Chapter 17
Tom
Tom climbed down first, cradling the shotgun, and then held the rope ladder steady while Amelia followed. He hooked the ladder back and took a last look into the dark canopy, bidding a silent goodbye to his younger self.
“Heads up,” Amelia called softly, as he turned. He registered her lobbing something to him and instinctively caught it. The paperweight. “We might need your lucky charm.”
“I hope we won’t need luck,” he said, pocketing it. “We’ll go around the house and onto the moor, to the village.”
They walked in silence, Tom’s shotgun raised.
In every shadow on the ground, he saw the shape of a curled body.
His hope that Duncan would reappear had trickled away as the day had progressed.
It was still possible he’d been keeping to the shadows, just as Tom and Amelia had, and there was a logical explanation for everything, but the worry sat heavily under Tom’s ribs.
“Is the stream water okay for drinking?” Amelia said, looking at its inky trail.
“I wouldn’t risk it, even in an emergency—especially in an emergency. Too much farm runoff.”
She quietly sighed, rubbing the back of her neck. She seemed weary, buckling under the weight of a long day with little sustenance and a lingering hangover. He could relate. They were a very long way from the escape of yesterday afternoon.
Eventually, the wood thinned and the hulking form of the house came into view, loosely tied with a silvery ribbon of fog. Tom took a deep, smoky breath. The incinerator was going again. The Pritchards, destroying the evidence?
“We’ll follow the wood around until it meets up with the moor,” he said.
“How long is the walk to the village?”
“Through the moor? A few hours.” Possibly longer, but he sensed she could use some encouragement.
She grunted.
“Hey, we have it easy. Servants used to walk the six miles along the lane all the time in days past. Peddlers and merchants, too, sometimes pulling their own carts—most couldn’t afford horses. The moor will be slower going but it’s nothing the smugglers didn’t manage, back in the—”
“Would you stop trying to put everything into perspective?” she hissed.
“I was just trying to—”
“Help? Make me feel better? Yes, I get that. But, you know you’re allowed to feel something of your very own, right? It doesn’t have to be part of some wider picture.”
He blinked at her, feeling like a fool.
“It’s like with your dog. You’re allowed to be sad about your dog, even if he was old.
And the house. You’re allowed to be sad about losing your home, even if your family shouldn’t have had it in the first place, even if it’s literally crumbling, even if you believe the changing of the guard is inevitable.
You can mourn your brother’s injury even if it’s history and you can’t change it.
” She fisted her hands at her sides. “You’re always trying to zoom out—‘yin and yang,’ ‘the great balance sheet.’ Not everything has to compare to something else.
Statistics never helped anyone feel better.
You’re allowed to have a feeling in your own right, independent of the entire path of human history. Sorry, but… Sorry.”
He stood stunned for a few seconds. “You’ve been keeping track.”
“Okay, so I might be freaking out here, but … I’m just…
It’s something I’m sensitive to. It’s like when people say to me, about the robbery, ‘Well, at least you weren’t killed!
’ ‘It could have been worse!’ ‘You got off lightly, really!’ Like it somehow falls short of a minimum standard at which I’m allowed to feel traumatized.
They think they’re being helpful by ‘putting it into perspective.’ But it’s not helpful!
I know that plenty of people—millions and millions of people—have lived through things far bigger than this.
I know that my entire existence is breathtakingly insignificant compared with the lifespan of the universe.
But that doesn’t change the fact that right now you and I are living through this shit, and we have to figure out what to do about it.
If you put too much into perspective, you become smaller and smaller until you write yourself out of existence and you might as well just sit on the sofa and watch movies all day.
We are all significant to ourselves and the people around us, and that needs to be enough.
Who cares if anyone else even knows our name?
” She pressed a palm to her forehead, as if taking her own temperature.
That headache must still be troubling her.
Hell, the air around his own head felt like an icy vice.
“Okay, freak-out ended. My point is…” Her voice weakened.
She seemed defeated by the energy of her outburst. “Yes, other people have had it worse, but that doesn’t make the village seem any closer. That’s all.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I suspect we’ll both feel better once we’re on the moor, away from the abbey.”
