I stand to follow, only for Mack to step out from behind the bar, thick arms folded ominously.
“It’s a groat for the drink.”
Trust Ren not to have paid.
I pull my purse from the basket and hand Mack a dull silver coin, then follow Ren outside.
He’s already halfway across the square, coat flaring behind him like wings, courting the same unfriendly looks from Gavan’s circle as I did, though he does a better job of ignoring them. At the edge of the square he stops, waiting for me to catch up.
“Everyone is looking at us,” I mutter, glancing back to where James Ballantyne and Cora Reid are giving us both filthy glares.
“And that bothers you?” he asks, a curious expression on his face. “Ashamed to be seen with me? Don’t want them to think you’re friends with that Ross boy?”
He does a surprisingly good impression of Maggie Wilson. It takes me a few seconds to recover, and all the while he watches me.
“I just mean I don’t want people gossiping that I’m following you around Ormscaula like a lost lamb,” I say.
He grins but doesn’t reply, stalking off again.
I follow him, silently seething, through the village, past the butcher and the baker, past the village hall and the tiny chapel, and Iain-the-Smith’s smithy. We walk on, leaving behind the neat houses with their white fences and brightly painted doors, past scrubby wee houses that are rundown, the paintwork chipped, the yards overgrown and littered with bottles, houses where the windows are dirty, smeared with grease and fingerprints.
There’s a moment when I think maybe he’s taking me to his home, and I feel a thrill of excitement – Domestic Ren isn’t something I can imagine; he seems too fey to live in something as mundane as a cottage. But we pass the last of the dwellings, with their sparse thatch and patched walls, and move into pasture, heading towards the forest.
“Are we going to the woods?” I ask. “Ren? I have to get back.” I’ve been away for nearly two hours, I don’t have time to mess around.
“We’re almost there,” he says, his limp more pronounced now the ground is uneven.
“Where?” I ask, but he doesn’t answer.
It’s much cooler under the canopy of the trees, the scent of resin and pine thick and clean. Again I think of the candy, and his tiny, boyish face, the greed and fear on it, and I wonder if he remembers, or if he’s forgotten, like I had.
Brown pine needles crunch under my feet, and I drag my boots through them, kicking them, until Ren stops in a small clearing and sits on a fallen log, extending his legs in front of him. The right one turns inwards slightly, but that’s the only tell he was born with a twisted leg. Carefully, I sit too, perching on a raised root, resting the basket in the space between us.
“Was this really necessary?” I ask, shifting to face him.
“I’ve not brought you here before, have I?” he says, and I shake my head. “It’s my favourite place. I come here to think.”
I look around, trying to see what’s special about it, but my attention moves back to him when he reaches into his coat and pulls out a package. The bullets. My pulse quickens.
“What are they for?” he asks, weighing the parcel in his hands.
“A gun.” I give him my best grin.
He fixes me with a glacial look. “What are they for?”
“I just told you.”
He tilts his head. “Fine. So they’re for a gun. What about the new earasaid, and the dresses?”
“I decided I need to get out more.” I smile.
He doesn’t return it. “You’re leaving, aren’t you? That’s what it’s all been about. All the stuff you’ve asked for. You’re running away.”
I don’t even blink. “No.”
“Where are you going?” he continues, as if I haven’t spoken. “Inverness, it has to be.”
“Ren…”
“I want to come with you.”
I choke on thin air.
“Is that so strange?” He looks at me. “I have as much reason to want to leave. More. I’m not from here, remember?”
I shake my head. “Can I just have my bullets, please?”
He puts the package back in his pocket. “You want them, let me come with you.”
“Will you get it out of your head that I’m going somewhere, Murren Ross? This is ridiculous.” I stand and walk towards him, holding out my hand.
“Full naming me, gosh, it must be serious. So am I: no me, no bullets. You can have your money back.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the bag I gave to him, dangling it in the air, where it twirls one way, then another.
Maybe I don’t need those bullets. I can take another gun, it doesn’t have to be that one. I’ll throw the gun into the loch, let it go. It’s about time. What would I even need a gun for in Thurso?
But the thought of not having it makes me feel panicky; immediately sweat prickles along my shoulders, my heart beats a little harder. No, I can’t leave it behind. I can’t get rid of it. I need it. I need the bullets for it. I don’t know why but I do.
“I thought we were friends,” I try.
“We are. That’s why you should tell me when we’re going. That’s what friends do.”
I growl in frustration. “Ren, give me the bullets or I swear—”
“Swear what?” He looks me up and down, smirking, as he tucks the money pouch away once more. “Alva, come on. You don’t need to put on your tough-girl boots. I know you.”
I hear the echo of my words from the other day, on the loch. But there’s no soft apology in his tone. Instead he’s sure I’ll back down, now he has something I want – need. He’s so confident he knows me, but he doesn’t know anything. Doesn’t know what I know, or what I’ve done.
Before I realize I’m doing it, I reach into the basket and pull out the gun.
His eyes widen with surprise for a second, and a bolt of triumph bursts through me. He doesn’t know me that well. Then his mouth splits into a grin, and I falter as the heat of my fury gives way to icy shock at my own behaviour. What the hell am I playing at?
But Ren doesn’t seem frightened by the gun. Or even bothered.
He reaches out, taking the barrel of the gun in his hand. He pulls it – pulls me – forward until the tip is kissing his forehead, all the while watching me calmly.
“I’m not going to shoot you,” I say quietly.
“Says the girl with a gun to my head.” He smiles. “They’re in my top inside pocket, if you were wondering.”
I try to pull the gun away, but he holds it fast, keeping it pressing into his skin.
“Do you have a death wish?” I ask. “This isn’t funny. Stop it.”
“Take them.”
I hesitate, looking into his eyes, trying to read the intention there. Slowly, I reach into the inside pocket of his coat, find the box resting against his heart. I pull it out, my knuckles feeling the rhythm behind his ribs, beating hard and fast. Despite his arrogant smile, he’s frightened.
Or excited.
He smiles at me: a pure, open smile.
“You’re insane.”
“Am I?”
As I lift the package free, he raises his other hand, resting it over mine. One still keeping the gun to his head, the other pressing my hand to his chest. His heart is wild beneath it, the twin of mine. Glacier-blue eyes watch me, clear as the sky above. A girl could drown in eyes like that, and not in the fun way.