Chapter 2 #3
“During your reading, before Mitch interrupted us, I saw something in your chart. In your seventh house—the house of partnership.” She hesitated, choosing her words carefully.
“There was a dark strand, Agnes, that was coiled through your love line. It was, I don’t know, barbed and kind of, pulsing, I guess? Like something alive.”
My throat tightened. I couldn’t speak.
“I didn’t know what it was then,” Liora continued. “But seeing that thread at the loch, the one connecting you to the Stone ... I think they’re related. I think whatever that dark strand is, it’s tied to your bloodline. And it’s tied to whoever you love.”
There it was.
Spoken aloud, finally, by someone other than my grandmother.
“My grandmother,” I heard myself say, the words scraping out before I could stop them. “She warned me. On her deathbed. They were her last words to me, actually.”
For three weeks I’d waited. Hoping against hope that Gran would rouse again and tell me something different. Tell me that I was free to love whoever I wanted. But she didn’t, so her words stayed with me, her edict final.
Liora went very still and I sucked in a breath before continuing.
“She said the women in our family must never love fully. That the loch takes what we love.” I pulled in a shaky breath. “And if I let myself love Graham, truly love him, the water would claim him.”
“Oh, Agnes,” Liora breathed.
“She made me promise, well, I did. I had to. She believed it. As do I.” I crossed my arms over my chest and rocked forward.
“Graham and I were dating. Back then.” At Liora’s surprised gasp, I realized that this was part of my life that not everyone knew.
She hadn’t been around then, and I guess I hadn’t been very open about my past with everyone I’d met.
It was easier, sometimes, not to think about what Graham and I once had for a very brief glimmering moment in time.
“I’d fallen in love with Graham. And the moment I admitted it to myself—the moment I let myself want a future with him—I started having nightmares. The loch, pulling him under. His face disappearing beneath the surface. Every single damn night.”
Liora’s grip on my hands tightened.
“So, I ended it. Just like my gran had asked me to do. To save him.” My voice had gone hollow.
“I told him I didn’t love him. I watched his heart break, and I let him believe it was his fault.
Because I thought—” My throat closed. I forced myself to continue.
“I thought if I didn’t love him, the curse couldn’t touch him. ”
“And you’ve been living with that ever since,” Liora said softly. “All these years. Pretending you don’t care for him.”
“Aye,” I said, turning to look back out at the loch.
“I think we need to dig deeper, no? Like, surely we can’t just accept this?”
I jerked my eyes away from the loch to see fierce determination light Liora’s face.
“Surely there are some records? There’s got to be something. Anything that can help us break this for you.” Liora’s jaw set.
“I don’t know,” I said, leaning back and twisting the bracelet more rigorously on my wrist. “I need … I need to research more. I need information. That’s how my brain works, Liora.
I can’t just accept that I can break a familial curse on vibes alone.
Like, I’m all for this She-ra, let ’em hear us roar mentality of women kicking butt and destroying all the things, but also, you know, I need like concrete actions to take. I don’t do vibes.”
At that, Liora’s lips quirked in a smile. “I mean, I’ll admit, I’ve coasted through a lot of my life on the fumes of vibes alone, but I get it. But you don’t have to do it alone. That’s sort of the whole point of having friends, Agnes. Especially friends who can literally see the threads of fate.”
I laughed, despite the unease that slipped through my gut.
Why had I always just accepted that this was the way of things?
I’d pushed aside my own chance at happiness out of fear of what could happen to Graham.
Because I loved him too much to take the risk that he could die.
And I’ve never doubted what my gran had told me as simply gospel. She was my person.
“We’ll start tomorrow,” Liora said, rising from her chair. “I’m coming over and that’s that.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
At the door, Liora paused and looked back at me.
“Agnes? That thread connecting you to the Stone?”
I waited.
“It wasn’t only dark. Because on the flip side of dark, is well, light. So, there’s something to be said for that, you ken? It was, I don’t know, really beautiful.” Her expression softened. “I think we can figure it out. I have faith in us.”
She slipped out before I could respond, leaving me alone with the weight of her words and the dark surface of the loch glittering beyond the window. I leaned my head back against the chair for a moment, watching the lights of the village ripple across the surface of Loch Mirren.
Graham.
His name ached in my heart, the way it always did when I let myself think it.
For years, I’d told myself that keeping him at an arm’s length was an act of honor. That my distance was the kindest thing I could give him. That watching him live—even if it meant watching him live without me—was better than the alternative.
But what if I’d been wrong?
What if the curse wasn’t a death sentence, but a puzzle? Something that could be understood, unraveled, or bloody hell, broken?
What if I didn’t have to be alone?
I pressed my fingertips to the cold glass of the window, staring out at Loch Mirren.
Somewhere beneath that still surface, the Beithir waited. If that wasn’t enough to mess with my head, the thought of actually being able to love Graham open and freely would certainly do the job.
“Great, and that’s me not likely sleeping tonight,” I murmured out loud, standing.
A soft moo sounded, my only warning before Clyde slipped softly out of the wall. It was the first time I think I’d ever seen the ghost coo gently enter a room. It was as if he’d sensed that I needed a gentle approach in that moment.
“Hey, buddy,” I murmured, laughing as he bounded over to me and booped his big head against my arm. It was like being showered with ice crystals, and I shivered as I brushed against his apparition.
Clyde mooed again, the sound soft, and I understood he was trying to soothe me.
Was he telling me that I wasn’t alone in this weight I carried? Just like Liora had so blatantly reminded me. Maybe it was time. Time to put down this burden and actually do what I was good at.
Research.
It appeared we needed answers, and according to the Clach na Fìrinn, the Truth Stone buried out on the island and currently wreaking havoc on our lives with its band of merry water horses, I was the one to get them.
Lovely. Just lovely.
“I guess it’s time we find the truth.”
Clyde threw his head back and bellowed to the ceiling, sending me flying a few steps forward and clutching my hands at my chest.
“Damn it, Clyde.” I laughed. “Warn a lass, first, would ya?”
Clyde tossed his head and stomped his foot, delighted with himself, and winked out of sight, and despite everything, his appearance had eased some of my tension. I straightened my shoulders.
It appeared I had some work to do.