Watching a young family in the seats opposite on the train up to Edinburgh, Faye had given motherhood a lot of thought. A mother, about her age, was keeping two little ones occupied – a toddler boy, who wanted to walk up and down the train carriage continually, and an older girl of about five, who sat quietly, colouring in a book with fierce concentration. Faye watched the mother’s face move from bright to tired, through patience to irritation over and over again as she walked with the toddler, talked quietly to the girl about her pictures; as they played a game over lunch, and as the toddler snuggled into her for a sleep.
Could I do that?Faye wondered as the mother caught her eye and smiled.Do I have that in me, that patience?She didn’t know. It was another kind of power, another kind of strength, to do everything for others, all the time. She guessed that the mother might have a day job, too.Did she have a partner to help with it all?Faye wondered. If Faye had the baby, she’d be alone. And, if Moronoe was right, Levantiana would take the baby unless Faye did something drastic. Unless she used all of her power to defeat the king and queen of Murias once and for all.
Faye wandered to the kitchenette and found a box of peppermint tea bags in the cupboard. She filled and boiled the kettle, glad she’d paid all the bills when she was away. Some part of her had known that London was temporary, even if she hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself.
She leaned against the kitchen worktop and looked back out into the shop, thinking suddenly about Finn Beatha. It felt like such a long time since he’d first walked into the shop and changed her life completely. She felt a sudden urge to go to Black Sands Beach and feel the wet sand between her toes; it had always been her special place.
She drank her tea and pocketed an energy bar from a box in the cupboard, pulling her coat around her. Abercolme in January was cold, and the wind and rain had no mercy, but she went, nonetheless. It was hers; she was at home in its icy winds and under its dark skies.
The village was quiet. Faye nodded to a few people she knew; now that she’d been seen, the rumours would start.Faye Morgan’s back. Aye, not with that boyfriend, though. Wonder what happened there. And before long the gossip would take into account that she was pregnant.An’ with a bairn too, with no dad. They’d shake their heads.All ye expect from a Morgan, aye.
Perhaps Faye was being unfair. The village opinion of her had certainly changed after Midsummer when she’d helped the survivors at the concert. But people only remembered their own version of events.
The beach was dark, but Faye knew her way. The tide was halfway in, and the waves were choppy, blown by the winter wind. Despite the cold, she took off her shoes and socks and rolled up her jeans. She could still just about get into them – before long she’d have to start wearing those pregnancy jeans she’d seen in shops.
The ice-cold water slashed at her ankles as she waded in further, keeping in front of the point where the pebbly sand dropped off in a sudden ledge a few feet out. Her jeans weren’t rolled up far enough, and the water soaked them on the second wave, but she didn’t care. It was so good to be back; to feel the freshness of the air and taste the salt on her lips. She closed her eyes and breathed the sea in as she’d done countless times.
For the first time in months, Faye relaxed. Sorrow rose up in her throat, and she let it. She let the tears come and the wail tear itself from her. Spectral, it echoed over the beach, thrust back to the land by the force of the wind on the tide. She wept for Aisha,who she hadn’t been able to save. For Rav, who she’d met on the beach.I need help, she screamed into the night.I can’t raise this baby alone. I don’t know what to do. Please, help me.
The wind screamed back at her. It pulled at her hair, whipping her long plait across her face like a slap. The water pushed at her feet, trying her balance. Faye dropped to her knees, despair filling her.I can’t do this. I can’t do this.
There was a hand on her shoulder, and Faye cried out, stumbling to her feet.
Gabriel Black caught her, and she clutched in desperation at him, burying her head in his chest.
‘Hush, hush,’ he whispered as Faye sobbed. With a sudden drop in wind, the tide calmed, and they stood together, ankle-deep in the freezing water. ‘Faye. All will be well, I promise,’ he said. They held on to each other under the moonlight: two suffering souls that desperately needed a friend.
40
Excerpt from Grainne Morgan’s diary
17 March 1590
The witchfinders have arrived in North Berwick and have set up a tribunal there. I have heard that the sheriffs are rounding up men and women from the local villages, though it is mostly women.
All this is an excuse: these evangelical hatemongers resent women for their power to make life. They know they cannot make it themselves, and rather than honour women as was always the way in the old times, they seek to control our bodies for their own purposes. If they cannot own it, they will nail it to a mast and kill it.
Time is short. I fear the worst, though Gwyn says he will protect me. An ill wind blows. I fear for the future of the Morgan women.
When Faye opened the door to the shop, Gabriel reached up for the hag stone charm that hung by the door. Grandmother had made the charm before she was born, threading pebbles with natural holes in them onto a thick string and chanting a spell of protection over it. It was old lore that if you looked through the hole in a hag stone, you could see the faeries that were usually invisible to human eyes; it exposed spells and rendered them useless.
‘Morgan magic?’ Gabriel smiled wanly. When Faye turned on the shop lights, she saw how gaunt he was; he’d hardly improved since she’d last seen him a couple of weeks ago. Faye nodded, not remarking on his grey pallor or the dark circles under his eyes.
‘It’s a protection. Against the fae,’ she replied. ‘Come in and get warm. I’ll light the hearth.’ The bottom of her jeans were still wet where the sea had splashed them, and she was chilled to the bone.
‘Can it protect me from nightmares?’ Gabriel shuffled in behind her and folded himself carefully into the chair by the fireplace. Faye knelt, arranging kindling, and sat back on her heels as it caught, waiting to add the dry wood stacked in a basket next to the hearth. He closed his eyes as the firelight started flickering over their faces. Faye regarded him cautiously.
‘I don’t think so.’ She wouldn’t lie to him – the nightmares would be with him a long time. Yet, Faye didn’t ask whetherGabriel’s terror was the memory of his sadist torture, or the masochistic loss of his torturer Levantiana. She knew it could be either. Still, she was glad of the charm. At the beach, she’d felt watched, and she knew Levantiana and Moronoe’s eyes would be on her every moment until she’d had the baby.
‘Why did you come?’
Gabriel sighed, his eyes still closed.
‘I needed to get away from London, Sylvia, the coven. All of it. You always spoke so lovingly of Abercolme. Clean air, cold sea, wide horizons.’ He opened his eyes and stared into the fire that crackled now that Faye had added two logs. ‘I didn’t have anywhere else to go.’
‘What about Fortune’s?’ Faye sat in the chair opposite him.
‘Penny will look after it until I get back. I trust her.’
