Chapter 9
NOW
Jake dropped Violet back at the guest house after a quick cup of tea.
Violet had, ludicrously, found it all a bit awkward.
It wasn’t Jake’s fault; he was perfectly kind and nice as he always was.
But she was just on edge. She was holding on to too much of a secret, what with her pregnancy and all that entailed, and she hated herself for it.
But she worried, perhaps ridiculously, that if she spent too much time with him in his cosy van, she’d say something, and she wasn’t ready to yet.
And the van was where it had all happened, really.
It had been a total accident – a nasty tummy bug after Jake’s office Christmas party. Too much to drink, and too little thought to the fact that they needed to take extra precautions. Her Pill would have been completely ineffective, and she never considered doing anything about it.
Then there’d been one, special, magical night on the Scottish coast, watching the Northern Lights in the camper van. It had been the Winter Solstice, and it had been beautiful.
Even afterwards, she could have gone for the morning-after pill – but she didn’t.
And then it was too late.
And then it was February. And she had to start thinking about it. Start taking it seriously.
Which is why she’d come here.
And here, also, was Jake.
He’d thrown her by turning up at that exact moment and hauling her to safety – she was grateful for it, of course she was.
And she did want him to be near her. She absolutely did not want to be without him.
But getting pregnant had kind of put a spanner in the works; especially as she knew children had not been on the agenda in his failed marriage.
Couple that by imagining what might have happened if he hadn’t have turned up when he did – and the fact she’d seen that dagger – and it had her jumpy as hell. She was pleased to be back at the guest house.
‘Oh. That’s my itinerary,’ Jake said now, handing her a scrap of paper after he’d parked.
She shook her head and laughed, despite herself, as she took it.
Jake did not do itineraries. She’d seen him scrawl it down on the back of a receipt while she’d been washing the mugs up.
‘So if you do want to get together, well,’ he shrugged, ‘it would be great. If not. No worries.’ He flashed a grin. ‘I’ll see you at home anyway.’
‘Thank you.’ She lifted the scrap of paper up and couldn’t resist a smile. ‘I shall study this and see if it matches my itinerary.’
‘Because of course, you have a proper one.’ Jake sat back in the driver’s seat. ‘I’m flexible though, just so you know.’
‘Yes. I know.’ Violet hesitated, then leant over and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. ‘Thanks for saving me from a watery grave.’
‘You’re welcome.’
She waved at him as he turned the van around and drove it out of the car park, the wheels crunching on the snow.
God, it was cold.
She walked inside, grateful for the heat, already shedding her coat as she headed up the stairs to her room.
She changed out of her wet clothing and pulled on a soft pair of leggings and a long, baggy jumper.
Bliss. She hung the damp clothes over the radiators to dry off and made herself a hot chocolate from the sachets Cynthia had kindly provided in the room.
Then Violet did a little work on her book, losing herself in the socio-political world of the seventeenth century.
And, when it was dinnertime, she closed her laptop, stretched out her back and headed downstairs.
She wondered what Jake was doing this evening. Maybe, if their itineraries correlated, she could have dinner with him one night. Maybe not breakfast. She pulled a face at that thought. She wasn’t ready for that quite yet.
As she entered the dining room, she saw Ollie – the chap from this morning. He looked pretty jittery and not like someone who had found their country pile. Poor chap.
‘Hey!’ She walked up to his table. ‘Any luck?’
Ollie raised his eyes to her. ‘No. And to be honest, it’s not an experience I want to repeat. I got a bit freaked out, so…’ He shrugged, trying, it seemed, to look nonchalant.
Something in his eyes made her pause. ‘Oh? That bad?’
He looked around and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘Let’s just say it was a bit – weird.’
‘If it makes you feel any better, I have also experienced weird today.’
They looked at one another for a moment, then Ollie gestured to the seat opposite him. ‘Please. Sit down. Do tell.’
Violet paused for a second, wondering whether this would also be something to add to the ‘weird’ list – having dinner with a practical stranger when her partner was in a camper van a few miles away. Possibly heating up a tin of soup and pouring water into a Pot Noodle for supper.
She put the thought out of her mind. She knew Jake better than that. He’d be in the pub with a steak and ale pie.
‘I’d love to.’ She sat down. ‘But you first.’
* * *
Ollie wondered how batshit crazy he would actually come across as if he told Violet the truth. What did it matter, though? He’d never see her again after this little sojourn and he was only here for a couple more days – if that.
Okay, he might as well tell her – he had to tell somebody or he’d implode.
‘I found the spot where Milburn Hall used to be,’ he said. ‘So far so good, yes?’ Violet nodded and he continued. ‘It’s there on the old maps – you can see the shape of the place on the aerial views as well, but it’s on a private road.’
‘Oh, that’s a shame.’ Violet pulled a sympathetic face.
‘I decided to pull rank, though.’ He half-smiled. ‘So, I parked up and legged it over the fence, all ready to tell them I was a member of the Milburn family, should I be challenged. I mean, it’s just a rumour and nothing has been proved, but still.’
‘And were you challenged?’
‘I think I confused a sheep, but beyond that, no.’
‘That’s positive then.’
Ollie nodded and moved his fork around the table, considering how to tell her the next bit: the weird bit.
