Chapter 9
9
Keyanna
My first week at Rhona and Finlay’s farm is strained, to put it mildly. My grandpa, as he insists I call him, has determinedly done his best to make me feel welcome, but Rhona has been decidedly less warm. Her icy regard of me is still as frosty as the day she begrudgingly invited me in from her porch, and I am starting to think that no number of attempts at helping around the farm will thaw her reception of me.
Not to mention their infuriating farmhand, who seems to take distinct pleasure in making me feel as stupid as he first assessed that I was.
Just thinking about the interaction with Lachlan today outside the barn has me frowning in the small twin bed in the guestroom I’m occupying, and even hours later, after a full day of work and fruitless attempts at conversation with my would-be grandmother at dinner—I’m still flustered when I think about it. I have never been the type of person to let someone get the best of me, and I can’t for the life of me determine why it’s Lachlan who seems to have found all the right buttons to press to make me mute with irritation. I don’t even really know the guy. Especially since he’s done his best to make himself scarce since that day outside Loch Land. Not that I’ve been looking for him or anything.
I saw him again later coming out of the house, not missing the smirk he shot at me when he took in my frazzled state after I’d finally managed to complete the chores I’d volunteered for. He silently regarded my wild hair, which had turned frizzy after all my sweating, a maddening quirk of his brow that was loaded with all the thinly veiled insults I just knew he wanted to give. I still can’t decide if him striding past me without a word was a better or worse outcome.
Better , I tell myself. Definitely better.
I don’t know why I can’t sleep tonight; I could blame the slightly uncomfortable mattress that feels like it hasn’t hosted a body in years, or the racing thoughts pinging around my skull surrounding my precarious family situation, or even the dick of a farmhand I have to actively not think of—but strangely, the most predominant thing that keeps me from closing my eyes is the all-encompassing feeling of failure. It’s been a week now, seven whole days, and I’m not one step closer to learning anything about my dad that I didn’t know before.
There have been moments when Finlay has started talking about his son, but every instance earns him a sharp glare from his wife, and he is always quick to fall silent after. It’s so frustrating that I don’t even know why they won’t talk about him. Even more so that I had every opportunity to ask my dad when he was alive and yet never did simply because I was afraid of that sad look he got whenever he mentioned his home in Scotland.
What could have possibly happened to make Rhona want to forget she had a son?
After several more minutes of tossing and turning, I can’t take it anymore. I swing my feet over the side of the bed, moving to the window to get some air. I try the latch, but it doesn’t budge. I notice when I lean closer that the thing is rusted with age—probably hasn’t been opened in years. Great. I grab for it again and pull with all my might, doing nothing but working myself up into a warmer state as exertion floods through my limbs.
“Fucking hell,” I mutter, glaring at the window.
Can nothing go my way this week?
I rattle the window like a toddler having a tantrum, but quietly, still not wanting to wake anyone with my bout of insomnia. I can’t imagine how ridiculous I must look right now. I’m sure Lachlan would love to make fun of me for it. I throw up my hands after a few seconds with a frustrated huff, craving water now that I’ve worked myself into a sweat—maybe even alcohol if I can properly raid the cabinets. I shove my feet into my worn slippers and grab my robe from the old wooden rocking chair in the corner, wrapping it tightly around myself.
I’m still muttering obscenities at the window that hasn’t really done anything wrong but is the perfect victim of my misplaced ire, and when I start to shuffle out of my room, I hear a soft click followed by an eerie creak, and when I turn back, the window is cracked open slightly, the two panes parted down the middle and pushed outward as chilled air starts to make its way in.
Huh.
I move to the window once more, finding the latch just as rusted and stiff as it was before, but now it’s pulled all the way back. I stare at it for a moment, my sleep-deprived brain thrown for a loop, finally shaking my head and rationalizing that I must have loosened it with all the frantic tugging. Maybe the universe just decided to throw me a bone. I let the cold air wash over me, breathing it in deep and letting it refresh my mind.
Okay , I think. Drink. Then bed.
