Daughter of the Storm

by Tina Callaghan

  Andrew marched off into the rain.

  Brendan watched him go and then moved back to look over the edge of the cliff again.

  The priest’s body was down there, already taken by the waves, perhaps pulled into the network of caves that pocked this side of the island. It gave Brendan no comfort to know that the priest wasn’t alone in the churning water. Perhaps the dead were knocking against each other in the dim light that reached inside the caves, bones mingled together by the evermoving sea.

  He shuddered and cut back through the land towards his cottage. He should have taken a pup the last time Andrew’s bitch had whelped. At least it would be warm and alive, happy to see him and something to hold on to at three in the morning when it seemed as though light would never come again.

  He went inside and put the kettle on. When the tea was made, he sat at the small table and sipped from his old mug. He had work to do around the place but, not for the first time, he couldn’t see the point of doing it. Instead, he looked out the slightly grubby window at the clouds. It was raining a little, but the clouds weren’t ready to give their all yet. Brendan’s eyes wandered over the kitchen. He did all of his living in here, such as it was. The parlour was unused. Sometimes, he didn’t even bother going up the stairs to bed, but just stayed on the lumpy sofa in front of the fire. He didn’t mind the lumps. They fitted him now after all the years.

  The fire had gone out. Grey ashes had spilled onto the hearth and the old tin mug he sometimes used to stew his tea a bit stronger by shoving it into the burning coals had old milky tea in it, the surface scum marred by the butt of a rolled fag. The newspaper that covered the table was a few months old and covered in circular mug-marks.

  He was ashamed of the way he lived. No one came here to see it, but he was once a different sort of person. He used to like nice clothes and looking well. Those days had gone. There was no one to care if his collar was grubby. There was no one at all. Not since Will had died. Will was not like him, but Brendan had loved him all the same. They had been friends and Will knew how he felt, but neither of them ever mentioned it. It was painful when Will left the island, and it was then that Brendan had started to let things slide, but when Will died Brendan gave up all pretence of keeping his life in order. So here he was, here they all were, still alive when so many others were dead.

  Like a child then, he put his head on his arms at the table and let silent tears fall on the newsprint.

  The lights. That was the key. The storm had become too strong. The captain said they had to make for harbour or the Lilith would founder. The high waves already had the decks awash. Corvo had tried to argue but gave up quickly. They had stopped once already to resupply the ship, but this felt wrong. However, there was nothing they could do against the power of the wind and the sea herself.

  He clung to the rail, knowing that he was being foolish, that he should go below decks as the captain had instructed, shouting over the roar of the storm. Yet, he couldn’t bear it. Down there, he felt as though he were in a crypt. For as long as he could withstand it, he would stay here in the wild, natural world. It was all about sensation. He could see nothing.

  The dark was so intense that he couldn’t see the water, although the owl figurehead on the ship’s bow dipped perilously close to it after every mountainous wave. Having securely brought his dreadful cargo this far from Rome, it seemed as though the end of the journey might be nigh. Perhaps it would be for the best. If the sea took the ship, crew, cargo and all, to the bottom, it might herald the end of the nightmare. At the very least, it would end his nightmare.

  But that wasn’t what he had vowed. He had sworn to take the creature to those who would understand what she was. He was old now and had spent too long being her guard. New people who weren’t yet fully in her thrall would have a better chance of keeping her, or killing her, whichever they could manage.

  He saw the lights first. Struggling back to the captain, he managed to draw his attention to the tiny flicker of hope. Some sort of harbour. Fighting the storm, they made for it.

  Too late, the few lights they had left on deck showed the edge of a cliff. The Lilith grated alongside half hidden rocks and he heard her ribs open. Water must surely be flooding in, but she carried on, grinding through the treacherous water. He was knocked flat to the deck when she suddenly came aground. An animal shudder ran through her deck and he heard the screams of men below. He clambered to his feet, ignoring pain, and saw the false lights bobbing along the clifftop as the wreckers ran towards their prize.

