“Don’t you worry. I’ll be just fine. Plus, that sofa is as hard as a rock,” Betty protested.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, now go,” Betty said, waving her hand in a shooing motion.
Nora pulled the blankets up around Betty. “We’ll be back soon,” she said as she stepped out of the bedroom. Alistair was by the fire that was now raging in the stone hearth, quickly dispersing the chill in the room.
“She doesn’t want to come out to the sofa. Said it’s hard as a rock. She is eating, and the color is back in her cheeks,” Nora announced as she came to stand next to him.
“As long as the fire burns steadily, it should warm the back area fairly quickly. The cabin isn’t very large, and this fireplaceshould be able to warm the entire place without any trouble,” Alistair reassured her.
“As long as you think it will stay burning until we get back.”
“It will be hours before this even dies down a little. It’s fully stocked. You ready?” he asked, walking away from the fire and opening the door.
Nora followed Alistair into the bitter winter air, Lochland close behind her. They ventured toward the sloping mountain, thick with pine trees and laced with danger.
Chapter Forty-Six
Eyes of Earth and Sky
Gathering an axe and a wood sled from the cottage, Nora and Alistair strolled away from the loch and toward the woodland, Lochland following close behind. As Nora looked up the long sloping hill toward the dark patch of thick evergreens, a sinking feeling that gave way to a pang of anxiety washed over her. The snow had begun falling heavily again, and Nora wondered for a brief moment if she, too, was controlling the weather, like Cora had in the book. The unsettling thought was followed by a burst of biting cold wind that swept up the valley toward them, solidifying the idea in her mind. The small field behind the cabins came into view, and amidst the snow, they encountered an elderly woman, hunched over examining something in her hands.
“What’s that woman doing out here in this cold?” Nora asked Alistair under her breath.
“No idea. She must be from one of the neighboring properties. We should make sure she is okay,” he said, confusion creasing his brow.
The woman was wrapped in a wool cape the color of freshly tilled earth, her gray hair peeking out from beneath a green knit cap. She was plucking withered frozen flowers from the ground, shaking off the snow, then placing them in a wicker basket hanging from her arm.
Alistair gave Nora a skeptical look as they approached.Why be out in this kind of weather collecting dead flowers?Nora wondered as she watched her diligently fill her basket.
“Hello,” Alistair greeted as they approached.
“Hello, fine day for a foraging,” the old woman replied, looking up from her task.
“Aye,” Alistair responded, his tone lacking conviction. “Are you okay?” he inquired.
“Yes, of course. There is no better time to collect these than after the first heavy snow of the year. They become naturally preserved, and the cold has sent all the bugs off to other places to find warmth and shelter,” she said, dusting off the snow from a large flower head.
At first, the idea seemed crazy to Nora, but then she remembered some of the weird things her grandmother used to do, like collecting rainwater in a bucket to wash her hair. She said it was an old beauty trick her mother taught her. Even though they seemed strange today, those kinds of things had been common practice back in the day. Maybe this was the case here as well. Some of the old ways that had been passed down were still alive and thriving within this old woman.
“This storm doesn’t seem to be abating. Maybe you should head back before it gets any worse,” Alistair suggested, gently hinting she should head home.
“Oh, nae bother, I’ll be fine. I’ve been out in much worse than this,” the old woman remarked, plucking another cluster from the ground. Breaking off a few flower heads, she approached Nora. “Later, for tea. You may need it,” she said before returning to her duties. The woman’s white curly hair hung low over her forehead, obscuring her eyes, yet Nora caught a glimpse of what she thought was one bright blue and one brown, but the woman looked away too quickly for a closer inspection. She wondered if her mind was playing tricks on her. She had never seen anyone with two different colored eyes, and now in the past five days, she had come across two people and a dog with the very same condition.Very odd, she thought.
“Thank you. Do you live around here?” Nora asked, politely taking the flowers and tucking them into the oversized pocket of her jacket. Alistair shot her a quizzical look.
“Aye, for a very, very long time.”
“You don’t happen to know who this dog belongs to, do you?” Nora said, looking down at Lochland.
“Yes, I do,” she said, pausing for a long moment, then continued. “You, I believe.” She looked at Nora with her mismatched eyes.
Nora smiled and nodded. That wasn’t the answer she had been hoping for.
“You have a good day and get yourself back home safely,” Alistair said, moving past the old woman, who had resumed her foraging, paying them no mind.
“Well, that was a bit strange,” he remarked once they were out of earshot.