I pull the window closed but don’t latch it so as not to risk it getting stuck again, quietly making my way down the stairs. The last thing I need is to wake up Rhona and have to face her while she’s tired when she already barely tolerates me.
I’m only a few steps from the kitchen when I hear the voices, momentarily frozen by the hushed tones coming from the open doorway. Almost like my thoughts of my grandmother manifested her presence.
“—been nothing but cold to the lass since she arrived, Rhonnie. She’s your blood!”
“She’s not a MacKay,” I hear my grandmother say. “Not really. Duncan gave her the name, but that doesn’t make her ours.”
Something squeezes in my chest, wrapping around my heart like a vise, and I know I should back away, that this is a conversation I don’t want to hear, but I can’t seem to make my feet move.
“Are you willing to push away the only part of our Duncan we have left over something so foolish, love? We lost our boy.” Finlay’s voice is low and mournful. “We don’t want to lose her too.”
I can’t help it; I take that final step that allows me to peer around the doorframe and into the dimly lit kitchen—enough light from the small lamp in the corner to see the harshness in Rhona’s features when she answers, “Aye, we lost our boy. We lost Duncan the day he walked out of this house, and I’m not interested in anything he left behind.”
Finlay shakes his head, opening his mouth to say more but seeming to think better of it as he stalks toward the back door to escape to the screened-in porch just beyond. Rhona stands resolutely by the counter, a hard set to her jaw and pure, unadulterated anger in her eyes that tells me she meant every word.
The crushing grief swells up in me all at once—grief for my father, for this family, for me —and I feel it piling up inside my chest like water, filling my lungs like I’m drowning. The pounding in my head is a living, throbbing thing, and I struggle to take in air, the feelings in my chest needing to get out, to go somewhere —needing to escape , and I—
The crashing sound of glass breaking startles all three of us, a small pile of shards now on the floor where the remnants of a cup lay in pieces, seeming to have fallen from the counter of its own will. I can’t help the quiet gasp that escapes me, and I don’t miss the way Rhona’s head swivels to meet the sound, her eyes so like mine connecting with my gaze and holding it. Her lips part, genuine surprise in her features, but no remorse, I note. Her eyes flick from the broken cup back to me, her mouth closing as she seems to lose the battle of finding something to say for herself. Maybe there is nothing to say for herself. Not in her mind.
And I realize all at once what a mistake this was.
I turn on my heel and rush back up the stairs, gulping in lungfuls of air as I stare at the small, cold room that I’m realizing has nothing for me. It takes me only a second to begin packing my things, to start throwing on clothes. In the entire twenty minutes it takes me to do so, no one comes after me up those stairs.
Not even when I walk out the front door.
It’s silly to be here, and I know that. As dangerous as the cove is supposed to be during the day, I can only imagine it’s more so at night. I can practically hear Lachlan’s voice in my head telling me how stupid I am, and it’s strange how a flicker of disappointment rushes through me at the thought of him, but for what, I can’t even pinpoint. I clutch my father’s urn in my hands as I watch the gentle lapping of the waves, knowing that I have to do this, regardless of who owns the land or how stupid it might be.
“I’m sorry,” I say to the air, imagining that maybe my dad is listening. “I tried. I really did.” I take a deep breath in through my nostrils, trying to quell the urge to cry. I can feel the traitorous prickling in my eyes, and I wipe away the lone offender on the back of my hand. “I wish you had told me more,” I tell my dad. “I wish I had asked more questions.” I tilt my head back to the sky, blinking rapidly. “I wish you hadn’t left me alone. ”
The sky is clear and brightly lit with twinkling stars, and sitting in the quiet, I can feel the beauty of this place, and I wonder for the umpteenth time what would have caused my dad to leave it. There’s a buzzing energy here, like a presence you can almost touch—almost as if the land itself is listening to my sad little soliloquy.
But maybe that’s just my fucking loneliness talking.
I take a deep breath as I strengthen my resolve, because neither rocks nor Lachlan fucking Greer is going to keep me from doing this one thing. I am going to finish this, at the very least.
