Chapter Fifty-Four

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

Scarwell Woods, Orkney

May 2024

CLEM

“You looking for Edina?” a voice calls through the trees.

Clem squints at the figure emerging from the silver mist that has gathered, veillike, between the trees. The tall thin man who was among the people who pulled her from the car last time she was here is walking toward her. Before she can answer, the burr of an engine comes into earshot, and she turns to see a van idling across the field, parking up behind her car. Freya begins to cry. The knot in Clem’s throat tightens.

“I brought the book,” she says, holding it out to him.

He stops a few feet away from her, looking down at the book, as though he can’t believe what he sees. Stepping forward, cautious, and he takes it from her, running his hands over the bark. Then, seeing people get out of the van, he puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles, before lifting his hand high in the air and waving.

“Come inside,” he tells Clem.

She follows him into the byre, where a wood burner is lit. On a table an electric stove with a large silver pot steams something aromatic. He gestures at an old sofa in a corner.

“We saw you coming,” he says. “We knew you’d be here. So I made some soup. Would you like some?”

“You saw me coming?” she says.

“We have cameras on the ferry,” he says. “So we see who comes and goes to Orkney. Soup for the baby, too?”

She is cautious, but tries not to show it. The man seems friendly toward her, going to the trouble of plumping the cushions for her to sit down.

“Oh, she’s just eaten,” she says, glancing at Freya. “Thanks.”

“Ah, visitors,” a voice says, and she looks up to see Edina entering the byre. She’s not wearing the cloak from last time, and there is no black paint on her face. Her white hair is still long, and she still wears the purple fleece and jogging bottoms but without the disguise, she’s a rather ordinary-looking woman of about eighty years old. She moves toward Clem with the aid of a walking stick.

“Clementine,” she says with a smile. “Nice to see you so soon.”

“I brought the book,” Clem says haltingly.

The tall man passes Edina the book, and she stares at it in her hands, before pressing it to her chest. “Thank you,” she says. “We will perform the ceremony tonight.”

“Ceremony?” Clem asks.

“I see you’ve met my grandson, Thorfinn,” Edina says, nodding at the tall man who is passing a spoon to Clem. “And who is this little sprite?”

“This is Freya,” Clem says. “She’s my granddaughter.”

“Ah, Freya ,” Edina says. “A Norse name.”

“Is it?” Clem says.

“It means ‘noble woman,’?” Edina says, taking the baby’s hand. She smiles at her, then turns to the others who filed into the room behind her. There are six of them, three men in their twenties, and three women of the same age. None of them are wearing the costumes that Clem saw the first night she was here.

She dips a spoon into the soup and tastes it. Hot French onion.

“Can I ask you something?” Clem says.

“Of course,” Thorfinn says.

“Why is this book so important to you?”

“This book holds all the darkness on earth from the beginning,” Edina says. “It has been looked after by the Triskele for centuries. Fear, hate, every form of magic that is designed to do harm—it’s all in here.”

“I found out who stole the book,” Clem says. “It wasn’t my daughter. A man I only know as ‘the Brother’ was leading a cult in Glasgow, they were calling themselves the Triskele. The one I told you about last time. He was the one who stole it, and then he gave it to Erin.”

Edina holds her in a long look, as though deciding whether to believe her or not. “And where is this man now?”

“He’s dead. He committed suicide. Erin tried to bring the book to Orkney. I’m just wondering if you can help me…”

“Help you?” Edina says. “In what way?”

Clem lowers her eyes. She turns to Freya, who is mesmerized by something on Thorfinn’s hand.

“I think she likes my ring,” he says, smiling.

It’s only when he takes it off to let Freya handle it that she realizes the yellow stone set into silver is a tooth.

“Maybe not,” she says, plucking the ring from Freya’s hands as she attempts to put it into her mouth. She smiles at Thorfinn as she hands it back.

“Strange, how she is drawn to the witch’s tooth,” Edina says thoughtfully.

Clem looks up sharply. “The what?”

