Chapter Twelve #2
They walked side by side, Velas gesturing as he spoke, and Caelum listening with his whole body tilted toward his companion.
They looked happy. They looked like people who had shared countless roads together and knew each other's thoughts before they were spoken. They looked like two people in love.
The vision, like the others, was silent.
I couldn't hear what they were saying, couldn't hear what had made them laugh.
But I could see the love between them, clear as the water around me.
When I looked at áedán, I found him frowning.
Had he been there when they visited? But no, áedán was six hundred years old. Velas had died before he was born.
Before I could wonder more about áedán's frown, another memory came, but it was fuzzy at the edges, indistinct.
I could see a few kelpies in the loch, but then a section dissolved, as if someone had washed it away.
I frowned as the memory vanished entirely.
Another tried to take its place, but it faded too.
áedán's hand tightened painfully around mine. I looked at him and saw something I'd never seen before. Fear. Real, visceral fear.
The water always remembered, that's what he said. Humans could forget or change what they remembered, but not the water. Until now.
I wanted to say something, to offer comfort, but I didn't know how to speak underwater. So I leaned against him, trying to communicate what I couldn't say aloud. He didn't look at me, just stared at the visions as they continued to rise, only to fracture.
Then the water around the vision began to ripple.
As the vision dissolved, the current twisted through it, forming a familiar shape—a spiral.
It was the same one we'd seen in the pond, with an extra curved line at the outer end, either severed from the whole, or a stunted start.
Then the spiral dispersed, and the light retreated to the standing stones.
áedán pulled me upward with desperate urgency.
We broke the surface, gasping. The night air hit my face like a slap, and I floundered.
áedán was already swimming toward the dock, towing me behind him, and I kicked my legs to help.
He let go of me to climb onto a ladder on the side of the dock, and his magic left me in a rush.
I coughed up water, my body going cold, and I nearly went under.
But then the water lifted me to the level of the dock, and áedán hauled me onto the boards.
As the water receded, it took what was on our skin and in our hair.
I rolled onto my back, dry, and he sat beside me as we got our breathing under control.
“Did you see it?” áedán's voice was rough. “The spiral.”
“Yes, I saw it. We need to figure out what the hell it is.”
“Whatever it is, it just erased the water's memories, and that shoulda been impossible.”
We sat in silence for a moment. Then áedán stood up and offered me his hand. I took it and let him pull me to my feet. My legs felt unsteady.
“Come inside.” He picked up our clothes and shoes, piling them in his arms. “You're freezing.”
I was. Now that his magic had left me, I could feel the cold settling into my bones. My teeth began to chatter.
áedán led me up the hill and into the cottage. The interior was warm; the fireplace already burning low. He disappeared through a doorway and returned wearing pants, with an armful of clothes—soft flannel pants, a thick wool sweater, wool socks. They'd be warmer than what I'd been wearing.
“Change. Bathroom's off the bedroom.” He handed me the clothes. “I'll make some tea.”
I went through the bedroom into the small bathroom. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely pull on the dry clothes, but eventually I managed. The sweater smelled like lavender and something else. Something that was distinctly áedán.
When I came out, he was setting the kettle on a hook above the fire. I tried not to stare at the patterns on his back, but he'd lit some oil lamps and stoked the fire, and the low light made the shimmering beneath his skin brighter.
“Sit.” He gestured at the sofa.
I sat down and sighed. The cushions were squishy, worn in a way that suggested many years of use. He sat beside me and leaned back to watch the fire as we waited for the water to heat.
“You have a toilet,” I said.
He looked at me. “Uh, yes.”
“It surprised me because the cottage is so rustic.”
“Plumbing doesn't require electricity, nor is it all that complicated. I divert water from the loch.”
“Ah.” I didn't want to talk about the spiral, but I couldn't think of anything else to say.
It didn't seem to bother áedán. He sat with me in silence without trying to break it. Only when the water boiled did he get up and pour some into a couple of mugs. He dropped some metal tea balls in the mugs and brought them over to the couch. After handing me one, he sat back down.
“Thank you.” I took the mug and stared into it. No milk or sugar. Oh, well.
I looked over at áedán and frowned. He'd put on a shirt at some point, but I hadn't noticed when.
