Free Finder's Shore by Anna Mackenzie

running away was wrong.”
    A branch snaps in the trees and we both spin about. “Go, Ness,” she hisses. “You’ve no call to be here. None!”
    Then she’s gone, darting across the clearing and away through the trees. I turn back to the path that leads down the hill, my emotions in a tangle that twists and tears within me. I’ve barely gone five steps when a hand grips my arm. “Wha—”
    Ronan motions me to silence. He tilts his head to our left. Pulling away from his grasp I search through the shadowy branches. Nothing. I’m about to speak when another branch cracks. Our eyes meet. Ronan turns and I hurry behind him through the trees, past the farmyard and ditch, back to the bay.
    “Get the packs,” he says, as our feet reach the sand. “We need to move the dinghy.”
    “It was probably nothing. A goat or —”
    “We can’t risk it. If we lose the dinghy we’re trapped.” He doesn’t wait for an answer but runs across the sand, his movements abrupt as he begins casting our scant camouflage aside.
    I collect the packs and sailcloth and join him. “I need to talk to Sophie again,” I say. “I hadn’t time to ask about the Council or Colm.”
    “We’ll discuss it later.”
    With the tide full in, we’ve not far to tow the little craft. While Ronan turns it to meet the waves I run back and scuff the trail the keel’s left. “Come on, Ness.” His impatience irks me.
    As I splash into the water, the sun’s first rays slant over Cullin Hill, dappling the sea out beyond the cliff’s shadow. Ronan pushes us farther off shore, the boat tipping beneath his weight as he clambers over the side. I try to steady us with the oars but they feel awkward in my hands. A wave lifts us, sweeping us towards the rocks.
    “I’ll do it,” Ronan says, the dinghy tilting wildly as he scrambles up beside me.
    “I can manage.”
    “Just get out of the way, Ness!”
    I baulk at his tone, but it doesn’t seem the time to argue. Ronan proves his point by pulling us out of danger in several swift strokes. Moments later we’re beyond the first finger of rock and Skellap Bay has begun to slide from view. Another minute and all that remains is the far end of the dunes, then that, too, is gone, and with it the flash of movement I glimpsed at the last. Studying Ronan’s closed expression, I decide against mentioning it. It might have been no more than longing that led me to imagine a figure looking out from the path that leads to Leewood.

CHAPTER 9
    The island’s shadow falls chill across us as we round the headland, our progress hampered by the swell that breaks in against the cliff. “It might be easier if we go farther out,” I suggest.
    For a moment I think Ronan plans not to answer. “Close in we can’t be seen from above,” he says finally.
    I could tell him that no one but Merryn lives on the headland, but I don’t. I no longer trust what I once knew of Dunnett. What I once knew of Sophie. Something knots in my chest as I recall our exchange. Resentment I can understand, a little, though she knows better than anyone that I had no choice about leaving, but Sophie’s cool distance, as if she doesn’t care what became of me, leaves me winded.
    “You shouldn’t have gone without me.”
    Ronan’s tone is flat but I feel the sting of his accusation — mostly because I know that he’s right. I don’t blame him for being angry. “I was only meaning to check whether my family still lived there before I came back. Then I saw Sophie, and —”
    “And whoever was watching saw you.”
    “You don’t know that,” I snap, feeling stubborn and mutinous, as if being at Leewood has somehow returned me to childhood.
    Ronan rows on in silence, while I try to swallow my pride, to make way for the apology I know full well he’s owed.
    The shove of the waves slowly changes, coming more from behind. I gaze up at the cliff. “There’s an old fishing village above us,” I say, laying the words out as a peace