A Witch In Winter (13 page)

But I didn’t. I didn’t say any of that. Instead I took his large hand in my smaller one and nodded weakly.

‘Deal.’

‘I’m not doing the castle again,’ Seth said, as we walked together towards Maths. ‘I’ve done a project on that every sodding year since I was five. I had thought of local witchcraft, there’s quite a bit in the town museum …’ I shuddered involuntarily at that suggestion, but before my face could reveal my horror he continued, ‘But I think James and Claire are doing that already and we don’t want to compete, I guess. Can you think of anything different?’

‘What about the local fishing industry?’ I mumbled, thinking of Dad and his bloody book. Seth stopped dead and grabbed my shoulder.

‘Anna, that’s genius! My grandad is a fisherman – well, was – and I’m sure we could get some interesting stuff out of him. Well, at least …’ He seemed to have a moment’s doubt and then shook himself. ‘No, I’m sure we could. Shall we go over this weekend and talk to him?’

‘OK,’ I was a little taken aback but prepared to go along with anything that didn’t involve more witchcraft. ‘Where does he live?’

‘Out on Castle Spit.’

I’d never been to Castle Spit but had seen it often from the cliff-tops. A narrow strip of pebbly sand ran out to a small, barren island about quarter of a mile away. At extreme low tide you could walk out to the lighthouse there, but I’d been given many warnings about the treacherous speed of the tides.

‘I didn’t know anyone lived out there,’ I said, surprised. ‘It must be so lonely.’

‘My grandad used to be the lighthouse keeper, before the light went automatic. He still lives in the keeper’s cottage. It is lonely, but he’s a bit of a loner so I don’t think he minds too much.’ He hesitated again, then added, ‘He’s … well, he’s a bit odd.’

‘Odd how?’

‘Just … er … odd. He’s disabled and doesn’t get to the mainland much. But he knows a lot about the local fishing industry – he was a professional fisherman before he took on the lighthouse.’

‘OK.’ I was becoming quite enthusiastic about this, in spite of myself. ‘What time do you want to meet? Will we walk over?’

Seth shook his head.

‘Not unless you want to spend twelve hours there. It’s either that or set back almost as soon as we get there.’

‘Oh.’ I hadn’t thought of it like that. ‘So how then?’

‘In my boat, if you don’t mind sailing?’

‘I don’t mind.’ In fact I felt curiously excited about sailing with Seth. I wanted another glimpse of the stranger I’d seen in him that day at the quay.

‘Good.’ Seth looked pleased too. ‘Saturday then, I’ll meet you at the quay at noon.’

I had no idea what you wore sailing so I dressed in jeans and trainers, with Dad’s Gore-tex jacket in my backpack in case of bad weather. It looked like it would be unnecessary though – the day had started out a blazing hot one, and I was pink and perspiring by the time I got to the cliff road, in spite of the breeze from the sea.

I was happy, I realized, as I walked along the cliff. Which meant I was officially a really bad person. I should have been taking Maya’s advice, avoiding Seth, trying to keep my distance. Now Mr Brereton had made that impossible – and I couldn’t stop something inside me unfurling and fizzing with joy, as hard as I tried to damp the feeling down.

Seth was already on the boat when I crested the hill. He was too absorbed to notice me as I approached, so I was free to watch him to my heart’s content as I walked the last half mile down the road towards the harbour. He moved about the boat with swift efficien [wif" align="jt movements, tugging at ropes, tying knots, deftly threading up sails. By the time I got to the quay he seemed satisfied with the sails and their arrangement and was bent over, tinkering with the little engine, his back towards me.

He was stripped to the waist, his skin tanned the deep red-brown of someone who spends a lot of time in the open air, and he had a small tattoo at the base of his back. I couldn’t see what it showed, but I remembered June’s words that first day at Winter High, ‘Seth’s not exactly flavour of the month with authority … Drinks, smokes, got a tattoo against the rules … Smacked some guy’s head against a wall …’

It was strange, none of her words fitted with the Seth I’d got to know since my arrival in Winter. I’d never seen him smoking, far less ever seen him violent, except if you counted his anger towards Caroline and Jess in my defence. Perhaps he drank – I wouldn’t know. I didn’t join what June derisively called ‘the cool crowd’ on their Friday nights down at the harbour. But I did hear the Monday morning gossip, the stories of who’d got served, who’d been refused, who’d chucked up the best part of a bottle of Merrydown and who’d got off with who. Seth rarely ever featured in the gossip, except as a bystander. If he did drink, he wasn’t one of the people throwing up over the seawall and engaging in drunken snogs.

