Pulling off my apron, I ran upstairs to the shower and stood under the steamy blast thinking about all the jobs left to do before Seth arrived. Wash hair – check. Shave legs – check. Change bedclothes – check. The thought gave me a funny little shudder: half anticipation and half terror.
As I got out of the shower and towelled my hair off I looked out of the window. Darkness had fallen and a creeping sea-mist had spread across the forest, turning the lighthouse beam into a strange ghostly halo over the wood. I hadn’t bothered to draw the curtains – we had no neighbours; there was no one between us and the coast – but all of a sudden I was conscious of my nakedness and the unguarded window, and I shivered.
In my bedroom I scolded myself as I pulled on one of the dresses my grandmother had given me. It was silly to be so jumpy. Just because Dad was away tonight didn’t make it any more dangerous. And anyway, I was hardly some defenceless damsel. If it came to it, I could take care of myself a lot better than Dad could.
But all the same, as I smoothed the silky-soft material down over my hips and thighs, I was very glad that Seth would be here soon.
I looked at myself in the mirror as I pinned up my hair. The dress was lovely – it was made of a very fine silk jersey and started out deep, midnight-blue at the collarbones, fading through shades of cobalt and azure, until it ended just below the knee in a shimmer of pearly grey. It reminded me of the moon rising over Winter Harbour, and when I’d unwrapped it from its paper sheath I’d thought of my first proper date with Seth, when he’d taken me out on his boat for a moonlight picnic. The only snag was I couldn’t wear a bra because though the front was very demure, the back was kind of low, nearly to my waist. Still, I thought I’d get away with it.
Then the doorbell rang and I ran downstairs barefoot to answer it.
‘Ohhhhh my God …’ Seth groaned when I opened the door. ‘Don’t do this to me, Anna …’
‘What?’ I looked round anxiously, wondering what he’d seen, what had upset him.
‘You expect me to sit through dinner while you’re wearing that?’ His cold hands crept around my waist. ‘And … oh Christ, no bra …’ His fingertips traced an icy path up my naked back.
‘Ahhh!’ I yelped. ‘Your hands are like ice!’
‘Sorry,’ he grinned. ‘It’s very chilly out and there’s no shower yet on the boat. I had to wash with a jug over the side.’
‘Urgh.’ I shuddered as I led him through into the living room. ‘Rather you than me. Still, there’s a fire in here.’
‘If I warm up, will I be allowed to touch you?’
‘Maybe.’ I smiled to make it a joke, though his words set my insides fluttering.
I leant against the mantlepiece, trying to hide the sudden flush on my cheeks, and Seth stood beside me, his hands held out to the blaze. We stood in silence, side by side, not touching but very close. I turned to look at him, his skin flickering gold and red in the flames from the fire, his dark hair tumbled over his forehead, his eyes smoke-dark. Then, very slowly, he brushed his hand across my cheek.
‘So … is that better?’
‘Yes,’ I said. My voice was husky.
‘Still OK?’ He let his hand trail down my jaw and the side of my neck.
‘Yes.’
‘This?’
His fingers skimmed underneath the soft midnight-blue hem of my dress where it dipped below my throat. I closed my eyes. The world shrank down to the heat of the fire, the slow touch of Seth’s hands, his fingers … the white bed upstairs, waiting with clean sheets …
Something fell to the floor with a thud. We both jumped and I opened my eyes.
‘What’s this?’ Seth bent and picked it up. He held out the small packet, wrapped in silver paper.
‘Oh …’ It was almost a struggle to remember. ‘I … it’s my present. To you. Happy Valentine’s day.’
‘Anna!’ He looked stricken. ‘I didn’t know we were doing presents. I haven’t got you anything – only a card.’
‘That’s OK. That’s why I didn’t tell you – it didn’t seem fair. I’ve only just had my birthday. I didn’t want you to have to get something else.’
‘But … but now I feel …’ His expression struggled between affection and irritation and then he gave up.
‘Open it,’ I said.