  The next giant wave came and lifted them bodily from the piercing rock, carried them forward and the ship, already coming apart, was smashed against the cliff. There was a brief ebb, before she was again lifted and flung against the steep wall. The screams of the men changed from pain and fear to terror. He knew then that the Strix was free. With the ship’s innards broken, she had escaped her bonds and flown from his captivity.

  For one terrible moment before the relief of death, he saw her at her most beautiful. She was nature itself, impervious to the storm, unafraid of the jagged rocks, enraged at her captivity. And alive. Beautifully, cruelly alive. Then the waves swept him from the remains of the ship to a clean death against the cliff of this unknown place. The others hadn’t so lucky an escape. She had a thirst to satiate.

  The lights. The false lights had to be positioned just right. For ships approaching off course in the storm, enough lights would look like a harbour. Any vessel would make for shelter from the wind and wild water. Some nights, the weather would turn so sharply that a boat could founder on the rocks without their help. Hidden rocks had taken lots of ships. Most of the ones brought in by the false lights would probably have foundered anyway. Probably. The goods and timbers were theirs if no one survived. It was easy enough to ensure that no one did. He checked the knife in his pocket.

  This night was one of the worst he had seen. He was leaning into the wind, fighting to stay on his feet. The light above his head was swinging wildly. They wouldn’t be able to stay long. Surely a sensible captain would stay far out to sea, too far to see their lights? But she had come. Had come to her doom on the Devil’s Teeth. Even in the storm, he had been able to hear the terrible death throes as she was flung against the cliff, over and over again.

  They saw that five of the bodies had been thrown up on a rocky ledge halfway down the cliff, something that invariably happened. Without consultation – it was routine – he and two of the others began to climb down the cliff, one by one, first using the knotted rope to climb over the outcrop. Then they climbed down the path they had cut out of the cliff-face to reach the ledge.

  Some of the dead were wearing rings and earrings. He had to cut off some fingers and earlobes to get them, but blood washed off easily. They searched the broken bodies for purses of coin and found two well-filled ones. The rest of the treasure would have to wait until the storm passed or lulled. The shattered ship had now become trapped between the rocks and the cliff. From experience he knew that it would probably stay stuck there till the morrow, it and its cargo whatever that might be. Bodies and other goods would be in the nearby cave, along with the bones of past shipwrecks and crewmen.

  They were climbing back up the path when they all heard the scream. Unearthly, it stopped them in their tracks. The man ahead of him was already hanging from the knotted rope to get over the outcrop. He froze and they all turned towards the wreck.

  A girl was standing on a jagged rock, feet in the crashing waves. Somehow, she was standing still, her white gown whipping madly, her hair flying above her. He stared at her, not even sure how he could see her. She seemed to be made of light. Then she opened her mouth and that scream came again. That terrible shriek, born not of terror but of rage. It galvanised them all at once. There was no conscious thought, just blind animal panic. He shoved the man in front of him, who was already scrambling up the rope. He himself was being pushed from behind. They were caught in the worst place.

  He started t
o climb, grabbing for the thick knots in the rope. The pushing behind him suddenly stopped but he didn’t look back. Instead, he climbed faster, scraping his knuckles bloody against the wet rock, panic lending him careless strength and indifference to pain. The man ahead must have reached the top because he no longer struck against his boot as he reached for the next knot. He was almost there himself. So close.

  Then he was grabbed from behind. He screamed, his voice sounding like that of a rabbit caught by a predator. He held onto the rope as he was lifted away from the rock, but it burned through his grasp, leaving a bloody gash on each palm. Then the rope was gone and there was only the wild darkness. He felt the wind catching his clothes and the moon, enemy to a man who earned his living by the destruction of others on the uncaring rocks of the island’s rough coast, suddenly split the clouds. It showed enough to make him scream again. He was hundreds of feet in the air, wheeling on the fierce, freezing current swooping up the face of the cliff. Terror sharpened his focus and he could clearly see the rocks below, surrounded by broken timber and broken bodies. It was only a matter of seconds before whatever had him would let go and he was dropped to his own crashing death.

