‘It has also claimed a life, Fionn.’
Fionn’s jaw dropped. ‘Are you serious?’
His grandfather was indeed wearing his serious expression, the wrinkles around his eyes rising to the surface. ‘A boy called Albert Cannon died in that cave thirty years ago. He was in your dad’s class at school. He managed to get down by himself when the tide was low but didn’t tell anyone where he was going. By the time the lifeboat crew finally found him, he was dead. He had got lost in the darkness, had run out of food and water and, in the end, hope, I suspect. He was so far in, no one heard him when he called out.’ He shook his head mournfully. ‘Something went wrong with the Sea Cave a long time ago, Fionn. There’s a strange darkness there and if you’re not careful, you can lose your way inside it. That’s why you’re never supposed to go there by yourself.’ He paused, his gaze meaningful when he added, ‘There’s a reason I’ve kept my low tides hidden. The cave is not to be trifled with. The island is volatile enough as it is – I don’t want you to go looking for trouble. Do you understand me?’
Fionn blew out a breath, a cocktail of guilt and shame swirling inside him. ‘Yeah.’
‘It’s a good thing the island likes you,’ he added. ‘Otherwise you’d be –’
‘Dead,’ said Fionn.
‘Or well on your way, at least.’
Fionn felt very dizzy all of a sudden. He had been so close to taking that next cliff step, so close to plummeting into the ocean when it disappeared. And what would have happened if he had reached the cave? Would he have lost his way like Albert Cannon had? Would the lifeboat crew have found him in time?
His grandfather patted the bed beside him in invitation, his face softening when he said, ‘Why the sudden wish urgency? Does this have something to do with your dad’s anniversary tomorrow?’
Fionn slumped down beside him, the hurt from earlier bubbling back up. ‘Tara and I had an argument. She said it was my fault that Mam is sad all the time. She said it’s because I look like Dad. I just wanted to help. I wanted to get to the wish before Bartley, so I could make Mam better.’
‘Ah.’ His grandfather leaned back on his palms, his shoulder hunching up around his shoulders. ‘Well, that makes sense.’
‘Does it?’ said Fionn, horrified.
‘Not the part about your mother, Fionn. The part about you taking the candle and going by yourself,’ his grandfather amended. ‘Tara’s theory is far from the truth.’
‘But how do you know?’
‘Because I just do,’ he said with full confidence. ‘Tara might believe that explanation because it’s simple and it’s neat but matters of the heart and matters of the head are never straightforward, Fionn. Your mother loves you both. She’s been bombarding me with photographs and stories of you two for as long as I can remember. Quite frankly, if I wasn’t so emotionally invested myself, I would have reported her for harassment a long time ago.’ He smiled at Fionn, his eyes twinkling in the duskiness. ‘She adores you. Can’t you feel that?’
‘Only sometimes,’ said Fionn truthfully.
‘You and Tara are the sun in your mother’s sky. The truth is she never really said goodbye to your dad, nor to Arranmore. She took her grief and her fear with her on the ferry boat that day, and all of that darkness became a cloud. Sometimes it moves across the sun and eclipses it for a time. You are not the sadness, lad. You are the antidote. The fact that you look like Cormac is a gift, Fionn. It is not something you should ever regret, no matter what your sister might say in the heat of the moment.’
Fionn looked into his grandfather’s eyes and saw the clear blue of a summer sea, the truth shining just beyond it. He believed him, and that belief shifted the weight on his heart. ‘I just want her to get well again. For good.’
‘There are many different kinds of bravery, Fionn. Often the journeys we take inside ourselves are more difficult than the stormiest seas.’ He ruffled his hair, his voice soft and sure when he said, ‘Your mother has a warrior’s heart and an islander’s soul. Some day it will lead Evelyn McCauley home. Some day that sky will clear.’
Fionn pressed a shaking hand to his chest to steady it.
‘You must try and forgive your sister, Fionn,’ said his grandfather gently. ‘She was speaking from a place of sadness. Tara has a good heart despite what you may think.’
Fionn nodded glumly. ‘Can I at least ignore her for a while?’
