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her eyes. She couldn’t bear to see the pity on people’s faces. No one gave them anything. There were beggars on every corner and people lined up outside the priest’s house crying to be fed.
    In the late afternoon, they passed out of the town and headed towards the beach. On the far side of the dunes, by the roadside that led up towards the cliffs, they found a ditch where the wind off the harbour couldn’t reach them. They huddled down for the night. Bridie lay awake for a long while, staring up at the stars. She couldn’t understand why she wasn’t weary. Streaks of pale pink and green light began to appear in the sky above her. ‘Maybe the world is near an end,’ she thought. She crawled across to where her mother and brother lay and snuggled in close against her mother’s back.
    That night, as they slept in the open air, Bridie woke to the sound of her mother gasping in pain.
    â€˜Mam, Mam, what is it? What’s wrong?’
    Her mother’s eyes were wild and dark in the moonlight and she pushed Bridie away from her.
    â€˜The baby, the baby’s coming, Bridie.’
    â€˜The baby?’ Bridie held her mother’s sinewy hand and shut her eyes and prayed, prayed as she’d never prayed before. ‘Take the baby, sweet Jesus, but leave us our Mam.’
    When it came, at last, just before dawn, it was a tiny thing, small enough to fit in the palm of Mam’s hand, and its skin was a strange pale green colour in the half-light. A changeling, too small to be human; a girl child, but too strange to be Bridie’s own sister. Bridie stared at it as it lay curled on Mam’s shawl, so still. Her prayer had been answered. Mam’s brow was damp with sweat, her skin clammy to touch. She folded her shawl over the baby and pushed it away from her.
    While her mother slept, Bridie carefully gathered up the tiny changeling and climbed out over the side of the ditch. She walked down to the sea. When she reached the shore, she wrapped the baby in seaweed, winding thick dark strands of kelp around the tiny body. She didn’t hesitate when she reached the water’s edge, walking straight into the icy water. The dark bundle bobbed and weaved on the waves as she released it, floating out to sea, out to the mouth of the harbour, and on to the deep waters of the bay.

6
    Road into darkness
    Bridie woke on damp sand, and in a cloud of whiteness. A thick fog had rolled in over the water and covered the beach while she slept. When she held her hand out in front of her, she could barely see the outline of her fingers. She sat up and drew her knees against her chest. She was chilled to her marrow, and her ragged clothes were heavy with dew. The sound of the waves rolling in and her own jagged breathing was muffled by the fog; and yet she could hear voices – her father, the O’Farrells, little Paddy, and even the strange changeling baby. It was as if they were all just out of her sight, but she felt their presence so strongly that she could almost imagine the touch of their hands on her skin. For a moment she wondered if she too was close to death. Maybe this wasn’t a fog at all, but the dream place between living and dying. Maybe she had been washed away, beyond the ninth wave to a new world. But the cold sand beneath her felt rough against her skin and she could hear her own heart beating, blood pounding at her temples. She stood up slowly. Like a blind girl, one hand stretched before her, she walked into the swirling mist. She could still hear voices in the fog, but now they sounded real and warm and firm, not the voices of the dead. She couldn’t decide which direction they came from. It was the brightness that caught her eye and guided her forward. She stared at the point of light, a small flicker of orange and gold in the still, heavy mist.
    There were a dozen people gathered around the blaze. Bridie stepped into the ring of light cast by the fire. No