And yet, here was that tattoo. Against the rules, as June had said. And illegal, as he was underage. I wondered who’d done it for him. There were places in London, I knew, that would tattoo anyone with the money to pay for it and the nerve to sit still for long enough – but I wouldn’t have drunk a cup of tea in most of them, let alone let them stick a needle in me.

As I got closer I tried to see what it was. At first sight it looked like a circle, about a third of the way up his back, where the deep hollow of his spine started to flatten out with his ribs. The ink was dark blue-black against his tanned skin, and it stretched and shimmered in the sun as he moved, twisting a knob on the engine, then pulling the starter. He listened to the note for a few minutes then, seeming satisfied, he cut the engine and straightened, just as I reached the boat.

‘Nice tattoo,’ I said mischievously into the sudden silence. He jumped, grabbing his T-shirt reflexively and yanking it over his head.

‘Hi, Anna,’ he said. First his tousled hair, then his face appeared through the opening. He hadn’t shaved and his cheeks rasped against the material as he forced it down. ‘Glad you like it.’

‘What is it?’

‘Want to see?’ He pulled up the back of the T-shirt a little, twisting round so I could look. I bent down, and there it was; a little fish, not blue-black, as I’d thought, but very dark blue-green. It was beautifully drawn, each scale individually shaded, the eye it cocked towards me bright and intelligent. Its body was twisted into a circle, the snub nose yearning towards the frisking tail, forever doomed to just miss the connection.

‘So you like fish?’ I said. I spoke more mockingly than I meant to, trying to cover up the way my fingers itched to reach out and [eaceight="touch the smooth tanned skin beneath.

He shrugged and dropped the T-shirt. There was a blush of self-consciousness under his deep tan.

‘So what made you…?’

‘Get it done?’ He shrugged again. ‘Not sure really. I had a bad time a few years ago. It was not long after …’ He didn’t finish the sentence but I could guess. Not long after his dad. ‘I did some silly things, getting a tat was probably one of the sillier ones at the time and I got a lot of grief about it, but I’m quite fond of it now.’

Suddenly I felt bad for teasing him.

‘It’s beautiful,’ I said, and I meant it. ‘I like it.’

‘Thanks.’ He smiled briefly. ‘At least I had the sense to get it done below the neckline, eh?’

‘You could have done worse.’

‘Yeah. Well, I did, unfortunately.’

His voice was sombre and he turned away from me again, fiddling with the engine. I felt really bad now. He’d looked so tranquil, so truly happy as I walked down the cliff path. Now his head was bowed and there was a deep unhappiness in his voice. It seemed like I wasn’t able to bring anything but unhappiness to Seth, one way and another.

‘Do you want to … ?’ I said uncertainly.

‘Talk about it? Not really.’ He looked up and smiled with forced jollity. ‘I’d rather get sailing instead.’ He held out his hand and suddenly the gap between the quay and the boat yawned very wide and constantly shifting. The drop looked about six feet, the boat dancing up and down in a terrifying manner.

‘Don’t worry,’ Seth said, his smile real now. ‘It’s not as bad as it looks, I won’t let you fall.’

I fought a temptation to shut my eyes and instead grasped his hand and lurched towards the void. The shifting, heaving deck tilted wildly at the first touch of my foot and I felt myself teetering back towards the slice of dark oily water between the concrete quay and the boat – but Seth’s strong hand grasped me firmly, pulling me towards him.

For a minute there was nothing else – nothing but Seth’s hard grip on my upper arm, his chest inches from mine, his breath warm on my face. But then he let me go, as quickly as if my touch had burned him.

Suddenly there I was, both feet on the wooden bottom of the boat, crouching and ducking under the flapping boom as it swung in the breeze.

‘Do I need to do anything?’ I asked, as Seth stuffed my rucksack into a stowage hole and did busy things with ropes and knots at the quayside. He shook his head, not looking at me.

