The Lighthouse Keeper's Last Watch

The tender's bow scraped against slick stones. Sarah Macleod steadied herself, one hand gripping the gunwale, the other clutching her leather satchel. Behind her, the mainland had vanished into December mist.

The Flannan Isles Lighthouse rose seventy-five feet above black cliffs. Granite walls streaked dark with spray. The lamp room stood extinguished in midday grey—wrong, all wrong.

Captain Morrison's voice echoed in her mind: *No signal flags, Miss Macleod. No response to our rockets.* She touched her iron key belt. The familiar weight steadied her hands.

The spiral stairs wound upward through granite silence. Sarah's boots rang against iron treads. Each landing smelled of lamp oil thick enough to taste, mixed with damp wool and omnipresent salt that coated her tongue.

The keepers' quarters were pristine. Lamps filled and trimmed, wicks blackened from recent use. Three beds made with hospital corners, blankets tucked tight.

One set of oilskins hung on its peg. Sarah read the embroidered initials: *J.D.*—James Ducat, principal keeper. The others' pegs stood empty.

She pulled her pocket watch free. "Wind northeast," she said to the empty room. Her voice came out tight, clipped. "Barometer twenty-nine point eight. Lamp oil sufficient."

The lighthouse logbook sat open on the desk. Sarah's left hand trembled as she turned pages—November entries in Ducat's meticulous script, December growing more rushed. Her fingers found the final entry.

*December 15, 1900. 9:00 AM. God preserve us—the light attracts what dwells beneath.*

The handwriting was James Ducat's. Formal Victorian precision, each letter perfectly formed. Sarah checked the date again, counting days on nerveless fingers.

Eleven days. The keepers had been missing eleven days.

She turned the page. Her pocket watch slipped from her fingers, struck the desk, kept ticking.

*December 26, 1900. 6:13 AM.* Today's date. This morning's time.

The handwriting remained James Ducat's—same slant, same pressure, same meticulous formation. Three words in the dead man's hand: *You should not have come.*

The Atlantic boomed against granite foundations. Regular. Rhythmic. A heartbeat that never stopped.

Sarah's fingers found her iron key belt. She pressed hard enough to leave marks. The metal warmed against her palm, solid and real.

She read the impossible entry again. The ink was fresh—she could smell it mixing with lamp oil and salt. Her breath came shallow, professional assessment warring with rising dread.

"Lamp room inspection required," she told the empty air. Precise nautical terminology. Facts spoken aloud to anchor herself. "Light restoration priority one."

The stairs wound upward. Sarah climbed toward the extinguished lamp. Behind her, the logbook lay open to words written by a man who'd vanished before she'd left the mainland.

The boom of waves continued. Steady. Unchanging. Like a pulse beneath the lighthouse floor.