I make my way along the shore with determination in my steps, finding the same wide, flat rock from that first day that marks the start of a path of sorts farther out into the water. I test my brand-new boots against the stone to ensure that they have the grip the store owner promised, inhaling deeply before stepping up onto the rock.
Stupid , I hear Lachlan’s voice say. That’s what you are.
I grit my teeth and take another step, moving toward the next rock that’s just a little higher.
She’s not a MacKay , says Rhona’s voice in my head. Not really.
Another step, and I have to shift my dad’s urn under one arm to grasp the largest rock and start to hoist myself up.
We lost Duncan the day he walked out of this house, and I’m not interested in anything he left behind.
Standing a few feet higher than the water, I feel a rush of accomplishment, because even if I failed at what I came here for, even if I never know this part of my dad, and in turn this part of myself—I can say that I did this, at the very least. I bring the urn higher to press my forehead against it, closing my eyes for a moment as I quietly tell my dad goodbye for the last time. I know if I drag this out, I’ll end up crying myself to sleep right here on this rock, and the last thing I need is for some asshole farmhand to find me out here tomorrow morning with a smug look and a big fat I told you so.
I remove the lid from the urn, taking one last deep breath before tipping it down to let the contents flutter in the light breeze, watching as they gently float toward the water below. I watch until the urn is empty in my hands, the weight of it seeming more substantial now. Even empty, it feels heavy in my grip.
“I did it,” I whisper. “I did it, Dad.”
I smile despite everything, feeling a flicker of triumph.
And it’s exactly at that moment that I’m thrown into the water.
It takes me several seconds to orient myself when I break the surface of the loch, gasping for breath as an ache blooms in my legs and my shoulder. Something hit me. Something solid and large. I felt the weight of it sweep across my legs just before my shoulder collided with the rock, grateful in hindsight that I didn’t bash my skull against it on the way down.
I kick my legs under the water as I turn my head to try and determine the culprit, and even as I’m trying to make sense of it, alarm bells are sounding in my head. The rational part of my brain is desperately trying to dismiss the notion, trying to make sense of how I got from point A to point B in a way that is logical and not mythical in the slightest—but a splash a few yards away shuts that little voice right up.
I don’t see it at first—maybe because it’s dark out. The light of the moon and the stars only offers so much, the glow of them making the water’s surface seem almost black. But the distinct shape of something rolls with the wave that passes in front of me, and inside it there is an impression, an impossibility, really, because there is no way.
First comes the head: wide and flat with eyes that gleam like a cat’s in the night. The shape of its neck follows, then the curve of its back as it glides through the water. I’m frozen, unable to do anything but try to stay afloat and gape at what—until this very moment—I had been almost sure didn’t actually exist, but proof is right there, coming at me at breakneck speed that doesn’t even allow me time to be properly terrified.
I’m going to be eaten by the fucking Loch Ness Monster.
It’s a hysterical thought, one that in my delirious state almost makes me laugh—and I see teeth now, sharp teeth—and this is really it. This is how I’m going to go.
Stupid. That’s what you are.
He would really get a kick out of this if he—
The force of another wave pushes me farther in as it crashes over me, and I have to kick my legs even harder to try and stay afloat. Water gets in my eyes and my mouth as I come up sputtering, blinking water away and trying to clear my blurred vision as a haunting sound rings out in the night. Like a fucking dinosaur and the screech of a bird rolled into one, the roar of the monster is so loud that it feels impossible that someone might not hear it even from miles away, and it distracts me for a moment so that I don’t immediately realize what I’m seeing.
Because not only is the fucking Loch Ness Monster real , but apparently—there is more than one.
I watch as a similar monster rushes the first, snapping at it with its teeth and rolling its body against it as if trying to force it in the other direction. The first monster howls, spinning in the water with a ferocity that pushes me below the surface again. I see the new monster rolling its body weight into the first when I manage to sputter topside again, and when it rolls once more to put its body between me and the first beast—an impossible thought occurs to me.
I think it’s protecting me.
It seems ludicrous, but every move from this second monster seems purposeful, designed to keep the first one away from me, and absolutely nothing about that makes sense. If I weren’t cold and terrified and half drowning, I might marvel at that, but as it is—I take the opportunity given by my would-be savior to start swimming in the other direction. Let the monsters duke it out. This is more than I bargained for.
