The Island House

by Posie Graeme-Evans

  But though the phantom had been willed away, Katherine felt uneasy as she picked up the pen. She’d finished the translation of the diary last night—a cause for celebration—but the last entry had been strange if the writer was indeed a nun. Freya would want to know. Should she try to ring tomorrow—today, rather?

  And if Freya does not answer? Katherine threw the covers back, suddenly hot. Perhaps she should go over to the island. She could not banish the certainty, the necessity of telling the girl what she’d read. Katherine’s long-banished Catholic childhood stirred as she named the thing; she had performed a sin of omission, and that must be remedied if her relationship with Freya was to be an honest one.

  Loving Michael Dane, finding in him her intellectual equal, had given Katherine more than a technical understanding of archaeology. It had peeled time open. Passion for him had ignited another passion in her—for the past, and for Findnar’s past as well. He had shown her how to see, how to look, how to find meaning in the evidence of people’s lives from long ago. That had been a comfort when he’d died, as if, in her own small way, she carried his work further. But there are many ways of seeing, and Michael had shown her that too. And some of the things he’d told her were as if he was using metaphors, or symbols, to tell the truth in a different way.

  But now there was Freya, and she was so much Michael’s daughter. Looking at the girl in the last days, Katherine had begun to wonder what it would have been like to have a child.

  Katherine knew she was not an emotionally open person, too disciplined—or timid—for that, but with Michael she had experienced unconditional love for the first time in her life. And he had allowed her to be brave, to take risks. He lived again, in some ways, in his daughter. It was delicate, but Katherine longed for her and Freya to be close.

  “Michael, tell me what to do. Should I tell her?” Perhaps, if she put out the light, she’d sleep and he would provide the answer by the morning.

  “Good night, my dear love. I so wish you were here. Your daughter needs you. Perhaps, though, I shall have to do in your place.”

  Katherine yawned. She felt better sharing her anxiety with the empty air. She flicked the light off and lay in the dark with open eyes, listening. She still did not believe, not truly, that she would never again hear his step on her staircase. She sighed, and her eyes closed.

  The night was windless. Breathless.

  Abruptly, light spilled across Compline’s front windows, bluewhite. It tracked back and forth, erratic scribbles over the grass, toward the cliffs, into an immense night sky.

  “Where are you?” Freya put the light down and wiped her face. She was sweating. She’d run as far as the stones and all around the Abbey ruins, trying to find the girl. “I saw you. I did see you.”

  Freya sagged. She huddled on the top step at the front of the house. “You were here.”

  As her heart stilled and her breathing slowed, she heard the night. The sound of the sea, below, came back, and something else. A soft pat-pat. She looked down. A large moth was battering at the glass of the camping light.

  Behind her, the front door creaked and opened softly with a click, as if a careful hand had eased the latch.

  Light jumped among the shapes inside the big room, traveled over the desk, spilled across the floor as Freya ran inside.

  The room was empty.

  Freya stopped.

  She could hear herself breathe; she could feel the blood in her veins. Her heart squeezed and then ran fast as fire.

  The door to the kitchen was open; she’d closed it earlier.

  One foot in front of the other. Count the steps. “One, two, three, four.” Shadows bled into corners when she raised the light high. The kitchen was empty.

  But the undercroft door was ajar.

  She had to do this. “Five, six, seven, eight . . .”

  Freya placed her feet so carefully on the treads going down, and stopped at the bottom. “Hello?”

  She stood in a circle of light, but all around was dense black. If she moved, if she moved, what would she see?

  She swung the lantern in a slow, wide arc. The light passed over the walls—nothing. It traveled across the carved panel; the faces stood out stark—white against black trenches in the wood.

  Freya walked forward—just a few paces. Then more—toward the back wall. She was rigid, muscles corded with tension, as the light bounced and jerked.

  There were footprints in the dust. A man’s boots; Dan’s. Her work boots as well, from the other day. But there were also other prints—delicate naked feet, the shape of the arch a pronounced indentation.