He began to pick at the wrappings with his oil-stained nails. I watched as he struggled with the tape.
‘Should I get scissors?’
‘No, wait, I’ve got it – oops!’ The paper ripped suddenly and the ring shot out, skittering across the floor. Seth chased after it and caught it with a foot, then picked it up.
‘What is it? It looks like a bit of plumber’s pipe – reminds me of those sawn-off ends I used to find in my dad’s pockets.’
‘It’s a ring. Do you like it?’
‘A ring?’ He looked at it curiously in the palm of his hand and then nodded. ‘Yeah. I do. I don’t know, I don’t think of rings as being very blokey somehow but this – it’s great. I love it.’
He slipped it on to the third finger of his right hand, matching the finger where I wore his seaglass ring, and then took my hand, interlacing our fingers. He pulled my hand to his mouth. His lips were warm and soft, and I felt them curve into a smile.
‘Your fingers smell of fish. What’s for supper?’
‘Oh!’ I groaned. ‘I scrubbed them raw – but it’s the bloody smoked salmon.’
‘Smoked salmon? You’re pushing the boat out.’
‘Well, we’re cooking off a gas bottle in the dining room, so I was a bit limited. The smoked salmon is for the main course, with tagliatelle. Dessert is chocolate mousse. And starter …’ I led him through to the downstairs loo where the starter was sitting in a bucket of sea water. ‘These.’
‘Oh …’ His broad grin became even wider. ‘Anna, you star. Oysters. My favourite.’
Not my favourite – in fact I was only just learning to stomach them – but Seth adored them and would eat them by the bucket load.
‘You’ll have to open them,’ I warned.
‘Not a problem.’ He picked the bucket up and took them back to the living room, where I’d laid out plates, napkins and lemon on the coffee table. ‘So … are you trying to put me in the mood?’ he teased.
‘The mood?’ I was deliberately demure. ‘For fishing?’
‘I’m always in the mood for that.’
Some two or three hours later and the fire had burnt low in the grate. I lay with my head against Seth’s chest, enjoying the feel of his fingers lazily playing with my hair, long since tumbled out of its careful pins. The silver ring glinted in the firelight.
‘Where did you learn to cook like that?’ I heard his voice through his ribs, a deep, quiet murmur.
‘Mmm … school … Dad … natural greed …’
‘It was delicious.’
‘Even the oysters?’
‘Especially the oysters.’ His chest shook with a quiet laugh and his hand stroked down my cheek and over my throat and shoulder. ‘I like things that are hard to prise open. Perhaps that’s why I love you.’
‘What do you mean?’ I twisted to look at his face, soft and golden in the light of the dying fire.
‘Well … you are quite a private person, don’t you think?’
I considered for a moment, surprised. I’d never thought of myself as particularly private but perhaps Seth was right. I could count my close friends on the fingers of one hand.
‘And yet, you’re so soft and lovely and tender inside …’ He pulled me closer and I shut my eyes, and felt his lips on my forehead and my closed lids.
‘Shame so many people get food poisoning from oysters …’ I said with a shaky laugh.
‘Not if you’re careful,’ he said softly, his lips on my cheeks, my jaw, the crook of my shoulder …
‘You never know what’s inside …’
‘It might be a pearl.’
We stayed like that, completely still, for – I don’t know h
ow long. My eyes were closed, but I could feel his warm, sweet breath against my throat, the heat of his lips, barely touching my skin. The room was silent except for our ragged breathing and the sighing shifts of the logs in the grate. My heart was beating so hard that it felt painful in my chest. Was this what it felt like to die from a broken heart – not from desertion, but from a love so huge that it split your heart clean open?
‘I love you,’ I said to Seth, and felt my voice break with the impossibility of ever telling him how much I loved him – how purely and completely and utterly. How could three short words sum up all the glorious agony of being with him?
‘I love you too,’ he said and then he took hold of the hem of my dress. ‘Is this OK?’