‘Of course. You don’t have to be a saint about it.’
For the rest of the day and the night that followed, that is exactly what Fionn did.
When Tara tried to speak to him in bed that night, he put his earphones in and turned over, keeping his back to her. In his dreams, he made it all the way to the bottom of the cliff steps and found the Sea Cave glittering with possibility. Inside, his mother was waiting for him with open arms, her smile wider than he had ever seen it.
Come to me, my fearless Boyle, she crooned.
And see the magic I can brew.
She took a step towards him and the blackness of the cave came with her until she wore it around her shoulders like a cloak.
Visit me beneath the soil.
Come and wish me back to you.
Fionn felt the earth crack beneath his feet. He blinked to find it wasn’t his mother standing before him, but someone else entirely. The ravens came and buried him in darkness, and Fionn went willingly, desperate to forget what he had seen.
Chapter Nineteen
THE SYRUPY TASTE OF REMORSE
‘I made breakfast,’ Tara announced the following morning from the doorway of their bedroom. ‘French toast. Your favourite. I thought we might have it out the back, like a picnic.’
Fionn peered at his sister from underneath his duvet. ‘Why …’
‘There were rashers too, but I burned them.’ Tara shuffled from one foot to the other. ‘I did get a grapefruit from the shop though. But it might be a melon. I don’t really know the difference. Sorry.’
Fionn sat up, the duvet pulled around him like a shawl. ‘That’s all right …’
Tara cleared her throat. ‘Not about breakfast, Fionn. I meant … I’m sorry about yesterday, about what Bartley said.’
‘Oh.’
‘I did say those things to Bartley,’ she admitted, not quite looking at him now. ‘But I don’t think I really meant them. I was angry and upset. Dad’s anniversary always makes me feel strange. Sometimes it’s easier to blame someone for what’s happened with Mam and … I don’t know. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings and will you please just eat the French toast and let’s put it all behind us?’ she asked, before hastily adding, ‘I promise it’s not poisoned.’
The momentousness of this moment was not lost on Fionn. This was the first time Tara had ever apologised for anything. He swung his feet over the side of his bed and stretched. ‘I will eat the French toast,’ he informed her. ‘And I will enjoy the syrupy taste of your remorse.’
Tara rolled her eyes. ‘You don’t have to be weird about it.’
Fionn grinned at her. ‘But who knows when this might happen again? It could be another fifty years before I get to experience an authentic Tara Boyle apology.’
Tara smiled crookedly. ‘That’s because I’m never wrong.’
A one-ha laugh burst out of Fionn.
‘Come on then,’ she said, sashaying out of the room. ‘Before it gets cold.’
Fionn followed her outside in his pyjamas, where the sun was beginning its ascent into a cerulean sky. Tara had transformed their grandfather’s workbench into a makeshift picnic table, covering it with one of their grandmother’s crocheted blankets and planting a little vase of dandelions in the middle. Fionn didn’t have the heart to tell her they were weeds. ‘Did you hear what happened to Bartley yesterday?’ he asked.
‘I heard,’ said Tara, pouring three glasses of orange juice. ‘He’s very upset about it.’
Fionn picked up a slice of melon and popped it into his mouth. ‘I can’t believe he actually told you.’
‘He didn’t.’ Tara uncovered a steaming stack of French toast and plonked two slices on to her plate. ‘Shelby and I were at his uncle’s house when he got back. The bird poo was … hard to miss.’
Fionn didn’t bother to hide the glee from his face as he forked a slice of bread and dropped it on to his own plate. It smelled delicious, warm and buttery, and just like home. Since he wasn’t entirely ready to let his sister off the hook (she did still have terrible taste in boyfriends) he resolved not to be too generous with his praise. ‘Well done, Tara. These look edible.’
‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’ She sat down across from him, before screeching ‘GRANDAD, BREAKFAAAAAST!’ at the top of her lungs.
Fionn winced. ‘He’s in the next room, not Siberia.’
‘Yeah, but he’s old,’ she said, squeezing an alarming amount of maple syrup on to her French toast and using a slice of melon to wipe up the overspill.