‘Nope. Just keep out of the way – oh, and put this on.’ He flung a life jacket at me.

‘You’re not wearing one,’ I said, feeling slightly sulky. The day was getting hotter and the prospect of sweltering in a massive, insulated jacket of yellow plastic wasn’t enticing.

‘How far can you swim?’

‘I don’t know. Twenty or thirty lengths?’

‘In the sea.’

‘I’ve never swum in the sea. Well, I mean I’ve paddled around, but not swum far.’

‘Then I suggest you put it on. It’s up to you, of course. I wear one if the sea’s anything more than glassy smooth, and I’m a strong swimmer.’

I looked out at the choppy waves beyond the harbour. If this were Seth’s idea of glassy smooth I’d hate to see a stiff breeze.

‘Unless you just fancy another trip to A&E with me?’ He was facing away from me, towards the quay, so I couldn’t see his expression but there was something in his voice that made me suspect he was laughing at me.

‘Tosser!’ I aimed a kick at him but the boat shifted, spoiling my aim, and my foot whacked the bulkhead instead. ‘Ow.’

‘Serves you right.’ Now he really
was
laughing and not troubling to hide it. ‘Well, be it on your own head …’

He cast off and the boom whipped across my head, two inches from my skull. I hastily pulled the jacket over my head.

The trip was completely magical. Under Seth’s hands the little boat seemed almost to fly across the scudding waves. Above our heads the bright sails billowed out, taut and full, and the air was filled with the ripping sound of the fluttering spinnaker, the slap, slap of waves against the wooden hull, the mew of seagulls and the salty clean smell of the waves.

Everything was perfect – the deep azure sky, the wind-whipped waves, the crisp cool breeze against my hot skin. But mostly I was entranced by Seth – at school he looked pretty competent but always slightly aloof, a bit too cool to care much. He got OK marks – but somehow gave the impression that this was chance, as much as anything, and that he was permanently thinking of something else, would rather be somewhere else.

Out on the water he was a totally different person; the craft, guided by his swift, sure hands, seemed almost a part of him. He crouched and stretched, using his strength to counter-balance the pull of the wind, leaning out across the water, his muscles taut against the force of a rope, all the time balancing the forces of the wind and the water with his own body. His face was completely concentrated and yet completely relaxed. He ma [ela…de sense, out here, in a way that he didn’t at school. The phrase ‘fish out of water’ swam through my head and I smiled, thinking of his tattoo.

‘What’s the joke?’ Seth called, above the noise of the waves and I blushed – I’d thought he was too absorbed to notice me.

‘Nothing,’ I called back, ‘Just thinking about school.’

‘I try not to,’ he said, and grinned. ‘But I’m glad someone’s got the project on their mind. Actually that reminds me, just to warn you, I didn’t manage to tell my grandad that we were coming. So I’m not sure if he knows or not.’

‘What does that mean – he might be out?’

‘No! He never leaves the island. But he might not be, er, very prepared. Very welcoming, I mean. It might be a false alarm,’ he hastened as he saw me looking worried. ‘I did leave quite a few messages, but he didn’t return my calls, so I’m not sure if he got them.’

‘Oh.’ I digested this as the boat sped along. I wasn’t sure what to make of Seth’s grandfather. He wasn’t painting a very reassuring portrait. ‘If he never goes to the mainland how does he survive?’ I asked at last.

‘My mum drives over twice a week.’

‘She drives over?’ I was surprised. Seth nodded.

‘Yes, in fine weather you can make it over in a four-by-four if you know the best route and pick your times. And he’s got a lot of supplies – tins and stuff – so he can survive quite a while without a visit. In fact if civilization ever comes to an end, you’ll probably find my grandad still out there ten years after they’ve dropped the bomb, living off tinned curry and irritably wondering where my mum is. Watch your head – I’m going about.’

He pushed the tiller. There was a moment of flapping, whipping sails, and the wind suddenly dropped. I turned, and was surprised to see we were in the lee of the island – we seemed to have covered the distance from the harbour in no time at all, and were gliding towards a small jetty. There was a slight bump and a scrape, then Seth was out of the boat, tying the painter to a rusty iron ring.