19 Elle To See #2
The sack deflates before our eyes. Something oozes out, gray or green but hard to see in the low light. There’s something mixed into the liquid, lumpy.
“I spat out a blood clot earlier,” I whisper to Douglas. “What’s happening to me?”
Douglas shakes his head. “I’m not a physician. You’ll need someone from the mainland to check.”
Absolutely not. There are too few to trust that none would connect the dots. Plus, while we have enough coin for a few more months of supplies, I can’t afford both an appointment and whatever prescribed substance I’d be given.
“Noted,” is all I give him. I’ll talk to Mr. Pratterman. I thought the first was a result of our bargains. This could be an extension. Will I fall apart without the Devil and his gifts?
I need to take stock now if I plan to leave sooner than my usual monthly run. I find multiple crates have rotted faster than expected. Is it from the dampness since the storm or something more sinister?
“Caught any fish today?” Douglas asks, lounging near the door.
“There were no fish,” I lie. I haven’t checked the nets in days.
The last time I went out to do so, I drew in not fish but viscera instead.
Guts, blood, bones. I don’t know what animal they came from, but I know fish don’t have pelvic bones.
The smell of rot was strong and sick-sweet.
I threw the nets back under the water and haven’t dredged them up since.
“When was the last time you went outside, Elle?”
Such a casual use of my name. “Why?” I ask back, my nerves catching in my throat.
“I didn’t mean to offend.” I hate how soft his voice is. I wish we could go back to when this was simple. When he was the mourning ghost and I his end. Now he’s searching for remorse and goodwill in me.
“You don’t need to reward me.”
“Reward?”
“Don’t play the fool.” I turn, standing tall despite a shaking voice. “It doesn’t suit you.”
The fear inside me is taut since the storm. Violin strings. Every day they’re turned tighter. When will they snap?
“Fool? What are you talking about?”
My stomach churns, and that rotten taste returns in the back of my mouth, now mixed with copper.
Likely from the gallbladder. Liney can’t find this.
I grab the box and pour it out an ocean-facing window.
Though I’ve done my best to ignore the island’s hunger, its hold on me continues. Losing an organ should hurt more.
“I understood the punishment before,” I continue, inventorying a shelf of preserves. “I deserved it. But this… The niceties, asking after me, the pleasantness as though we are amicable. You shouldn’t reward me for nothing.”
“Eleanor,” he says. I don’t correct him. If anyone has claim to twist the knife with my Christian name, it’s him. “That wasn’t punishment. This isn’t reward. You aren’t a child I scold or praise. Circumstances change.”
Not a child, yet until recently I was merely girl.
“My actions toward you haven’t changed.” It comes out bitter. When I look up, he’s warped from the wetness of my eyes.
“We can’t change the past,” he agrees. “But if I’m stuck in this place for the rest of…time, I suppose, then I plan to make the most of it. Your guilt finally catching you doesn’t mean my grieving must continue. It’s done. Allow me the pleasures this afterlife can grant me.”
My heartbeat skips. The rest of time. That’s not true. At times I forget that Douglas believes he’s tied to the lighthouse, instead of its infernal keeper.
I didn’t sacrifice Douglas. I didn’t use the dark power to end his life. He’s not under the Devil’s control but my own. When I’m dead, he’ll have no tie to the world. Every day that I live, I delay his rest.
What would he do if he knew the only thing blocking him from paradise is that I’m still breathing?
But what are a few more decades with me when all of eternity lies on the other side? A blink of the eye. I’ll be dragged to hell either way.
“I hadn’t considered it that way,” I say, flatter than what he deserves.
I check my reserve of court bouillon, an essential element of winter soups. But I only stare at the large jar. I can’t open it.
“Is something wrong with them?” Douglas asks.
“Can you smell?” I ask back. I rarely answer his questions without posing my own. Does he find that bothersome?
Douglas hesitates, then nods. “Smell, see, and hear.”
“What about taste?” Could a ghost have a better sensory connection to the world than I do?
