heaped in the road. There is no hope anywhere. Everyone is dead. What did they do? They brought him back. Balor!' He coughed a mouthful of blood on to the stony ground. 'Balor.'
The word sent a shiver through Church. Suddenly he was back in the mine, listening to Tom's croaking voice recounting the terrible history of the Fomorii. 'Balor,' he repeated fearfully. Their long-dead leader, all-powerful, monstrously evil. The one-eyed god of death who almost destroyed the world.
Church prevented Shavi slumping sideways, then, holding him under his arms, dragged him to his feet. He was afraid to take Shavi out into the main part of the castle in case someone saw, but the fear that he might be on the verge of a coma or heart attack drove him on. As Church struggled to walk with him, though, Shavi seemed to recognise what Church was doing.
'Leave me,' he croaked. 'Fine … fine … just need time.'
Church was torn, but when Shavi protested more insistently, Church went along with his wishes. He laid him
