“I think so, now that I have thawed. I’m sorry I gave you a fright. How long have I been sleeping?”
“Since we pulled you onto the boat yesterday. You were out cold until we reached the shore, but you have been in and out of consciousness most of the morning. Murmuring in German mostly. I thought you had gone into shock.” Adam shook his head. “And there’s no doctor in this blasted place.”
Stretching his arms and legs, Immanuel curled his toes and then his fingers. Everything felt stiff, like his skin had shrunk a size too tight, but as he straightened, he winced at the pain in his temples. He should have expected a headache. His attempt to control the waves was too much too soon.
“You should lay with me,” he murmured, the warmth and safety of the bed slowly pulling him back into sleep.
“You forget yourself. We’re in the cottage we’re supposed to be sharing with Mr. Jacobs, and I don’t know when he will be back,” he replied in a harsh whisper, though Immanuel could detect a hint of a smile in his voice. Glancing toward the door, Adam added, “Not that I wouldn’t want to cuddle up to you when you’re only in your skin.”
Immanuel’s eyes widened as he reached lower and found, at the brush of his palm against his bare thigh, that Adam had been right.
“What happened to my clothes?”
“They were drenched, so I dried them by the fire. The captain recommended warming you in a state of undress. Apparently it works better that way. He told me not to be squeamish about it.”
“Little did he know,” he replied with a laugh. Sighing, he stared up at his lover with a tired grin. “I’m just glad Miss Larkin is all right. We should call on her today. What is Mr. Jacobs like? Do you think we have to worry about him?”
“I haven’t met him. The captain led me straight to the cottage when I told him where we were staying. He said he hadn’t seen Jacobs, but he would probably be back by nightfall. He never showed.”
“Did we go to the wrong place?”
“I don’t think so. The captain did say Jacobs was investigating a disappearance, so he’s probably busy. Besides, the door was unlocked and he was expecting us, so I can’t imagine he would be upset to see us here. I was just surprised I didn’t see him at the dock. That’s where Miss Elliott said he was supposed to meet us, isn’t it?”
“I believe so. Do you think he didn’t get Judith’s telegram or maybe he took the earlier ferry into town and we missed him?”
“I don’t know, but the larder is very well stocked, so I don’t think he went into town for groceries.”
A pit formed in Immanuel’s stomach. Something wasn’t right. “Can you hand me some clothing? I would like to get up and have a bite. If you don’t think he would mind us rummaging around.”
“Are you strong enough?” Adam asked, his blue eyes tinged with worry.
Before Adam could react, Immanuel pulled him closer until their lips met. Between Immanuel’s urgent movements and the arousal of fear and deprivation, Adam was soon on top of him. Keeping one ear on the door, his lips worked down the delicate flesh of Immanuel’s neck. Immanuel’s body locked, pressing against him beneath the layers of blankets. Adam could picture the shape of Immanuel’s ribs beneath his pale flesh, the way his scars stood as starkly as tattoos. More than anything he wanted to have Immanuel beneath him, to see his body tense and relax with the rhythm of his movements. The taste of him on his tongue and the sensation of his skin burning like ice beneath his palms was all it took to set his nerves on edge. Immanuel ran his fingers down Adam’s ear, returning to clasp the back of his head to his offered neck as his hips bucked beneath the blankets’ weight. With a press of his hand, he directed Adam’s mouth back to his lips. Drawing in a shared breath, Immanuel’s tongue slipped into the hot part of Adam’s mouth. Adam suppressed a moan at the feathered touch, but as Immanuel’s hand slid down the front of his trousers to cup his growing erection, Adam shook his head.
Breaking free, Adam touched his lips and rasped, “We can’t. We have to stop.”
Falling back against the pillow breathlessly, Immanuel watched as Adam straightened and readjusted his clothing. “I think I have sufficiently proven that I have enough strength to command my body, but I would prefer to have some clothing before I get up. A union suit at least.”