Fionn prised open the tin of Lyle’s Golden Syrup and stuck his knife inside, twirling it round and round as rivulets of sticky sugar drizzled on to his own toast.
‘Bartley says you found a way down to the Sea Cave.’ Tara shovelled a bite into her mouth, her words sticky and muffled when she said, ‘How did you manage that?’
Fionn took a swig of orange juice. ‘I used my natural sense of adventure.’
‘How, really?’
‘I found a Low Tide candle in Grandad’s room and burned it,’ he admitted. ‘The whole sea drained away and I found a pathway to the beach. I didn’t get inside the cave though. The island kind of freaked out when I was halfway down the cliff.’
Tara stared at him. ‘Does Grandad know?’
‘Unfortunately.’
‘He must have been livid.’
Fionn nodded as he chewed. ‘Turns out I could have died in a lot of different ways.’
‘I can’t believe you tried to go by yourself.’
Fionn grinned at his sister through syrupy teeth. ‘Not such a coward now, am I?’
‘Just an idiot.’ Tara shook her head in disbelief. ‘I’m relieved nothing bad happened to you. It could have been a lot worse.’
‘So I hear.’
‘Can I know where it is then?’
‘Nah,’ said Fionn. ‘I don’t think I trust you.’
Tara considered this while she chewed. She dipped her chin then, as though this was a fair conclusion. ‘What if we go together next time, just you and me? We can use those steps.’
‘Why would you want to do that?’ said Fionn suspiciously. ‘I thought you wanted to go with Bartley.’
Tara laid her fork down and leaned towards him, dropping her voice like she was afraid the birds might hear her. ‘Look, I don’t care about Bartley’s wish, Fionn. I know he’s obsessed with being the next Storm Keeper and his gran won’t give him a minute of peace about it, but it seems to me that the island should make that decision, not the Beasleys. And, anyway, as long as it’s not me, then I don’t really care who it is.’
‘You wouldn’t want it?’ said Fionn with surprise.
‘I’m too young and too talented to be tied to this rock forever. How would I ever kick off my Hollywood acting career?’ She swallowed her smile, the seriousness returning to her voice, when she said, ‘I was thinking we could use the wish for Mam. I want her to come out here and be with us.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’ asked Fionn. ‘I thought you’d lost all your brain cells.’
Tara glowered at him. ‘Because you were being annoying.’
Fionn rolled his eyes.
‘And it made more sense to go without you anyway,’ Tara added. ‘That way, Bartley wouldn’t be worrying about us ganging up and tricking him.’
‘Making it easier for you to trick him,’ said Fionn with admiration. ‘Your poor, stupid boyfriend.’
‘It makes sense that we go together now we know exactly how to get to it. We both want the same thing. There won’t be any ugly arguments when we reach it.’
‘I don’t think Grandad would be happy with either of us trying to get that wish.’ Now that he was properly considering it again, Fionn’s uneasiness was rearing its head. ‘He says the cave might swallow us.’
‘Not if we’re together,’ said Tara dismissively. ‘It’s only a matter of time before the tides behave again. Bartley’s as close as we are. Maybe even closer, with that weirdo Ivan helping him. If the wish is going to be used up either way, why can’t we have it?’
Fionn chewed on his bottom lip, considering.
‘I mean, we’ve spent so long looking for it already, are you really going to give up now that it’s within reach?’ Tara went on, expertly playing his resolve like a violin. ‘The cave is part of the island, Fionny. Dagda left it for us. How dangerous could it really be?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said uncertainly.
‘Grandad won’t know until it’s over.’ She looked at her plate, her voice wobbly when she said, ‘We owe it to Mam, Fionny. We’re all she has.’
Fionn’s heart thumped painfully in his chest. Tara was smiling sadly, just the way their mother did, and in that moment, she looked so like her that Fionn melted. If there was a chance to help their mother, then they owed it to her to try.
He dropped his voice so he couldn’t be heard from the next room when he said, ‘Let’s go tomorrow morning then. That’ll give us enough time to look for another Low Tide while Grandad’s asleep.’
‘What if Bartley gets to it before then?’ Tara whispered.
