Chapter 36
The cottage was quiet in a way it hadn’t been the night before.
Leah and Maisie had left after midnight, their car lights sweeping briefly across the garden wall before disappearing down the lane. Gabriel had gone not long after.
Now it was just Erica.
And Lucky.
The morning had arrived pale and slow, a thin wash of light creeping across the kitchen floor. Erica stood by the sink with a mug of coffee growing cold in her hands, staring at the box on the table.
She had been standing there for what felt like hours.
The lid was closed again, the old wood dull in the morning light, as though nothing remarkable had ever been inside it.
But she couldn’t shake the feeling.
Something about it tugged at her.
Lucky jumped up onto the table with the confidence of a cat who believed all surfaces existed for him. He sniffed the edge of the box. Then sat down beside it, watching her.
Erica frowned at him.
“What?”
Lucky blinked slowly and gave a low, satisfied purr.
“You wouldn’t understand,” she muttered. “But I just need to read … one.”
His tail flicked as if in mild judgement.
Erica sighed, pushed her mug aside and lifted the lid again.
The letters lay exactly where Gabriel had placed them the night before, bundled neatly with faded twine. Even in daylight they looked fragile, the paper soft with age.
Lucky leaned closer to inspect them.
“Oh no you don’t.”
She gently nudged him off the table. He landed with a soft thump and stalked to the windowsill in protest.
Erica hesitated, then crossed to the dresser and pulled out a pair of thin wool gloves.
If any of her old lecturers could see her now, rummaging through eighteenth-century correspondence alone in a cottage kitchen without a museum archivist breathing down her neck, they would probably faint.
She returned to the table and slipped the gloves on.
Carefully, she lifted the bundle.
The twine was wound tightly around the letters. Too tightly to untie without disturbing the whole thing.
“That feels wrong,” she murmured.
She turned the bundle over slowly.
And then she saw it.
A smaller envelope tucked at the back, half hidden beneath the twine.
It was thinner than the others, barely more than a folded slip of paper.
Her heart began to thump.
Very carefully, she eased it free, out of the gap.
Lucky had abandoned the windowsill and returned to watch, tail curling around his paws.
“This is a terrible idea,” she told him.
He purred again.
Erica slipped the letter into her pocket before she could change her mind.
Then she stepped outside.
The air was cold but calm, the sea below the cliff unusually still. She walked past the patch of torn earth where they had dug the night before and through the little gate that always needed an extra shove before it opened.
By the time she reached the edge of the cliff, the sky had brightened to a soft grey-blue.
Only then did she unfold the letter.
My dearest Isobel,
I think of you more often than is sensible for a man who ought to be attending to his duties. Your hair, so bright it catches the light like flame. It follows me even into sleep, and it is a strange sorrow to wake and find you gone.
I write to ease your fears, if I can. My family are aware of our attachment. Though they do not welcome it as I might wish, they have promised that you shall not want for anything. I have secured what arrangements I can to see that you are provided for.
I regret only that I cannot stand beside you openly.
At your urging I have at last consulted a physician. He speaks of a weakness in my chest and warns that it must be watched carefully. I believe he is overly cautious. You know well I have never been easily undone.
Do not trouble your heart on my account.
When I am restored we shall find our way forward together, not in secrecy, but plainly and without shame.
Until that day, remember that I remain
Yours most faithfully,
Charles
Erica read the letter twice.
Then a third time.
Eventually, she let the letter fall to her side, still held loosely in her hand. Her gaze drifted out across the horizon, searching for something – clarity, perhaps.
But the sea lay quiet and grey beneath the cliff, offering nothing back.
So that was it.
Charles had been ill. Perhaps he had never even met the child Isobel carried. Perhaps he had died believing he still had years ahead of him.
But the promises in his letter hadn’t vanished with him. Someone had honoured them.
Maybe Isobel had stayed.
Maybe she’d raised her son here, quietly, out of sight.
Their son. The boy who would one day become Charles William Grigor, the man remembered by the statue in Caileanbray. History had celebrated him, while the woman who raised him had almost disappeared from it.
And somehow, despite everything whispered about her, she had endured.
Erica folded the letter carefully and slipped it back into the small envelope.
A woman once accused of witchcraft had built a life here anyway.
Not loudly, not triumphantly.
Just … day by day.
Erica understood that kind of survival now.
She looked out across the water, the wind tugging lightly at the sleeve of her jumper.