  Freya was shaking, her whole body vibrating.

  The small footprints led to the back wall.

  And they did not return.

  CHAPTER 34

  THE STONES were Signy’s refuge now, and on this warm morning, she drove the animals toward them. As the sheep and goats scattered to graze the slopes below, she approached the offering stone with a beaker of new milk.

  Pouring the libation, Signy bowed. “Great Cruach, I beg that you hear me. And that my ancestors hear me.” She clapped her hands three times and stared up at the God in the sky for as long as she could.

  Cruach’s power was too strong. Unwillingly, Signy squeezed her eyes shut, and it was a moment before she could see to place Bear’s gifts on the offering stone. She kissed that tragic face one final time; this was a very great sacrifice.

  Though she tried not to show it, Signy was frightened, for it was a long time since she had made the proper observances. She bowed to the stone three times and each time felt Cruach’s warmth, like a hand, on her head; this, at least, was a good omen. Opening the lead box, she drew out a small piece of vellum covered in her own writing. It had been hard to make ink without the resources of the Scriptorium, but with soot and the white of a stolen egg, she had finally succeeded. Last night, beside her small fire, she had tried to make each word of the prayer perfect.

  Throwing her arms high, Signy began to chant. “By the strength of the wind, by the height of the sky, by the might of the sea—by the power of all these things—I ask that you hear your daughter, Great Cruach.” She laid the prayer on the stone and knelt, her hands held out in supplication. “This is what I ask. May Bear find strength and courage and guile to defeat his enemies. Stretch out your hand against those who would do him harm. Guard and protect Bear so that he returns to me. And protect me also, great Cruach. My father was once your servant, and though I am all that is left of my family, I shall serve you in their names.”

  Signy lowered her arms. She was sweating. Would Cruach listen to her? She had deserted his service for a long time—he might not think her worthy.

  She picked up a digging stick. “This is the last part of my offering and my prayer. I bring gifts.” She placed the crucifix on top of the lead box. “I give these to the earth—your sister and my mother. They are precious; may they lie safe in her embrace. And when time is accomplished and all is well, may they be returned to me, and may I meet my daughter again in the land of the sky.”

  The day was bright and, for the moment, windless.

  Gunnhilde shaded her eyes as she hobbled across the meadow. She truly must be growing old, for walking pained her now. In the distance, scattered across the hillside, the Abbey flock grazed peacefully. These were the animals that wintered over in the byre, and it pleased Gunnhilde to see the new calves and lambs. The herds were increasing again—that must be part of God’s plan for their community.

  Gunnhilde stopped, puzzled. She cupped her hands around her mouth and called “Signy!” The hobbled goats looked up, and a few sheep stumbled away, winter’s fleece a burden when they tried to run.

  She tried again. “Signy?” Turning, she surveyed the plow land and the meadows. And then she saw the girl. Signy had walked out from among the ring of stones.

  Gunnhilde’s heart lurched in her chest. This was a Pagan figure, a girl crowned with red berries and new green leaves.

>   A staff of hornbeam in her hand, Signy watched impassively as the nun labored toward her. She had woven the new rowan and last autumn’s rose hips among her growing curls, the old year and the new. To perform the ceremony correctly, that had been necessary, but Gunnhilde would be shocked.

  “Signy, what are you doing!” The nun arrived short of breath. These days, with increasing pain in her hands and her body, she did little physical work and was less fit than she had been.

  “The tasks I have been given by Brother Abbot.” Signy’s tone was flat.

  “But this is not God’s work.” The nun pointed to the garland.

  Signy did not move. She was framed by two of the larger monoliths, and behind her was the Pagan altar.

  The nun swallowed—this was a heathen priestess guarding her temple. “You should not come here, Signy. It is a cursed place, and these stones were raised by the Devil. I think they have bewitched you.”

  Signy stared at Gunnhilde quizzically. “The circle has been here longer than your church, Sister. To my people it is sacred. My father was a holy man. He was our clan’s shaman—did I tell you that?”