‘The tides are all over the place.’ Fionn took another bite of his French toast, the sugary syrup exploding in his mouth and dancing along his taste buds.
And he doesn’t know about the secret steps either, he thought with satisfaction.
‘OK.’ Tara ate another forkful, her eyes blazing with determination.
When there were only three pieces of toast left in the stack, their grandfather appeared in the doorway. ‘Well, well, well. Do I detect the sweet smell of reconciliation?’
‘That’s the golden syrup,’ said Fionn.
‘We saved these for you.’ Tara clinked the edge of the plate with her knife. ‘They’re a bit cold now.’
His eyes lit up. ‘Ah, French toast. My favourite.’ He seated himself at the head of the workbench, and made quick work of the French toast, drowning the slices first in maple syrup and then in Lyle’s, just for good measure. Fionn watched him eat, drawn to the wrinkles along his forehead and the deep creases underneath his eyes. He seemed so much older than he had been only days before.
Fionn thought again of the wish … of their mother back in Dublin wrestling with the shadow inside her … of all the things that had been slipping through his grandfather’s fingers recently, spectacles and hours and people …
One wish and two heartaches.
‘You know it’s been years since I’ve had a picnic,’ his grandfather was saying. ‘What a lovely idea, Tara. And what a fitting way to honour your father’s anniversary today. Winnie and I used to take Cormac for picnics on the beach all the time. We’d have to take turns tackling him when he ran off to find the Merrows.’
There was a sudden flash of violet in Fionn’s periphery. His attention was pulled skyward, where a rainbow was shimmering into being. ‘Hey, look.’
His grandfather turned his face to the sun. It sprinkled its rays along the crevices in his face until he seemed not quite as old as before. ‘Ah, a gift.’
The seagulls circled them in muted silence, the rainbow glinting off their wings and painting colour wheels along the ground.
‘And there’s another one!’ said Tara excitedly.
There, just a breadth above the first one, a second rainbow was painting itself into the sky.
‘One for each of you,’ said their grandfather.
‘They’re right over the cottage!’ Tara was wearing her own special shade of wonder; it softened her smile and glistened behind her eyes. Fionn realised he hadn’t seen her like this in a v
ery long time. He wondered if per-haps she had a shadow too, somewhere inside her. If perhaps they both did. ‘It seems like it’s only meant for us.’
‘It does, doesn’t it?’ said their grandfather, a twinkle in his eye.
Tara and Fionn watched the rainbows until they scattered their shades across the sky and dissolved into the ether.
Their grandfather ate his toast, chomping happily to himself, as though there was both a rightness and a distinct expectedness to this moment.
‘Does this happen every year?’ asked Fionn.
‘Of course it does.’
Fionn understood then why his grandfather had dedicated his entire life to protecting the secrets of this strange place, why he didn’t resent Arranmore for the loss of his son. The island remembered. It cared. And Fionn thought that perhaps it was sorry too, for what had been taken from them.
‘So,’ said their grandfather, once he had licked every last drop of syrup from his fingers. ‘What’s on the agenda for the rest of the day then?’
Tara pushed her stool away from the workbench. ‘Shelby wants to make a cake for her aunt’s birthday. I said I’d give her a hand.’
‘Well, that’s all very altruistic, Tara, but you must remember to smuggle me at least three slices.’
‘I will,’ she said, skipping back inside.
Fionn’s grandfather pointed his empty fork at his forehead, gold-spun threads of syrup dripping off the end. ‘And what about you, Fionn? Do you have some time to spare for your dashing grandfather this afternoon?’
‘What did you have in mind?’
‘I thought I might show you how the candles are made. Would you be up for that?’
Fionn swallowed the sudden dryness in his throat. ‘I am definitely up for that.’
His grandfather winked at him, the promise of enchantment lingering in his smile.
Chapter Twenty
THE STORM KEEPER’S SECRET
‘I’ll just be a minute,’ Fionn’s grandfather called from inside the shed, his words punctuated by a cacophony of clanging and banging and thumping. ‘Where has all this rubbish come from? I can barely see past my own nose in here …’
The Storm Keeper's Island Page 15