I couldn’t speak, my heart too full to find the words. I only nodded. And then he tugged gently upwards and the dress lay on the hearth in front of the fire and he caught me in his arms and buried his face in my hair with a strange choking sob that might have been anything – love, desire, even pain. I pressed myself against him and all I could think was, please God, I’m empty. Please let it have been enough, what I did. If I can just get through this without hurting him, or burning down the house …
My fingers began to work the buttons of his shirt, awkwardly, slowly, one at a time, until at last it lay crumpled with my dress and we were pressed skin to skin, mine milk-white, Seth’s tanned to deep gold even in the depths of winter. The firelight flickered off his torso and I looked at him, full of love, triumphant, finally fearless.
‘Wait.’ He put his hand to mine as I reached for his belt.
‘What?’
‘There’s just one thing … I have to ask …’
I drew back a little and he sat up and ran his hand through his hair.
‘I have to hear you say it.’
‘What? Anything, you know that.’
‘The other night,’ his dark eyes searched mine, ‘when I asked you if you knew that I loved you. You … hesitated.’
Oh God. Not this.
‘And I have to know, do you honestly, honestly believe that I love you? You’ve put all that stupid stuff about the spell behind you, right?’
My heart began to thump again and I put my hand over it, trying to quell the pain.
‘Seth …’
‘That’s all I want to know. Just promise me – that you believe me. Do you?’
‘Seth …’ I said again and then stopped, struggling, drowning, trying to find the words.
‘Anna?’
But I couldn’t speak.
It was terrible, chilling to watch – the soft openness of his face turning hard and cold; like watching a lake ice over in summer. As he saw me struggle to promise, saw that I wanted to, but that the words wouldn’t come, that I couldn’t frame the lie I wanted to utter, all the warmth left his face, leaving only a bleak anger.
He got up and began to yank his shirt on, buttoning it all askew, shaking his head in bitter disbelief. The sight broke my paralysis and I scrambled to my feet, clutching at him with hands that trembled.
‘Seth, please, don’t be like this.’
‘I can’t believe it; I can’t believe it,’ was all he said, still shaking his head.
‘Oh please, don’t be like this, don’t ruin this.’
‘Me ruin this?’
‘I know.’ I picked up my dress, clutching it against myself like a shield. ‘I know, it’s me; it’s my fault, but please—’
‘You were prepared to do this –’ he flung an arm at the pile of crumpled clothes on the hearthrug ‘– and all the time…’
‘I’m sorry,’ I wept.
‘So am I.’ He caught up his shoes in one hand and pushed me away from him, not aggressively, but not gently either. I tripped and fell to my knees and caught my dress up in my hands to stifle my sobs.
At the door he turned and his face was horrible. Tears streaked his cheeks, though he seemed quite unaware of them.
‘Goodbye,’ he said. And something about the finality in his voice struck cold into my guts.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’m sorry, Anna. This is it. I can’t do this any more. I can’t go through this again and again. I can’t.’
‘No – please no, Seth. Don’t go …’
‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated. ‘I’m leaving, for good. Don’t come after me.’
‘Seth!’ I wept. But he only shook his head and began to walk away.
In the doorway he stopped for a moment, his back still turned, as if he couldn’t bear to see my face.
‘Was it all a lie?’ he asked, and his voice cracked on the last word.
I shook my head, completely unable to speak, and he bowed his neck and walked into the night.
He walked away and it felt like there was a fish-hook buried deep in my guts. Seth was holding the line and every step he took he was ripping out my insides, step by step. And I couldn’t say anything, I could only stand and gasp, wordless with pain, as part of my soul was ripped out of me.
At last, as his shadow mingled with the darkness of the wildwood, I found my voice.
‘No!’ I screamed, into the darkness. ‘No!’
But it was too late.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
I lay for a long time, curled in front of the dying fire. It grew colder and colder until I began to shake, and I realized that if I stayed here I would probably be hypothermic by morning.
