Page 8 of A Snowy Seaside Christmas
While the fragrant smoke filled the air, Lark picked up the chunk of green, polished malachite crystal she’d prepared in anticipation of any negative energy brought into her home from Crayke’s Cottage. That morning she’d rinsed the crystal underrunning water and left it to air dry in the living room. That way, she felt happy that she’d washed away any traces of negative energy it could be holding on to; she was keen for its properties to be at the optimum level.
Clutching her crystal in one hand, she took the herb bundle in the other and walked slowly around the room, the scented smoke drifting all around her and filling the tiny space. She stretched out her arm, ensuring the smoke reached right into the corners. Lark repeated this action in every room of the house – even the bathroom – until she was satisfied the cottage was adequately cleansed, and every trace of negative energy had been eradicated.
In the living room, she set the herb bundle back down, fragrant smoke still drifting from it. She placed the piece of malachite beside it while she went around closing all the windows. She was just about to hunt for Luna, who was still making herself scarce, when she heard a gentle mewing from her bedroom. The sound appeared to be coming from under her bed. Heading over to it, Lark lifted the edge of the patchwork quilt and peered beneath to see two eyes blinking back at her.
‘Oh, Luna,’ she said softly. ‘You can come out now, sweetheart, everywhere’s back to normal. There’s nothing left to upset you. Come on.’
The cat gave another plaintive miaow before tentatively inching her way out, letting Lark scoop her up and carry her downstairs. ‘I’m so sorry, Luna, I should’ve taken notice of your warning and not touched the case.’I should’ve taken notice of my own warning, too.
With tranquillity restored at Seashell Cottage and Luna watching from the doorway, Lark set about making herself a soothing mug of camomile tea. Her mind was turning over the items in the second suitcase. As thrilled as she’d been about Betty’s clothes in the larger case, the contents hadbeen overshadowed by the smaller one. Could the items inside have anything to do with why Mr Thurston had said Crayke’s Cottage was cursed with bad luck? And, if so, did he know anything about that particular suitcase? Was that why he was so determined to not keep any of the items? So many questions!
Lark had decided against texting or calling Nate about it, deciding, instead, to tell him tomorrow. She was at a loss at what to do with the smaller suitcase. She was reluctant for Nate to have it with all its weird energy; she didn’t want even the tiniest hint of it to rub off onto him, especially after the weird feelings she’d detected on him earlier. It made her wonder as to the vibes in the furniture currently stored in his van. In fairness, there hadn’t been much. The place had been sparsely furnished, though what there was had been heavy, it being made of aged oak. If he was okay with it, she’d treat the van to a spot of sage burning before he moved it, and its contents, to his workshop, hang up a couple of the malachite crystals she had on chains.
As she poured hot water over the teabag, the more she thought about it, the more she wondered if the small suitcase and its contents should be handed over to the local heritage centre – she didn’t want it, and she wasn’t so sure Nate would either. At least, she hoped he wouldn’t. The centre would be the best place for it. Surely it couldn’t cause any distress to anyone there?
The Old Micklewick Heritage Centre was dedicated to the unlikely partnership of the town’s notorious smuggler, Jacob Crayke and Benjamin Fitzgilbert. Though it was only small, it had an interesting collection of exhibits. Situated in the converted chandlery building, facing out to sea in the old part of town, it had become a popular visitor attraction. It had been a while since she’d looked round the place, but Lark was confident the curator and her staff would be thrilled to receive the items and have them on display amongst the other artefacts. A wispof a memory flickered in her mind. She felt sure she’d heard something about it being awarded some investment or a grant. And now she thought about it, something told her Florrie was on first name terms with the curator; something to do with the out-of-print books the bookshop stocked.
Another thought popped into her mind. She wondered if there would be anything in the museum’s archives concerning the history of Crayke’s Cottage. She made a mental note to contact the visitor centre tomorrow, it suddenly dawning on her that it was closed on Mondays except for Bank Holidays.Drat!Not only was Lark impatient to dig into the history of Crayke’s Cottage, but, more pressingly, she was also impatient to get the small suitcase out of her shed and into the hands of someone who would know what to do with it.
Checking the time on her phone, she saw it was almost nine o’clock. With the usual calm and positive air restored to not only herself, but the cottage too, Lark decided it would be a good time to call her dad, see how he was doing. She couldn’t wait to hear what he’d have to say about the case, hoping it would pique his interest. He needed something after the last three years he’d had.
EIGHT
Armed with her mug of camomile tea, Lark headed into the living room, savouring the cosy warmth and the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree. Her nose twitched at the scent of the recent herb burning that still lingered and had joined the scent of pine. Luna stalked behind her, leaping up onto the armchair and tucking her paws beneath her.
She set her mug down on the coffee table and reached over to Luna, treating her to a quick scratch between her ears. The cat rewarded her with a deep, contented purr. It was a sound Lark had grown to love.
As she went to retrieve her phone, Lark found her gaze being drawn to the photo of her with her father next to it on the sideboard. A favourite of hers, it had been taken at the end of the pier on a bright and blustery day in June when she was fifteen. She could remember it as if it was yesterday, the sound of the waves crashing below, the smell of fish and chips from the kiosk on the bottom prom whipping around them and the salty tang of the sea air on her lips. Both Lark and her father were wearing wide smiles, eyes dancing with happiness, enormous ice creams in hand. She’d taken the photo on her phone, and despite the grainy image, there was no getting away from the strikingresemblance she bore to her dad, with their matching golden-blond hair that was being roughed up by the wind, and clear green eyes. She’d inherited his straight nose, too. She smiled as she recalled how they’d roared with laughter as they’d battled to eat such mountainous ice creams, Lark’s hair getting stuck to hers, which was a mix of raspberry ripple and summer fruits.
