Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
AGNES
It happened sooner than anyone thought.
Three days. It had been three days of carefully orchestrated Graham Watch rotations, of quick showers and taking the long way around the loch, and of Lachlan’s insistence that we all had Graham’s live location on our phones so we could track his movements like he was a particularly troublesome toddler prone to wandering into traffic.
Three days of pretending everything was fine while we waited for the other shoe to drop.
I woke up in my bed, tangled in my duvet, with the soft light filtering through the door from a light left on in the hallway. For a moment, I just lay there, enjoying the warmth and the solid presence of Graham beside me.
Then Quilliam landed on my chest with all the delicacy of a small, scaly bowling ball.
“You snore,” he informed me, his opal eyes approximately two inches from my face.
“I do not,” I whispered, sliding a glance to where Graham still slept.
“You absolutely do. It’s like sleeping next to a small, angry badger with a sinus infection.”
“Wheesht!” I did not snore. Did I?
“I will not hush. I’ve sat in those archives for years with nobody to talk to.” He settled more comfortably on my sternum, and I sighed. “Also, you talk in your sleep. Something about cheese. Very concerning.”
What was wrong with dreaming about cheese? Didn’t everyone love cheese? Sophie would back me up here.
“Why are you bothering me right now?”
“I got bored. Your romance novel collection can only sustain me for so long, and I’ve already cataloged all your historical inaccuracies.
” He fluttered his wings. Graham stirred beside me, one arm tightening around my waist as he pulled me closer.
His eyes were still closed, but I could tell from the tension in his jaw that he was awake.
“Is the dragon insulting us again?” he mumbled into his pillow.
“Book wyrm. And yes. Apparently, I snore and talk about cheese.”
“You do snore. It’s adorable.”
“It is not adorable,” Quilliam interjected. “It’s cacophonous.”
“He says it’s cacophonous.”
“Tell him to sod off.”
“He can hear you.”
“Good.” Graham cracked one eye open and fixed Quilliam with a bleary glare. “Sod off, you wee menace.”
Quilliam’s tail flicked with what I’d come to recognize as amusement. “I like him. He’s grumpy in the mornings. Very relatable. Though his vocabulary could use some work.”
I translated, leaving out the vocabulary comment, and Graham snorted. “At least we agree on something. Now get off my girlfriend so I can kiss her good morning properly.”
Every time Graham called me his girlfriend, my insides twisted into knots, and I felt the inane need to fan my face. Which was ridiculous. I’d known this man most of my life.
“The romance in this flat is suffocating.” But Quilliam obligingly flew to the headboard, settling there like a tiny, judgmental gargoyle. “I’ll just watch from here.”
“You absolutely will not,” I said, glaring up at him.
“Fine. I’ll go inspect the kitchen. I believe there are crumbs that require my attention. Though I wouldn’t mind my brekkie soon, ahem.” He disappeared through the doorway, and I heard the distant sound of tiny claws on the countertop.
Graham rolled over and pulled me close, his mouth finding mine in a kiss that was soft and warm and tasted like sleep. I melted into it, letting myself forget about curses and ancient water serpents, at least for a few minutes.
“Morning,” he murmured against my lips.
“Morning.”
“How’d you sleep?”
“Apparently like a snoring badger with a cheese obsession.”
“My favorite kind of badger.” He kissed me again, deeper this time, and his hands started to wander beneath the covers.
“We don’t have time for this,” I said, without much conviction.
“We have some time.”
“Lachlan’s spreadsheet says Munroe’s Graham Watch shift starts in forty-five minutes.”
“That’s plenty of time.”
“Graham—”
“Thirty minutes, then. Twenty.” His mouth traced down my neck, and I lost track of whatever argument I’d been about to make. “I can work with twenty.”
The man was efficient when motivated, I discovered twenty minutes later.
Afterward, we went through our new morning routine: Graham’s shower timed to exactly four minutes while I stood outside the bathroom door like a nervous parent, both of us checking the weather app obsessively before we’d even had coffee.
The forecast showed clear skies for the next three days, which should have been reassuring but somehow wasn’t.
“Stop,” Graham said, catching my expression as I frowned at my phone for the third time.
“Stop what?”
“Stop looking at that thing like it’s going to give you different answers if you check it enough times.”
“It’s just—”
“You’re being paranoid.” He took the phone from my hand and set it on the counter. “The sky is clear. Munroe’s on his way. Everything’s fine.”
“Everything is not fine. There’s an ancient curse trying to kill you.
” And I still hadn’t found any answer to help with the curse.
