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“IT’S NOT GOOD, ABEL.

Rebecca heard Niina’s voice before she opened her eyes. Her body hurt, her head hurt, and worst of all, the awful image from the previous night remained trapped behind her eyelids. That woman. It couldn’t have been Annabel. The Annabel that had visited before, had wandered the shore, even the Annabel that had disappeared beneath the waves—she had been ethereal. Distant. A gentle but unsettling spirit. The one from last night had been sheer terror.

Niina continued to whisper, and Rebecca strained to hear.

“Is it the baby?” Worry tainted Abel’s voice.

“No, no. Not that.”

The brush of material and a whiff of musty air pushed through Rebecca’s haze. Was Niina rifling through Kjiersti’s trunk, releasing mildew and memories, or did Annabel’s ghostly visit still haunt her senses?

“The men I met on the way here. They’re looking for her.”

“For Annabel?”

“ Annabel? ” The mockery in Niina’s tone directed at the miners was easy to decipher. “No. For her .”

“Rebecca?”

“ Joo .”

“I’d hoped they thought she was dead.” Abel’s words sliced through Rebecca as full consciousness returned. She remained still, unwilling to open her eyes and cut their conversation short. She knew the moment they knew she was aware, they would bite their tongues, give her those awful pitying looks, and pretend they knew less than they did.

“I had hoped so as well. But these men were his men. Not the superstitious ones from town who think Annabel holds some sort of power.”

“This isn’t good.” Abel echoed his mother’s words.

“And what happened here?” Niina must have toed a bucket filled with the remnants of the pitcher because glass clanked against tin.

“I don’t know,” Abel breath released in a heavy sigh that Rebecca felt reverberate through her body as though somehow he felt her pain, had inherited her fear, and was at an equal loss as to what to do next.

She stirred then, mostly because she felt she would be discovered eavesdropping and secondly because her body ached from holding still.

“There now.” Niina’s hand brushed Rebecca’s hair back from her forehead.

Finally, Rebecca opened her eyes and met the concerned, motherly face of Niina. Behind her towered Abel, and hovering in the doorway behind Abel was the stoop-shouldered and very silent Edgar.

“She’s good then?” Edgar’s relief was evident by the tone of his voice.

“She’ll be fine.” Niina nodded. She met Rebecca’s eyes. “You rest. You’ve not been going easy on yourself or the baby since you arrived here, and that’s unwise.” The reprimand was soft, as though Niina didn’t hold her completely at fault. Niina turned to her son. “I’m going to go make tea for Rebecca. You stay with her.”

Abel nodded as his mother pushed past him. They weren’t demonstrative, mother and son, but there was an evident bond of familial loyalty between them that pricked at Rebecca. It stung her deep inside and revealed something she had never had. Never experienced. Or, at least she didn’t think she had.

Rebecca frowned. That was a memory, wasn’t it? The unbidden realization that she wasn’t close to whoever had been or was her family?

The mattress sagged beneath Abel’s weight as he lowered himself onto the edge. He searched her face. “What happened last night? I heard you scream, and then the crash. Edgar heard it up in the lighthouse. We both came running. You were all cut up from the pitcher breaking, but we couldn’t get you to come to.”

The memory was still as vivid as when it happened. The opening door, the creaking floor, the burst of frightful cold air, and then the black, sooty holes where the woman’s—Annabel’s?—eyes should have been. Her breath—the smoke-filled breath—all so real, and now it felt so like a dream. A conjured vision, real but not real. It wasn’t like the other night when Kjersti’s and Annabel’s ghosts had come to visit. This was more like a mist. Rebecca wondered if she’d actually seen it, or if her mind was playing cruel tricks on her.

“I-I dropped the pitcher,” Rebecca finally answered.

The doubt in Abel’s eyes told her he didn’t believe her, and the way he studied her told her he was able to see through her emotions. His eyes narrowed, scanning her features, telling her without words that he knew. He knew of her fear, her confusion, her loneliness. That she was lost inside of herself, was something he understood—and how Rebecca knew that Abel understood this was a mystery. He had not said a word and yet their exchange of looks communicated more than any vocabu lary could have in that moment. Someone had once told her that when you met a kindred soul, it took no introduction, and you could sit by them for years with no names exchanged and you would be closer to them than one’s own family.

Rebecca bit the inside of her lip.

Someone had once told her...

A sprig of hope flickered inside of her. If she was remembering little things, perhaps the big things would be soon to follow.

