The Society of Misfit Stories Presents: The Year of the Heddagh

By Cindy Vaskova

Fearing for his life, a troubled man travels to cold and dreary Scotland searching for an explanation and a possible salvation. He embarks on an expedition ascending a fearsome mountain where only folklore and old religion breathes the air.

Est Word Count 13,300 words

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bards and Sages Publishing
• Release date: Aug 30, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386175315

Book preview

The Year of the Heddagh

Cindy Vaskova

ODD PLACES FIND US at misleading times when others take our lives as their own.

That ephemeral and incomplete cite came to Knox’s mind for a second time since he had set foot on Scottish soil. He hummed the words, almost turning them into a song, a familiar tune on repeat in his head. He shivered leaving the empty road, glancing over peeking lights from highland hotels, picnic tables glistening with morning dew, a leftover beer can littered with cigarette butts spoiled and wet overnight marking a spot there. The exterior lights, knotted bulbs swaying over the tables went off, daylight shifting in. Knox paced the small gas station across, overlooking the silvery loch. Early black-winged birds threw swirled shadows over the calm surface. Knox watched their effortless glide, gulls late for their warm salvation calling out, calling loudly one and then the others in the tiny flock. A light wind brushed the surface spreading wrinkles over the loch, chasing their shadows away.

An engine roared behind him, a yellow jeep pulling steadily next to the columns. A young boy with uneasy curls put his head out the open window.

Might you be Knox? For ‘Uaine ‘Bheinn?’

Knox nodded but struggled at the Gaelic name, the pronunciation too new for him to grasp. The boy caught his uneasiness waving at him to come closer.

Green Mountain - that be the name of the inn you booked in, right?

Yeah that’s the one. Is it far away?

Couple of kilometers. Grand view though.

Knox clambered into the jeep. Thank you coming out here to pick me up. I hope it wasn’t a bother.

Ach, no problem. It’s a wee bit far off the village, the Green Mountain and ye wouldn’t be having other transportation other than masel and this ol’ pile of junk here. Will you be doing some sightseeing, eh?

Something like that. Knox touched his breast pocket, the reason folded there.

There was a light drizzle that accompanied their drive over the curving road at the base of barren hills, boulders standing as misshapen sentinels to their grass-ridden terraces. Black-faced beige-woolen sheep obstructed their road, no shepherd following in their hooves. The boy honked at them repeatedly. The herd answered in their monotone orchestrated bleat.

Semi-wild these ones. Stubborn bunch too. C’mon now will ye!

Knox caught the glint of their hidden eyes, beady and wet under cascading manes. Too many, they held for longer than Knox would’ve enjoyed before crossing over to the vast plains of the Great Wilderness.

Before long, the boy hit the brakes on his yellow jeep climbing it down off the main road over to a dirt one running just as far as where a stone inn stood, mossy and grey and lonesome overlooking nothingness. There wasn’t anything green about the Green Mountain, Knox noted. Even the painted sign nailed to the stony exterior depicted a mountain peak more white and ghostly than green and summery cheerful. Before Knox could say much the boy waved him off and like a beetle scurried back on the road leaving him with a backpack on a doorstep.

Odd places find us at misleading times when others take our lives as their own, Knox repeated to himself opening the door. The doorbell rang twice.

KNOX SAT IN HIS ROOM at the Uaine ‘Bheinn ruining the corner of the folded paper that had brought him here. Four days had passed since he’d arrived and he’d gotten used to the ritualistic nature of existing in this place without acknowledging the true purpose of his visit. He had become another guest, another visitor prolonging his stay, settling into the comfort that notion brought. It was only that his nights ruined that mirage and urged him to infuse that invented comfort with paranoia, infested dreams worming their way to his core, a murder a night, over and over again. He had died a million times. Each morning he woke up from another sleepless night, sat on