When she got back inside, she would write the final piece for the blog. The accusations, the rumours, the fragments of truth buried beneath them.
But the box … that part would stay hers.
Some stories were meant to be told.
Others could rest.
She slid the letter back into her pocket, her fingers lingering there for a moment.
Strange to think that a woman who had lived and died in this small corner of the coast had managed to alter the course of Erica’s life some centuries later.
Somewhere in Rock Cove, she thought, their descendants might still be living ordinary lives, carrying Isobel's blood without ever knowing the story.
The sea moved steadily against the cliffs below.
Erica turned back to the cottage.
There was still a story to tell.
Erica stood across from the statue of Charles William Grigor, his iron-cast gaze fixed on the horizon.
In the flat winter light his expression seemed softer somehow. Less severe.
Or maybe that was just what she knew now.
The son of Isobel, a woman once branded a witch … or something close to it.
One who had gone on to build a life powerful enough for the neighbouring town to cast him in iron.
A gentle touch on her shoulder pulled her from the thought.
“Is this him?” Leah asked, nodding at the statue.
“Yeah.”
Leah studied it for a moment, hands tucked into her coat pockets. “He’s certainly more popular these days,” she said. “Thanks to your blog.”
Erica gave a small smile. “I wonder if he’d be mad at me for telling everyone his mother was a witch.”
“But was she really a witch?” Leah asked, one eyebrow lifting slightly.
Erica didn’t answer.
Instead she found herself looking at her sister properly – perhaps for the first time since arriving in Rock Cove.
At the soft creases at the corners of Leah’s eyes. The windblown strands of hair escaping her scarf. The way her hands rested loosely at her sides, open and steady in that quiet way Leah had always had.
Her chest tightened unexpectedly.
She wanted to say something – something more – but the words didn’t quite come. Instead she laughed softly and held out her hand.
Leah took it at once, squeezing it with an affectionate wink. “Well,” Leah said, with a nod, “I think it’s time, don’t you?”
Across the street, a red velvet covering draped over the new memorial.
A crowd had gathered, more people than Erica had expected. Families, locals she half recognised from the bakery and the harbour, a few journalists hovering with microphones.
People were talking quietly, glancing between the statue, and the covered memorial.
And looking at her.
Standing beside it all was Councillor Andrew Peters, smoothing his tie while attempting to angle himself into the centre of a photographer’s frame.
“Wonderful turnout,” he declared loudly to anyone within earshot. “Always said the town needed something like this.”
Erica caught Leah’s eye.
Leah raised an eyebrow.
Erica’s stomach flipped. “I don’t know if I can do this,” she murmured, watching the crowd shift and gather. “What if they hate me?” she added quietly. “I’m just … an incomer turning up and pushing my own agenda.”
Leah snorted softly. “Yes,” she said dryly. “That terrible agenda of acknowledging women.”
Erica frowned. “No, I mean—” She stopped herself. “I’m not really from Rock Cove.”
“Not really?” Leah said, smiling faintly. She waved at the crowd.
Margery waved, her granddaughter tucked close at her side. Rosa stood nearby, hands deep in her coat pockets.
The baker from the high street nodded when Erica caught his eye, and a fisherman she’d spoken to on the harbour wall lifted his cap in greeting.
Then Gabriel appeared beside them, quiet as ever.
“Looks like quite a few people would disagree,” Leah said gently.
Erica stared for a moment, something warm and unfamiliar settling in her chest.
Leah squeezed her arm. “You can do this,” she said. “Because of you, these women are finally getting the recognition they always deserved.”
Together they crossed the road.
The old plaque – weathered and easily overlooked – now sat in the shadow of something far greater. Behind it, a new garden bed had been prepared, dark soil waiting patiently for the deep red roses that would bloom there in spring.
Even in winter, the place felt alive.
The crowd parted as Erica stepped forward.
Cameras lifted.
Someone called her name.
Andrew Peters slid neatly into place beside her, beaming as though the entire occasion had been his idea.
Erica cleared her throat. “I want to thank you all for coming,” she began, her voice steadier than she felt.
“Today marks the anniversary of the witch hunts that took place across this region – accusations fuelled by fear, ignorance, and power. But today isn’t only about remembering what was done to those women. ”
She paused, glancing across the faces in front of her, familiar ones now and strangers who had come because they’d read the story and cared enough to stand in the cold.
