Chapter 5
Chapter Five
W alking back to Strand House, a cold wind whipping at her cheeks and making her eyes tear up, Esme’s mind was filled with thoughts of Kate Foster and her confident manner. Could they really be getting a new resident? Just like that?
Her only comfort was Tobias’s utter calm about the whole thing. After Kate Foster had left, saying that she was going to speak to her financial advisor, Tobias had assured Esme that nothing else would come of it. ‘The young lady will go home and forget all about this notion. This sort of thing happens every so often. How many times have visitors told you that they would love to stay longer?’
Having just got into the house and begun to unlace her boots, Esme’s phone buzzed. She picked it up to find a message from Luke.
Are you free for a chat?
Esme tapped out a reply. Yes! Shall I come to shop?
Thanks. I don’t have any milk though.
Having stopped at Matteo’s to buy milk, Esme headed to the bookshop. The window display hadn’t changed in all the time that Luke had been in residence, and she realised that he had never seen Alvis at her best. She had slowed down over the last couple of years and had been quite distracted in her last months, but before that she had put real effort into the front window of the shop. Not just changing the books on display, but adding seasonal decorations like autumnal leaves or summer flowers, wintergreens in the cold months and a bottle of whisky at Hogmanay. It wasn’t exactly Harrods, but it was cheery and inviting.
The bell on the door of the shop jingled softly and Esme inhaled the scent of old paper and warm wood. She found Luke in the front room of the shop and knew he would have seen her walking past the window, maybe even pausing to look at it. She hefted her shopping bag. ‘I brought milk.’
‘Kettle’s just boiled,’ he said, heading to the tiny room that served as his kitchenette and office. It had a kettle, a microwave and a fridge, and it occurred to Esme that she didn’t know how Alvis had coped with such bare facilities for so many years. She had the pub for her main meals, of course, but even so… She thought about her own cosy, well-appointed kitchen and felt a surge of gratitude for all she had.
Once they had mugs of tea, Luke led the way back to the front room. He offered Esme his reading chair and perched on the stool behind the counter. He looked uncharacteristically nervous. ‘I’ve got a favour to ask.’
‘Okay.’
‘It might not be possible. It’s probably not possible…’
‘Just say it.’
He took a breath. ‘Could you put a ward on Lewis? To protect him?’
‘Oh,’ Esme felt a wave of disappointment. She wanted, very much, to say ‘yes’ to anything Luke asked of her. ‘I don’t think that is possible.’
Luke nodded, as if that was what he had been expecting, and Esme’s stomach dropped in sympathy. ‘I’m sorry. The wards are physically here. On the island. I don’t know how I would add one remotely. Even if I knew where he was and could picture it…’ She trailed off, remembering her vision of Lewis in a bed. It was unlikely he was still in that room.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said again, feeling useless. Worse than useless. ‘I wasn’t really given instructions for this stuff. Just how to keep the wards going on the island.’
‘It’s okay.’ Luke’s shoulders were hunched and he looked miserable.
‘Do you know what you are going to do? About Lewis?’ Esme didn’t want Luke to say he was leaving to look for his brother, but it seemed inevitable. It was a quest that had brought him to the island in the first place. Now that Lewis had been in touch…
He shook his head. ‘I feel like I should start looking again, but I wouldn’t know where to start.’ He looked at Esme. ‘One message telling me to butt out of his life doesn’t really help.’
‘No.’
There was a short silence. Luke wasn’t drinking his tea, but he wasn’t looking at Esme anymore, either. She could see he was thinking and she waited quietly, lost in her own swirling fears. She had been happy on Unholy Island before Luke arrived. She would be happy again. There was no need to be afraid.
‘Would you hate me if I didn’t go?’ His face twisted and he laughed self-consciously. ‘That came out a bit weird. Sorry. I mean, would I be a really bad person if I didn’t start looking again?’
‘If you did what Lewis is asking?’
‘It might not be him,’ Luke’s face was now utterly bereft. A mix of misery and hope.
‘I don’t think you would be a bad person,’ Esme said. ‘Not at all.’ She just didn’t think he was a man of inaction and her gut told her that Luke Taylor would not be able to leave the mystery alone.
Tobias was standing in the front room of the bookshop, waiting. Luke had heard the door while he was in the cubby making himself a tea in his favourite mug. It was a misshapen pottery thing that had been clearly made by an enthusiastic amateur. Or a genius. It had wobbly sides but was a dream to drink from, with the most comfortable lip. God help him, he was thinking far too much about mugs.
‘You look settled,’ Tobias said, approval in his voice.
It was a phrase that Luke would have expected to send him running for the hills. But it made him feel warm. ‘I like it here.’
Tobias wasn’t looking at him. Instead, he was gazing at the bookshelves and Luke expected him to ask about ‘that mystery with the yellow window on the cover’ or an obscure first edition. Normal bookshop questions.
‘These shelves are made from French oak,’ he said instead. ‘They were grown in the ancient Forest of Rouvray, between Paris and Normandy, and cut down for a monastery library. When the order made their way to Melrose to found an abbey, they brought their library with them, shelves and all. Imagine how difficult that journey would have been back then. How highly they valued their library to transport it by cart and boat. Books are important. They keep the knowledge so that it can be passed down. They stop things from being forgotten.’
Luke wondered if Tobias knew about the internet.
