Fear the Drowning Deep(44)
“It’s nearly four in the morning!” Mam hissed. “Took the doctor long enough.”
I poked my head into the main room in time to watch her open the door. I blinked, wondering if I’d fallen asleep at the kitchen table and was only dreaming this moment, but the vision before me didn’t change. Instead of the tall, gray-haired doctor from Peel who usually came to us, Lugh was framed by the doorway, his fiery hair ablaze from the light of torches at his back. Behind him were several men, including his stern-faced father and Mr. Gill.
Lugh’s da opened his mouth to speak, but Lugh was faster. “My mam is missing. She took supper to my aunt, and she was supposed to come straight home after, but she never did.” In the torchlight, Lugh looked ill, his face hollow like it had been after last winter’s fever. “We checked with my aunt, and my mam never even made it there …”
“I’m so sorry,” Mam said at once, putting a consoling hand on Lugh’s shoulder. For a moment, I thought he would shrug her away, but he merely flinched, accepting the warmth of her touch. “Peddyr is at sea now. He can join the search party as soon as he’s ashore—”
“That’s not why we’re here,” Lugh interrupted, his voice strained. He locked eyes with me for the briefest moment, sending a shiver up my back as I glimpsed his haunted look, then dropped his gaze to the ground. “Thomase Boyd says he saw …” He paused, then squared his shoulders. “He saw Fynn sneaking around near my aunt’s house earlier. Around dusk, right when Mam would have been arriving there.”
I shook my head, my mouth too dry to speak. That was impossible.
“That’s right,” another voice said. Mally’s former suitor, Thomase, pushed through the small knot of men to stand beside Lugh. “And there’s another thing, too. My da and Mr. Nelson never came home from sea today. They promised to be back by suppertime. That comeover on your sofa—” Thomase clenched his fists and took a step across the threshold, scanning the room for Fynn—“has a lot to answer for.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
The words rang out with force. Mally and I had spoken at the same time.
“Fynn was with me at dusk.” My face grew hotter as I added, “He was with me all day! Ask Mrs. Kissack or Mrs. Kinry. Plenty of people saw us. We were hurrying home. Fynn’s wounds—”
“Stop, Bridey,” Mally cut in, crossing her arms and looking daggers at Thomase. “We don’t have to defend ourselves, or Fynn, to these idiots.”
My gaze flitted over the faces of the other men in the search party. Mr. Gill had a supportive hand on Thomase’s back, as though he was so quick to believe the worst about Fynn—no surprise from him. Some of the other men had faraway looks, like they weren’t sure who to believe.
Lugh caught my eye again, mouthing an apology, but I wasn’t of a mind to accept it. I trusted Fynn, and that meant Lugh should, too. Believing Fynn could have anything to do with the disappearances was as bad as accusing me.
“Bridey,” Lugh murmured, but I focused all my attention on Mally and stuffed my hands in the crooks of my arms to hide how they were shaking.
“If you keep making false accusations, I’ll make sure you’re laughed out of town, Thomase Boyd.” Mally shook her head, still bristling. “Honestly. I don’t know what I ever saw in you. Now off with you. Go! Help Lugh find his mam instead of wasting time pointing fingers where they don’t belong. Or someone might break them!”
Mam stepped in front of Mally, blocking Thomase from taking another step inside. “That poor lad on our sofa is injured. There’s no way he attacked anyone. Good night to you all!” She started to shut the door in their faces, but before she closed it all the way, she called softly to Lugh, “I hope they find your mam soon, dear. I pray they do.”
After latching the door, she leaned against it, rubbing her temples.
Fynn shifted restlessly, and Mally hurried to his side.
I crept quietly into my bedroom, where Liss and Grayse had somehow managed to sleep soundly through our nighttime visitors’ raised voices. Climbing under the warm quilts, I snuggled against Grayse’s back.
But as I lay there, my mind churning over my brush with the fossegrim and Thomase Boyd’s insane accusations, the gray light of predawn slowly filled the room. Sleep wouldn’t be coming any time soon, and I had much more important things to do than rest.
I had to stop the fossegrim before it claimed another soul.
Hopping out of the bed it seemed I’d only just crawled into, I pulled on yesterday’s rumpled clothes and snuck into the main room. Mam and Mally had finally gone to bed, and not even Fynn stirred as I stuck my feet in my boots. He was surely in a deep sleep from one of Mally’s tonics.
But when I crossed to the door, a familiar voice whispered, “And where are you headed at this unseemly hour, Ms. Corkill?”
I turned to the sofa in time to see Fynn crack an eyelid and grin. I smiled back. It was a good sign that he felt well enough to make jokes.
“Morag’s. Tell Mam where I went, would you?”
“What’s the rush? Morag probably isn’t awake yet.” Fynn’s voice was gravelly with sleep. “Come. Rest with me a while. It’ll help me heal faster.”
My feet itched to close the distance between us, especially as the memory of our time at sea drifted back. But Lugh’s face flashed to mind, so gaunt in the torchlight, and I shook my head. “If there’s any hope of finding Lugh’s mam alive, I need to see Morag now. She gave me that book of sea monsters and claimed it would help me, but it didn’t say how to kill the fossegrim.”