The Truth Against the World Read online

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  The Truth Against the World © 2014 by Sarah Jamila Stevenson.

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Cover models used for illustrative purposes only and may not endorse or represent the book’s subject.

  First e-book edition © 2014

  E-book ISBN: 9780738740973

  Book design by Bob Gaul

  Cover design by Lisa Novak

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  To Gramp

  1

  Llewyrchid gwir yn nhywyll.

  Truth shines in the dark.

  Welsh proverb

  “Right over there, behind the old church.” Gareth’s mother pointed. “You used to love rolling down that hill. Over and over until you got dizzy.” She laughed, the wind blowing her pale hair out of its ponytail and whipping it around.

  Gareth glanced up from his phone. The hill looked a lot smaller than it had seemed in his memory. It soared gently upward, its grassy flanks covered in purple and yellow wildflowers. The trail they were on meandered past it, looping around picturesque ruins and mysterious heaps of stones before ending in a rocky cliff overlooking the sea.

  “Good thing we left Tommy back at the house with Great-Granddad,” he said. “He’d start rolling around and we’d never get him to leave.”

  “Bit chilly out here for a little tyke,” his dad said, zipping his nylon jacket closed.

  That was true. The gusts blowing in from the Bristol Channel carried the tang of salt, and misty gray clouds formed a cottony ceiling that stretched to the horizon. Gareth could feel the clammy moisture condensing on his face as he walked. Still, it wasn’t so bad out here. Quiet.

  Maybe too quiet. He should have brought his earphones.

  He looked back down, his thumbs flying over the keypad of his mobile.

  Wales: land of sheep, rain, and boredom. He found Amit’s name in his contacts list and hit Send. A reply came a moment later.

  Told u. Should’ve stayed in London this week.

  He remembered coming to this spot with his dad, about a year before their family moved to London. The two of them had spent the afternoon making grave rubbings, and then they’d gone back down to the beach for a picnic. In those days they’d spent a lot of weekends in the village, driving out from Swansea to visit Great-Granddad.

  Nice scenery, tho. Rolling hills. Bit of a workout.

  Just like yr mum last night.

  Gareth huffed a laugh.

  “Gareth! Look where you’re going,” his mother called, somewhere behind him. He stopped short, just in time to avoid tripping over a half-fallen rock wall, and almost dropped his phone. “Keep hold of that thing!” she added. “I’m not paying for a new one.”

  “It’s truly amazing.” His dad came up the path, a little breathless. “You spend the entire week whinging about being bored, so we take you somewhere, and then you spend the entire time texting your friends.” He exchanged a look with Gareth’s mum. “We could have left you at the house and had a lovely quiet afternoon.”

  “Sorry,” Gareth said.

  “A romantic afternoon,” his mother added.

  Gareth groaned. “Go ahead then. I’ll catch you in a sec.”

  The truth was, it wouldn’t be such a bad place if somebody actually bothered to care for it. The building that used to be a church was nothing but a ruin. Piles of rocks and rubble; a tumble of headstones. A few dried remains of flower bouquets. Presumably that meant someone made the occasional visit, but nobody was around today except for Gareth and his parents. The place was silent except for the ocean’s murmur.

  He walked behind one of the fallen walls and was about to kick at a knee-high pile of stones, encrusted with lime-green lichen, when he realized it was a cairn—some villager’s memorial to a lost loved one. A plaque of dark gray slate was embedded in the ground in front of it, weeds and shrubs encroaching on its edges.

  He was about to walk on when the inscription caught his eye. Hunching in his jacket against the chilly breeze, he stooped to look closer.

  Er Cof Cariadus ~ In Loving Remembrance

  “Our Little Girl”

  Olwen Nia Evans

  1944–1950

  That was depressing.

  A corner of metal was sticking up out of the dirt, half-buried in the ground next to the plaque. He nudged it with his toe, but it didn’t move. An urn, probably. Disgusting and depressing. He took a photo with his phone, in case anybody asked him how he spent his spring holidays. Then he took a photo of himself making a pathetic face, the grayish-blue sea in the background, and sent it to Amit with a note that said nary an Internet in sight. pity me.

  Shuffling along through the gathering mist, Gareth scrolled through the photos he’d taken at dinner the previous night in his great-granddad’s kitchen. He particularly liked the one where his little brother was standing on his chair and his great-granddad had his eyes raised to the heavens as if wondering how he’d been cursed with this family.

  Seemingly out of nowhere, a crooked headstone loomed up at him, the inscription long ago weathered to nothing. He tried to veer around it but tripped, landing on his hands and knees with a grunt, his phone flying off into the gloom. When he looked up after it, his heart sank.