“It’s about recognising their strength. Their courage. And making sure their voices aren’t lost again.”
Andrew Peters leaned into the microphones. “And of course,” he added cheerfully, “the council is delighted to support initiatives that celebrate our region’s—”
Erica smoothly lifted the velvet cord from his hand. “And,” she continued without missing a beat, “Councillor Peters was kind enough to make sure the funding appeared very quickly once the story gained national attention.”
A ripple of laughter moved through the crowd.
Andrew Peters blinked once, and then smiled broadly, deciding that sounded excellent.
Erica turned back to the memorial. “With help from many of you, we’ve created a place not just to remember the past, but to honour the women who lived through it.”
She pulled the cloth free.
The bronze figure emerged into the grey winter light.
A woman stood there. Her hair loose around her shoulders, a small book held against her chest, herbs gathered in her other hand. Her gaze looked forward, steady and unafraid.
Around the base, names had been carved into the stone.
Some full. Some only fragments. But no longer lost.
For the women accused of witchcraft in this region.
Healers. Mothers. Daughters.
Misunderstood. Not forgotten.
Say their names. Let them be heard.
For a moment the crowd stood silent.
Then the applause came. First a few hands, then many.
Erica stepped back, her throat tight. Her eyes moved across the crowd and found Dylan with his arm around Leah, Maisie perched between them on tiptoes trying to see.
Erica winked at her.
Maisie beamed.
Reporters began calling questions.
Cameras shifted closer.
Andrew Peters immediately positioned himself beneath the plaque.
“Yes yes, thank you all for coming,” he announced, raising both hands grandly. “Erica and I are absolutely delighted to unveil this important cultural contribution. If the photographers would like a few pictures.”
He stepped squarely in front of the statue.
Flashes began popping.
Erica slipped quietly away.
She moved through the crowd, past familiar smiles and warm congratulations.
“Well done, love.”
“Proud of you.”
“About time we acknowledged them.”
For the first time since arriving in Rock Cove, she didn’t feel like she was passing through.
She felt part of it.
A hand rested gently against the small of her back.
Gabriel.
He didn’t speak straight away but his eyes moved across her face, studying her.
“There you are,” he said softly.
Erica laughed under her breath. “Escaping.”
“You handled him well,” Gabriel said, glancing at Andrew Peters who was now enthusiastically pointing at the plaque for photographers.
“I’m learning.”
“You were remarkable up there.”
Something in the way he said it made her look up. There was pride in his voice. But there was steadiness too, a quiet certainty.
“You’ve changed things here,” he said quietly.
With a small wave, Maisie had already climbed into the car with Dylan and Leah. Dylan opened the car door for Leah first, his hand resting on her back.
“Gabriel,” she turned back to him, half laughing. “I come with baggage. A public breakdown, an unfortunate internet reputation, and a tendency to dig up gardens in the middle of the night.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“But if you’ll have me … I’d like to stay.” She hesitated. “Not just in the cottage.”
Gabriel looked at her for a long moment.
Then he stepped closer, his hand brushing a strand of windblown hair from her face.
“Erica,” he said quietly, “I was hoping you’d say that.”
He kissed her then.
Not for the cameras.
Not for the crowd.
Just a steady, certain kiss. Warm and unhurried, as though he had nowhere else to be.
For a moment, the noise around them faded. The voices, the movement, the click of cameras.
And in its place, she felt the wind.
That wind from Rock Cove seemed to reach her even here – a sudden, salt-edged rush that didn’t belong to this place.
The same wind that had once left her breathless, standing too close to the edge of something she didn’t understand.
Only now, she wasn’t bracing against it.
Gabriel’s hand rested lightly at her face, steady and sure, keeping her exactly where she was.
She let out a soft breath, something in her chest loosening in a way she hadn’t known how to name before.
The memory didn’t pull at her.
It settled.
And, unexpectedly, she thought of the cottage.
Of its low stone walls tucked into the cliffside. The way it had stood there through weather and years of everything thrown against it. Isobel once moving through its rooms. Gabriel after her. And now Erica.
Not passing through. Not borrowing it for a while.
Living there.
When he drew back, his forehead resting briefly against hers, she didn’t reach for anything beyond this moment. She didn’t look ahead, didn’t wonder where she ought to be.
She already knew.
Erica slipped her hand into his.
When the world shifted around her, as it always did, she didn’t move.