She turns to Rowan in a dizzy haze. “So this is Witches Hide. They killed witches here.”
Rowan laughs. “You mean, they killed women here, silly. I know this is Witches Hide. I’ve lived here all my life.” She produces a lighter from some hidden pocket in her dress and flicks it.
“So you’ve been in here before?”
Rowan looks away. “They’ve always had it locked. But I’ve seen photographs. Most of the islanders are terrified of this place.” She rights herself, flicking her long black hair over one shoulder. “But I’m not.”
They walk a little farther into the cave, into the part where it seems to swell and deepen, the walls green and damp with algae and shadows swirling on the ground. Rowan walks ahead, holding her lighter to the walls until she finds what she seemed to be looking for. Markings on the walls. She shivers and raised a hand reverently, as though not daring to touch the marks.
“This is incredible,” she whispers.
“So,” Saffy said, in what she deems a valiant attempt to bring herself around, “you’re OK with me and Brodie, then.”
“I never said I was OK with it,” Rowan says. She says it so easily that it takes a long minute for the words to spiral in the air and sift their meaning to Saffy’s brain.
“Then how come you’re here?”
Rowan is suddenly sitting next to her with her legs crossed, looking around the cave. She is probably admiring the beautiful ceiling too, Saffy thinks, with its symbols of black magic that have started to glow bloodred, as though a rich sunset was bleeding its light all along the cave floor and up into the engravings.
“I have a proposal for you,” Rowan says.
“A proposal?” Saffy rolls onto her belly. She feels happy and snug. “Do you want to marry me?”
“No, silly,” Rowan says. “I want to cut you.”
Saffy isn’t sure how it happened, but one moment she is on her belly kicking her legs, and the next she is sitting upright staring at a sharp knife that Rowan is holding in front of her.
“What are you doing?” Saffy says, the knowledge that she is in danger pitching her into semi-soberness.
“It’s the law of return,” Rowan says, as if Saffy is stupid. “You took what wasn’t yours. So now you have to pay.”
“No,” Saffy says, rising awkwardly to her feet. Is she dreaming this? Is Rowan really suggesting that she cut her? She tries to will herself sober, but her head is spinning and the ground beneath her feels light as clouds. “I didn’t take anything,” she says.
“Yes, you did,” Rowan says, with surprising clarity. “Three times is what he said. And so you owe me. Three cuts.”
Saffy laughs, but a glance at Rowan’s face tells her she is deadly serious. “I’m not letting you fucking touch me,” she says, backing away. She looks left and right, realizing with panic that she can’t remember how to get out of the cave. Which way is it? The cave seems like an endless loop, with no indication of whether she needs to go up or down, left or right.
“You said you came to warn me,” Saffy says, her heart racing. She reaches to the side and feels the wet, rough contours of the cave wall, a gasp of wind on her skin telling her she is near an exit.
“I did,” Rowan says. “I didn’t lie. But I had promised myself to him, and you took him.”
And with that, she lunges forward, the blade landing in Saffy’s shoulder. Saffy screams, the pain both distant and so gut-wrenchingly real it knocks her to the ground. But when she looks down, her hands are red with blood, and suddenly she is on her feet, running to the night sky ahead. The sea is howling, calling her name. She can hear Rowan calling after her, telling her not to go that way, doesn’t she know where it leads? Come back, she is shouting, come back!