  In front of him was a cromlech, a Neolithic stone monument. It had a huge, slablike capstone several feet thick, gray and weathered, that was supported by squat, smaller boulders. Though the top of the structure was higher than his head, the gatelike opening between the stones only came up to his shoulders; beneath it, a dark hollow yawned into the ground. A white shroud of water vapor rose from the grass around it, as if it wasn’t already creepy enough.

  Gareth shivered involuntarily. “Mum is going to kill me,” he muttered. He’d better at least try to retrieve his phone, even if it was broken. He approa
ched the hole and peered in.

  It was dark inside, but he thought he could see the dirt floor a few feet down. Cromlechs were supposed to be ancient burial chambers, but he really did not want to think about that. He needed his phone.

  Gareth lowered himself to a sitting position and scooted forward until his legs dangled inside the opening. He still couldn’t quite feel the floor, so he pushed off and dropped down, landing in a crouch. A cloud of dirt and dust swirled up from where his feet had landed, obscuring the weak sunlight. He squinted into the shadows of the cave. The chamber inside was about five feet high and just a bit wider, but he couldn’t tell how long it extended. His phone couldn’t have gone far, though.

  He started feeling around, scooting ahead inch by inch until he was completely underneath the earthen ceiling, the opening a wide square of light behind and above him. He patted the dirt floor around him and hoped he didn’t find something other than the phone. Of course, if he did, it would officially become the most exciting trip to Wales he’d ever had.

  “Who are you?”

  Gareth jumped, knocking his head hard on the packed, rocky soil above him. The voice was high and soft, and he took darting glances all around, searching for its source, his heart racing.

  Off to one side, half-hidden by the shadows, was a little girl, small and thin. She had wispy dark hair and was wearing a white dress. He blinked, sure it must be a trick of the light, but she was still there.

  “You gave me a heart attack,” he said.

  “What are you doing here?” the girl asked sternly, with a strong Welsh cadence.

  “What are you doing here?” Gareth said. Little urchin. No doubt her parents were somewhere up on the path looking for her.

  “I asked first!” she said, shuffling her feet soundlessly.

  “Oh. I dropped my mobile.” Gareth rubbed gingerly at the sore spot on his temple and looked around again. There wasn’t much down here that he could see. He moved toward the girl. Maybe she had the phone. “Do you need me to help you out of here?”

  She backed away. “You’re not supposed to be down here,” she shrilled. Her face showed a slight frown in the dim light. She peered closer at him, and then her face relaxed, as if she’d recognized him. “But it’s all right. You came to visit then, didn’t you! My name is Olwen.” Even as she smiled, her gaze shifted away, restless.

  “Olwen?” Gareth thought back to the plaque at the other end of the churchyard, the one that said “Olwen Nia Evans.” Interesting coincidence. She was probably playing a game. He crouched down in the dirt, trying to seem nonthreatening. “Who are you? Where’s your mum and dad?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, seeming momentarily confused. Then she giggled. “You can be my friend if you want. I think you’re funny!”

  Funny. Something was definitely funny about this girl. Gareth’s head pounded. He needed to find his phone, and then he needed to get out of here and find his parents. They were much better at coaxing small children. He straightened up as much as he could, and finally caught sight of his phone glinting in the girl’s hand.

  “You found it! My mobile.” He reached his hand out, slowly, as if she were a shy cat. “Please?”

  She looked down. “This?” The phone’s screen momentarily flashed on. She met his gaze again, her eyes questioning. But she never moved from the shadows.

  “We’re—we’re friends, right?” Gareth said, a bit desperately. He decided to try to play along. “I came to visit you, yeah? So, er, if you give me back my phone, I’ll be able to ring you up, because we’re friends.”

  Her eyes widened, and a tiny hint of a smile brightened her wan face. “We are friends,” she said.

  She held the phone out to him, but the moment he reached for it, she snatched it back. “Wait.” She peered more closely at it, tilting her head, curious and intent. Her fingers hovered over the keys for a moment, not touching them, and he could have sworn he saw a spark flare in the dark. He gritted his teeth.

  “Don’t play with it,” he said, trying not to sound impatient. The girl was as bad as Tommy.

  “Only promise me that you’ll come back to visit me? I’m so lonely.” Her voice faded, as soft as an echo. “I won’t let you go unless you promise.”

  “Of course, I promise,” Gareth said, resisting the urge to roll his eyes.

  She smiled and held out the phone. When he leaned forward to grab it, a static charge jolted his fingers and he almost dropped it again. Pocketing the phone, he rubbed his hand on his pants to ease the tingling. His head had started to throb again, too, and he sank to his knees for a moment, the shadows spinning around him until the dizziness passed.