“How dangerous is the moor?”
“It’s like any exposed wilderness, especially in winter—cold, foggy, easy to lose your bearings and walk in circles. There are bogs and sinkholes. You wouldn’t want to go wandering if you weren’t familiar with it, especially at night.”
“But no quicksand? Wild animals? Haunted marshes? Bogs? Elves? Sprites?”
He was glad to see she was back to usual levels of wry humor. “You’ve read too much Bronte. All that throbbing.”
“Imps! What about imps?”
He smiled.
“Truth be told,” she continued, “it’s probably Enid Blyton who gave me an irrational fear of moors. Plus, The Secret Garden! Followed by Daphne du Maurier. Topped off with Sherlock Holmes. What is it about British writers and creepy moors?”
“This one’s definitely windswept but not very interesting. There are no wild animals you couldn’t cope with. Exposure is more of a risk than imps. Though you do have to watch out for were-sheep.”
“Were-what?”
“You know, werewolves, except … sheep.”
She rolled her eyes, the whites catching in the diffuse moonlight.
“But seriously,” he said solemnly, “even if you know it well, you have to be careful.”
She nodded. She knew what he was referring to, though his grandfather hadn’t been the first to get in trouble, or the last. Tom’s father had always hated the old earl’s habit of wandering the moor alone at night. “I know that moor better than I know my own skin,” his grandfather would snap.
Tom reached out and took Amelia’s hand. “You’re so cold.”
“Ah, but it’s nothing compared with the Arctic explorers of old!”
He laughed quietly. “Okay, I’m seeing your point, though I’m also reminded of someone I know who can’t land her plane because she’s worried about what might happen at the lights on the corner of twenty-fifth and Main, five days from now.”
“And who’s scared to start a relationship because she can already see the bitter end,” she said wryly.
“Is this what would be the end of us? My habit of zooming out?”
She blinked rapidly, and he realized he’d done it again: suggested a future between them. “I guess it’s no more of a crime than my tendency to zoom in.”
“Still. I thank you for your feedback and assure you that we at Sundew Abbey Tours will take it on board in order to improve our future customer experience.”
Surprisingly, she stretched up to kiss him. He eagerly met her halfway. It was amazing how natural it felt to go for the kiss. Like how it felt right to hold her hand.
As they pulled apart, their gazes locked, and he could see the same confusion in hers that he felt. What was this thing between them, and was it still chemically enhanced? It felt almost tangible. He pulled her in and they wrapped each other up.
Over her head, a dozen rectangles of light shone through the trees from various windows in the abbey.
As a child, he’d drawn comfort in coming home from rugby training or whatever and seeing lights on in the house.
It was a physical memory: warmth and calmness.
Miss Havisham gathering her inhabitants in her protective embrace.
A cocoon, as Amelia would say. A hug, even.
His parents would be in the drawing room, watching TV, his grandfather drinking whiskey beside the fire in the smoking room, Eddie in his bedroom, reading graphic novels.
Tom would join him and they’d sprawl on the rug, sifting through the piles of comics, hoping to find one they hadn’t read, or at least hadn’t read in the previous week.
But tonight, the house’s welcome was a mirage—the lights he and Amelia had evidently left on during the previous night’s ramblings.
The night his grandfather had disappeared, every light in the house had spilled into the night, as if Miss H. herself was joining the search. Outside, dozens of torch beams had swept the grounds, bouncing like fireflies. It was probably the last time the place had been full of people.
You’re allowed to be sad about losing your home.
He was sad. Yes, he had more immediate problems, and yes, the world had bigger concerns, but the thought of not having this anchor left an emptiness in his stomach.
Would his memories fade, once he could no longer stand in the rooms where they were made?
The image of his father slumped over his desk was a recollection he would readily part with.
Ditto the sight of his grandfather stalking off into the darkness.
But racing toy cars along the floorboards in the basement with Eddie and Connor?
Watching his mother pull a tray of golden scones from the big old oven?
Swinging into the river on a rope Duncan had hooked up?
Through the wood behind him came a rustling noise, getting louder. Something was coming for them, through the undergrowth, fast. Tom spun to face the threat, standing in front of Amelia, his arms splayed.
