St. Kilda, the island at the edge of the world. An archipelago of islands and ocean rocks towering fourteen hundred feet out of the sea, inhabited for two thousand years until the last St. Kildans were evacuated in 1930 in the teeth of the autumn storms and a sickness that killed four. The silent stacks were left to its birds, and its sheep, and their seasonal watchers. And that is how the residents wish it.
The fishing ships were due in, and all bodies were to the work. Moira stood on the rock, overseeing the waves and raised her hands as the dark sea lay flat. The brush of muffled oars drifted over the calm waters, for it was safest in the clogged channels to scull. Too fast, and mariners swiftly learned that here the seafloor had teeth for unwary boats. Low in the water, full- laden, the boats were chased by seabirds and the island would eat well tonight.
She whistled softly, feeling the air thrill, and on the marriage rock a young man leaned forward, allowed himself to overbalance, plummeting towards the sea before wings snaped open at the last second. He swung out, through the crowds of gulls and fulmers that chased the boats, snatching the unwary and wringing their neck on the wing, slinging them into his bag. Skimming the waves, he dropped a full bag on the sands, and wheeled on a wingtip for a second pass.
She felt his passage, allowed the air to bouy him up, as the first of the boats hauled to the beach. The waiting crowd surged forward to unpack. Welcoming the crews could wait until all was stowed and stored. Hirta was a harsh island, no place for those who prized sentiment above survival.
The last of the shallow boats safely on sand, she lowered her hands, let the fog roll in until all that could be seen beyond shore was the ever-present clag that wreathed St. Kilda and the varied wings that danced in it. Shawl gathered tight, she turned to make her way to the beaches, to claim the portion of the fishing that she would salt to take her household through the winter and the excess she could trade for wool to spin.
The fisherman threw the largest of the catch to the waves. None protested as it was pulled down, knowing it was but fair to share their portion with their safety. The waters churned once more, trespassers uninvited by nature itself though it was a month yet until the storms would cut them off naturally for another nine months, as something beneath the waves drew the water down and spat it out in spouts.
Without their neighbours' gifts, the island would not be safe. Without the ungifted's work, their neighbours would not eat. That balance brought no masks, no conflicts among the folk here, for all had to contribute all they had to the only battle that mattered: the ongoing fight against nature itself as it battered them in the small refuge from the world they had carved out here in the remotest isolation. And the fight against the world that wanted them to fight its battles instead.
St. Kilda, the island at the edge of the world. An archipelago of islands and ocean rocks towering fourteen hundred feet out of the sea, the silent stacks recorded as left to its birds, and its sheep and their seasonal watchers who come no longer for the weather forbids. A harsh land, and a hard one. But for those that now called it home, it was a safe one.