Even my morning porridge has an aftertaste of rot to it.
The power of the island has finally settled, claimed me from the inside.
Is it that as my resolve against the Devil rots, so too will I?
Or am I rotting for my attempts at resistance?
“Are you finally realizing that you’ve never offered me a seat at your table?”
“There are only two chairs,” I answer logically, but he laughs. “That was an optimistic choice of yours during your time here, I suppose.”
His eyes crinkle slightly at the edges, alight with a mirth I didn’t think possible. My cheeks flush.
“You weren’t exactly the entertaining sort,” I continue. I want to hear that laugh again. “I would’ve had more than one caller to deal with if you had been.”
“Aye,” he agrees, shrugging. That smile makes him finally look like a young man only a few years older than me. “One doesn’t become a wickie for the love of companionship.”
I turn away from the jar, curiosity piqued. “Why did you? Was your father one?”
He shakes his head. His short beard brushes against the collar of his work shirt. Can he feel that? “My father was nothing and no one to me. Never knew him.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re faster to apologize for that than—”
I pick up a sad, half-drooping orange from the crate by my feet and throw it. It flies through him and hits the door.
“Hey!” he calls out, looking offended.
“Did you feel that?”
Douglas rubs a spot in the middle of his chest. I look away from his revealed skin.
“What about your clothes?” I ask before I can stop myself. “Have they become…intrinsically part of your soul, now?”
Who is this version of me? One who asks questions before thinking and throws oranges at ghosts? A shadow of how I once was. When laughter filled the Forsyth house, when being an elder sister meant being a jester, a companion, and a miniature parent all in one.
“Would you rather I be—”
“This isn’t about what I’d rather!” I hiss, careful of my volume. I turn back to consider the fish stock and not consider how deep my blush has become. “You never answered my question. Why did you come here?”
“It was a quiet place in need of a keeper. Surely you can understand the appeal.”
I can. God above, I can. Had it been a possibility for my gender, perhaps I’d have chosen the same. A little world away from it all.
“You asked about smell,” he says, changing the subject. “Why?”
I reach out for the jar again. “If I open this stock, will you tell me what it smells like?”
His brow creases in confusion. Or is it concern? “You’re not the squeamish sort.”
Well, my senses have become bedeviled into rot.
“I find it hard to smell. Must be a cold coming on.”
He walks closer instead of gliding. To make me more comfortable? Unnecessary. I’m well versed in the spectral and unearthly. “Go on.”
I unscrew the lid. I lift it to my nose. There’s a light fragrance of onion, wine, peppercorns, and cloves. But even without fish present, my tongue is clouded with sour ash.
“Well?” I offer the jar to his inspection. He leans down and takes a deep breath through his pointed nose. His nostrils flare. In the low light, he could be alive. His skin is translucent, yes, yet some color remains in the red of his hair.
“I smell something earthy, something light. Nothing amiss.” He looks up at me, sheepish. “But I don’t know how I’d tell if I were missing anything.”
Good enough. If he can’t smell the rot, then it’s confirmed. This is a problem within me.
“Thank you.” I never used to say that to him.
Or stand so close.
I part from him to take my place for the night beside the red-tinted light.
Nothing to do but stare into darkness and plan.
I’ll need to wait for the right weather conditions to leave.
While many might take the much shorter route toward Eastern Passage, I have no horse waiting for me there.
It’s too long a walk among settlements too small to host all that I require and too nosy not to connect me to the posters in town, even in a disguise.
I can’t be gone for too many days on end, not when the light needs tending or a ship may come through that needs sinking.
A couple of nights will be tight but doable.
Until then, I won’t sleep. No dark dream will bind me to Mr. Pratterman.
I will find him on my terms. I’ll bring Liney and Bridget, just in case I need to act quickly and so neither will search where they shouldn’t.
I’ve always trusted Liney not to, but Bridget’s an unknown.
They’ll stay hidden at an inn on the edge of town while I collect supplies and meet with the only man who may stop my rot.