Adam regarded him with a sly smile. “If you insist.” Crossing the room, he opened the top drawer of the shared dresser and pulled out his undergarments along with a shirt and trousers. “I took the liberty of unpacking your belongings. I needed a way to keep busy while I waited for you.”
Catching the union suit Adam tossed to him, he slipped it on beneath the covers. “I greatly appreciate it. I would have lived out of that suitcase all week.”
“I know, that’s why I did it. So what do you propose we do first?”
A shiver passed through Immanuel’s form as he threw off his covers and took the pile of clothing from Adam’s arms. The tips of his fingers were still red and he wasn’t certain he had full feeling in his toes, but it was good enough. Tucking his shirt into his trousers, Immanuel’s eyes fell upon the window where the ocean’s undulant light winked back at him through the curtains. By the height of the sun, he knew it had to be mid-morning at least, yet it felt as if he should have stepped off the ferry a moment before. He ran his hands over his cheeks before lightly slapping them, hoping he would perk up with time.
“I thought we might walk around and get our bearings.”
“But your coat is still damp.”
“I could just borrow one of yours.”
Adam frowned before retrieving a spare black coat from the wardrobe. “It will be short on you.”
“That’s fine. I was thinking we could talk to the people who live here, ask about the local seal population. The selkies could hide with regular seals or they could have a colony all their own.”
“Do you think the locals will really care about seals?”
“If they breed near the island, I assume they would notice. You can’t exactly ignore a herd of barking beasts overtaking the beach every year.” Immanuel paused, his lips parted as an odd thought crossed his mind.
“What? What is it?” Adam asked, straightening his companion’s tie.
“No. No, it’s nothing. I think I would like to look around.”
Slipping past Adam into the hall, Immanuel wondered if it was possible for so many secrets to stay hidden on such a small island.
***
The cottage was larger than Immanuel had imagined. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but staying on an island that was only accessible once a week, he hadn’t expected to find a house littered with ancient carved wood, an obscenely large, soot-caked hearth, ceilings that nearly grazed his head, and a bathroom in a shack outside. Well, the last one perhaps he had expected. The floor in which Immanuel awoke contained only one other bedroom that was smaller than their own but with only one bed that had yet to be turned down. While sparse, the rooms were hung with watercolor seascapes and decorated with motley quilts, which had all been unceremoniously dumped onto Immanuel’s bed after his rescue, but what Immanuel loved most were how the rooms were illuminated by mullioned windows facing the beach.
With Adam following close behind, Immanuel trotted down the narrow steps into the common room. A massive hearth dominated the room along with an equally large table made of thick, wooden boards that a Londoner of refinement would have considered crude. Behind a broad, oaken door stood a cavernous kitchen where several crates of canned goods and dried meats lay waiting for its owner. The parlor had been appointed with worn, bowlegged chairs, but the fussy, outdated furniture gave the room an air of familiarity. A smile crossed his lips as he stroked the carved lintels above the fireplace. Through their looping knots appeared pop-eyed dragons and impossible plants. The carving was old, perhaps even far older than the house itself, and as Immanuel ran a finger along them, he swore he felt the vaguest twinge of something more.
“I didn’t even notice this whe
n we brought you in,” Adam said, hooking his thumb toward a door at the far end of the parlor. It sat adjacent to the front door, neatly hidden should the door open.
“A cupboard?”
“One way to find out.” Grasping the knob, Adam tried to turn it and then threw his weight into it. The door merely rattled in its hinges. “Do you think he could be in there?”
Immanuel knocked hard on the door. Assuming the man may have been asleep and hadn’t heard them come in. “Mr. Jacobs? We were sent here by the Interceptors. Judith Elliott told us to contact you.”
Stepping back, Adam waited but heard no response.
“I didn’t see anyone else’s things upstairs. The spare room was empty.”
