“I put my hand into my pocket, and all I had I laid it down,” Ewan sang as he kneaded the rough dough, keeping time with the rhythmic motion. “And when I’d paid the reckoning, all I had left was a poor half-crown.”

 

A flour-dusted hand clipped the side of his head.“Where’d you learn a ditty like that?” his mother demanded, formidable in her faded apron, hands on her hips. “That’s no song for a bairn of seven to be singing. Now, how about you put some of that effort into the bannocks? The fair won’t wait for daydreamers.”

 

Ewan sighed and returned to the dough. All week, the village had been preparing for the fair: stalls erected, bunting flapping, barrels rolling. The air was thick with baking bread and smoking fish. The fair was the highlight of every year, but it was hard work as well. Ewan had been working in the hot kitchen all day, and he longed to play outside.

 

The door creaked open and his father shouldered in, wearing his thick navy gansey, his beard flecked with salt. He carried the scent of the sea in with him, making Ewan even more restless.

 

“A good catch?” Ewan’s mother called, wiping her hands on her apron.

 

“Aye, herring are running strong today,” the fisherman replied before turning to Ewan with a wink.

 

“Go on, away wi’ ye lad, before your ma has you baking all night.”

 

Ewan bolted before his mother could protest, wiping his hands on his trousers. He slammed the door behind him and scampered along the seafront, past Old Man MacKinnon sat mending his nets in his doorway, and down the old stone steps onto low-tide sand.

 

The salty stink of seaweed filled his lungs as he picked his way along the kelp-strewn shore, taking in the castle ruins glowing in the late sun, the bright herring skiffs bobbing in the harbour, and the fishermen hauling crates, shouts mingling with the screech of gulls.

 

“And when I’d paid the reckoning,” he sang rebelliously, out of his mother’s earshot, “all I had left was a poor half-crown.”

 

As he sang he saw something glint beneath a pile of seaweed. His heart leapt. Perhaps a farthing, or a halfpenny, enough for sweets at the fair. But the coin he dug free was large, its surface worn with age. He could barely make out the outline of a face on one side, angular symbols on the other.

 

Treasure, then.

 

A prickle ran down his spine. He clenched the coin, feeling its weight as he stood up, scanning the sand for more. Then, just for a moment, the world shifted.

 

A shadow loomed over the water—a great ship, its prow pointed toward the harbour.

 

Ewan blinked, and it was gone.

​

A daydream, his mother would tell him. But as he walked on, the gulls’ cries grew distant, replaced by a low murmur of voices. He turned, but the beach was empty—only the fishermen on the harbourside, carrying in their catch.

​

The voices rose, carried on the wind, a language he almost understood but couldn’t quite grasp.

He squeezed his eyes shut and stuffed his fingers in his ears. But when he risked a flicker of a glance, the ship-shadow was back. Not a skiff or a trawler, but a long, narrow craft with a square sail, its sides bristling with oars.

​

At the shoreline, figures flickered into view: men crouched and braced, hands tight around thick ropes. Their voices rose in a chant as they heaved, strange, rhythmic and overpowering.

The ship began to rise.

​

Then, in an instant, it was gone, and Ewan was alone, staring out at an empty sea. The only sound was the distant chatter of men finishing their work as the sun slipped toward the horizon. He looked down at the coin in his palm, warm from where he’d been grasping it.

​

That evening the fair buzzed with music, laughter, and the scent of roasting fish. But Ewan barely heard the band, barely tasted the hot bannock his mother pressed into his palm. Slipping away from the dancing crowds, he climbed onto the harbour wall, watching the dark water ripple beneath the moon. 

​

“Found somethin’, have ye?” a voice asked.

​

Ewan started, then looked up to see Old Man MacKinnon peering down at him, pipe clenched between his teeth.

​

Ewan hesitated before pulling the coin from his pocket. MacKinnon took it, turning it slowly in his fingers.

​

“Aye,” he murmured, handing it back. “Nothing here is ever truly lost, lad. The sea keeps its stories.”

Ewan curled his fingers around the coin. The fair hummed behind him: fiddle music, shouts of vendors, the warmth of little lights. He slipped the old coin into his pocket - then heard a clink.

​

Frowning, he reached in again and pulled out a halfpenny.

​

He grinned, feeling the weight of the past in one hand, the promise of a fleeting summer’s night in the other.

​

Then without looking back he ran towards the hum of the festival, history whispering at his heels.