Tobias reached out and ran a finger along one of the shelves.
Luke felt a tingle on the back of his hand, as if someone had touched his skin.
‘They may have been misguided in a few of their beliefs,’ Tobias continued, ‘but those monks had one thing right. It’s a sacred duty to care for books.’
‘Right.’ Luke lifted his mug and took a sip of his tea. It was too early for this.
‘You are our Book Keeper.’
Bee had said the same. The same emphasis on the phrase as two words. ‘I’ll look after the shop,’ he said, trying to reassure Tobias.
The older man seemed to relax. At once he was the usual Tobias. A kindly old gent. ‘If the shop shows you Pliny the Elder’s second book of natural history, I would very much like to see it.’
‘I can look for it now,’ Luke said, putting his mug down.
‘Oh no, don’t trouble yourself. I’ve looked many times.’
‘Right… I don’t know if it’s something I can order.’ There were a few contact numbers for book suppliers and Luke assumed that on occasion he would need to order books in. Or by request. He really needed to read up on how to run a bookshop.
‘The bookshop will provide,’ Tobias said. ‘But there are volumes it is reluctant to reveal.’
‘I don’t think I understand.’
‘I don’t know what the problem is with it either.’ He looked around, as if addressing the shop. ‘But I would dearly like to read it. I will bring it back in mint condition. I solemnly promise that there won’t be a repeat of Cassell’s Volume Four.’
‘Why do I feel as if you aren’t talking to me?’
Tobias smiled at him gently and raised a hand. ‘Cheerio, Book Keeper. See you at dinner.’
The witch was more distracted than usual. Bee opened her eyes during their meditation and contemplated the woman sitting cross-legged on the floor, obediently breathing slowly. There was a feeling around people when they relaxed and entered an open state. Esme had been here for almost an hour and Bee hadn’t sensed it once.
Bee rose to her feet and went to make tea. She wasn’t a quitter by nature, but she knew the edges of her sphere of control. If Esme wasn’t focused for today’s session, then there was little Bee could do about it.
As soon as the kettle began to boil, Esme opened her eyes. ‘Is it twelve already?’
‘Eleven. I thought we’d stop early today.’
‘Okay.’
Bee turned away. If Esme had thought she had hidden her relief, she was mistaken.
Bee put her blend of tea into the warmed pot and added the water. The sound of the china lid against the rim of the pot reverberated strangely, and she knew there was an answering memory or premonition somewhere in her consciousness, the sound playing at the same time to make that unmistakable layered tone. A chorus.
She ignored it and carried the tea tray to the seats near the front window of the open plan living room.
After they had taken their first sips and Bee had noticed Esme studiously avoiding her gaze, Bee was ready to interrogate the witch. It wasn’t just a matter of neighbourly concern. In fact, it wasn’t neighbourly concern at all. Bee was Esme’s tutor. Her guide. She had a responsibility to make sure the island’s Ward Witch was performing at full capacity. And currently, she really wasn’t.
‘I am not your friend.’
Esme put her cup down.
Bee felt, rather than saw, Esme draw herself together. A surface knitting tightly to form an impenetrable shield. It wasn’t physical or something Bee could actually see with her eyes, but she knew it had happened all the same. ‘I am your guide. Your teacher.’ She tried to make her next words gentle, but it was difficult. They were true and Bee didn’t know to soften the fact. ‘And you are honoured.’
Esme sat a little straighter. ‘I know. I am very grateful.’
‘I don’t want you to be grateful. I want you to concentrate. To work.’
‘I am trying,’ Esme said, a little sharpness in her tone.
Bee took a sip of her tea before changing tack. ‘How much do you know about the island’s history? Do you know, for instance, why we have a Ward Witch?’
‘To protect the island from the mainland. The wider world. Keep us hidden.’
‘Yes, that. But why?’
‘It’s a place of sanctuary?’
‘And we are lucky to have it. All of us incomers have been granted sanctuary here, but the island was here before the first residents.’ Apart from Tobias, of course, but Bee wasn’t going to tell another’s story. Especially not his. ‘Have you wondered why?’
Esme frowned. ‘I don’t know what you mean… It’s a place. Places… form. Tectonic plates. Geology and all that.’
Bee watched the other woman. She had been waiting for Esme to complete her training before revealing the full extent of her responsibilities. But it had been seven years, and she was starting to worry that Esme’s progress wasn’t ever going to speed up. It could put more than the island in danger if she didn’t know what she was protecting. But if she freaked the witch out and she panicked, maybe ran away, they would be even more vulnerable. Not to mention that she was fond of Esme. ‘This place formed for a reason. A spirit, not sentient at first, but becoming increasingly so over time.’
Esme nodded. Her eyes were wide and fixed on Bee’s face as she listened.
‘You know about thin places?’
‘Like on Hallow’s Eve?’
‘This place is like Hallow’s Eve all year round. The spirit formed. Or, more likely, came through thousands of years ago and stayed. It acts as a guardian. Stops more things coming through.’
‘Unholy Island is a gateway and we’re, what? The gatekeepers? The bouncers?’
You are the bouncer, Bee thought, but didn’t say. The small woman in front of her with her messy bun and large eyes and spiral of terror wound tightly around her own power was the last line of defence between the other worlds and this version of Britain. Probably best not to tell her that. Just yet.