of.
Before she could think, something knocked into her knees. She looked down, shocked to find Eamon clutching at her legs, shaking, clearly distraught — he’d come running out of the crowd, and though a few sympathetic faces had turned in his direction, the energy of the crowd remained hostile. Helen reached down to scoop Eamon into her arms, surprised by how natural that movement felt — two weeks ago, she’d have had no idea how to go about holding a child, but Eamon settled onto her hip as though he belonged there. He buried his face in her shoulder again, sniffling a little — she could feel him shaking.
“What’s wrong, buddy? What’s going on?”
“The fishermen are all yellin’ at Da,” he said, voice low and worried. “They’re real mad about something and I don’t know what it is, and nobody will tell me.”
“It’s okay, buddy,” she said softly, jiggling him a little on her hip. They did that in movies to calm babies down, right? It must work. But Eamon didn’t seem particularly soothed. “We’ll figure out what’s going on, I promise.”
“There are five men missing,” one of the fishermen called suddenly, his voice breaking through the low hubbub of the crowd as he strode forward to confront Niall. Niall squared up to him, and she was reminded again of what a tall man he was, how broad and powerful… but this fisherman didn’t look intimidated at all. He was a short man, much shorter than Niall, with dark hair and a strong build.
“Perry, I’m as worried as you are. I spoke with the Laird yesterday — he’s in the process of investigating —”
“Oh, aye? Is he doing that by sacrificin’ his guards to whatever’s out there? One of his men is missing since last night, too.”
Helen bit her lip. Word travelled fast around here, it seemed. Hadn’t she only just heard that fresh gossip upstairs?
“We’re men of the Loch. We’ve encountered this kind of thing before,” Niall was saying, projecting his voice so it echoed across the water. “If these disappearances have something to do with the Burgh, we’ll get to the bottom of it. For now, we know how to deal with Unseelie Fae. Don’t we? They come out at night — so we keep to the daylight hours.”
A murmur of dissent went up at that, and he raised his hands. “I know that’s not ideal for —”
“Our best fishing’s done before dawn!” yelled one of the fishermen. “You’re asking us to cut our catches in half —”
“It’s better than losing your life, isn’t it?” Niall snapped. “Be sensible, now —”
“I know what this is,” said the man Niall had called Perry, his voice low and ugly. “This is that pet Monster everyone’s so fond of. It’s finally turned on us.”
“Don’t be absurd,” Niall shouted — but the voices of the crowd were clearly in support of Perry’s idea.
Helen bit her lip — were the fishermen going to turn on the Monster?
“The Monster is a Seelie creature. It protects us from the worst the Burgh has to offer — it would never do us harm.”
“Aye, that’s what we’ve been told. But I don’t trust it. And if I see it, I can tell you — it’s getting a spear through its head and no mistake.”
Niall kept trying to reason with the crowd, but it was clear they’d heard enough — the fishermen scattered, muttering to each other with scowls on their faces. Helen hurried up to Niall, who was standing on the dock looking utterly dejected. He barely mustered a smile when he saw her — though she appreciated the effort.
“So you’ve heard,” he said drily. “It seems our investigation didn’t need to be quite so clandestine. Five fishermen missing — that we know of.”
“And a guard,” she said, biting her lip. “Taken off the end of the pier, if the servants are to be believed.”
“Not good,” Niall said simply. But they were both disturbed by a low whine from Eamon, whose tearful eyes were now peeping up at his father from Helen’s shoulder. “What’s the matter, little man?”
“Don’t like those men,” he said truculently, his voice low.
Helen could feel his body trembling, and Niall sighed.
“Little man, please — please no tantrums now, okay?”
“I’m not!” Eamon howled — but Helen could feel him tensing up, see the tears spilling over his cheeks as his feelings got the best of him.
Niall sighed, scooping him out of her arms as he began to thrash and shout, drumming his tiny fists