Seth’s jacket was on the hearthrug where he’d left it. I shrugged my discarded dress back on, then picked it up and wrapped it around myself. Then I tried to stand, but I was so cold and cramped that my limbs gave beneath me. At last, with great difficulty, I dragged myself upstairs and crawled into bed, still clutching Seth’s jacket around me. Then I pulled the covers over me and sobbed into my pillow, great tearing sobs that would have woken Dad, if he’d been there. But he wasn’t there. I was alone. I pulled my knees to my chest, trying in vain to stop the great hole that Seth had torn when he left – but nothing worked. Every thought, every memory was agony.
What could I have said to stop him? You could have lied, my heart said bitterly. You should have lied. I’d spent so long trying to push him away – and now he was gone. I’d got what I’d wished for – but at such a price.
I wanted to be numb. I wanted to never feel anything again. Anything would be better than this feeling of having my heart and my guts and my soul ripped out through the hole in my chest.
The darkness pressed around me, nudging me, touching me, whispering bitter accusations in my ear until I screamed to shut them out.
Oil and water … oil and water … oil and water …
At some point – I don’t know how long after – I fell into a half-sleep, dogged by strange dreams, where I relived our fight over and over, saying all the things I should have said, could have said. Then I was running, running through Wicker Wood, with Seth always a few steps ahead of me, just out of reach of my arms. I could hear his footsteps just ahead of me, the crack of sticks and branches, and the tearing of my own breath as I ran, twigs catching in my hair and ripping my clothes, but always unable to catch up. It was the last dream which was the worst. The one where Seth didn’t leave and was in bed with me, his arms around me, his breath hot and harsh on my face. His grip was hard, so tight it was painful, and then, with a shock, I awoke.
It was no dream. It was real. There were arms around me – but not Seth’s. The person bending over my bed, pinning my arms to my sides, stank of sweat, tobacco, beer. As I struggled to free myself a shaft of moonlight caught the intruder and I saw he was dressed in black, with a black hood over his head, and slit-eyes that glittered.
I opened my mouth to scream – and a hood was thrust over my head. Rough hands crammed the material into my open mouth so hard that I gagged and bile flooded my mouth. I could barely breathe, the material was stifling, and I drew desperate snorting breaths through my nose.
Someone was doing something to my wrists and with a huge effort I wrenched my hand
s free, clawing at the threads drawn tight around my neck, desperately trying to get some air, to see what was going on. They caught my hands and bound them too, and I was face down on my own bed, still fighting, but drowning in fear and sweat. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t … You can cast spells, you stupid witch!, the voice in my head was like a panicked shout.
I gathered all my power for a huge burst – and a voice shouted, ‘Oi! She’s casting a spell! Stop her! Stick her now!’
There was a burning, stabbing pain in my thigh – and everything began to slow. It was a nightmarish feeling – everyone in the room was moving with normal speed but I was mired in tar, my limbs heavy and sluggish, my mind completely unable to gather … to gather … to think …
I felt my head loll, slip to one side, fall. There was a slithering rush and a blinding crack. My skull hit the floorboards. I slid into black.
I awoke to darkness and a pounding pain in my head. I was cold and stiff, but the worst was that I was unbearably thirsty. It hurt to move. When I tried, the pain sent little flickers sparking across my vision, but I couldn’t lie here and wait for them to come and find me.
Ignoring the stabs of pain, I tried to move my hands. They were still bound, but only with rope, and there was some room for movement. My feet – loose … No, wait, there was something round my ankle. A chain, but a long one. That was something at least – I could kick, even though the movement sent red flashes of agony searing across the blackness.
Cautiously I tried to move my hands up to my face. I could feel from the cold stone against my cheek that the hood was gone, but something felt wrong – there was something in my mouth, on my face. Something hard and cold, digging into my skin. My fingers met metal.
For a second I was puzzled, then as my hands moved across my skin, I realized what it was. A wave of fear and revulsion threatened to overwhelm me – but anger won. I grabbed and yanked, trying bodily to rip the thing off me. The movement was agony, sending red and black shards of pain ripping through my head – but I gritted my teeth and carried on.
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