Chapter Twenty-Six
Julian drove áedán and me to Heathrow Airport. From there, we took a plane to Orkney. About five hours later, we stood before Skara Brae, on the western coast. It sat on the shore of the Bay of Skaill and past the bay stretched the Atlantic Ocean.
I'd seen the photographs, read the archaeological reports, and studied the site plans until I could draw them from memory. None of it prepared me for the reality.
The settlement burrowed into the earth like a crab, its walls topped with thick grass.
Stacked slabs of stone formed the walls.
The roofs, or perhaps the upper floors they once held were long gone.
The buildings huddled together, connected by low passages, as if the people who'd built them understood that survival meant staying close.
“It's smaller than I expected.” áedán stopped walking, hands shoved deep in his pockets, and stared across the site. “You said a storm unearthed it?”
“Yes, in the winter of 1850.”
The wind screamed across the bay. Waves crashed against rocks that had been there since the world was young. The grass around the ruins was thick and tough, the kind that grew in places where nothing else could survive.
I felt it in my chest—the weight of time. The sense that we were standing in a place that existed before history became something people wrote down. A time before humans created magical beings with their imagination.
We walked between the sunken buildings and peered at the stones, searching for the spiral even though we knew the picture in the book was of structure eight.
I had to be sure there weren't any others first. Millennia of wind and rain had softened their edges, but I could still see zigzags, chevrons, and triangles carved into the stones.
But no spirals. Some walls were higher than others, stretching above the ground.
Some structures were in better shape. Huge stone slabs formed recesses and cubicles in them.
Some stones formed an outline that was probably a hearth.
It was hard to know what they'd been used for.
This was just a skeleton—the bones of lives lived so long ago that even their language was lost.
We reached the end of the site and came to a structure that sat slightly apart from the others—structure eight, the one with the spiral.
According to the archaeological surveys, it was the only building that wasn't a dwelling.
A workshop, they thought. The walls curved in and out like an amoeba, with recesses built into them.
I couldn't see into those recesses, so I went down into the ruins.
áedán followed, then split from me to inspect the walls to the left, while I went right.
Three feet down, I stopped. There it was.
The spiral carving lay in a stone near one of the recesses.
It was just as we'd seen in the photograph, just like the others we'd seen—a spiral with its outer tail hanging free and trailing away like an unfinished sentence.
“It's here,” I called to áedán, then peered at the carving. “This looks newer than the other carvings. Not as weathered.”
áedán came over and crouched in front of it. “It does look more preserved.” His hand lifted, hesitated, then traced the carved line with his fingertips. “I feel something. The tickle of magic.” He ran his finger over the broken tail of the spiral three times, then tapped it.
A grinding came from the stone—low in tone, coming from somewhere inside. The wall groaned, and I felt it through my feet, through my bones. áedán jerked his hand back, but the sound continued.
A section of the wall—three stones wide, six stones high—shifted with a scrape that made my teeth ache. It didn't move straight back, but swung inward like a door on hinges. Darkness lay beyond, the sound of falling pebbles echoing out of it.
“How did you know to do that?” My voice came out hoarse.
áedán stood slowly. His eyes had gone wide, reflecting the gray Orkney sky. “I just traced the pulse of magic in the stone.”
I pulled my backpack off my shoulder, removed my torch, and shone it into the hole. “There are stairs.”
The gap was narrow but passable. I squeezed through sideways, holding my pack at my side as the cold stone scraped against my chest and back.
The air on the other side was different—still and dry.
It smelled of dust, time, and minerals. My torch's light flared over stone steps that descended into darkness.
“Ethan.” áedán's voice came from behind me. “I feel more magic. Stronger.”
“Can you tell if it's malicious?”
“Magic is never malicious. It's neutral. I can sense its energy, but not the spell itself.”
“Well, this is what we came for. I'm not leaving now.” I went down the stairs.
áedán squeezed through the gap, pulled a torch from his backpack, and followed me. “Just go slowly.”
The stairs were steep, carved directly out of the bedrock. My torch's light bounced off walls that pressed close on either side. The air grew colder as we descended. I counted thirty steps before the stairs ended. Then I stepped out into a chamber larger than the workshop above.
