The next day, Eli found a man in town willing to talk.
He was an old hunter with a lame leg, living in a log cabin outside the town.
The place smelled heavy; yellowed animal hides hung on the walls.
When the old hunter heard his purpose, he let out a laugh with no warmth in it.
“What’s the name of the lost one you’re looking for?”
Eli was silent for a few seconds.
“Mara.”
The old hunter nodded, as if he had known all along.
“What was she to you?”
“Someone I was meant to protect.”
“Meant to protect—and didn’t?”
Eli said nothing.
The old hunter pulled a yellowed paper from a drawer.
On it were drawn the lake and the island, with several crooked marks.
He unfolded it slowly, as if the paper weighed more than a life.
“My son drew this.” he said.
Eli looked at the marks.
“He went up there too?”
“He went up there.” the old hunter said.
“Twelve years ago. He’d just turned seventeen and said he wanted to see what was in the castle. I couldn’t stop him. When he left, I pressed this hunting rifle into his hands and told him to keep it for protection. Before he walked into the fog, he turned and smiled at me, said, Pa, I’ll come back and tell you what’s inside.”
“And then?”
“Then I never got to hear it.” The old hunter slapped his lame leg.
“I waited three days, then went into the fog at night to find him. Halfway in, my leg gave out—not from a fall, but because all at once I didn’t know how to take the next step. My left leg has had no feeling in it since that day, as if it had decided on its own not to follow me anymore. When I made it back, the rifle was still in my hands. But there were tooth marks on the barrel. I don’t know which night they were bitten.”
Eli looked at the lame leg.
“Is your son still on the island?”
“I don’t know.” the old hunter said.
“This lake never tells you anything clearly. You go in, you lose things, you come back—then you find out what you lost. The ones who don’t come back never even find out what they lost.”
The old hunter tapped the paper with his finger.
“There are two nights each month when a thin mist settles over the lake. When the fog is thick enough, they say you can get close to the island. But every crossing costs something.”
“What does it cost?”
“Last time, a man lost his son’s face. After he came back, he couldn’t picture what the boy looked like anymore. Another man lost the reason he ever pulled a trigger. After that, he wouldn’t touch a gun.”
“Why do you keep drawing these?” Eli asked.
“Your son never came back. Who are you drawing them for?”
The old hunter folded the paper.
“For myself.” he said.
“I’m afraid that one day I’ll forget what he looked like entirely. These marks are what I drew from memory the last time I went into the fog. But you can see them—crooked, drifting. I can’t remember anymore where the paths were supposed to turn. The lake takes a little every day. I draw one stroke, and a little more is gone. One day this paper will be blank. And then I’ll have no son at all.”
Eli took the paper.
“Is there fog tonight?”
“There is.” The old hunter looked at him.
“If you’re set on going, take the thing you most want to keep and repeat it over and over before you go in. Say it enough, and maybe a little of it will survive.”
“What did you repeat, back then?”
The old hunter started, like a question no one had asked in years.
“My son’s name.” he said.
“I said it the whole way. When I came back, the name was still there. But it felt different. Before, when I said it, something in me went warm. Now when I say it, it’s empty—like calling out to a neighbor who moved away long ago.”
Eli nodded.
At the door, the old hunter added:
“This lake doesn’t care how badly you want to save someone. It only collects its toll.”
That night, the fog came.
The lake went white first, then the mist spread in layers, swallowing the lower half of the castle and leaving only the tower.
Eli carried the rifle, the canteen, and the old paper.
He set Mara’s name between his teeth and walked into the fog.
Water climbed past his calves, then his knees.
With every stretch of walking, another piece of his mind came away empty.
First he forgot the name of the town’s only shop.
Then the blacksmith’s name—he could picture the man sitting on his doorstep working a piece of iron, but not what anyone called him.
Then the color of his horse.
He began to doubt whether his horse was chestnut or dark brown.
He remembered the feel of the reins, the worn patch on the saddle, but the color had gone unreliable.
He didn’t stop.
He only said the name slower, clearer.
