Page 23 of 'Til All the Seas Run Dry

“I apologize. I didnae mean to zone out like that. That was rude.”

Magda waved a hand. “You don’t have a rude bone in your body, despite what Walter has decided about you.”

Callum saw the little yellow puff sitting placidly on Magda’s shoulder. There was so much… hair? Whatever it was, he was so completely covered in it that Callum couldn’t see his eyes, though he had the distinct impression that Walter was glaring murderously at him.

“Watch your drink, Cal.”

“Why?”

“I told you. He’s got three talents. Being small. Being adorable.” She scratched underneath what might have been a chin. “And poison.”

“But he cannae bite me.”

“More than one way to skin a cat, Cal. More than one way to kill a man.”

“I like you, Magda,” Robbie said with a bark of a laugh. “You’re spooky.”

Magda preened for a moment before fixing her eyes on Callum. “Enough chitchat. What are you gonna do about Jory?”

That was the million-dollar question, wasn’t it?

“I dinnae ken. She hates me, remember? And I’m angry with her, too.”

Magda leaned on her forearms on the table. “I had this dog when I was a kid. Boots. One day, Boots got lost. Maybe she ran away. Maybe someone stole her from the front yard. She was a beautiful dog. Anyway, one day, she came back. I was sitting on the front porch reading a book, and there was Boots trotting up the front walk like she hadn’t been missing for four years.”

“I—“

“I’d grieved Boots. I’d buried her toys in the backyard under one of the trees. Made her a little headstone from a rock I painted. And then, suddenly, she was back. But she wasn’t the same. She was wary. She bit if you came at her too quickly before she realized you were there. She hated surprises. She gobbled her food and growled if you looked at it.”

Callum sighed. “I’m the dog?”

“No,” Magda said, taking a long sip. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

His eyebrows knit tightly together.

“She was dead. Right? You avenged her.”

“How do ye ken?—”

“Don’t worry about how I know things, Cal. Just trust that I do.” She sighed. “I buried Boots’s things because I couldn’t bear to have them around anymore without her. So I put them somewhere where I could go to sit with her memory, but I could also leave and keep living. Jory mourned you. Forcenturies. She had to bury you and how much she loved you deep because if she didn’t, how was she supposed to keep going? And then she finds out that you aren’t dead. You never were. And she doesn’t know you left to avenge her.”

“I didnae ken she was alive! If I’d known she?—”

Magda held up a hand. “You never would have left her. But you didn’t know, and youdidleave. You left her for dead on a goddamn beach. Which was fine when you were supposed to be dead too. But you weren’t. Which means you abandoned her. Didn’t bury her. Didn’t attempt to give her the courtesy of a good farewell. You just left her in the sand.”

“Magda,” Callum croaked, feeling the hot dampness in his eyes gathering. He’d be crying blood in a moment, and it would probably scare the shit out of her. Or maybe it wouldn’t. Magda knew things. Magda certainly knew a hell of a lot more than he did.

“You wanna know what happened to Boots, Cal?”

He swallowed thickly and nodded.

“Well, it took some time and a lot of patience and a few bitten fingers, but eventually, Boots came back to us. I meanreallycame back. She let us pet her. She slept at the foot of my bed again. She chased our new dog around the backyard and let herself be chased. She wasn’t the same as she’d been before. She’d seen too much for that, whatever it was. But she let us love her again.”

Callum hung his head, a bright red tear falling and splashing onto the wooden tabletop. Robbie reached out with his napkin and wiped it up before handing the napkin to Callum.

“And she did the damnedest thing too, Cal. She found the little grave that I’d made for her things, and she dug them all up. Every toy. Every ball. She dug them up and shook them out and carried on with them like she’d never been without.”

Callum looked at Magda. He felt bleak. Hollow. Hopeless, the anger having almost deflated completely.Almost. But Magda was smiling at him, that gentle mother’s smile she’d shone on Robbie. She reached out with a sure hand and swiped the bloody tears from under his eyes. She wiped her thumb on her napkin and swiped beneath his other eye. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her, unfamiliar with being mothered.