“But never at the same time.” I think back on my own most recent death, decidedly nondescript compared to the ones that preceded it. “Seeing where you—Olympia—had died split my reality. I was never the same, could never be the same.”
“And your father…” She shudders. “Is he gone?” I can see that she hates him with something deep inside her. It’s a visceral reaction most have to him, and it’s good to see she has some genetic memory to avoid him.
“Everything was taken from him in the divorce, and what little he had left, he squandered on whisky and women and I don’t want to know what else.”
“He lost it all.”
I nod. “Even Leith.”
“So, he’s still alive? He still walks the physical realm?” she whispers.
“He does. For now. Madness grips his days, and he drinks himself to sleep with whisky. I assume he lives somewhere on Skye, but I don’t know. I tried to have him arrested, I went to the local constable and explained his crimes, but he ignored me. Even Keats refused to bear witness to my father’s horrors.”
She nods, eyes downcast. “Do you see him?”
“Never.”
“What about the others?” she asks.
“Others?”
“The women he hurt. There are others.”
“How do you know?”
“I feel it.” She blinks away tears then looks up at the sky. “Like the stars, they’re hiding in plain sight all around us.”
Anxiety ripples my muscles as I realize what she’s saying. “Fable—”
“We have to find them.”
“Where? How? We really don’t have time once you realize—”
“It doesn’t matter. They need to be found. They need justice.”
I sigh, frustration settling over me. “It sounds like you’re looking for revenge.”
“I am.” She stands, looking as if a new strength is charging through her veins with her fresh purpose.
“We really, really don’t have time for this revenge-plot thing, Fable.”
She turns, looking down at me and grinning. “I know where to look.”
“Fable.” I groan as she pulls on my arm.
I willingly shove off the step, standing at her side. “There’s more to say,” I caution.
“Then say it.” She grins. “While we walk.”
“Where are we walking to, then?”
“The evidence.” She cocks an eyebrow, then glances up at the moon and smiles. “We have all the light we need. I bet the tide is low.”
And then I realize she does remember; something in her remembers like I do. But only she feels it, and I, in my mind’s eye, can see it.
Without words, we both hurry down the path. I force her to hold my hand, because I don’t trust her not to slip and fall as we follow the bottom edge of the loch. We climb the stone walk that leads over the heather hill and then pick along the gravestones as we aim for the path that will lead us past Leith and down to the cave. By the time we’re there, I’m damp with the mist that clings to everything, and her hair is wet at the ends as it shimmers with silver streaks in the moonlight.
She’s stunning by night, but she always has been.