  Signy’s lack of shame confused Gunnhilde. “But this is the past, Signy, the bad, old ways.” She stepped toward the girl.

  Signy backed away inside the outer ring. “This is my church, Sister, though I wish yours no disrespect.”

  Gunnhilde was more than dismayed and, holding up the crucifix on her rosary, she called out, “I abjure you, Satan, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Leave the body of this, my sister in Christ, and return to the Pit. Go!”

  Sorrow darkened Signy’s eyes. “I am not possessed, Gunnhilde.” She put her hand on the altar stone. “There are no devils here. We are the demons, the evil spirits in this world, and it is we who create suffering and delusion, just us.”

  It shook Gunnhilde that the Devil was so cunning. Signy sounded like a normal girl, and yet she could not be. Only a possessed soul, in thrall to the Lord of Lies, would seem to speak in this way.

  The nun backed away, holding up her cross. “Devil, I know my sister is within this frail flesh. The strength of the Lord will defeat your evil purposes.” Turning, she hurried away and, as Signy watched, sped up as if pursued.

  The girl knelt and placed Bear’s crucifix and the box in the hole she had made. “When will you return, Bear?” This was her own private prayer. “Or must I come to you?” She stared toward the Christian settlement. “Tell me where you hid the coracle. I have looked and looked. Show me, I beg.”

  Signy raised her arms and slowly turned. Her eyes were closed. She stopped, and sniffed the air like a hound. Her eyes opened. She stared toward the cliffs behind the circle.

  CHAPTER 35

  AT DAWN on the second day, fourteen ships rode at anchor. Well maintained and sleek, they sat beyond the point where the small estuary emptied into the sea. The river mouth had given the raiding band easy access to the settlement behind it, but now the fleet was stayed to boulders on the shore as the trade goods were assembled.

  This was Grimor’s raiding band now, and he’d led them for four seasons after killing Reimer. If Thorkeld had not earlier retired to his farm, Grimor might not have been successful, but the old man had gone down to his ax at the end of a bad summer when they’d returned home with little of value in the hulls.

  It was a young man’s game, raiding, and Grimor at twenty-eight or twenty-nine summers was in his prime. He had some years of this work yet before his physical powers declined and it became too hard to manage the men. But he remembered this coast from a season long ago; that had been the year he’d lost his brother, Magni, in one of Reimer’s ventures. The boy had been among the first to charge the cliff path on the Christian island, and then he’d disappeared into the flames of the Abbey.

  Grimor had always intended to settle that score—to go back to the island and burn it again in memory of his brother. That had been part of the dispute that cost Reimer his life, for the old leader said that pickings in the East were too lean. The people, too, were more difficult and the winds not useful for much of the year. But Grimor knew that Magni’s blood would never be appeased until he’d made a proper pyre to his brother’s spirit in the place that had taken his body. The Christian island—was this the season to find it again?

  He gazed at the sky. He did not like the color of the clouds—wild weather on its way. Perhaps this was the omen he needed; it would be safer for the hulls to run south in front of the storm rather than beat their way north again. But would forty or so seasons be enough to make the island worth another raid?

  It was always a problem to assess such things, Grimor knew, and his current company was, on average, young; that meant they were not yet experienced enough to avoid stupidity in the heat of the fight. It was annoying that most of the buildings in the river village had been destroyed, as they had been on the Christian island all those years ago—that was a blunder in both cases. How many times had he said it? Do not burn everything; better to leave something standing and habitable to encourage resettlement.

  Raiding was like farming. Burn the stubble, till the ground, leave the crop alone while it grew. Then harvest.

  A buffet of wind swirled the plaid from his shoulders. Grimor could smell the storm building from the high east. Time for decisions.

  “Edor, hurry it up!”

  His chief lieutenant waved from the water’s edge and shouted, “Not long now, Grimor, just them to load.” Edor pointed. A group of crying women and their children sat on the beach. The leader nodded and turned away, gazing thoughtfully at the smoke still rising from what remained of the village.

