Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 146289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 731(@200wpm)___ 585(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 731(@200wpm)___ 585(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Speaking of more strange things, there is an iron horseshoe nailed over the bedroom door, points up.
There is another over the front door, smaller, older, and one on the back door as well.
There is also coarse salt in every windowsill, a thin, neat line that’s gathered a little dust. She must have done it just before she’d left for good.
There is also a single rowan tree near the front door, mature, planted deliberately a long time ago. There are dried herbs hanging from the rafters in the kitchen, some I recognize, and some I don’t. There is an herb garden out back beside the roses, the mint run wild as it’s prone to do, but otherwise it’s in good condition.
Now, I don’t remember my father ever mentioning his aunt was a witchy person, but being as I am a somewhat witchy person myself, these things stand out. Perhaps that’s why I inherited the cottage, though I wasn’t really into that stuff at twelve. In fact, it was a botanical folklore book that my father picked up for me somewhere during that trip here that got me interested in plants to begin with.
The thought of him makes my heart both swell and constrict. It’s funny how fresh grief can feel while at the same time it’s been your shadow for over a decade.
I sigh, put the sketchbook down on the kitchen table, and make a list—because making lists is one of the few neurotypical things that actually works on me. I want to leave the cottage today for reasons that are not entirely about groceries.
Bread.
Oat Milk.
Find out who the hell my naked neighbor in the castle is.
The drive into Shieldaig is twenty minutes of a single-track road that bends around the hills like it was laid down by someone who hated cars. I take it slow. The rental car has a wonky alignment, and the road climbs and dips around boulders like a rollercoaster. I’ll eventually have to fork out some dough to buy a car since I can’t afford to rent one for an entire year, I just don’t know if what I get is going to be any better than this hunk of junk.
Shieldaig, when I get to it, is a single curve of road, a picturesque pier, a handful of stone cottages that wear the weather like a second coat, and a restaurant called Gille Brighde I haven’t been brave enough to try—it seems the type of place where you have to eat haggis or else. The post office is in the front room of someone’s house, while the shop is in another. The shopkeeper is a woman called Mhairi, who, I have decided, based on two visits and approximately ninety seconds of total interaction, is going to be the person I orient around in the village.
She’s behind the counter when I come in, late fifties or early sixties, dark hair pulled back, sleeves rolled to her elbows, hands red from the cold of the chest freezer she’s just been reaching into.
“There she is,” she says, smiling. “Are you all settled in?”
“Well,” I say. “Mostly.”
“Mostly is about as much as anyone gets out this way.”
I gather a few things—bread, milk, a wedge of sharp cheese, a packet of biscuits I don’t need but have a funny name, a can of bean soup for the kind of evening I can already feel coming on—and bring them up to the counter. The shop smells like cured meat and woodsmoke and something herbal, courtesy of a small posy of dried lavender by the till.
“Mhairi,” I say carefully while she’s ringing me up, hoping I’m pronouncing her name right. “Can I ask you something?”
“You can ask,” she replies mildly.
“There’s what looks like an old castle across the bay from mine. Big one, I think. It’s hard to tell. Tall, anyway.”
Her hands don’t stop moving, but she takes a breath that’s a beat too long before she answers.
“Aye, I know the one.”
“Who lives there?”
“Nobody.”
“Nobody?”
“That’s what they say,” she says as she weighs the cheese. She glances up, one eye squinting at me. “Why’re you asking?”
“I saw someone over there this morning. On the shore.”
“On the shore, you say?” Another squint, this one loaded with meaning.
“Yes. Not the loch itself, but on the other side of that small bay by the cottage.”
“Could’ve been a hill-walker. People do come round, end of the season.”
“I guess,” I concede, and I can hear myself deciding not to mention the part where the walker was naked. Old me would have been quick to blurt that out, but new me doesn’t want to offend the only person I’ve had conversations with since I got here.
Mhairi gives me one slow nod and bags my groceries. She slides them across the counter. And then, just as I’m reaching for the handles, she puts her hand lightly on top of mine. Her skin is warm; for a moment I wonder if I’ve caught a chill.