I suspected I was still in shock. Maybe he was too, and that's why he was quiet.
We drank in silence for a while. The tea was strong and sweet, warming me from the inside out.
He must have added some sugar. Yet another thing I hadn't noticed.
“The water has never lied to me.” áedán leaned back and stared out the front window. “Never failed to show me what I asked to see. It has never forgotten.”
“I don't think it forgot anything. Something destroyed the memories.” I curled both hands around my mug to warm my fingers.
“Yes.” He stared into his mug. “Someone has enchanted the water.”
I thought about the spiral. “Or maybe the water is reacting to the new version of your story.”
“Nae, that can't be it. I've looked upon those memories many times over the years, and this is the first time they vanished.”
“We need to go to the estate.”
áedán looked at me sharply. “What?”
“I don't know what we just saw, but I'm certain it has something to do with you fading. Maybe someone in the Velasca will know what's happening. Caelum has been alive longer than you have. If anyone knows what this is, he will. Then we can stop it.”
“You want me to go to the Velasca Estate?” His voice was flat.
“I want to figure out what's happening.” I set down my mug. “áedán, we need help.”
He was quiet for a long time. The fire popped. Outside, an owl called.
“It's been a long time since I visited.”
“You've been to the Velasca Estate? Why didn't you tell me? What happened? Julian said you cut off contact with them, but he never mentioned that you'd been there.”
He shrugged. “That was before my clan started fading. Nothing happened. They were nice enough.” He turned to meet my gaze. “But they waited until now to send someone. All those years, while my clan was fading, they did nothing. I've lost my family, Ethan. But they never came to help me.”
“I'm so sorry, áedán.” I tried to remember what Julian had said. “Julian said the fading had just come to their attention.”
“I thought they were supposed to be monitoring us?”
“They probably have a lot of myths to monitor.”
“Probably?” áedán narrowed his eyes at me.
“I'm not sure how it works. You're actually my first assignment. But we will ask them together.”
“They waited all this time to check on me, and then they sent me a new member?”
I lifted my chin. “Julian was afraid you would bolt if you saw one of them. And I may be new, but I'm smart, capable, and I care about you. I will stand by you and confront them about this. And I swear I will do everything I can to save you.”
áedán sighed. “You think they can help?”
“I think it would be foolish if we didn't use every resource we have available to us.”
He was quiet for another long moment. Then he nodded, just once. “All right. We'll go to the Velasca. But not tonight. Tonight I need to think.”
“Of course.”
He stood and collected our empty mugs. “You should stay here. It's late, and you're exhausted. The sofa is comfortable enough.”
I opened my mouth to protest, then realized he was right. I was exhausted. The water-breathing, the visions, the fear—all of it had drained me. So, instead, I said, “Thank you.”
áedán brought me a blanket and a pillow. “Sleep well. We'll figure out what to do in the morning.”
I lay down on the sofa and pulled the blanket up to my chin. It smelled like áedán. I watched him move around the cottage, banking the fire, turning out the oil lamps, doing the small domestic tasks that people do before bed.
“áedán?” I said into the darkness.
“Yes?”
“The children. In the vision. They loved kelpies.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Yes, they did.”
“That's the truth that needs to be remembered.”
“Yes,” he said again, softer this time. “It is.”
I heard him walk toward the bedroom. Heard the door close softly. Then there was only the sound of my own breathing. I'd never realized how much noise people made. I was so used to all those little sounds that the silence unnerved me.
I lay awake for a long time, thinking about visions, strange spirals, and áedán's hand in mine.
I thought about breathing underwater and about the way he'd looked at me when I'd agreed to dive into the loch with him.
He trusted me enough to go to the Velasca Estate with me.
I couldn't let him down. Honestly, I was worried.
The fact that Gran had worked for them had made me trust them, but I barely knew those people.
They had better treat áedán well, or I'd take him straight back to Scotland, and we'd struggle through this on our own.
The thought had me blinking. I hadn't known áedán long either, but I was willing to give up my job for him.
Eventually, exhaustion pulled me under. I dreamed of children weaving flower crowns, horses rising from deep water, and two men walking side by side, shining with love.