  Counting those they’d taken plus the dead—the useless women past their physical prime, the oldest of the men, the youngest of the children—there’d been more than seventy people among the houses. Not a bad result in ten years, but then most people thought a river mouth was a good place to live. It was their fate and his luck that people generally rebuilt in places they’d lived before.

  Grimor yawned and stretched until his bones cracked, then tramped across the beach. Fenrir bucked against the mooring as waves grew beneath her bow, and he waved Edor over.

  “Yes, Lord?”

  Grimor pointed at the sky. “What do you think?”

  Edor shrugged. “Could get ugly.”

  “I agree.” Grimor nodded. It did no harm to seem to take advice from time to time.

  Farther up the beach, a man called out, “Sail. Sail!” The cry was echoed by crew on the other hulls.

  Grimor turned and stared out to sea. A substantial ship was making good progress toward them from the south, and a man was standing at the prow, waving.

  Edor grinned at his master. One trading vessel against a war fleet. “This man is brave.”

  Grimor clapped his lieutenant on the shoulder. “Or foolish. Or both. Excellent.”

  “Lord Grimor? Here is our visitor.” Edor’s irony was obvious, and some of the crew on Fenrir smirked. Grimor glowered. Faces dropped.

  Grimor was standing beside the longship’s mast. Around him the hulls were loaded and waiting for his command to sail. He nodded to his lieutenant; this would not take long.

  Edor ushered the man toward Grimor. Young, with barely a beard, he was dressed well in good, thick wool, the tunic ornamented with expensive braid. His cloak was lined with fur too—another sign of wealth; it was probably only rabbit, but the garment was of good quality.

  On the beach, well guarded, was the crew of the ship the stranger commanded. He had run his vessel up onto the beach beside Grimor’s hulls as if expecting a welcome.

  Leaning on his ax, Grimor glowered. “Who are you?”

  The point of Edor’s blade just touching his spine, the stranger made a stiff bow. “I am Idorn. Son of Iredern, son of . . .”

  Grimor waved his hand impatiently. Edor jumped in. “That is sufficient.” Genealogies, after all, could go on all day.

  “And what do you want,
Idorn, son of Iredern?”

  “Lord Grimor, I am an emissary from Solwaer, Lord of Portsol. I have this for you, from my master.” The young man swallowed.

  Grimor gave the man some credit. He might speak very bad Norse, but he was brave enough to present a scroll with steady hands and a clear voice. The war leader grunted and spat into the tide. “What would I want with this?” He could not read, but he wasn’t about to say that to this young fool.

  Idorn bowed. “If I may . . .” He went to unroll the parchment and found a knife at his throat. Edor.

  Grimor scowled testily at his lieutenant. Jumps too fast, this one. “Yes, read it. But be careful, Idorn; my men may not like what you say. They may not like you.” No irony here; he prodded the emissary in the chest with a stiff finger. Around him, the crew guffawed.

  Idorn’s face leached to an uncooked, pale gray, and yet he waited until the laughter died before he cleared his throat and began to read. Another mark in his favor.

  “ ‘To Lord Grimor, son of Ragnar, son of Iarl, son of Othere, son of . . .’ “ The sonorous genealogy rolled out of the stranger’s mouth with skaldlike majesty. Grimor stood straighter. How did he know? “ ‘. . . greeting from your brother, Solwaer, Lord of Portsol.’ ”

  “Brother? I have only one brother, and he is dead.”

  Idorn’s rather harried expression lifted. He said, earnestly, “But that is why I am here, Lord Grimor. Your brother, Magni, is not dead.” He waved the parchment.

  The silence on the ship changed. It was instantly absolute.

  Grimor beckoned Idorn. The youth edged forward a step. Grimor beckoned again. Another step; only the length of a man’s forearm separated them now.

  The raider lunged. Two massive hands, two thumbs, gouged into the emissary’s neck. The boy was yanked up, and his feet jerked above the deck. As he struggled, his face turned red, then purple, and his eyes rolled back.