She’d be the first to admit she was a daddy’s girl. Always had been. It was Silas who’d come up with her nickname: Lark. The name on her birth certificate was Lauren Harker – she had her mother’s surname – but since she’d always been an early riser, he’d combined the two names and come up with Lark, which he’d thought most appropriate since he’d said she was always “up with the larks”. It had stuck and she’d been Lark ever since.
Lark adored him, and, despite his journey to fatherhood being a little unusual, he adored her in return. There was no escaping the fact that her parents’ relationship had been unconventional, which was something they’d never made a secret of. They’d never actually been an item, and Lark was conceived after Silas – who was the brother of Serena’s best friend Elfie – real name, Delphine – and four years older than them – had agreed to “help out” when Serena had announced she wanted to become a mother. Though she was only twenty-one at the time, early menopause was rife in her family – her own mother Clarinda had gone through it by the time she was in her late thirties – and Serena didn’t want to just get on with her life, indulging in her love of travel, and leaving it too late to conceive. Silas had been understandably shocked and outraged when Serena and his sister first broached him with their request. But he’d eventually backed down after listening to the reasons behind it, accepting that it wasn’t just some half-baked whim.
Not long after Lark was born, Serena and Elfie became an item and set up home together, and though Elfie was technicallyLark’s aunt, the two women thought the title of “godmother” worked better for her.
Despite Lark not growing up in the same household as her dad, she’d stolen his heart the moment he’d first set eyes on her and he’d vowed to be a regular presence in her life. He’d been true to his word, and she’d always looked forward to his visits.
Her heart squeezed at the thought of him and the tough few years he’d had since losing his wife of twenty-six years. It had hit him hard, his grief sitting like a heavy cloak on his shoulders, dragging him down. Lark was beginning to think he was never going to shake it off and it worried her.
The weeks prior to Greer’s diagnosis had been one of the most distressing times Lark could ever recall. Never before had she wished so hard that she could be rid of her “gift”, as her mum and grandma referred to it. It didn’t feel anything like a gift. A curse, more like.
For weeks she’d been overwhelmed by a dreadful sense of foreboding. It had gnawed away in the pit of her stomach, leaving her with the unshakeable feeling that something wasn’t right with her stepmother. It had been agonising, occupying all her waking thoughts. Her concerns had been compounded the day Greer called in at Seashell Cottage. It had been a few months since Lark had last seen her and she’d been shocked to find her stepmother’s aura so dramatically transformed. The usually smooth, turquoise glow around her had dimmed and become black and faint. Lark had realised in that instant her stepmother was ill. She’d scrubbed her eyes with her fists, doing all she could to unsee it. Even without her gut feelings and hunches, the black circles that sat under Greer’s eyes and her pasty pallor was enough to suggest she wasn’t well.
It had knocked Lark for six, her thoughts going to her father, wondering how he’d respond once he knew.
Much as she’d been aware she needed to act on it quickly, Lark had been unsure how. It wasn’t an easy thing to put into words without sounding melodramatic or bonkers –I hate to have to tell you this, Greer, but I think you’re seriously ill and you need to see a doctor urgently.It didn’t help that Greer had chosen not to hide her scepticism about her stepdaughter’s sixth sense. She’d even gone so far as to suggest that it was merely something that had been made up or embellished upon by Serena and Clarinda – Lark’s maternal grandmother. ‘We can all get a hunch about something, doesn’t mean we’ve got extrasensory perception. It’s all about evolution, when you think about it. I mean, there was a time when early humans needed such instincts to keep them safe from sabre-toothed tigers and the like. But we don’t need them now, and while some of us have evolved such that it’s been erased from our DNA, it’s still present in others, like wisdom teeth; some of us have them, some of us don’t. That’s all this “extra sense” is about,’ she’d said on a number of occasions, by way of what she called a “logical explanation”.
Lark had lost count of the number of times she’d wished her stepmum was right.
Putting this to one side, all Lark knew was that her stepmum needed to get herself checked over. She’d made up her mind to speak to Greer, and had spent an age working out what to say. She was inordinately relieved to have had the problem taken out of her hands when, at a routine cervical screening appointment at her GP’s surgery, Greer had mentioned to the nurse that she’d been experiencing a handful of uncomfortable symptoms including bloating and abdominal pain, joking that it was probably down to eating too much bread. When the nurse had questioned her further, she’d been sufficiently concerned such that she’d booked Greer an appointment to see the doctor straight away. The GP had shared the nurse’s concernsand arranged for his patient to have a scan. The results had confirmed their worst fears: Greer had ovarian cancer. Despite surgery and chemotherapy, it had been too late. She died less than six months later owing to the complications of an infection.
Since then, Lark had done all she could to disengage herself from her intuition and premonitions. What had happened with Greer had been traumatic, she’d even blamed herself for not acting on her instincts and speaking to Greer sooner. She didn’t want to experience anything like it again, so she closed her mind, and set about breaking the habit of aura reading. If she sensed anything negative in the future, she was determined to ignore it. After all, her intuition hadn’t helped Greer. And now her dad was heartbroken. Instead, Lark decided she was going to focus her attentions on something positive that gave her enormous pleasure: crystal healing and aromatherapy. She’d still used her intuition when selecting the items for Lark’s Vintage Bazaar, but that was as far as it would go.
Until the dratted warnings about Nate had started to push their way into her mind. She was just thankful she’d worked out what was behind that.
Lark was pulled out of her thoughts by the tinkling ring of her phone in her hand. Glancing at the number that lit up the screen, a rush of love filled her chest.
NINE