“All right.” Abel nodded, even though he had been waiting for her to expound on her story of last night. “I’ll leave it at that.” Yes. He knew. He knew she was withholding, and while part of Rebecca was alarmed Abel could read her so well, another part of her was drawn to the safety of that. To have someone else wish to slip in alongside of her, to guide her—it was tempting to tell Abel all she knew. Which, admittedly, wasn’t much.

But then he seemed to know something too. What had he told Niina? He’d hoped they had thought Rebecca was dead ?

Abel cleared his throat, and Rebecca met his eyes. “They are looking for you. Men. My mother met them on her way here after Edgar went to retrieve her.”

“Do you know them?” Rebecca pretended she hadn’t already heard the conversation between Abel and his mother.

He shook his head and lied; she was sure of it. “No. But you must stay here, Rebecca, in the lighthouse. You mustn’t go out—even to the shore. If the miners from earlier thought you were Annabel, then these men will know you are you .”

“And they’re dangerous?” Rebecca pressed, wondering why Abel wouldn’t tell her what he’d meant when he identified them earlier as “ his men”— who was this he Abel and Niina had referred to?

Abel’s look told her the answer should be self-evident. “They attacked you already and left you in this state. Of course they are dangerous.”

“I don’t understand.” She didn’t mean to sound so pitiful, but her words came out before she could bite her tongue and suppress her confusion.

Abel leaned forward but didn’t reach out for her, his expression urgent for her to hear him. “Do you have any idea, any idea at all what happened to you that night before Edgar found you?”

Rebecca strained to remember. Perhaps if she offered a little of her truth, Abel would reveal some of his. “The other night, I had a memory of a man shouting at me. We were on a rock outcropping, and the lake was splashing my dress. That’s why I left the lighthouse, to see if I could find this rock. But—”

There was no need to reveal the vision of Annabel.

“Do you remember this man?” Abel’s brow furrowed.

“He’s faceless. I just recall his voice. He was so angry, so aggressive. The fear I felt was, well, it was strong...” Her voice trailed as she remembered, hearing the words again in her mind in all their vitriol.

Abel ducked his head, a strand of dark hair falling over his forehead. “There are men—we’ve already told you about them. Hilliard and his mine. The investors. Silvertown is growing, and Hilliard has big plans. If you crossed them in any way, they would want retribution.” He waited as if that might engage a memory for her, or trigger something more she could provide him.

But Rebecca knew nothing. The name “Hilliard”, the mine, even Silvertown felt as distant and imaginary as if it had been another life. Rebecca stilled. It had been another life. It had been the life before she had lost her memories.

She could only offer Abel a look of regret. She had nothing to give him for answers. “I-I don’t remember. I don’t know. What could I have possibly done to anger someone like him?”

Abel’s mouth thinned, and he nodded in acceptance of her reply, though he gave her no answer to her inquiry. Instead, he drew in a deep breath and closed his eyes as if to center himself. When he opened them again, Rebecca was looking directly into those icy blue depths, only this time they had darkened. A storm was brewing inside Abel. She could see it. Feel it.

Yes. She could feel Abel the same way, it seemed, he could feel her. He was a tempest, he was brewing, his emotions were barely controlled and just as the lake, the calm was merely a facade for the rough waters that lay just beneath the surface. No.

She and Abel could sense other. Somehow, Rebecca knew they understood each other. They would not be able to keep their secrets much longer.

She stared out the window, her palm resting on her abdomen. It was firm beneath her hand, a small mound that could barely be seen, telling her she was not far along in her pregnancy.

But it meant that she had known a man, been close to a man, created a child with a man—and yet she could not recall him. Could not summon up the slightest remembrance, and it curled her insides with an anxiety Rebecca didn’t know how to rein in. The questions she now considered were awful ones: Had she been happy to be with child? Did she love the child’s father? Had something far more dreadful left her with the pregnancy and that was part of why she was in trouble—in danger even?

“You are a chilling reminder...” The man’s words could be in reference to her and the babe. Perhaps they reminded this man of mistakes made, or perhaps it jeopardized his future in a way she and the babe were best gotten rid of. A scandal perhaps, or worse. She might be some man’s secret, and the babe what threatened to expose him.

Rebecca strained to remember as she watched the lake rolling in with its steady waves. Edgar stood on the embankment, his hand over his eyes to shield them from the sun. It was a beautiful spring day, nature beckoned, and she was imprisoned in the lighthouse to avoid being seen.

“Do you fear the child?” The voice came in a whisper over Rebecca’s shoulder. She glanced behind her. No one was there, yet she could see the icy eyes surrounded by curling dark lashes. She could hear the tempered anticipation in her voice.

