Siri Mitchell - Chateau of Echoes

Cranwell looked up when he heard me.

His chest hairs were peeking out of the collar of his sweater.

Swallowing, I focused my attention on Lucy. I’d never said the man wasn’t handsome. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

We walked to the garage together. It was his idea, so Cranwell insisted on driving. I offered no argument; his black Jaguar beat my cream soda-colored Mini hands down. And his heater probably worked too. Though I still had money left from the settlement of my parents’ estate, I didn’t choose to invest it in a car. What I owned had four wheels, and it got me where I needed to go.

As I settled myself into the beige leather passenger seat, I sighed in pure bliss as Cranwell pushed his coat into the space behind our seats. He glanced over at me and started laughing.

At that moment, I didn’t care: I liked the smell of leather, I liked the look of burled walnut trim. I liked nice cars; it just wasn’t a priority for me to own one. “How do you come to be driving a Jaguar?”

“I like Jags. After I bought my first one, I promised myself I’d never drive anything else.”

“So you had this one shipped to you?”

“No. I bought it in Paris and then drove it over here.”

“And what will you do with it when you leave? Sell it?”

He shrugged. “Probably give it to a friend.”

“Nice gift.”

“I have nice friends.”

He’d alluded before to the fact that he had friends in Paris, but he hadn’t left my chateau for the city except when I’d forced him to in the middle of the month. Maybe, like most smart rich people, they spent their winters in places farther south.

Cranwell pointed out the heated seat feature and let me play with the adjustments while we sped away from the chateau. The ride was heavenly. The weather wasn’t the best, but cocooned inside the Jag, it didn’t matter.

The trip took three hours.

By noon, we had motored into Douarnenez, the site most closely connected with the ancient Legend of Ys. A quaint fishing town in the old Breton style, its fishing port is brightened by a string of buildings with colorful facades topped with black roofs facing off against the ocean. We checked into the hotel and had lunch at a restaurant at the Port de Rosmeur along the water. Heat lamps made it warm enough to eat outside.

Then we drove to Pointe du Raz.

Cranwell parked his Jaguar at the far side of the parking lot. Can’t say that I blamed him; with a car like that, I would have been worried about bumps and scratches too.

We walked together past the gift shops and snack bars and then began the hike over the hills and up toward the rocks until we could see the surf break now and then over the tops of jagged, jumbled stone.

When we reached an abandoned concrete slab at the start of the point, I crossed my arms and hugged myself, trying to trap some body heat inside my pea coat. “So how did you know they weren’t married?”

“I know them.”

“Know them?!”

“Not personally. But I know of them. Enough to know that Sophie has never been married.”

Although I sent forth a fist to punch him, he captured it before it reached his arm and took it and tucked it into his coat pocket. Then he turned to me and smiled the most self-satisfied smile I’d ever seen him make.

And rascal that he was, I had to smile back.

Inside his pocket, he worked my fist apart and then entwined his fingers with mine.

I began to berate myself for not putting up a defense against him, but with the wind whipping my hair and the waves breaking far above the rocks, I decided that I didn’t care anymore. Apparently he was like this with everyone. If flirting didn’t mean anything to him, then why should it mean anything to me? Besides, it felt good to have my hand held; I had missed my companionship with Peter.

To cement my decision, I gave Cranwell’s hand a squeeze.

He tightened his hand around mine for an instant, pulling it close.

Thinking he wanted to say something, I turned toward him and in doing so, my hair blew between us.

He backed away from the stinging strands, releasing my hand.

After using it to tuck my hair inside my coat, I turned back to him, but he was already several yards away, staring seaward.

Suddenly, he turned to me and yelled across the wind, “Come on!” grabbing my hand and yanking me forward. He wasn’t content to just look at the edge of Continental Europe. He wanted to stand on it.

“Cranwell, I don’t think-”

“Nothing says we can’t climb out there.”

Of course nothing said we couldn’t climb out there. The French don’t care if you’re an idiot, risking your life scrambling over slippery, slime-covered rocks. And should you die, any French court of law would say it’s your own fault for being stupid.

“Cranwell…” I dug my heels into those rocks just as far as they would go.

“Freddie!” He let go of my hand in exasperation. “What are you afraid of?”

“Heights. Drowning. Strong tidal currents. Undertows. Hypothermia. Breaking my head open and having to watch my brains leak out.”

He broke into laughter, placed a hand behind my head, and pulled it close so he could kiss my forehead. “Is that all?” Then he pulled the tips of my coat collar up around my neck. “I’ll take care of you.”

And in that instant, he sounded so much like Peter that I couldn’t help but offer my hand when he extended his.

He was able to push and pull me over a trash heap of huge tumbled boulders before I balked at the sight of what lay ahead.

“Don’t look, Freddie.” The words were whispered in my ear.

Grasping at Cranwell’s hand, I gave it a violent squeeze. “If I don’t look, I’ll fall.”

“I mean don’t look at the waves, just look at the rocks below your feet. They’re not going anywhere.”

Ahead of us, the rocks abruptly gave way to the ocean, plunging downward at ninety degrees. In between the tip of the point and where I was standing was a half-cauldron filled with angry sea that crashed into the rocks sixty feet below us to send spray shooting up. Relentlessly, it fell back, gathered strength, to begin another assault. I could feel the vibrations of those onslaughts in my chest. The only way forward was to skirt the semicircle of the cliff. One misstep meant certain death or dismemberment… maybe both.

“Step where I step.”

“Cranwell-” Before I could stop him, he’d jumped forward onto another rock.

I looked back from where we’d come. Forward toward Cranwell. He was looking still forward to that beckoning jut of rock at the very tip of the point. Then his shoulders dropped and he hopped his way back to me. “Never mind.”

“Go. I’ll wait here.” I sat down, leaning back against the rock above me. “I’ll be fine.”

He helped me up by the elbow. “Let’s go back.”

As he raised me to my feet, I looked up into his eyes, and instantly, I knew I couldn’t, wouldn’t, turn back. So I let him help me up and then ducked around him and started picking my way forward along the edge of the cliff.

How I did it, I’ll never know, but the image of the top of my boots is indelibly etched in my memory. As I crested that final rock, a spray of salt water came spurting up from the sea.

Caught off guard, I threw up my hands against the cold wetness and teetered on the spine of the rock.

I felt strong hands grip my shoulders.

Turning, I saw Cranwell beside me. He slipped an arm around my waist to steady me. “We did it.”

“We did.”

We stayed there, enjoying the reward of our labor. Before us, beyond a lonely lighthouse, the sea stretched, endless, and merged with the mist. Somewhere out there was the Ile de Seine, portal to druidic paradise, but according to my eyes, before and beside us was nothing. We were truly standing on the last piece of continental soil. The last stanchion against the ocean. Several times we were drenched by spray, but the sensation of being the last two people in the world was so strong that we were powerless to turn back. And when the spell had finally dissipated, I found myself bound much tighter in Cranwell’s clasp than I would have chosen to be.