Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
L uke was meant to meet Lewis for lunch, but the shop was too busy to close. He texted him to let him know that he would see him at dinner instead. The reply came back quickly.
Bring it to the house.
‘Yes, your highness,’ Luke muttered, but at the appointed time, he went via the pub and collected the takeaway order that was waiting.
‘I’ll pop round later to clear up,’ Seren said.
‘You don’t have time for that,’ Luke said, confused. ‘And Lewis doesn’t need looking after. Are there dishes in here that need returning?’ He hefted the bag, realising that it was heavier than he would have expected. There had to be enough food to feed all of the visitors, too. Luke wondered whether Lewis was paying for it himself.
‘I’m happy to do it,’ Seren said, waving him on. ‘Go on, before that gets cold.’
There was a stone in Luke’s stomach. Something wasn’t right, but he didn’t know what it was. The thought was slippery, and it slithered away before he could grasp it.
The windows were wide open at Lewis’s house. Tobias’s house, he mentally corrected himself. Luke could hear the music as he approached and someone was laughing loudly in the garden. A couple were sitting on the formerly neat lawn, which was now muddy and torn-up in places. They were smoking and talking, and the woman was laughing in an unconvincing way that set Luke’s teeth on edge.
Luke didn’t bother knocking as the front door was wide open. There were people in the hall and, going into the kitchen to find cutlery and plates, more people again. He didn’t know any of them and hoped they were all aware that the causeway was going to close for the day in just over an hour.
He heard Lewis’s voice before he walked into the living room. He was sitting in Tobias’s chair by the empty fireplace. A group of six were sitting on the floor, gazing up at Lewis. Luke had the distinct impression that he had interrupted something important. A story. Or a service. The word was strange. His brother wasn’t a priest, had never been religious, but there was something fervent and charged in the atmosphere.
Lewis smiled at him, though. He stood, raising his hands. ‘Time for a break, my children. Go into the fresh air and breathe deeply. The island will whisper its secrets.’
The group didn’t seem thrilled, but they stood up obediently and filed out of the room.
‘Thank Christ,’ Lewis grabbed at the bag of food, his voice reverting to its usual tone. ‘I’m starving.’
‘My children?’
‘Cringe. I know.’ Lewis didn’t look up from his task of peeling back the cardboard lid from a foil container. ‘They like it.’
Luke put a plate and set of cutlery onto the small side table. He remembered Tobias putting his tea tray onto the same space and the memory was sharp. Like it was trying to pierce something. Break through. ‘It’s weird,’ he said out loud, as his mind tried to chase the line of thought.
‘Your face is weird,’ Lewis said, flashing Luke his old smile. He looked like his brother again. Normal. Then he noticed that the grate was filled with cold ash. The fire was always burning in this room, he’d never seen it out while Tobias was here. Fire in the grate and frost on the windows. It was another reminder that all was not as it ought to be. Something wasn’t right. Tobias wasn’t here, that wasn’t right. Lewis was here and that wasn’t… well, it wasn’t wrong. He was his brother. He was glad he was safe and whole and with him. But something wasn’t quite… ‘What are you saying to them?’ Luke managed. ‘Why are those people looking at you like that?’
‘Like what?’ Lewis was intent on the food. He had spooned some curry into his mouth already, as if he couldn’t wait to plate it up.
‘And how did you get Seren to make you curry?’
‘I asked,’ Lewis said around his mouthful.
Curry in Tobias’s living room. That was another sharp thought. A shard of glass that cut through the muddle in his mind. Tobias’s room was a place of tea and cake. A fire in the grate and frost on the windows and Winter lying on the hearth rug. Now there were containers of curry and dead ashes in the fireplace. And a group of random strangers roaming the garden like zombies, waiting until their master called them back inside. A moment of clarity. Luke felt the wool in his head part to reveal a single thought – he had to get out of this room.
Tobias was still in the forest. He had walked for a while, away from the clearing with the grassy hill, but had arrived back at it again. He had touched the hill and felt vibrations through the palm of his hand. There wasn’t a way inside the hill. He was frustrated and not used to the feeling.
He knew that the hill ought to have an entrance. He knew it in the way that he knew his own name. Horrifyingly, he realised that he didn’t know his own name. Did he have one?
Moving away from that troubling question, he returned to the hill. Beat his fists on its grassy slope. There should be an entrance. A doorway. But it was just a hill.
Defeated and exhausted, he sank to his knees. The ground was wet and he dug his hands into the soil and dead leaves. He thought about lying down. He was so tired and had been walking for so long and now he was here, the place he remembered, the doorway, and he couldn’t walk through. Something like despair crept through his mind and he felt it steal away his will. He thought about closing his eyes and going to sleep.
Luke left Tobias’s house and went to the first person he always wanted to see, in good times and bad. And, incidentally, the only person he trusted.
Esme was unpegging sheets from the washing line in her garden. She looked happy to see him, but he thought he could detect a wariness, too. The clarity was holding, and he knew why she was concerned. He had been thinking over the last few days as he walked from the mayor’s to Strand House, and he was mildly horrified. He had been following Lewis around like a sheep. He had given him free rein in the bookshop. He had barely spoken to Esme and had only had time for Lewis. When Esme had raised a concern about his brother’s effect on the islanders and visitors, he had turned away from her. His face burned hot with shame. ‘I’m sorry,’ he blurted.
She dropped a handful of pegs onto the washing in the basket at her feet. ‘What’s happened?’