  Straightening, he turned just in time to see his dad’s head peering in from the opening above.

  “For God’s sake, Gareth. What are you doing in there? On second thought,” his dad said, “don’t tell me.” He reached a hand down. “Here; I’ll pull you up. Quick, before Mum notices.”

  “Thanks.” Gareth got to his feet carefully, brushing the dirt off his jeans. He stretched for his dad’s hand and then hesitated. “Wait, Dad. What about the little girl? She’s lost her parents or something … ” He looked back into the shadows.

  Olwen was gone.

  2

  Four white trefoils sprang up behind her wherever she went; and for that reason she was called Olwen, of the white track…

  “Kilhwch and Olwen,” from The Mabinogion,

  in The Red Book of Hergest

  I still felt like I was caught in a dream; my mind, all cobwebs. Seven a.m.

  By seven p.m., we’d be back home again and everything would be different.

  I pulled on a block-printed skirt and sat on the edge of the bed, lacing up my calf-high boots, then paused for a moment, listening to the prerecorded voice coming through my computer speakers.

  “Mae’r tywydd yn braf, ” I repeated haltingly, trying to concentrate. The weather is fine. “Sut dych chi? ” How are you?

  “Olwen ydw i.” My name is Olwen.

  With every repetition, I tried to remember how Gee Gee, my great-grandmother, added that special lilt at the end of every word. When she spoke Welsh, it almost sounded like singing, more magical than ordinary speech.

  I’d learned the words, but I wanted to get it right.

  I swallowed past a sudden lump in my throat and closed my eyes for a moment.

  “Wyn! Five minutes! And bring those empty boxes down with you.”

  I winced, my mother’s voice piercing even through the closed bedroom door. “Coming!” I called.

  With one hand, I grabbed my black sweater off the back of the chair; with the other, I hit Publish on my latest blog post, letting the past few weeks of my life fly off into the ether. Disappearing into unread oblivion, probably, like everything else I’d posted. In a way, it freed me up to write whatever I felt like writing, no matter how weird.

  Language is like music, and each language is a different instrument, one of my posts began. Welsh is like gently plucked harp strings.

  Another one: Finished up book on Norse mythology. Back to the Mabinogion—Ceridwen and Gwion Bach, the original story. So much better than the Black Cauldron movie. Mind blown.

  Or: Sometimes I feel like I’m too strange to relate to anyone. Even my strangeness is strange.

  Ruminations, obsessions, fascinations. Things I couldn’t even talk about with Rae, let alone any of my other friends. But this morning’s post was different.

  It was harder than I’d anticipated: putting into words all the constantly shifting feelings that well up inside you when you find out someone you love is going to die.

  I closed my laptop and grabbed the stack of empty file boxes from under my desk. The drive to Gee Gee’s house in Mendocino would take three hours, and then we’d bring her back here to San Francisco and move her into Mom’s cramped office. The
re was already a hospital bed, delivered yesterday and wedged into the corner under the window.

  “Gwely,” I mumbled, maneuvering the stack of boxes through the hallway and dropping them near the front door. Bed.

  I’d been learning a lot of new words.

  Metastasized. Carcinoma.

  I closed my eyes for a moment and leaned against the wall next to the door.

  My mom walked in, footsteps clacking on the hardwood. “Where’s your father?”

  I shook my head.

  “I need him to hang up his bike so we can put Gee Gee’s boxes on that side of the garage,” she said, dropping a roll of packing tape into my hands as she breezed past into the back of the house.

  I slipped the roll of tape onto my wrist. Everything around me was changing so quickly. But I had to keep up. I had to learn; I had to feel like I was accomplishing something.

  If I didn’t, then I’d have to admit that I really didn’t know anything about anything. That this situation—Gee Gee’s illness—was something I couldn’t control or fix, no matter how many words I repeated to myself, no matter what I wrote or who might read it.

  That night, after hours of driving, of carrying boxes and unpacking the car and moving Gee Gee’s life into our small Victorian-style flat, I was exhausted, and so was Gee Gee. But she called me into her room in Mom’s office anyway.

  She was already holding the musty old book open on her lap, carefully turning its thin, foxed pages until she reached the right spot. This had been our bedtime ritual for years, whenever she visited, but this time it felt different. It felt like there was a catch in my heart.

  Not quite able to look at her, I settled in on the adjustable bed, snuggling in the way I used to when I was little. As a child, I’d had no trouble fitting under the covers beside her, but today, at age fifteen, I felt tall and ungainly next to her fragile frame.

  “‘Kilhwch and Olwen, or the Twrch Trwyth.’” It was a myth from the Mabinogion, a collection of medieval Arthurian legends. A book I’d loved almost to tatters. A story I’d heard a thousand times.