Saundra Mitchell - Mistwalker

My smile died a little. “What?”

“You heard me,” Uncle Dalton said. “Don’t you know the story? You get the Grey Lady on your side, and you’ll have anything you wish for. But you have to trade everything you have to get it. Guess he took that deal, didn’t he?”

That wasn’t the story I knew. Ours was bits and pieces. Only the superstition. There were no trades in our version. No exchanges. It was just good fishing, and a faery ally in a lighthouse . . . that no one could think about for long. The wind outside whispered through the trees, but inside my skin, it howled.

Unfolding myself, I asked, “So he took her place? What happened to her?”

“Roy says he saw Susannah in town, one more time. At least, he thought it was her. The opposite of a ghost, because she had black hair and a yellow dress. She looked at Roy like she knew him, then ran out of the store. All gone, never heard from again.”

Bailey leaned her head against Cait’s knee. Her brows knit, she changed the subject gently. “Roy found somebody else, though, right?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, yes. Married Charlotte the day she graduated from high school. Happily ever after, nobody dying.” Shaking his head a little, Uncle Dalton looked at me. “Who are you, again?”

I thawed myself enough to answer. “Willa Dixon. Bill Dixon’s daughter.”

Studying my face, he took a minute. Then finally he asked, “Any relation to Albert?”

In 1929, William Albert Dixon carved his initials into the back staircase at Vandenbrook. WADII, William Albert, the second. His son was William Eugene; Bill Gene’s son, William Jack. That was my granddad, the captain of the boat when my dad still worked the stern. I was the firstborn, so I got the name. The legacy. The one that had just slipped away.

Not that Uncle Dalton cared. And not that I could explain it. So I just nodded and said. “Yessir, that’s my grandfather.”

Sensing I was off, Bailey nudged me with her foot. “You okay?”

“I’m gonna get some air,” I said. I claimed that I would be right back. But instead, I walked into the night; into the cold. And I headed for the shore.

I wasn’t sure before, how Willa came to the island. I was aware when she landed. Even now, I feel her approach. The facts of it have, until now, been entirely obscured to me. This time, I watch and see a dark marvel.

The mist comes, just a fine haze. It’s a veil drawn, but a thin one—admitting light and detail, making shadows of shapes in the distance. Then at once, the haze swirls, the veil parted by unseen hands.

Introduced by an ornate prow, a boat appears. Skimming across the water, it’s all but silent in its approach. There are no oars, no motor. The prow barely cuts the water. Ripples roll away from it, then melt back into the black sea.

This is magic in the open; I admit, I’m entranced. It could be the very ship that carried King Arthur to Avalon for his once and future rest.

But no, in this vessel comes my salvation. My Willa, her light more formed tonight than it has ever been.

She has a body. Her hair flows over her shoulders. Her eyes are looped with dark brows; her jaw is set. It’s not the intimation. There’s no blurry screen between us. Even the details I took in when I rescued her, it seems they weren’t entirely focused.

Here, I thought I knew all the intricacies of my curse. Even now I learn new details. That the one who will take it from me becomes real again. That I will see more than her light; I will know her flesh. Willa’s face is the first I’ve seen since Susannah’s.

I admit, I tremble. It’s the ache before a meal, when it seems impossible to wait even a minute more. The night before Christmas, when it seems dawn will never break.

It occurs to me that a gentleman would meet her at the shore. The stairs shake more than ever beneath my feet. Perhaps the lighthouse falls to pieces and remakes itself for each new keeper.

It could be the case. I promised to die for Susannah, and with that kiss, everything went white. When I woke, I found myself in a bedchamber fitted with my favorite things. I was alone; she was gone.

Until that moment, I had never been inside the lighthouse. Until that moment, I had thought only that true love called me to the cliffs. All the details—the boxes that come at breakfast, the souls I tally against my curse—those were mine to puzzle out by force and wit.

Willa won’t have to suffer the first years, fogged and confused. She’ll know all I know before I sail away; I wonder if the boat that brings her will take me to the shore. I wonder if I can take any of the music boxes. Or perhaps my glass news box. I rather like that. I’d like to keep it.

If not, I’ll muddle through somehow. My salvation is also my tragedy. Everyone I knew is dead. I have no home onshore, no family. The world has moved on in fascinating ways. From books and newspapers, I’ve caught glimpses of the life that waits for me. There will be so much to learn. So much to grieve.

But everything to celebrate!

The cold gathers, a misty cloak to wear as I hurry to the beach. The shadows stalk on spindling legs, flickering through the blacks and greens of the forest. Shells crackle beneath my feet. They’re proof of ancient inundations; once this island was sea, and the sea, this island.

The path to the shore is direct; it crosses the second-highest point on the island. At the apex, moonlight fills the clearing. In all truth, I would dance here if I had no errand. I’d sing, old songs and new ones. I’d sing, “It will not be long, love, till our wedding day.”

We’ll be celebrating a different sort of marriage entirely. Joining Willa with the island, matching myself to the living, waking world.

Though I hurry, Willa’s already splashing through the surf when I break into the clearing.

Willa’s too impatient for the boat to land. She jumps from it, wading through knee-deep water to get to me. I falter because she’s not an impression anymore.

The light that signals her life still glows, but from within a physical shape now. Like a boy, she wears trousers. Like a little girl, she lets her hair hang loose. Something silver flashes at the curve of her nose; silver crawls down the curve of her ear.

My hunger trembling has force now. If I had no control of myself, I’d leap at her. Clutch her freckled hands, press against her curls—put my mouth to hers, not for a kiss, but to draw out her breath.

Fully revealed, she’s beautiful. She’s alive. She’s everything I want. I hold out my hands to her and start to speak. She slaps them away; she cuts me off.

“What did you do to me?” she demands.

He stood there, blinking at me like he was confused. His face was so smooth, I’d mistaken it for soft. Innocent, maybe. I only waited a second. Then I asked again, jabbing a finger at him. “What did you do to me, Grey?”

“This is going to make you angry,” he said, “but in what sense?”

He wasn’t wrong. The way he avoided the subject plucked my last, raw nerve. I was sure he knew exactly what I meant. That he wanted me to drag it out so he could keep me here longer. The only thing I didn’t know for sure was why.

“In the sense of, why am I here? What is this place, exactly? What are you? ”

Grey raised his brows. Pleasantly, he nodded. Folding his fingers together, he said, “Of course, in that sense.”