I swim away as best as I can with the throbbing in my legs from where the monster struck me, hearing the commotion of their battle still raging behind me. Another screech pierces the air, one that sounds almost…pained this time, and I can’t help the way I pause in the water, turning to see who’s winning. I feel a pang of sympathy when I realize that my protector has just received a nasty bite from its opponent, the flesh where its long neck meets its body ragged and darker as if coated with blood.
You can’t do anything to help it , I rationalize. Get the fuck out of here.
I float idly for a span of seconds as my protector continues to fight back, my eyes going wide when it surges upward suddenly, its massive body crashing into the other monster with all its might. Another howl of pain, this time from the one that wanted to eat me, and as if by some miracle, it starts to swim in the other direction. I watch it sink lower into the water, its body disappearing more and more by the second—my protector lingering several yards away and seeming to watch it go. It makes another low sound, teetering a bit in the water, and I watch as it slowly turns, its glowing eyes landing on me.
Oh, shit.
I take off, not wanting to stick around to find out if the monster just wanted me for his own dinner—kicking my legs as fast as I can as I rush toward the shore. I can hear it behind me, its massive body seeming to create a wind of its own as it slices through the waves, and even when I’m stumbling onto the rocky shore, I think to myself that this might be the end.
So it’s a massive—pun intended—surprise when the monster rolls onto the shore behind me, its giant form slumping like a beached whale instead of a fearsome creature of myth. Its head lolls to the sand, and from where I’m standing several feet away, I can hear the harsh puffs of its breath.
I don’t know what compels me to move—maybe it’s the way it’s looking at me, not like it wants to eat me but with what seems like weary curiosity, and despite my best judgment, I take a cautious step forward. The monster doesn’t move to snap at me, and when I take another step closer, I notice the wound at the base of its neck, ragged and bleeding.
It’s really hurt.
I bite my lip as I hover, stuck between fear for my own safety and worried that the Loch Ness Monster might die because of me—even having a horrible thought that at least there’s another one before coming to a decision.
“Okay,” I tell the creature, taking another slow step. “I’m going to have a look at that, but if you eat me, I’m going to curse you with the worst indigestion you’ve ever had.”
The monster gives a weak chuff, something that might almost sound like a snort on something that wasn’t the size of a small charter plane. I imagine it’s thinking that my threats aren’t much of an incentive not to take a bite out of me, but it’s all I’ve got.
It doesn’t move when I finally get closer to its wound, one big, gleaming eye rolling to watch me as I carefully assess the damage. Which is pretty bad, it seems. The bleeding is steady, and given that I know nothing about the beast’s anatomy, I have no way of knowing if it’s a fatal blow or not.
I rip my jacket off in a flurry of movement; it’s not much in the way of first aid, but it’s literally all I have. I press the fabric to the gaping bite mark, immediately seeing it start to soak with blood, and I feel a sudden onslaught of sadness for this creature, one that I’m pretty sure saved my life.
“You can’t fucking die,” I say raggedly, feeling my eyes burn. “Not now.”
I did it , I think distantly. I found it, Dad.
“You’re not fucking dying, do you hear me?”
I press harder at the wound, desperation clawing at my insides as I silently pray for the bleeding to slow. I don’t know what that will mean for me, and I don’t know if what I’m doing will make any difference, but the desire to try is so strong, it feels like it’s filling me up. Like earlier, I feel so… full . So full of emotion that I can’t seem to contain it.
My body feels too hot, and my eyes blur with tears as I press harder, as I silently beg whoever is listening to save this creature that is the only tie I have left to my father—and I feel my head swim with the effort of it. I feel that same sensation from Rhona’s house threaten to suffocate me, feel it pouring into my chest like liquid heat.
Heat I can feel in my hands too, weirdly. It’s in my chest and my arms and my palms, and my vision is so blurry now that I can barely see, and my head swims, and my lungs burn, and somehow, there is a faint glow, and then…
Everything goes dark.