It was another memory.

It was of Kjersti.

Rebecca closed her eyes to allow the memory entrance. To remember Kjersti, if she couldn’t remember Abel or Niina or Edgar.

“Do you fear the child?” Kjersti asked.

“I fear the future.” That had been Rebecca’s response. She had trusted Kjersti. Kjersti had been her closest friend ... she thought.

“It will be all right.” In the memory, Kjersti was folding linens, dry from the clothesline. “You’ll see . You’re safe now. The babe will be safe too .”

“Will it?” Rebecca asked.

Kjersti paused, her hands gripping a pillowcase. “Abel will make sure of it. As will Edgar. My mother will stay in town, and she’ll listen ... she’ll hear if something is amiss.”

“I’m afraid.” Rebecca’s admission coiled within even now as she remembered.

Kjersti allowed the pillowcase to fall onto the pile of unfolded laundry.

Rebecca noticed that Kjersti had shadows under her eyes. Beads of sweat dotted her friend’s forehead.

“Don’t be afraid, Rebecca,” Kjersti whispered.

“Are you all right, child?”

Niina’s voice startled Rebecca. She jumped, spinning from her view out the window, lost in her memory of Kjersti.

“Don’t be afraid.”

The joy of retrieving a lost memory was shrouded in the turmoil of all the ones still swirling inside of Rebecca, unknown and yet to be seen.

Niina came alongside Rebecca, her shorter, rounder form bringing with it the smell of freshly baked cinnamon bread. She was unaware of the tumult within Rebecca. Unaware that Rebecca had remembered her daughter, Kjersti, which confirmed in Rebecca’s mind what she’d assumed. She had known Niina and Abel and Edgar before being found on Annabel’s grave. They did have a story, and whatever it was, Rebecca had been hiding here. At the lighthouse. With her babe, with Kjersti... She stilled, confusion swelling within her. But no. Kjersti had died here at the lighthouse. With fever. Had Kjersti’s death been more recent? As in two or three months?

Rebecca’s hand found the mound of her abdomen. She couldn’t be more than three or four months along, could she? She was small, her pregnancy barely seen.

Niina’s voice broke through her spinning thoughts, her question inane enough to bring Rebecca soaring into the present and leaving the questions deep in her subconscious.

“Do you know how the Porcupine Mountains got their name?”

Rebecca shook her head. She looked back out the window, a wistful feeling coming over her. Wistful and wishing ... but wishing for what? That she could be free? That she could remember? That fear could be exchanged for joy? For hope?

“The Indians say that years ago, a giant porcupine took a drink from the Lake of the Clouds and was frozen for all of time.” Niina’s smile was indulgent of the story.

Rebecca held the lake in her focus. “It’s a sad story in a way.”

“It is.” Niina nodded. “And you feel trapped here, like the giant porcupine, don’t you?”

Rebecca gave a small laugh. “Yes.” No use denying it.

Niina matched Rebecca’s stare through the windowpanes. “If you were a man, I would advise you to disappear into the mountains and be rid of this life. Start a new one. Only you are not a man, and you bear a new life inside of you.”

“I know.” Rebecca stifled some irritation that Niina would feel the need to remind her of what was such a weight inside of Rebecca.

“The babe is small inside you.” Niina’s words increased Rebecca’s anxiety.

“Child,” Niina continued, “I can see you’re going places in your mind, entertaining fears, and that is understandable. You have experienced so much in such a short time.”

“How do you know?” Rebecca snapped before she could bite her tongue. “I’m sorry, Niina, I—”

“No, no, it’s all right.” Niina shook her head. “I only wish to encourage you. To help you not drown in despair.” She sighed. “However, I know...” Niina left her sentence unfinished.

Rebecca eyed her. “You know what?” Niina was Abel’s mother. She likely knew the same things Abel was keeping from her. “What do you know, Niina?”

Niina flushed and made a pretense of wiping her already dry hands on her apron. “I know you are a good person. I can see it in you.”

It was gracious, but it wasn’t what Rebecca wished to hear. She decided to be more direct. “ Do you know me, Niina?”

Niina frowned in genuine confusion. “Of course I know you.”

“I mean, do you know me from before? Are you holding secret who I truly am?”

Without hesitation, Niina shook her head and refused to answer truthfully. “Rebecca, your memory will return to you. Give it time. You must give it time.” She patted Rebecca’s arm and then motioned toward the kitchen. “I must go check on the bread.”