Fynn was gazing around the room at Mam’s paintings. “I can’t read.” He shrugged. “Either I never learned, or it’s the—”
“Memory loss,” I finished for him, as I continued to turn the book’s tattered pages. Its entries didn’t appear to be in any clear order. Zaratans—sea turtles so enormous they were often mistaken for small islands—preceded grindylows, creatures that drowned people, though they looked nothing like the monsters I’d seen. The drawings of skeletal women with stringy black hair and razor-sharp teeth made me shudder.
Next was the entry for the lusca, supposedly the world’s largest octopus. I remembered this one well from my talk with Morag.
The next beast resembled a horse, except for its dolphin tail and the fins along its spine. The word above the horse-creature’s head caught my eye: glashtyn.
I studied the drawing again. This was one of the creatures Ms. Elena had described to Cat’s mam, though it looked nothing like the phantom made of sea foam I’d now glimpsed twice. It was a closer match to the water-horse in Mam’s recent painting.
Shivering, I hoped none of Mam’s other outlandish creatures would appear in this book. I turned more pages, black-and-white sketches blurring together, but the Bully, her most recent painting, mercifully never appeared.
Fynn drummed his fingers against the floor as I worked, and the rhythm reminded me of a sea chanty Da often sang.
At last, after passing over an illustration of a hairy whale and an entry devoted to evil green water spirits called the fuath, my misty phantom appeared: a wispy man in elegant but outdated clothing, hovering on the page beside his name as he played a fiddle. Fossegrim.
“Foe-say-grim,” I said aloud. “This is it! This is what I saw!”
Fynn leaned forward, running his fingers over the images and words with a longing I recalled from when I was small. Maybe I could teach him to read.
“‘Fossegrim, male water spirits native to Scandinavia, are known for their love of music,’” I read aloud. “‘Their fiddle tunes call men, women, and children alike to the nearest body of water, where the souls drown as they try to reach the source of his haunting song.’”
A chill ran through me. And then a memory stirred. “I thought—” I paused, licking my dry lips. “I thought I heard music when Grandad jumped off that cliff. Everyone told me I’d imagined it, but …”
“It seems you’ve found his killer.” Fynn narrowed his eyes at the drawing of the fossegrim. “We won’t let him escape justice a second time.”
I nodded, lost in the thought that there could be more than one creature stalking our shores. After all, the fossegrim didn’t have a curious fin like the one I’d seen in the harbor—the glashtyn did. And then there was the scaly thing I’d glimpsed the night Lugh and I heard a crash over the water, a river of dark flesh that disappeared in a blink.
Gooseflesh covered me from head to toe the longer I stared at the fossegrim. “All right,” I said slowly. “The fossegrim took Grandad. Does that mean everything else in this book is a”—I gulped—“a vicious killer?”
“Just because you’ve never seen these creatures doesn’t mean they’re all monsters.” Fynn’s eyes never left my face. “Maybe they’re like people. Some are wicked, some are fair. Some look out for their neighbors, and others only care for themselves.”
I thought back to the sketch of the grindylow women with their gaunt faces and pointed teeth, and something tightened in my chest. “If they’re really anything like people, they all have the potential to do harm.”
“Perhaps you’re right.” Fynn dropped his gaze to the book.
“‘Fossegrim prefer colder waters, but as scavengers drawn to places where other beasts are feeding, they have been found throughout the northern hemisphere. Legend has it they sometimes play to attract a human bride. An instance of this was first documented in Oslo, in the year 1297 …’”
I winced. “Do you think that thing wanted Alis, or one of the others, as a bride?”
Fynn blanched. “It’s possible.”
“But Alis was so young!”
Perhaps my missing friends had refused to be this monster’s wife, so it dragged them to a watery grave. My stomach lurched.
I shut the book with a snap. “How can we keep everyone safe?” I’d collected enough material from its pages to plague me with nightmares well into my sixties. “I’ve tried warning this town before. They won’t listen.”
Fynn shrugged. “Short of telling them to stuff cotton in their ears, I don’t know. But as soon as I’m able, I’m going to find the fossegrim and I’ll kill it.”
“You can’t!” I grabbed Fynn’s hands. “You need to heal. I’ll not lose you over your ridiculous urge to act the hero.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t go tonight.” Laying a hand against his stomach, he confessed, “My wounds are aching again. And besides, I promised to prove to you that you still know how to swim. Tomorrow.”
Somehow, his words and his smile only made me more nervous.
CHAPTER TWELVE