“Mara.”
Something was whispering in the fog.
It wasn’t the wind.
It was many voices layered over one another—men and women, old and young—all calling the same name.
Eli couldn’t tell whether the voices were calling to him, and he didn’t dare find out.
He knew only that if he joined them, he might give away something more important.
There were other things in the whispers.
He heard someone call “Mother,” someone call “Son,” someone call a stranger’s name, over and over, as if checking whether it was still there.
The voices weren’t in pain.
They were just hollow—like shouting down into a dry well and waiting for an echo that never came.
Halfway across, he heard footsteps behind him.
Not a hallucination.
A man in a wide-brimmed hat had come up through the fog behind him, rifle ready, but he didn’t fire.
“Stranger,” the man said, “this lake doesn’t welcome men who still think they can bring someone back.”
“You’re here looking for someone too?”
“I’m here to stop people.” the man said.
“The more who go up, the less memory is left on shore. There are already children in town who can’t say their own mothers’ names.”
“How long have you stood guard?”
“Nine years.” the man said.
“Nine years ago my wife walked into the fog and I never saw her again. I meant to go in after her. Halfway there, I heard a child crying on shore. I turned back. Since that day I’ve never entered the fog again. I stand on the bank and turn back whoever tries to go in. Stop one, and the town loses one less thing.”
“How many have you stopped?”
“Nine.” the man said.
“Nine years, nine people. They all hated me, called me a madman. But their names, their faces, the things they remembered—those are still here. That’s enough.”
Eli didn’t lower his rifle.
“That’s your reason. Not mine.”
They faced each other in knee-deep water.
The fog was too thick for either to see the other’s eyes.
The man’s rifle wavered for a moment.
In the end, he didn’t fire.
“Three years ago a woman walked this same way.” he said.
“A gunman who wouldn’t turn back was with her. The gunman came back. The woman didn’t.”
Eli’s fingers tightened.
“You saw it?”
“I didn’t see her go in.” the man said.
“I saw the gunman. That night I watched a man come out of the fog, soaked through, gripping a glove. He reached the shore and knelt there a long time. He buried the glove in the dirt, then dug it up again, tucked it into his coat, and walked off. I couldn’t have caught him, and I didn’t try.”
Eli’s throat tightened.
“Where did he go after that?”
“He walks everywhere.” the man said.
“Every year, around this season, someone comes to town asking about the lake. I’ve seen that gunman three times. Each time he came in with a different story, and each time it was the same: first he stared at the castle, then he asked how to get up there, then he walked into the fog—and came out a few days later, empty-handed.”
“You’re talking about me.”
“I know that glove.” the man said.
“You buried it and dug it up, dug it up and buried it. When you left, the glove was in your coat. Where is it now?”
Eli touched his chest.
The glove was gone.
He couldn’t remember when he had lost it.
He remembered its warmth when he’d picked it up three years ago, remembered its weight—but it wasn’t on him now.
He thought for a long time, and couldn’t remember the last time he had held it.
“If you do make it back,” the man stepped back, “you’d best leave whatever you find on that island.”
“Why?”
“What you bring back won’t be yours.” the man said.
“This lake never gives back. It only lends. You’ll carry home a face, a name—but underneath it will be hollow. Hold it like it’s your lifeblood, and it will slowly eat everything you have left.”
Eli didn’t answer.
He kept going.
The water deepened.
His left arm went numb, then lost all feeling entirely.
He uncapped the canteen with his teeth and drank—it tasted like rust.
Mara’s profile flickered in the fog, and was gone.
Eli took two steps after it.
His foot slipped on a stone and he went down onto his knees in the water.
When he got up, his pocket was lighter.
The old photograph was gone.
He knelt at the water’s edge and searched for a long time.
Nothing.
On the surface there was only his own reflection, broken into strips.
The castle stood close now.
Pale moss grew in the joints of the stone.
The door stood half open, and there was no light inside.
Eli leaned against a rock and caught his breath.
The photograph was gone, but he thought he still remembered her eyes.
At least, he thought he did.