Read Chapter 10: The Lie

The wind hit the cottage like a fist. Freya had stopped trying to sleep—the walls groaned with every gust, and the rain drummed against the glass in a rhythm that set her teeth on edge. She’d wrapped herself in a wool blanket Morag had left on the chair, and now she stood at the window, watching the sea churn white below the cliff.

The radio crackled from the kitchen.

She heard Alistair’s voice, low and patient, the way he spoke to a frightened child before a needle. But there was an edge beneath it now—something careful, measured, like a man walking on thin ice.

“No, she’s fully automated,” he said. “Has been for years. That’s why the board’s closure notice came as no surprise to anyone out here.”

Freya went still.

“Aye, I know what the file says.” A pause. “Look, I’m telling you—there’s no keeper on rotation. The optics are clean, the lamp hasn’t been lit in months. The only reason I’m up here at all is that the monitoring station routed a false alarm through the mainland. I went up to check, it’s nothing.”

The lie settled over her like cold water.

She’d been in the tower with him tonight. She’d helped him crank the mantle, watched the beam sweep across the black water as the storm dragged its teeth along the rocks. She’d smelled the oil, felt the heat of the lamp on her face. And now he was telling someone—some coastguard or shipping authority—that none of it was real.

Freya moved to the kitchen doorway. Alistair had his back to her, one hand braced against the counter, the radio receiver pressed to his ear. He wore a jumper she hadn’t seen before, dark wool, the sleeves pushed up. Rainwater still slicked his hair.

“No,” he said. “You’re right, it’s a courtesy call. But I’d rather you didn’t send a repair crew out in this.” A pause. “Aye, I know the protocol. But the island’s already lost its light. If a crew comes ashore and finds nothing to fix, that’s an expense you won’t get back, and the board will have questions about why you dispatched men to a decommissioned station in a gale.”

The voice on the other end buzzed, indistinct.

Alistair laughed—a short, dry sound. “I appreciate that. Listen, I’ll file the report myself when the weather clears. You have better things to do than talk to a doctor playing caretaker.”

He set the receiver down. The room went quiet except for the storm.

Freya didn’t move.

Alistair turned. His face flickered—a microsecond of surprise, then something harder. He didn’t ask how long she’d been standing there. He knew.

“You’re lying to them,” she said.

“I’m managing information.”

“Don’t.” She stepped into the kitchen. The blanket dragged behind her like a cape. “You told me she was automated. You told the coastguard she’s automated. But the board made a public announcement that they’re *closing* a lighthouse that’s already decommissioned—which means the light you’re running tonight isn’t supposed to exist.”

Alistair folded his arms. His jaw worked, once, like he was chewing on the truth before he let it out.

“The closure notice was a year overdue,” he said. “The light was officially automated in 2019. No keeper assigned. But the automation failed eighteen months ago. Faulty wiring, salt corrosion, a bird nest in the sensor housing—take your pick. The board’s monitoring system flagged it. They scheduled a repair crew.”

“And?”

“And the crew would have found what you found. The lamp was manual only. No backup. No battery. If they’d filed that report, the board would have had a decision to make.”

“What decision?”

Alistair’s gaze held hers. The storm threw a gust against the window; the glass rattled in its frame.

“Whether to spend two hundred thousand pounds repairing an automated light for a channel that sees nine ships a year—or to quietly declare it surplus, strip the copper, and leave the strait dark.”

The words landed in her chest.

“So you lied to keep the light alive,” she said slowly. “You told them she was already automated so they wouldn’t come look.”

“The light’s been running on manual for eighteen months. Donald can’t climb the stairs anymore—his ankle’s a mess, and even before that he had a hip that’d been grinding for a decade. So I took the shifts. I learned the lamp. I told the coastguard the automation was sound and I was just checking in as a local with a key.”

“That’s why you were resistant to me going up there alone.”

“That’s why I didn’t want anyone up there.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “One photograph of the manual mechanism, one question from the wrong person, and the board sends an inspector. Then it’s over. Not in a year—in a week.”

Freya stared at him. The compass in her pocket felt heavy, a dull weight against her thigh.

“You’ve been running a lighthouse that doesn’t exist,” she said. “For three years. On your own.”

“There was a keeper before Donald.” Alistair’s voice dropped. “She ran it the same way. When she left—when she vanished—I didn’t let the light go out. Because if it goes out, even once, they’ll never bring it back. And that strait isn’t just shipping lanes. It’s the ferry route. It’s the fishing boats. It’s Eilidh’s father coming home in the dark.”

The name hung in the air.

Freya thought of the east cliff. The witness Morag promised. The keeper who vanished. The compass in her pocket that had come from God knew where.

“Does anyone else know?” she asked.

“Donald. Morag. Now you.”

“The community raised matching funds for Iain’s clinic. They trusted him. Tam threw a glass at your head in the pub because he thinks you let that promise die. But you didn’t—you just let them think you’d chosen the lighthouse over their sick children.”

Alistair turned away. He looked at the window, at the dark sea hammering the rocks.

“Iain was going to build the clinic,” he said quietly. “I was going to staff it. That was the plan. Then he died, and the trust locked the funds, and the light—the light was already failing. I could only fight one thing at a time.”

“So you chose the light.”

“I chose the thing that would kill people faster if it failed.”

Freya opened her mouth to argue, then stopped. The storm howled again. She could feel the tower shift under the wind, the lamp still burning, a light the world had been told was already out.

And she was the only person on this island with a camera and a deadline.