“Stop Raghnall. Just give back the bag and let’s go,” said Morag. She tried to pull him away but he shook her off.
“Here,” he said, holding out the bag. But instead of giving it back, he threw it as far as he could. They all watched as it splashed into the river, the strap catching on a rock.
Kaetha’s hair flicked his face as she spun around, chin raised proudly as she marched towards the river.
“Kaetha, leave it,” Archie called. “You might fall in.”
“Oh, Skelpt-Arse here is scared of kelpies.” Raghnall laughed. “Don’t worry Lady Rich Lass,” he called. “I’ll make sure your wee pet gets home safe after you’ve been eaten.”
“Don’t be a fool, Kaetha,” said Morag.
Kaetha ignored them. She reached the riverbank, water seething and frothing, smacking against rock. Her heart began to race and a chill crept over her again which had nothing to do with the cold. The churning waters seemed alive. And angry. She shook her head. How can water be angry?
Despite herself, she couldn’t help but recall the stories. Water spirit, kelpie, Fuathan – over time, the peoples of this land had given different names to the creature said to haunt the river and the loch, yet all of the tales evoked the same horror.
It had long been said that only witches could feel the presence of the creature, being aware of its proximity when there was no sight or sound of it. Can I sense it? Did Morwena? She felt sick. She couldn’t be a witch. Neither of them could be. It wasn’t possible. Yet the idea whirled relentlessly through her mind, piercing her with more terror than the thought of being snatched into the river.
However, the chill of dread hadn’t cooled her temper. Oh no. She would not return without the bag and face humiliation. She knelt at the water’s edge, her bag just a few feet away. Water gushed over it, the strap still caught on the rock.
“Please don’t hurt me,” she whispered as she stretched out her arm, hoping there was no one there to hear her. Her fingertips slid against the leather, her other hand gripping a clump of long grass on the bank. Then she gasped as a shock of cold water drenched her. A hand clamped around the wrist of her outstretched arm. Her eyes widened at the sight of long, scaly fingers. Her heart pounded in her chest, her breathing short and sharp.
The creature pulled her arm and now her head was underwater. She struggled, keeping hold of the clump of grass on the bank.
“Human.” The word came from the shadowy form below her, indistinct like a muffled scream. “Defiler.”
“Let me go— Please.” Kaetha didn’t hear her own voice, only the bubbles that escaped her mouth. The murky water cleared for a moment, revealing a slithering of mottled scales, blades of kelp sewn together, floating like a garment, and a swish of hair like river weeds. She scrabbled for the right words that might save her, trying to remember what Morwena had told her long ago in her old Edonian tales of Fuathans. Fuathans love anything that sparkles in the light, like water, Morwena had told her. “I have silver. I can trade,” she said, seeing the last of her breath escape, hoping desperately that the creature could hear her.
The water began to darken around her. Then she was coughing, her body slammed down onto the bank, her fingers digging into the mud. For a heartbeat, she saw its face, obscured beneath the rippling surface of the water. Silver-blue scales speckled with dark green ones. Round, black eyes. Rows of pointed teeth. Its head was inclined to one side as if trying to decipher a riddle.
She pulled her silver ring from her thumb and lowered it into the water. Something like wet moss brushed against her hand, drawing away again with a scratch of claws like mussel shells, and the ring was gone. Then there was a splash and all that Kaetha could see where the Fuathan had been was a shoal of blue-green fish swimming downriver.
A moment later, her bag was flung onto the river bank. She grabbed it and spun around, colliding into Archie. She took his arm and ran.
Her hands were shaking but she managed to appear confident, grinning smugly at the Clatchers. Raghnall was ash pale and there was fear in Morag’s eyes as she pulled at his sleeve, hurriedly leaving without a word.
“Feartie-shitebags,” shouted Kaetha, hiding her trepidation at what the Clatchers would say about her now. She hoped Archie would agree with her but he remained strangely quiet.
They walked back over the hills without speaking a word. When they reached the road that ran through the village of Feodail, they stopped. Archie turned to her as if he wanted to speak but the words took a while to come.
“That was a kelpie, wasn’t it?” he said. “Were you . . . speaking with it?”
“Did you expect me to just let it kill me? I had to reason with it.”
Archie said nothing. He seemed very interested in the dirt he was scuffing with his feet.
“Would you rather I’d been eaten?”
“Of course not.” He swiped his hand through the air, seeming to push away an idea which frightened him, but to Kaetha it felt as though, with that movement, he made an invisible barrier between them. He squinted at her before dropping his gaze again. “I can’t read a word. I thought you should know that. Maybe I’m not clever enough for us to be friends.”
“I don’t think that, Archie.