“This has to be his room.” Adam stepped back, running his hand along the top of the door for a hidden key but came away with only dust. “If he works for the Special Branch, it would make sense for him to lock his door.”
“I suppose.”
“Well, let’s go have a look around before it gets dark.” As he reached for the door, he caught sight of Immanuel’s pensive features. “If you wear a coat and gloves, you should be all right, but you have to promise you will tell me if you’re cold.”
He released a breath, his eyes running over the threadbare cottage. “It isn’t that. What if he comes back while we’re gone?”
“He missed us, not the other way around. I’ll leave him a note if you are worried.”
Adam rifled through the drawers until he found a pad with a pencil tethered to it stashed in a kitchen drawer. Scribbling out a quick note, he tore the page off, folded it, and carefully placed it on the hearth’s lintel where Mr. Jacobs couldn’t miss it upon entering. Immanuel inclined his head toward the door, and with a sigh, Adam nodded and followed him out. He didn’t like the idea of him out and about so quickly in the murky cold that clung to the island like a miasma, but he knew stopping him would be a pointless endeavor. There wasn’t a doctor on Seolh-wiga Island, just a bunch of superstitious sailors, and if Immanuel’s hypothermia turned into pneumonia or bronchitis, there would be nothing he could do.
As he tucked Immanuel’s scarf tighter around his neck, his eyes ran over the house he had barely cast a glance at when they arrived. The slate and stone cottage sat atop a cliff overlooking the ocean with a dirt path winding away along the undulant green terrain. The house was broad like an upturned hull and covered in moss until it looked as if it had been shorn from the hillside rather than built. They walked only a few feet before it hit him: the silence. The only sounds were the crunch of their boots on the path, the mournful call of gulls, and the roar of the waves crashing into the beach below, as loud as the pulse in his temples. He had so rarely been out of London that the disconcerting absence of human noise set Adam on edge. Silence in London was quiet at best. This was true silence, a brief glimpse of what it was like before humans fell upon land as heaving, unrecognizable beings. Part of him wanted to speak to shatter the illusion, but something inside of him—equally awed and terrified—sought to submit to the nothingness he so often fought.
“What’s wrong?” Immanuel asked at his elbow, his head tilted as he watched him.
Adam shrugged and shook his head, trying to unsuccessfully rid his ears of the pressing sensation. “Nothing. It’s just so quiet.”
A chuckle escaped Immanuel’s lips. Taking a step down the path, he kicked up a spray of dirt. “And I think I’m a city boy. You should hear it in my head. This island is humming.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s hard to explain, but when you’re a practioner, you become attune to other extra-normal entities. It’s like a dog-whistle or a tuning fork. It’s barely perceivable most of the time, but it’s there if I choose to notice or if there’s a lot of it.” His gaze flickered over the skeletal ruins of a church rotting beside row after row of makeshift headstones. “In London, I can only hear it if a person with extra-normal abilities is close. Here it’s different. I feel it everywhere.”
“Do you think it could be amplified from the handfasting?”
“Possibly, but I wish I knew where it was coming from.”
Standing at Immanuel’s side, Adam stared at the gaps in the ancient church’s stone walls. It rose high above their heads, lichen-caked walls standing by sheer will while the roof and entrance had fallen away centuries ago. If he focused, he could picture where the altar must have been and the stained glass windows that muddied the view of the natural world in favor of god’s light. Why anyone would build something so grand where so few would ever see it was beyond him.
As the hill rose before them, Adam paused at the apex. From there, he could make out the whole island. If they headed back toward the inn and continued down the path, they would arrive at the village. Thirty or so stone and slate houses clustered around the dock, stacked and staggered on top of each other like mushrooms jutting from the grass. On the beach, men and women clustered around a man he assumed to be a parson holding a baby. Taking a shell full of sea water, he poured it over the infant’s head. When Adam turned to ask Immanuel about the strange baptism, he found him looking off toward a farm house surrounded by patches of mismatched land, but what drew Adam’s eye was the towering light house on the opposite bluff.