Thorfinn passes the ring back to Clem, who looks over it cautiously. “This is the tooth from one of our clan who was burned as a witch. I’ll pass it on to my son, and he’ll pass it on to his.”

“We don’t forget our dead,” Edina says. “They live on through us.”

“Arlo is dead,” Clem says impatiently. “A boy of just twenty. He was Erin’s boyfriend, and he was helping her attempt to get rid of the book on Fynhallow. That’s how he lost his life.” She stares at Edina, silently pleading for her help. “Please. Erin is very, very ill. I don’t think she’ll get well unless you find a way to stop whatever this book is doing.”

Edina runs her fingers over the book, her eyes fluttering. “The book is capricious. It is thousands of years old, and it knows its mind. We can attempt a spell to remove the attachment it has to your daughter.”

“What attachment?” Clem says.

“Well, you say Erin is ill,” Edina says. “My guess is that she wasn’t a Carrier, and neither was the man who stole it. Therefore, the book haunted them both. Giving them nightmares, perhaps driving them to do terrible, terrible things…And it would never stop until it was possessed by one who is authorized to carry it.”

Clem considers that. “I think it’s worth trying anything,” she says.

Edina glances at Thorfinn, and Clem notices something pass between them.

“My mother is the clan chief,” Thorfinn tells her. “She is the one who must do the spell. But it may backfire.”

“Meaning what?” Clem asks, glancing from Thorfinn to Edina.

“Just as the book claimed the life of the young man,” Edina says lightly. “So, too, may it claim mine.”

Clem feels her stomach drop. The last thing she wishes is to risk more lives. And she has Freya with her, too—will she be injured? What if Edina is right, and the book kills her?

And hundreds of miles away, Erin lies in the hospital, still under the book’s spell.

“I can see you’re worried,” Edina says. She glances at Freya. “Come and watch. We’ll make sure the bairn is safe.”

They move outside to the clearing just outside the byre.

“Sit here,” Thorfinn tells her, pointing at a large tree stump. She sits down, clutching Freya to her, who has begun to fall asleep. Thorfinn puts a woolen blanket around her shoulders, then removes the ring and places it on Freya’s thumb.

“Just while she’s sleeping. For protection.” He smiles. “It’s why my mother makes me wear it.”

Clem watches as the clan put on large, heavy cloaks of bearskin, helmets made of stag horns and tree branches, chain mail face coverings. The fire is lit, glowing red against the dark trees. Edina sets the book in the middle of the pyre, and the group forms a circle around it. They begin to chant, a rhythmic incantation of words that Clem doesn’t understand.

Edina approaches the flame, her arms held out wide and her face lit orange, determination writ upon it. An instinct tells Clem to move farther away, and so she rises, Freya still bundled up in her arms, and moves back, behind the corner of the building, peering out as Edina chants loudly over the fire. The rest of the group hold hands, the humming changing key again, growing louder, tall red flames spiraling up into the canopy.

Then a terrible scream pierces the air. Freya jolts awake, startled. She begins to cry, but another scream rings out, and another in a different voice. Clem steps back, soothing a hysterical Freya. Her heart races.

As she glances back out from behind the byre, it seems the screams are not coming from the group, who are still chanting in low voices. Edina drops her arms, her face aglow from the fire. She looks astonished, or terrified, her eyes fixed on the flame. And yet the screams spiral into the air, one after the other, until the night falls silent.

She stares at the group, who have ceased chanting.

“Come,” Edina calls her. “It is safe.”

Clem finds a dummy in her pocket and gives it to Freya to console her, and she falls back to sleep on Clem’s shoulder.

“Is everything okay?” she asks Edina, who nods, her face shining with sweat. But Clem can tell she is shaken.

Edina points at the fire, which has tamed to a low flicker. Clem squints into the fire, expecting to see the old book charred, the bark cover blackened by flame. But it has vanished, the fire diminishing until all that rises from the logs is a thin wire of smoke.

A rustle draws her attention to the understory. A hare looks up at her, its head tilted toward her and a paw lifted, before darting into the field.