Fear the Drowning Deep(20)

“You were safe,” Morag huffed, reaching for her tea. She glanced at the charm resting against my breastbone. “You still are, long as you keep that on.”

“Oh. Right.” I’d forgotten the hideous Bollan Cross, the fishbone around my neck. “You’re certain you don’t want it? Surely, you could put it on, and go to the beach yourself.”

Morag pushed my mug across the table until it bumped my elbow. “It’s yours. I insist. I’d like my bucket back, though.”

I lifted the mug and took a sip of flowery tea. “I know. And I’ll replace it, as I’ve said. I would’ve done so already, but I was busy saving a boy’s life yesterday.”

“You saved someone? Pray tell, from what?” Morag glowered at me, but beneath her sharp expression lurked … a glimmer of interest. “Tell me the story then, lass. For all I know, you’re just making up excuses for not hunting snigs.”

“The story?” I frowned into my tea. Perhaps living alone for so long accounted for the witch’s abruptness, but she still made me as uncomfortable as wet clothes.

“Tell me how you saved the boy.”

“I found him in the shallows while I was looking for snigs. At first, I thought he was dead. Something tore up his middle—a beast with giant claws, perhaps.”

Morag’s foot smacked against a table leg, making me jump.

“Are you all right?” I started to rise from my seat.

“Yes, yes. It’s this old foot.” She thumped a hand against her left shin. “Has a mind of its own some days.”

Her skirt’s hemline revealed a few inches of bare ankle and calf, the skin there scarred, white, and puckered where a wound hadn’t healed properly. The deep indents around her ankle reminded me of the tooth-marks left on my forearm when Grayse had bitten me as a toddler, but Morag’s looked more severe, as though they’d been made by a knife’s tip.

“Have you seen a doctor?”

Morag shifted, pulling her foot from view. “Doubtless your mam’s told you: staring’s not polite.”

I tore my gaze away and straightened in my chair. “I’m sorry. But I could fetch a doctor, if you like. Mally knows one in Peel who’s quite gifted. I can’t begin to imagine how much that hurts.”

“It’s not so bad. I make a balm to dull the aches on the worst days.” Morag looked down, brushing crumbs off the table. “Now, would you like to head out in this storm to buy me a new bucket, or would you rather finish your tale?”

My face flushed, and I stumbled through an explanation of finding Fynn on the beach.

“And is he a local boy?” Morag’s tone suggested she already knew the answer.

I shook my head and speared more berries on my fork, though I wasn’t sure I could keep them down. Now that the pie had cooled, the room’s foul odor was returning, despite my best efforts at cleaning. Or perhaps the stench was coming from me now.

“It’s good of your mam to keep him while he mends.” Morag’s foot bumped the table again. “He ought to be grateful he’s in such fine company. And you ought to be grateful the strangest thing the sea spat out yesterday was a boy in need of a bit of kindness.”

“Beg your pardon?” I sat up straighter. Perhaps Morag knew something about the missing girls.

“You heard me. There are more frightening things in the sea than a boy with no memories. When you didn’t return yesterday, I thought perhaps you’d encountered a sea ape. Or a ceasg. Or a lusca.”

I blinked, wondering whether Morag was having a laugh at my expense. Her eyes gave away nothing, as usual. “What are those?”

Morag seemed to be attempting a smile, but it looked closer to a grimace. “They’re living things, like you or me. A lusca is the biggest octopus in the world.”

“I thought the biggest octopus was the kraken,” I said quietly.

Da had told me the legend of the kraken once, a giant beast that dragged ships into the deep. When I had nightmares about it, he assured me it was pure nonsense, a tale made up by sailors to amuse children, though the ocean seemed vast enough to be hiding such a creature. I hoped whatever was lingering in the waters around Port Coire was something a fisherman could capture or kill.

“No. The kraken is only a story. But there are other creatures in the deep that have never been near land,” Morag insisted, drawing me back to the present with her raspy voice. “Just because men haven’t seen them doesn’t make them any less real.”

I faked a giggle, still unsure whether Morag was joking, or if she truly believed. Perhaps she thought she could scare me off with her stories so she might find an apprentice more willing to search the beach.

“I suppose you’ve seen them, though?” I frowned as I tried to read her expression.

“Maybe,” she said coyly. “Or I’ve read about them.” She pointed to a book resting on a rickety table. Gold letters, too faded to make out, adorned the book’s dark cover. Even in the low light, its frayed pages were distinctly yellowed. “You’re welcome to borrow that, if you think it would help you find what attacked your friend.”

“I see.” My skin prickled. Even with my sisters to protect, I wasn’t ready to face whatever fresh nightmares were nestled in those tatty pages, and wasn’t sure if I could trust the words inside a witch’s book. “I do love reading, but I don’t think that book is quite to my taste. It might frighten my sister.”