  But it did not drop him into the sea. Instead, the sea was left behind and the ground on top of the cliff appeared. He could see plumes of foam erupting through the blowholes from the network of caves and cracks below. Then he was free-falling. Just before he hit the ground, a white shape flashed in front of him, buffeting him out of his fall, causing him to roll and tumble in relative safety. He scrambled to his feet, feeling pain in his back and hips that would tell later, if there was a later.

  She was there: the girl with the white dress. She looked young, delicate, impossibly bright in the night, almost flashing like a wind-blown lantern as the moon slid in and out of clouds. She was the most beautiful and terrifying thing he had ever seen. He wanted to run, but he was the mouse. He had been seen by the owl and all he could do was await his fate and hope that it would be quick.

  She stepped lightly aside and he saw the others on their feet, bloodied and bruised but alive. They moved close together, herding behaviour coming instinctively. She smiled. Someone was crying. It was only when he felt the tears on his face that he realised it was him.

  He heard a shout and suddenly someone else was there. Someone glorious, bright and good. He wasn’t involved in their pursuits and had often tried to stop them. Now, the sight of him was a kind of revelation. It felt like salvation was rushing towards them.

  Then, still smiling, she took the best of them first and all hope of salvation was gone.

  Brendan woke, terrified, the dream possessing him. His stomach churned and he barely made it to an already overflowing rubbish bin before getting sick. The act made him cry and made his throat burn. He gave in to it and fell back on the couch, sobbing. The rain grew heavier and a brief shower of hailstones struck the window, as though there was a beast out there, rapping to be let in.

  Twenty-One

  Little islands are all large prisons; one cannot look at the sea without wishing for the wings of a swallow.

  Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890)

  AJ waited on the ferry, watching his single passenger disembark and go hesitantly up the slipway to the village. He had been tempted to stop her, but it was none of his business, not any more.

  He never set foot on the island anymore. He knew that the fact hadn’t escaped his father, but it was the only thing that kept him sane.

  A few nights after AJ had turned eighteen, his dad had come into his room and shaken him awake.

  ‘AJ, get up,’ he had said.

  AJ had been so used to taking orders from his father that he had got up without a question. He thought one of the animals might be in trouble. Instead, when he had pulled on some clothes and boots, his father led him through the silent house and away from the farm.

  His dad was acting weird and the stillness of the night made AJ himself silent. It felt like it would be a sin to break it. The whole thing had felt almost like a pilgrimage.

  They walked the rough road towards the Hall. There was a moon sitting behind it, fat and full, and the sight of it shot an arrow of fear through AJ’s heart. When they got closer, figures stepped out of the shadow of the house and AJ saw the shadowy figures of his father’s friends. The usual gang.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he said, looking at his dad.

  The moon was bright enough to show his father’s stony expression.

  ‘You’ll find out,’ he said. ‘Brendan, you have the key?’

  Brendan said yes and then they walked into the shadow of the Hall.

  AJ shivered. He liked the cold, bracing wind off the sea, with the smell of rain in it, but the shiver was like someone walking over his grave. He was about to retreat to the glassed-in quarterdeck when he saw his father walking his mother towards the ferry. When they got closer, he recognised the expression on his mother’s face as two feelings fighting for dominance. Kitty looked delighted to be getting off the island but furious at being made to go by Andrew.

  They boarded the ferry and his mother gave him a peck on the cheek before going inside to the heat. Andrew nodded at him and AJ was turning away when he felt his arm gripped by his father’s hard fingers.

  ‘I’ve let you go and play on boats for a long time, Andy. The time is coming for you to come back and play your part. Get your mother to her sister’s and come back. Bring your brother. We need him here now rather than in the hospital.’

