The Silver Witch(107)

Once downstairs she hesitates, but there is no decision to be made. She knows what she has to do. Tomorrow Lucas will resume the dig and remove the body. She has to act now. She slips the gold torc into her fleece pocket and jams on her beanie. Thistle stretches elaborately and stands wagging at the back door.

‘Okay, you can come, but it’s been thawing, there’s not much snow left to play in,’ Tilda warns her. She crouches down and hugs the dog. ‘You know what? I could do with a bit of help today.’

Outside, the snow has shriveled off the tarmac of the lane, but remains in slushy lumps on the fields and paths. By the time they reach the track around the lake, a steady drizzle has begun. Tilda regrets not putting on a waterproof jacket, but knows her fleece will keep out the wet for the hour or so she plans to be out, and she can move faster like this. If Thistle minds the rain she doesn’t show it, but bounds happily along beside her mistress.

It is so good to be running again! Come on, fleet, old feet. Pace, push, breathe. Pace, push, breathe. One step at a time. That’s how to tackle stuff. One thing at a time.

She runs on. The countryside looks drab as the snow is melted by the rain, turning the scenery from white to gray. On the lake, geese take to the deeper water, grateful for the thaw, untroubled by the lack of sparkle or sunshine. A long-legged heron prods around in the shallows. Tilda allows herself to revisit what she’s learned over the last couple of days. Seren did not survive the attack; she has to accept that was what she was shown in the vision in the museum. She had a baby daughter, and that child was taken prisoner, and later sent to live in Wessex.

So, the line continued. It really can be true. They are my ancestors. My family. All this crazy stuff, all the different ways I have felt connected since I came here—the designs on my ceramics and the torc; what the torc does for me; what I’ve seen; Seren, even the terrible being from the dig—it’s all because this is where everything started. This is where I started. This is where I belong, and where that mad spark of magic in me came from. Seren. The Afanc. The lake. Me. Here.

The notion that she is descended from the woman she saw in the boat, from the woman who she sees when she puts a loop of gold around her arm, somehow this makes sense of everything. She was meant to live here, in this magical place. She was meant to reconnect with her heritage. She cannot believe that coincidence alone has brought her here. She and Mat had visited the area several times before buying the cottage, and she had always felt an inexplicable affinity with the place. An affinity that surprised her, given her fear of water. When they had found Ty Gwyn, the cottage had felt so right, almost as if it had been waiting for them. But she had dismissed this feeling as one hundreds of house hunters experience after months of looking for their perfect home.

Only for me, it was more than that. This is my home.

And Thistle had found the torc.

And I found Thistle. Or did she find me, I wonder?

The timing of the dig seemed to be another factor that had heightened the chances of such a strong connection being made with the past. The ghost of the person in the grave was being disturbed, and that disturbance had led it to seek out Tilda.

Why me? What did my ancestor have to do with the person in the grave? There must have been something that happened, something huge.

She stops running. Thistle stops too, looking at her, ears pricked, waiting.

‘We have to go to the grave.’ She forms the statement aloud to the dog, but it is herself she needs confirmation from. ‘Tomorrow they’ll lift the body out. After that, well, there’ll be no getting the genie back in the bottle. Think I’d rather face her now, when that heavy stone weighs things a little in my favor.’ She turns down the path that will take her to the dig site. The going is horribly slippery, and the rain has increased so that it is starting to work through the fabric of her clothing. She spits away the water that courses down her face and increases her speed. As she approaches, she is relieved to see that the site is deserted. She imagines everyone will be away celebrating Christmas with their families for as long as possible before returning to raise the remains. There is something eerie about the empty tent, the abandoned trench and the general feeling of loneliness that permeates the place. She sets her mind against the wriggle of fear that is working its way in.

This is no time to get jittery. I can do this. I have to do this. That thing has got to see that I’m not going to be terrified by it anymore. That it has to leave me alone. I’m ready for it now. I’m not the defenseless person it thinks I am.

She reaches the grave. Lucas has covered it over with polythene sheeting, pinned down with tent pegs and weighted at the corners with hefty stones. The earth around the whole area is horribly churned up from all the activity of the preceding few weeks, followed by the harsh weather, and now the sudden thaw and heavy rain. Thistle stands close to Tilda, her body tense.