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Rory’s frown deepens. “I’ve barely spoken to either of them. Arabella was suitably punished at the time. What’s brought this on?”
There’s no way I’m telling Rory about Arabella’s diary, or the melancholia within its pages. “Nothing, really,” I lie. “Just feeling a bit sad that this is our last year together and the girls have spent it at each other’s throats. So I’m going to try and be better.”
“Yeah, that’s why we ignore them.”
“No, I mean actually talk to them. Be kinder.”
“Be kind all you want, they’ll still beat you to a pulp when you forget to toe the line.” Rory sticks the pastry into his mouth. After a moment, he dryly adds, “I mean, go you, feminist queen.”
I frown at him, disliking the thread of mockery in these words. “What’s the problem?”
“No problem, but — and as a bloke, and one who knows to keep his thoughts to himself when it comes to feminism — to my mind, appeasing others for the sake of harmony doesn’t strike me as a particularly feminist, orkind, pursuit.” He shrugs. “That’s it.”
“I feel like there was a lot of hypocrisy in that statement.”
A small smile tugs at Rory’s lips. “Hypocrisy isn’t a sin, and perhaps pacifying is different for me when it comes to you. But for other people…? Li and Arabella? No way. Kindness doesn’t mean shutting up and avoiding confrontation. A quiet life is a silenced life, and that’s bullshit, not kindness. In the face of bullies, kindness means being proactive, standing up, being difficult, and getting involved in fights to stop bad shit from happening to others. Otherwise, you risk becoming a passive doormat, not showing your true thoughts to the world, and living your life on your knees.”
“I’m not sayingworshipthem…”
“It doesn’t matter. Kindness is too woolly a foundation to pin your values on. It’s too easily twisted by bad actors to manipulate good people into doing whatever’s demanded of them. It’s the ultimate get-out clause. Never allow scammers the chance to toy with you.”
Rory must see the look of conflict across my face because his voice softens as he asks me, “Don’t you think if Li and Arabella had been kinder to you from the start, you’d be bosom pals by now? They’ve always been dicks. If Lochkelvin’s given them a humbling, thengood. You certainly don’t need their validation or their acceptance just because they’re girls. Come July, you’ll never have to see them again.”
Later, at some anonymous point in the baking heat of July, I’d recall Rory’s words and give a sad laugh. We’d been so wrong. So wrong about almost everything.
47
We leave the coach at Dunhaven Castle, my mind whirling so hard it fails to take in the view. It’s true, this search for acceptance from other women and girls. I think my mom must have really done a number on me, to the point I’m ripped between two poles: focus on self, as Rory had suggested, full of cold hard logic, or be the warm fluffy peacekeeper, as my instincts first compelled.
Eventually, Danny nudges me from my thoughts, and I finally look up.
Dunhaven is breathtaking.
I’ve never seen a location quite as dramatic. Perched atop a precipitous cliff jutting out from the lush green mainland, the castle is a collision of powerful ancient walls that adamantly tower and defend after centuries of sieges and battles, and tumbling brickwork that has long since surrendered to time to become ruins. The North Sea crashes around it, a thick angry black scrawl, and the mid-morning sun shines through glum gray clouds, dappling the castle with magnificent holy light. A narrow footpath winds its way from the coach to the entrance on the other side of the thin strip of land, and we make our way down it in single file.
“Place is fallin’ tae bits,” Finlay jokes. “Have they no’ thought o’ gettin’ the scaffies in?”
“It’s the same age as Lochkelvin,” Rory remarks behind me. “And Lochkelvin is in immaculate condition. We win.”
Danny pauses in front of me, taking in the majestic view. Waves lash against the rock with frightening ferocity. “Lochkelvin’s never been a battleground, though.”
“Time itself is the ultimate battleground,” Rory counters in a rich, affected voice, which makes Danny laugh.
“And anyway, I don’t know,” I add. “Haven’t you seen the stampedes when it’s sticky toffee pudding for dessert? Those first-years would chop off an arm for extra caramel sauce.”
It’s illogical, but it feels like we’re walking across a shaking bridge instead of a solid strip of land. There’s somethingmagicalabout this place, a word I’ll never use lightly again, and the closer we approach the dilapidated castle, the more my senses tingle. The wind picks up the moment we arrive on the jutting, exposed land, and the violent sound of waves smashing against rock is almost overwhelming. I grab hold of Rory’s hand, trying to ground myself.
“It feels weird,” I mumble to Rory, my hair blowing in the wind, catching against my lips. He’s the only one who’d understand. Rory’s fingers gently draw the strands from my face, tucking them behind my ears. His eyes resemble the sky again.
“It’s old.”
“Magic?” I ask, practically sensing it swirling around us, the spikiness in the atmosphere, the fizz of something heavy and unnatural in the air. Rory doesn’t respond.
Baxter gives us all a short safety talk, encouraging us to roam the ruins in pairs and not to meddle. I stick with Rory, and together we run to the furthest point on the map of our visitor guide, passing fallen stone columns and gray weather-eroded walls patchy with yellow-green lichen. I get lost more easily with Rory guiding me — Rory, who seems to know the precise place to turn, who never backtracks once, and who seems to be aiming for a location far beyond the map.
“Where are we going?” I pant, staring at rows of dilapidated walls, some with missing chunks. Rory’s only answer is his hand curling tightly around my wrist as we enter a small stone outhouse and proceed up twisting side steps. Eventually, we arrive at towering battlements at the very edge of the cliff face, so high I see shadow-dark rocks jutting like shark fins from the sea.
“Keep low,” Rory murmurs, crouching. The wind blows at us fiercely as we stand taller than anyone else on the island. “We aren’t supposed to be up here.”