I swept my torch across the space. Seamless stone everywhere. The entire space had been carved from bedrock, as had the shelves. Shelves filled with books, and nooks holding rolled parchments covered the walls.
“Holy shit.” I moved forward slowly, afraid that any sudden movement might make it all disappear.
I shone my light over the nearest books while áedán shone his around the room. Some manuscripts were bound in leather, others were loose pages tied with cord, and the rolled parchments sat in their cubicles above.
áedán moved past me, hand outstretched. “This is the source of the magic.”
“The books are magical?”
“Nae, I think someone preserved them with magic. That's why they havenae disintegrated. It's probably what keeps the damp out too.”
“Who would do this?” I turned in a slow circle, trying to take it all in. “Who would build a scriptorium under a Neolithic settlement? This obviously wasn't built in 3100 BC.”
“Someone who wanted to hide something.” áedán's voice was tight.
I moved to the nearest shelf and pulled down a book. The leather binding was supple under my fingers. On the cover was a painted symbol—the spiral. I opened it.
Inside, were pages covered in Latin handwriting, which didn't surprise me.
Latin was the first written language in Scotland, introduced by the Romans around 450 AD.
Then came Ogham, which originated around the 4th century AD.
Scottish Gaelic appeared around the 12th century, and then Early Scots around the 14th century.
Of course, Latin was used in books until around the mid-15th century.
So, the language didn't date the book, but the stories did.
The earliest one was dated 505. I assumed it meant AD, but that wasn't noted.
The stories were about ocean-dwelling creatures, none of which I knew.
I put it back and took down another. It told the tale of a race of beings, only a foot tall, with hooked noses and claws.
I flipped forward to another tale about yet another creature I didn't recognize.
I kept looking, taking down book after book, then replacing them.
Finally, I found something familiar—phookas, a type of shapeshifter from Celtic mythology.
“These are about myths.” I set the book down and pulled another one. “All of them. Look—this one's about selkies. And they all have that spiral on their covers.”
áedán had moved to the far end of the chamber. “Ethan.”
I turned to find him in front of a stone desk—a simple slab of rock supported by two carved pillars. On top of it sat a single book. Not an ancient one, but a modern bound book, with a modern pen lying beside it.
I crossed the chamber in four steps and added my light to áedán's. It was open to a page only half full, as if the writer had paused and meant to return later. The handwriting was neatly done in black ink. I flipped to the first page and went still.
Across the top of the first page, written in that same precise hand, was a single word. A name—áedán.
My heart stopped.
áedán reached for it with a hand that trembled slightly. I caught his wrist.
“Wait.” My voice came out hoarse. “We don't know what this is.”
“It has my name on it.” He pulled free gently and picked up the manuscript. His hands steadied as he opened it.
I moved closer, reading over his shoulder. The text began without preamble, no introduction. The first paragraph described a winter night when a fishing boat was caught in a storm. The man in it cried out for help as waves crashed over the bow.
I recognized the story immediately. áedán had told it to me when we were at his cottage. He'd rescued the fisherman and pulled his boat to shore. The man had lived for another forty years.
But that wasn't what the manuscript said.
The kelpie heard the fisherman's cries and smiled.
Here was sport. Here was entertainment on a dull winter night.
He swam closer, circling the boat like a shark, letting the man see him.
Letting hope kindle. Then he rose from the water in his true form—magnificent, terrible—and the fisherman reached for him with desperate hands.
The kelpie let him touch. Let him believe for one beautiful moment that salvation had arrived. Then he dragged the man under and held him there until his struggling stopped.
The truth yields to the tale most often told.
áedán made a wounded sound.
I kept reading, unable to stop. The next paragraph described another incident.
A child had wandered too close to the water's edge, and found áedán, wearing the shape of a beautiful pony.
The pony was gentle until she climbed onto his back.
Then he galloped into the loch and tossed her into the deepest part, watching as she sank.
The story ended with that terrible sentence.
“This isnae—” áedán's voice cracked. “Nae, I frightened her away from the water. She never drowned.”