It stood apart from the island, rising proudly from the sea on a pedestal of rock and foam. Its body had been constructed with layers of bone and blood brick. Atop it sat a glass and metal dome where a light cast its beam upon land and sea. Attached to the lighthouse’s side was a large, squat house in a style closer to the beacon than the little houses littering the island’s opposite shore. While he couldn’t see its face, he assumed from its red brick and square roof that it was probably a Georgian building put in at the same time as the island’s light. A smaller shed-like building sat at the bottom of the cliff, near the water’s edge and beyond it a series of flat stones that turned with the motion of the sea. Adam watched as the undulant path of white stones leading from the mainland to the lighthouse was swallowed stone by stone into the sea. The tide rose, quickly covering any evidence of their connection.
“Immanuel, do you know what those wheels are?”
Adam’s companion shook his head but pulled him along the path to where they could get a better look at the mechanical contraptions.
From far away, they could have been mistaken for the white spray of a cresting wave. Upon closer inspection, Adam could see they were large turbines submerged beneath the ocean. With the rhythm of the tide, they spun, cupping and spilling water with each rotation. Beneath the tumultuous rush of water, he could make out a faint mechanical growl. Adam’s eyes brightened as he reached into his coat and withdrew a folded newspaper from his pocket. Flattening it against his leg, he revealed the drawing of a spiraled lighthouse.
“No wonder it seemed familiar,” Adam said. “It’s the lighthouse from the article, the one with the generators.”
Immanuel stared down at the drawing, his eyes moving between the picture and the spire breaking through the blanket of fog. “Does it say anything more about what it can do?”
“No. All it says is the water wheels power the city and they even create a surplus of energy on good days.”
“I don’t know if we can call this a city.”
“I think the author was trying to be kind. The article is more about whether or not this type of thing would work in London or Liverpool. There’s very little about why it was created or who created it.”
“But why have water generators here?”
Adam shrugged. “Perhaps it was too hard to string power lines from the mainland. Gas lamps and oil are so finicky. At least with electricity, you don’t have to worry about blowing yourself up. Yet our lavatory is out in the yard,” Adam murmured.
“We can’t have everything.” Immanuel bit back a laugh and sighed contently at the quiet. Staring out at the waves licking at the path at the base of the lighthouse, he wondered who could have envisioned such a clever invention on an isla
nd with so little. “What else does it say?”
Adam’s eyes scanned the rest of the article for a third time. “There isn’t much else. It mentions how the generator works and the economic implications. Oh, wait. It says that the creator was an eccentric who had lived in ‘the city’ his entire life.”
“All scientists and inventors are eccentric. All that means is the person writing it doesn’t approve of how he acts.”
“My sister is an inventor,” Adam replied sharply.
“And you don’t think the other society ladies call her eccentric?”
“Touché.”
Leaving the flooded path to the lighthouse behind, Adam and Immanuel passed through a sparse woods lining their path. Above them birds tangled through the trees, only pausing to watch them to pass. Sunlight filtered through the leaves despite the grey day, but as Adam strode toward the clearing with his mind on lunch and what shops the quaint village could hold, he suddenly found himself alone. He turned to find Immanuel at the edge of the bare earth where the path diverged, his toes barely brushing the grass, his pupils wide and transfixed.
“Immanuel?” Adam called as he slowly walked back to his side.
His companion never moved. Adam stood at Immanuel’s shoulder and tried to align his gaze with Immanuel’s. At first, it appeared that the lush oasis was empty apart from the foliage, but then his gaze fell upon a crooked rock he had initially mistaken for a tree trunk. It jutted from the earth at a strange angle, and as he followed it higher, his eye jumped to its nearly identical companion a few feet away. Thirteen stone trunks stood in a ring like a mouth of crooked teeth.
Selkie Cove (The Ingenious Mechanical Devices Book 5) Page 11
