Page 58 of The Washwoman at the River’s End

He doesn’t wait for my answer, instead turning to walk in the direction of his house. I follow, allowing him to continue his nervous rambling.

“You see, I need to do what’s right, I think.” He wrings his hands together. “The Washwoman. Well, she’s the reason my wife died. I ken Theo doesnae think so. You probably dinnae either, but I saw her that night. I know it was her.”

I take several long strides to catch up to him. “Theo said Isla had been sick for some time⁠—”

“Aye. She was ill. But she didnae pass until the Washwoman appeared.” His voice cracks. “I saw her standing at our garden gate. Right here, watching.”

He stops just outside the gate, turning to me. “You seem like a good man, Brennen. So I’m going to show you something and trust that you will do what’s right with it.”

With a deep breath, he opens the gate and leads me straight into his house. It’s cozy inside, with touches of his late wife everywhere. In the scalloped edges of the curtains and the floral teapot sitting by the hearth. In the dried flowers hanging above it.

“Would you like tea?” he asks, but I shake my head, too interested in what’s got him so on edge.

“Right, then.” He hesitates for another long moment before moving to the bookshelf and pulling out what looks to be an old leather journal. It creaks as his fingers grip it, hesitating again, but he meets my eyes and hands it to me.

Immediately, I feel it. The reason he was so nervous.

Magic, buzzing within the fibers of the parchment. The binding.

“Harold—”

“I know it’s a risk, having it.”

“A risk? It’s illegal⁠—”

“It’s been in my family for centuries, and there’s nothing dangerous in it. Look for yourself. Honestly, I can’t even bloody read half of it.”

I flip open the cover of the spellbook, running my fingers along the name scratched into the first page. Benjamin Treestrom.

“Why are you giving me this? You know I’m honor-bound to report it. Do you want Cailleach coming here? She’ll think a ceatharnaich group is forming. Or that you’re⁠—”

“That I’m what?” he asks, voice sharp. “That I’m a sentimental old man who wants to hold onto something of his da’s? He asked me to keep it safe before he died. I vowed to him I would, and I’ll no be breaking it. It was written by his da. And his before that, and on and on for generations. It’s my family’s history. A few spells to help us survive the cruel winters here.”

“Spells that have been eradicated, and for good reason. Spells you have no business performing.”

“And why not? Because the Fates deem it so? Because they want to control all magic and leave none for the rest of us?”

I stiffen at his treasonous words.

“Now, you’ll not find a ceatharnaich group here. Frankly, all we want here is to be left alone. But I am an honest man, and while I have resigned myself to live peacefully under the rule of the Fates, it doesnae mean I have to agree with them. And it certainly doesnae mean I’ll allow them to pull wool over my eyes. I’d rather go blind.”

My lungs seem to go stiff, discomfort filling the space between them. I dinnae want to turn the old man in for his words. Not when he’s shown me such kindness. “You know why the Fates control magic, Harold. What happened when they didn’t?” I say, hoping I can make him see reason.

“I know what they say happened⁠—”

I cut him off before he can say something even more incriminating. “Wars. Death. That’s what happened. People are hungry for power, and when they have too much of it, they abuse it.”

“The Fates must be starving, then.”

His sentence slams directly into my chest, and I shake my head, remembering the stories I’ve read about the time before the Fates. A time of greed, when magic went unchecked completely, and to get it, you had to take it. “There’s a reason they control what power is given to each of us.”

He holds my gaze, but doesn’t seem convinced.

I sigh, swallowing down my frustration.

He taps the book. “You and I want the same thing, Brennen. That’s all this is. It is my job to protect the people of this village. I want the Washwoman dead. I willnae allow her to take another soul.”

He opens the book to the middle. “Somewhere around here, the Washwoman came. My family wrote about her, generations ago.” He flips until he reaches a water-stained page. Slanted handwriting fills it, the letters cramped as if whoever wrote them was preserving paper.