I passed the rock hewn with numbers, then pressed my palms on the outer wall of the cave and hauled myself out, falling headfirst into the black sea.
LIV, 1998
I
I raced through the forest, branches tearing up my face and arms, and my heart beating in my throat. I could hear Isla and the others behind me, calling and gaining speed. I had to keep focused on my path, weaving through the trees toward the sound of the waves. I’d get Luna and we’d get in my car and drive before the others could reach us.
If they hadn’t already taken her.
I was drenched in sweat and gasping for breath by the time the Longing came into view. I darted across the road, my heart in my throat. Was Luna there? I reached the door to the bothy, put my hand on the door handle, and from the corner of my eye I spotted someone stepping toward me, their arms raised in the air, holding something heavy. Before I could glance at them, they brought it crashing down on my head. The pain was sickening, knocking me clean to the ground.
And everything went black.
II
Colors flickered at the edges of my vision. Someone or something shuffled close to me, and in the distance, there was roaring.
I was lying on my belly, raised up from the floor.
Gradually, I recognized where I was—I was in the Longing, lying facedown on the wallpaper table I’d used to spread the mural out before painting it on the walls.
My head throbbed. I could smell vomit on my T-shirt from where I’d been sick. My vision was fuzzy, but gradually it cleared enough to bring the floor of the Longing into focus. A set of feet moved toward the door, and someone locked it.
Patrick.
“It turns out that I have made a bit of an error,” he said. “Language is everything. Did you know that? It really is.” He shook his head. His eyes were wide and his hair askew. Terror ripped through me. He had beaten me over the head and dragged me here. He looked and sounded like he’d lost his mind.
“All these years, I’d misinterpreted a single word,” he said, “and this misinterpretation has caused needless misery. As you might have gathered, I’ve been trying to find Amy. I can see you’re not Amy at all. No marks on your skin.”
I opened my mouth to tell him to let me go, but just then he moved something tight across my mouth and fastened it behind my head. I shouted into the strap but it came out as a muffled whimper.
“So it’s back to Plan A. You’ve helpfully painted the runes I need on the walls of the Longing. We’ll also need a bit of fire and one more crucial thing, which you’re also going to help me with.” He leaned close to my face. “Living bones.”
The bone triangle in the lantern room flashed in my mind.
“Now, I know what you’re thinking,” he continued, pulling down the waistband of my trousers.
He’s going to rape me.
“？‘Why hasn’t Patrick tried bones before now?’ To that, I’ll say that I have. I’ve removed the bones from countless creatures, painstakingly putting them in the right place on a full moon and so on. And guess what? Nothing. No Amy.” He started to laugh. “And do you know what? Just the other night I was looking into my translations of old Icelandic. The word I’d interpreted as ‘living’ actually means ‘human.’ Can you believe that?”
I felt a quick sting in my buttock. A flash of a needle in my peripheral vision told me he’d injected me with something.
He ran a blade up the back of my T-shirt, tearing it off. The cold air settled across my arms.
“This has to go, too,” he said, slicing the strap of my bra. I could feel my toes and legs, the blood in my hair from where he’d struck me, but not my back. He’d anesthetized me.