A shadowy creature shot out of the bushes, and bounded to a halt as it clocked them, barking. One of the dogs. In the distance, a whistle. The brothers. They couldn’t be more than a hundred meters away.
“Will it attack us?” Amelia said as the dog alternately bounced and crouched, barking.
“It wouldn’t be trained to attack large prey. Rabbits and pheasants, maybe. But it’s wearing a GPS collar.”
“So they know exactly where we are.”
“Change of plans,” Tom said, turning. The dog snarled. “You head for the road. I’ll go the other way, get the dog to follow me.”
“The road? But—”
“If they think we’ve gone the other way, you’ll get a head start. I’ll keep this guy occupied for a bit. Provide a distraction, while shaking him off. Just don’t stray far from the road. It’s easily done in the fog.”
“Uh, okay.”
“I’ll catch up with you as soon as I can. But don’t wait for me. If I don’t make it, keep going. There are houses on the outskirts of the village. Knock on any of the doors you come to—they’re all good people.”
“That’s what you said about your neighbors.”
“I never said they were ‘good.’ I just didn’t think… I’ll run first. Wait a second for the dog to follow me, and then go yourself. And watch out for imps.”
“Copy that.”
He reached out and squeezed her hand, then started running, glancing back.
The dog seemed to weigh its options but its instinct to join the chase won out.
It quickly caught up with Tom and bounded alongside, barking and occasionally jumping and snapping.
Tom hoped he was right that it wouldn’t attack a human.
He couldn’t risk an injury right now. It probably considered the wood its territory—it spent enough time there.
Tom stayed within the tree line, focusing mostly on the terrain, not that he could see far through the thickening fog.
Running through the forest with a weapon—it was like army training.
Mad dog aside, it was almost a relief to divert his excess adrenaline into running hard, though he had to be careful.
There might not be much he could do about the dog, but he could at least make sure he didn’t turn an ankle.
A rifle shot boomed. Tom instinctively ducked, not that it would help.
Another shot. Not the crack-boom you’d expect to hear if it was being fired at you, and the bullets didn’t sound like they were impacting around him.
Amelia? The dog leaped, snapping at his elbow.
Tom felt the nip of teeth, and hoped it was inadvertent.
He stopped, turned, and said “no” in a quiet, commanding voice.
The dog stretched back on its hind legs for a second, confused, and then lunged, barking more intensely, teeth bared.
Tom picked up a small, thick stick, waved it in front of the dog’s eyes and then tossed it, hard.
The dog was almost fooled. It took a step in the right direction but then reassessed.
More rifle shots, several this time. Tom tensed. Unless they were chancing it, there was only one other living creature they were likely to be taking shots at right now. He had to lose the dog and get back to Amelia.
There was one place the dog would be happy enough to wait this out, while taking its owners on a wild-goose chase.
Tom led it around to the western side of the house.
As they neared the chicken coop, it twigged and bolted ahead.
When Tom caught up, it was barking at the wire fence.
Tom opened the little door to the run and the dog rushed in, tail wagging, and started sniffing the ground.
“Sorry, pup,” Tom said, closing the gate.
“Only ghost chickens left. Your owners will be along soon though.”
Tom left the dog scrabbling in pursuit of chickens that were now safely in the yard of Mrs. Ellis from the village tearoom, who had insisted on repaying Tom with more Earl Grey tea than his mother could consume in a year.
He dodged his way past the shells of the old outbuildings, keeping to the shadows—the potting shed, the dovecote, the dairy. A piercing cry from one gave him a hell of a fright. “Easy, Fabio,” he murmured in the direction of the peacock’s call. The gunfire continued sporadically.
He circled behind the stables, catching a whiff of spilt petrol.
A mechanical whine rose into the air above him.
The sound was familiar, but he couldn’t immediately place it.
He backed up and scanned the roofline of the abbey, then stole farther out to check the skies above.
There, hovering over the treetops of the glade, a black shape against the glowing low cloud. It was headed to the road.
“Shit,” he muttered.
They were going to need a new plan.