Fletcher and I switched places just past the two small peninsulas. She handed me her unlocked phone and settled into the bench by the motor while I squeezed onto the narrow plank at the bow. Fletcher had already gone through a third of her stash if the little pile of wrappers at my feet was anything to go by.
The sun was fully gone by the time we left the relative shelter of the firth, and the water grew choppier now that we were out in the open, matching the nerves churning inside of me. I tried to focus on our course. The land to the west was one long, shadowy blob. It was hard to tell how far we were from it in the dark, but a little depth gauge by the motor that would hopefully keep us from straying into shallow water. I glanced behind us, but the other boats had been swallowed by the night. I turned on the phone’s torch, gave it a wave, and got two flashes of light in return.
We passed the mouth of the Cromarty Firth and kept going. I ate half of my Curly-Wurly, but that only made my already nervous stomach more upset, especially when combined with the sway and buck of the boat.
At the end of the second hour, Fletcher and I swapped again. Our boat was fully encased in darkness, and I struggled to drive it in a straight line with no landmarks to keep track of. A few lights twinkled onshore, coastal villages or singular houses up on the bluffs, but they were few and far between, and they made it seem as if I was driving up in space, encased in the cold and the dark. I found the night to be oppressive. I felt as if we were going nowhere, stuck in an endless loop of waves and rain and the rumble of the engine. I found myself checking in on Fletcher and the way her face glowed in the light of her phone, just to make sure I was still real.
I shivered within my coat. The rain had picked up from a fine mist to a pelting shower that slashed at my face with each gust of wind. My hat was almost soaked, as was the collar of my jumper, though my duster was still doing a decent job of repelling the water. When Fletcher and I switched again, I cracked a couple of hand warmers and stuck them in my gloves and tucked another couple under my shirt for good measure. My feet, safe in their thick leather boots and a double layer of socks, were doing alright for the moment.
“Okay?” I called back to Fletcher.
“Remind me to go to a spa after this, else I’m never getting this chill out of my bones.”
I was going to stand in the shower until the hot water ran out and then put on every article of clothing I owned and sit in front of the space heater.
The hand warmers did their job well, and soon, I could hold Fletcher’s phone without worrying about my fingers falling off. I let out a grateful sigh. Not long after, I spotted a sweeping beam of light that could only be the Tarbat Ness Lighthouse, which marked the point where we would turn west into the Dormoch Firth. Fletcher kept an eye on it as she steered, though she made sure not to point the boat directly at it, not wanting to crash right into the peninsula on which it sat.
It took us another half an hour to get close enough to see the red and white building in the glow of its great light. It also illuminated the rocky, broken shore all around the structure, waves crashing against black stone which eventually gave way to grass. After so long in darkness, I felt half-blinded and had to look away.
We regrouped right in front of the peninsula’s point. One of the boats had fallen behind, and we had to wait a few minutes for it to catch up, shining our torches around so they would know where to go. We floated as closely as we safely could. Each face was red with cold but determined.
“This is it!” I had to shout to make sure I was heard over the roar of the waves against the shore. “It’s a straight shot to the island from here. We don’t know if they’ll be monitoring the perimeter, but we have to assume they are, so cut your engines as soon as you see lights.” There were oars stashed at the bottom of each boat that we could use to pull ourselves in. It wouldn’t be fun, but it would at least be quiet. “Alright, let’s go.”
I took the rudder back for the last stretch, and we carved a straight line towards the mouth of the Dormoch Firth, ignoring the way the coast curved inwards. My hands shook, and it wasn’t just from the rumbling of the boat. Every case built to a crescendo. They swooped and soared, and sometimes dropped to a whisper, but they always crested one final, great crescendo. We were nearing that phrase, and it was the make it or break it beat of the whole piece.
Some crescendos, an ensemble could wobble through, and it would hardly be noticeable, wouldn’t wreck the entire composition, but this time, we were high and exposed, and our fingers were moving so fast that we didn’t even really have control of them. If we missed even a single note, everyone would notice, and the whole performance would come crashing down around us.
So no pressure.
Twenty-One
It was
