“Poor thing. My son knew him. I couldn’t imagine…”
Signa pulled her attention away from the conversation as curiosity began to fester. She didn’t need to muddy her mind with anything more than what was already going on. And so she focused her thoughts on how beautiful this beach would be come wintertime, so cold that the buildings themselves would quiver. A pleasant buzz warmed her skin as she pictured nights spent lounging by the hearth with a book and a mulled cider.
Her parents had been wise to put down roots in such a place—twenty years later the town was magnificent. She’d never been seaside before, and there was an indescribable charm to having one’s hair tousled by the wind and every sound dampened by the rush of waves and the wind in her ears. Every moment she spent here, it felt more like home. So far that day, she’d managed to go an entire hour without thinking of Thorn Grove and wondering how Blythe was faring.
From the pier Signa had only to cross the street to arrive at her destination—a tiny printing press in a building of dark green, where a man was hard at work behind a window. Smoke from a cigar the man had tipped precariously in his mouth plumed the air, and she tried not to cough as she stepped inside.
The man’s eyes barely lifted. “We’re out of papers for the day, come back tomorrow.” His voice was brisk as he rolled fresh ink over blocks of letters. Signa couldn’t help but stare as he worked.
“I don’t need a paper,” she began, holding out her ad. “I live in the manor at the top of the hill. I’d like to place an advertisement to staff it.”
The man arched a brow and took the sheet from Signa, skimming over it once. “Foxglove?” Surrounded by words as he was, the man didn’t seem interested in speaking many of his own.
“I’m Signa Farrow,” she said by way of answer, trying not to be put off by the way he huffed under his breath.
“Three pennies and it’ll be in next week’s paper.”
Signa stilled. That was far too long to go without adding more living souls into Foxglove. “How much for tomorrow?”
The man paused to look her over, searching her left hand for a ring. He grunted when he didn’t see one. “A half crown.”
He turned back to his work then, and Signa tried not to bristle at his obvious dismissal. A half crown was a right and proper fraud, and yet Signa reached into her coin purse all the same and lay the coin flat on the table.
The man didn’t reach for it right away, puffing on his cigar as he pulled a metal lever down, lifted it back up, rolled letters with ink, and repeated the process. “What happened up there changed this town forever. We lost parents. Grandparents. Daughters and sons. It’s a damn miracle that someone hasn’t burned that place to the ground. It’s not meant to be lived in, girl. They say only ghosts live there, now.”
Signa didn’t expect to be hit by such a wave of resentment, or a fierce protectiveness over a place she was only now learning to call home. Still, it swelled within her, making her blood hot and her glare livid. As well as she’d been containing herself, she had half a mind to show this man what spirits were truly like. Fortunately, she had the wits to throw her attention elsewhere until she could de-escalate.
Across the street, two bickering children fisted sweets in their tiny hands as they followed a beautiful woman in an ivory gown and a wide-brimmed hat adorned with a blue ribbon. All three of them seemed entirely unaware of the young boy lingering behind them, to whom Signa’s attention was drawn toward at once. He couldn’t have been older than eleven and was drenched to the bone. His hair was plastered to his round cheeks, too bloated. His skin was gray, and his lips purple and quivering as he followed the family.
Signa’s spine went rigid as the boy stopped. As if he felt her staring, he whipped to face her. His body faded from her view the second after their eyes met, and he flickered in and out of her vision until he was suddenly standing on the opposite side of the shop’s window. Hollow eyes never straying from hers, the boy waved.
Signa had never seen a drowned spirit before. Had never seen bloated skin or water pooling from lips embedded with barnacles, made so much worse by the fact that he was a child. She clutched her reticule tight as the boy backed away, motioning for her to join him.
“Thank you for your concern,” she hurried to tell the shopkeeper. “But I don’t need anyone to tell me what a tragedy it was. I lost people that night, too. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
Signa knew full well how odd she must have looked to anyone watching as she threw the door open and sprinted down the pier, following the boy. All the while the fishermen’s words from earlier rang in her head—a woman looking at the tides and a boy who wasn’t coming back. Not a sailor, as she’d thought at the time, but a child.
This close to the sea, wind lashed water and salt upon her, plastering Signa’s hair to her neck. She barely caught herself from slipping on slick planks by grabbing hold of a splintered ledge. Farther and farther the spirit continued, and Signa ignored all curious looks as she followed him to the end, to where a woman sat alone, her bare feet dangling over the pier as she stared ahead without any obvious awareness of Signa approaching.
“You can see me.… But you’re not like me, are you?”
Signa stilled at the sound of the boy’s voice. He didn’t sound waterlogged. He didn’t sound bitter or frightening, or anything like how he looked. Signa forced herself to look back at him—to see past the horror and crouch to his level as she whispered, “I’m not.”
The spirit exhaled, relieved. “Then can you tell her something for me? I want her to know that she doesn’t have to keep coming here. It wasn’t her fault, and every time I see her here… I just don’t want her to be sad.”
There was something about the boy’s request that reminded Signa of the night Lillian had passed from this world. Through Signa, she’d been able to communicate with Elijah and let him know that she loved him, and that it was time for them to all move forward.
It hadn’t been easy, but it was what they’d both needed. Only after that goodbye was Lillian able to pass on, and Elijah had finally been able to put the scrambled pieces of his life back together. If that was a gift that Signa could grant to someone else… how could she say no?
Squaring her shoulders, she crossed to the edge of the pier and took a seat beside the woman. “I know what I’m about to say may sound strange, but I have a message for you.”
There was tremendous sadness in the woman’s eyes. She didn’t acknowledge that Signa had spoken.
Nerves crawled along Signa’s skin, telling her to leave before she made this situation worse. But the moment she thought those nerves might get the best of her, a cool breeze settled over her. Death’s arrival came as a kiss of wind against her cheek, bracing her. She tried to settle into the knowledge that he was with her as she worked up the confidence to tell the woman, “Your son doesn’t want you coming here anymore. He wants you to know that this wasn’t your fault, and that it hurts him to see you so upset.”
“Tell her it was a riptide,” said the spirit as Signa relayed. “I know I shouldn’t have been out. I’m sorry.”
Halfway through that final word, Signa careened back as the woman landed a sharp slap. The ocean thrashed around them, the wind howling its rage as Signa doubled over, cupping her stinging cheek as the woman gathered her boots and stood.
Signa drew her hand from her aching face, grateful for Death’s chill as the wind soothed her skin. There were tears in her eyes from the sting of the slap, but one look at the boy’s urgent expression had Signa pressing on. “Your son is wearing a white shirt and dark trousers. He doesn’t have any shoes on, and there’s a scar on the top of his left foot—”