‘Anyway, I got distracted by a cottage on the other side of the track. I couldn’t get into the field where my house – sorry, Milburn Hall – was, because there was a blackthorn hedge around it. ’
‘Witches,’ murmured Violet. ‘Don’t they use blackthorn to make their wands?’
Ollie nodded. ‘Yes. I did some research afterwards. Apparently, people used to hang a branch above the door to ward off evil spirits. And they used to use blackthorn branches as walking sticks to protect them from supernatural threats on country roads.’
‘I suppose you could give a person a good poke with one of those branches.’
‘It’s pretty spiky.’
‘Oh! Didn’t the witches used to use it for pricking those wax poppets when they were cursing people?’ Violet sat up straight.
Ollie nodded. ‘Yes. So of course when I saw all this blackthorn today, I thought it was there for a reason.’ He shook his head. ‘And then I decided to have a look inside the cottage. And basically, it’s a shed.’
‘Oh.’ Violet looked deflated. ‘I wondered for a moment if it was…’ Her voice trailed off and she looked at her hands.
‘Old Meg’s house?’
Violet’s head popped up, her eyes wide. ‘No. Just Meg’s house. She wasn’t old. Why do people keep thinking she’s old?’ Violet frowned. ‘Nobody knows. Anyway – how was that weird? Because you wandered into what may or may not have been a witch’s house? Genuine question, I’m not being sarcastic.’
‘No, I know.’ Ollie took a deep breath. ‘It was because I’ve never had a feeling like it.
It was oppressive, it was almost like there was evil there; something that was just ready to jump out at me.
Honestly, I got proper goosebumps. It sounds a bit stupid, doesn’t it?
But anyway, I ran as fast as I could out of there. ’
‘Good God.’ Violet looked shocked. ‘I guess dark and creepy and abandoned can do that. It’s not pleasant, is it?
I know exactly what you mean. I’ve been to places like that and can completely understand.
Glencoe. Culloden.’ She shivered. ‘It’s like the history has stained the earth – I know, that sounds dramatic!
But I am a writer.’ She lifted her wrist. A charm bracelet was dangling from it and she pointed out a book and a pen.
‘Sometimes, I have to remind myself that my real life and my writerly life are quite different, even though I get lost in it too much. My partner thinks I should start writing fiction, but I’d be scared where my imagination would take me. He bought me this for my birthday.’
Ollie nodded and clattered his fork down noisily. He’d been playing with it the whole time. He leant back in his seat and looked at Violet. ‘Cute charm. So – beat my weirdness. Go!’
‘Riiiighhhht.’ Violet leant forwards. ‘How about this: I went to Coventina’s Well.
And I saw something that looked like a dagger lying around.
Just a small one – big enough to hurt you with, though.
And I mean, Coventina’s Well is a sacred space at the end of the day, so I didn’t like to think about a dagger being left there.
It just seemed wrong.’ Violet shuddered.
‘Why is it a sacred space?’ Ollie was intrigued. ‘Isn’t there a temple nearby anyway?’
‘Yes, there’s the Mithraic Temple. And there used to be a Shrine to the Water Nymphs just along Meggie’s Dene Burn – where Meg’s ashes were scattered for her beliefs.
But Coventina’s Well is dedicated to a goddess who the Pagans believed made the snow thaw and the spring come.
People still believe in that. And when you have three places like that together, four if you include the fact it’s probably where poor Meg met her fate, something’s going to linger isn’t it?
I’m writing a book on witch trials throughout Britain, and bringing in sacred spaces and folklore, and it all kind of makes sense in my mind. ’
‘That’s interesting.’
‘It is.’ Violet nodded, then it was her turn to take a deep breath.
‘But then I reached down to pick the dagger up, because I knew it shouldn’t be there and, all the time, it seemed like the atmosphere was changing and getting a bit more, I don’t know, sinister?
And then when I went to grab it, it was gone. ’
‘Fuck.’
‘Exactly. And then I slipped on the snow and nearly fell into the bloody Well. Luckily, my partner turned up and he hauled me up the bank before I actually drowned myself.’
‘Wow, that was lucky! Had you arranged to meet? I thought you were just here on your own.’
‘No.’ Violet flushed again. ‘We hadn’t arranged it. Pure chance he was there.’
‘Then it’s really lucky he was.’
‘Yes. So, there you go. Weird. Fate, maybe.’
‘I think, then,’ said Ollie carefully, ‘that we have stumbled upon… a weird place.’ He raised his glass of water and Violet laughed.
She raised hers as well and they clinked glasses. ‘I’m actually glad you had a weird day as well.’ There was, Ollie sensed, some sort of relief there as she spoke. ‘Because I was genuinely thinking I was going crazy.’
Ollie shook his head. ‘If you are,’ he said, ‘I am as well. Let’s just hope it was something to do with the weather.’ He glanced out of the window where the snow was falling. ‘Tricks of light and all that stuff. Atmospheric pressure and shifts. Not seeing things clearly through a blizzard.’
‘Let’s hope so,’ said Violet.
Ollie took a sip of his water. Yes, the blizzard and the strange, snowy light might explain some of the odd feelings around there.
But surely not everything?
That would take more than a snowstorm to explain away.