Three days I’d spent in the archives, digging through records with the whole team assembled.
Matthew’s capacity to research had been impressive.
I’d even closed Bonnie Books to focus on my research.
And we had nothing.
“And I’ve got seventeen people watching my every move to make sure it doesn’t succeed.” He cupped my face in his hands. “Agnes. I know this is scary. I know you’ve spent years carrying this fear alone, but you’re not alone anymore. You have to relax a bit.”
I wanted to argue. Wanted to point out that all the help in the world couldn’t stop something that had been killing the men in my family for three hundred years. But the look in his eyes—so steady, so certain—made the words die in my throat.
“Okay,” I said instead. “But if you die, I’m going to be very upset with you.”
“Noted. I’ll do my best to avoid dying.”
“See that you do.”
We headed downstairs to open our respective businesses. I needed to open today, as I could only take so many days off work before my balance sheets would start screaming at me, and still I hesitated as I unlocked the door. Shouldn’t I be buried in old records finding a way to save Graham from harm?
“You’re doing it again,” Quilliam observed from his perch on the shop counter. I glanced at him in confusion.
“Doing what?”
“Staring at the pub like it’s about to burst into flames.”
“I’m not staring.” Had I just been staring blindly out the window, worry crawling through my stomach? Aye, I certainly had.
“Uh-huh.” He stretched his tiny wings. “Graham is fine. Munroe just walked in. I can see him through the window. Your boyfriend is currently being supervised by a large Scottish man with excessive enthusiasm for his babysitting duties.”
“Good. That’s good then.” Relief filled me that Graham wouldn’t be on his own today.
“And Graham hates every second of it, which is frankly entertaining.” Quilliam’s tail swished. “Now stop worrying and help me with this research. I found something interesting in one of Hilda’s documents last night.”
I tore my gaze away from the pub window and joined him at the counter. “What kind of something?”
“A reference that might be of interest.” He nudged a photocopied page toward me with his snout. “Look. Third paragraph.”
I scanned the faded text, my heart rate picking up. The document was a letter, dated 1743, written in a cramped hand that was difficult to decipher.
“A Cailleach draws near. This could be catastrophic for Loren Brae.”
“It would be. If that was true,” Quilliam agreed.
“What’s a Cailleach?” I asked, worry slipping through me. The last thing I needed was another magickal being that I had to battle. I didn’t even know how to deal with the first ones we had in the here and now.
“The veiled one. We don’t speak of her.” Quilliam glanced around as though he was being listened to. “She is all that is death and destruction.”
“Excuse me?” My voice went high.
“A divine hag. In some myths she is honored. In others, feared.”
“And in ours?” I swallowed.
“It’s not ideal, lass. I’m hopeful this is just a mistake.”
“Och, well, that’s just lovely, isn’t it then?” This was a new fear unlocked.
We spent the next hour poring over documents, Quilliam translating the more archaic passages while I took notes and tried to piece together a timeline.
The morning rush came and went, a handful of customers browsing the shelves, a tourist asking for directions to the castle, Mrs. MacTavish popping in to gossip about who she’d seen leaving whose house at dawn.
I handled them on autopilot, my mind elsewhere.
The curse. Always back to the curse.
Around eleven, my phone buzzed with a text from Lachlan.
Shift change complete. Ramsay’s got eyes on Graham. All quiet on the western front.
I typed back a thumbs up and tried to focus on the inventory spreadsheet I’d been avoiding for weeks. The numbers swam before my eyes. I couldn’t concentrate.
“You’re checking your phone again,” Quilliam observed.
“I can’t help it.” I sat back. “I feel like I’m trying to walk a tightrope or something. My nerves are on edge.”
“But what can you do? The curse isn’t going to send you a notification before it strikes. There’s no app for that.”
“How do you know about apps?” I asked, sidetracked.
“Literally my only job is to absorb knowledge.” Quilliam sighed and shook his wee head at me, clearly exasperated.
“Right. Well, I just—” I set the phone down with more force than necessary. “I have a bad feeling.”
“How is this any different from how you’ve felt all week?”
“I don’t know. It just is.”
“How?” Quilliam tilted his wee head at me and waited.
I couldn’t explain. It was just a sensation, deep in my gut. A wrongness that had settled into my bones and wouldn’t let go. It was like standing on a beach and feeling the tide start to pull at your ankles, sucking you out to sea.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “It just is.”
Quilliam studied me for a long moment, his opal eyes unreadable. “If it makes you feel better, just go check on him. In person.”
I didn’t need to be told twice.