  AJ didn’t speak but waited until his father let go of his arm. He finally knew that when he took the ferry across this time, he would never pilot it again. This would be his last time past the Chimneys, if they even survived the oncoming storm. He would try to convince his mother to stay on the mainland and would need no convincing himself. He was through with his father’s obsession and the madness of what he had seen on the night that they went to the Hall. He had mainland blood and, after years of being in between, he was choosing the land. In fact, once his mother was settled, he thought he might just catch the first flight to the place farthest away from this place and never, ever come back.

  He watched Andrew walk back down the ramp, passing a few foot passengers carrying bags onboard. The people coming on were not talking and faces were grim. They knew the storm was coming. Several of them had dogs on leads and two women had cats in travel crates. One lady was carrying a small birdcage covered with a cloth. AJ waited for a few minutes after everyone was on in case there was any one else coming in a hurry, but he was itching to go, so he shut the gate and powered the ferry backwards out of the harbour. He spared one look at the Chimneys as the ferry chugged past, but the water was already getting choppy, so he wanted to concentrate. He caught a flash of white from the corner of his eye, but he chose to look away.

  Bob Glenn watched the ferry leave. They should have been on it, but Josie refused to leave. Something about Rose being ill. Bob knew Rose had been through a lot and he did feel sorry for her, but she had her own family to look after her. Josie wouldn’t listen, however, and Bob watched the last ferry go. The sky on the horizon was a deep blue-black. The storm was coming and God only knew what trouble it would bring.

  Andrew watched the ferry out of sight. He knew that AJ wasn’t coming back and wasn’t bringing his brother either. There was a time he would have raged against them until they came to see his point of view, or at least do his bidding. But for the first time he was glad that they were gone off the island, all of them. He would never say that out loud, but it was true. He looked out at the approaching storm before turning for home. He had animals to feed before the world turned to wind and rain. As he passed the Robin’s Rest, Evan and Jim came out and fell into step with him. He was glad. They weren’t great company but they were better than nothing.

  The baby had gone back to sleep after a feed and a change. Becky was moving around the kitchen, unable to settle. Matt watched her for a while, before catching her hand and taking her int
o his arms. Now that the baby bump was going, she felt little again, and he could hold her close. He kissed her cheek and felt her arms go around his shoulders.

  ‘You’ve been very quiet,’ he said, speaking softly. She had barely said a word since her mother had been hurt – or attacked as the women insisted. Whatever had happened had disturbed his Becky but it was time for her to talk about it. She was a talker and it wasn’t right for her to bottle things up.

  ‘Won’t you tell me what happened, Becky?’

  ‘You won’t believe me,’ she said.

  ‘Of course I’ll believe you. I love you, baby.’

  She looked up at him. ‘You’re not from the island, Matt.’

  ‘Not that again. I know I’m not but it’s my home now and my family is here. Besides, what difference does it make to what happened last night?’

  She shook her head helplessly. ‘Everything. I wish you had gone across on the ferry and taken the baby with you.’

  ‘Don’t be silly. The baby must stay with you. And I’m not leaving you. We’ll be fine. I’ll go out and make sure the place is shipshape and ready for the storm. We have plenty of fuel and food. We’ll just settle down here, the three of us and ride it out as we always do. This one won’t be any different.’

  He saw the doubt on her face. It made him feel bad, as though she thought he wouldn’t be able to protect them. He didn’t tell her that he had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. He would have taken the baby across if she had agreed to go with them, but she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t leave her mother and her mother insisted on staying as well. At least he had succeeded in getting Rose to stay in their cottage with them. She was asleep in the spare bedroom still. The painkillers Mrs. Glenn had given her must have been strong. The woman had a supply of illicit stuff in the back of the shop, but at least she was careful with it. Without a doctor on the island, everyone turned a blind eye to the secret stash, because they had all had need of it in the past. She was a dab hand at stitching wounds too, as he knew from personal experience, carrying her implements in a normal sewing kit in the bottom of her huge handbag. He was glad that Rose was getting to sleep through a lot of her pain. The wound in her throat looked ugly, although not infected.