‘I was at Tobias’s house. And I started remembering him. I think being in the living room there just made the memories stronger. I don’t think I’ve thought about Tobias for days. And then I realised how wrong it all is. It’s not right, is it? What’s happening?’
Esme’s relief was obvious, but she was still cautious in her reply. ‘It’s unusual. And you know I objected to Lewis staying in Tobias’s home. That doesn’t feel right to me.’
‘I haven’t been thinking clearly, but I think the fog has cleared.’ He crossed the grass in a couple of strides and took hold of Esme’s hands. ‘Forgive me?’
She smiled up at him. Properly this time, and his heart squeezed in relief.
‘If you help me with the rest of this.’ She kicked the laundry basket.
After bringing in the washing, folding the sheets, and kneading bread, Luke and Esme hatched a plan to go and speak to the islanders. The sun had set and the cool air was refreshing on his skin. It helped to anchor him in the here and now, although his thoughts were still strangely slow. Dreamlike.
‘Shouldn’t we go to Bee first?’ He asked on their way to Fiona’s house. ‘She will know what to do.’
His phone buzzed before Esme could answer. It was Lewis, and he held it out to show Esme. ‘Should I answer?’
She shrugged, and he could sense she was still wary. ‘It’s up to you.’
He wondered how honest to be. He could feel something tugging at the edges of his mind. A desire to speak to Lewis, to be near him. He was thinking clearly, he was almost sure, but there was the impression of fog at the edges of his mind. He would feel it there like when you felt the atmospheric pressure before the weather changed. ‘Bee will help,’ he said out loud.
‘She can’t,’ Esme said. ‘Not right now.’
His phone buzzed again. Lewis. At once, he felt the pull to be with his twin, stronger than he had ever felt it before.
‘I’m going to…’ He had pressed the button and had the phone to his ear before he finished speaking.
‘I miss you,’ Lewis said. There was a plaintive note that cut through Luke. How could he have left Lewis? What was he doing on the other side of the village?
He was walking away, phone pressed against his skin, before the thought had even completed.
Esme watched helplessly as Luke strode away from her. He was going back to Lewis, that much was clear. His moment of clarity had burst the moment his brother had spoken.
She felt like turning around and going home. She was the lone voice. What could she do? But she was close to Fiona’s and she owed it to her friend to check in. And perhaps Fiona’s unusual nature would protect her from whatever strange effect Lewis was having on the other humans.
When Fiona opened the door, Esme saw she wasn’t alone. Matteo was sitting on the sofa, Hamish cuddled on his lap and half-asleep.
‘Sorry, it’s bedtime, I didn’t think…’
‘Come in,’ Fiona said. ‘It’s all right. I’m glad you’re here.’
Esme sat on the floor cross-legged and waited for Fiona to settle on the sofa. She stroked Hamish’s head and smiled encouragingly at Matteo. ‘You’ve got the knack.’
‘Is Euan out?’
‘He’s working. Seren is run off her feet.’
‘I was supposed to be here with Luke. But he’s gone to see Lewis. We were going to talk about what’s going on…’
Fiona looked up. ‘What do you mean?’
Esme took a deep breath. ‘Lewis is gathering people to him like the Pied Piper. And nobody seems to find it odd.’
Matteo carefully laid Hamish on the sofa cushion next to him, where he promptly snuggled into Fiona. He took out his notebook and wrote something before showing it to Fiona and then passing it to Esme.
Silver blood in Luke’s family?
‘Not that I know of. His mother’s maiden name was Brown.’
‘Is that why you’re not affected?’ Fiona asked Matteo.
He shrugged and then took his pad back to write: I am. Feel too calm. Sedated.
Fiona’s eyes lit up in recognition. ‘That’s it. Exactly.’ She looked at Esme. ‘Until you turned up, I wasn’t even thinking about it.’ Her expression clouded. ‘We should be worried.’
‘And all these visitors. They are obsessed with him. There is turnover at the moment, the wards are holding, but what if that stops? What if some decide they want to stay with Lewis for longer?’
‘You’ll look after the wards,’ Fiona said, as if she was comforting Hamish.
Matteo tapped his notepad. We voted .
‘We did,’ Fiona smiled dreamily. ‘It will be all right. He’s The Book Keeper’s brother. All will be well.’
Lewis picked at the food on his plate and then handed it to a waiting woman. He was surrounded, as always, by his acolytes. A woman with a sleek grey bob and red-framed glasses was curled up on his feet. A man who had the tanned skin and toned physique of an Instagram influencer was leaning against his chair. His hand kept roving onto Lewis’s knee and Lewis kept removing it with a kind of tired monotony. The woman who had taken his plate held it aloft and carried it ceremoniously out of the room, presumably to the kitchen. Although, given the strange glazed look in her eye, Luke wasn’t sure. Perhaps she was going to add it to a Lewis-themed shrine. He would no longer be surprised.
‘This can’t go on,’ Luke said. He decided to ignore the several elephants in the room and to focus on Lewis himself. ‘You don’t look well.’
He turned mournful eyes to Luke. ‘I’m so hungry.’
Lewis had been eating well. Too well, really, for several days. Now he seemed to be unable to eat more than a few small bites.
‘I could pop along to the pub and get some soup. Something easy to—’
‘It won’t help.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I tried,’ Lewis flapped a hand, barely lifting it from his lap. ‘I ate until my stomach hurt, but I was still hungry. It doesn’t make any difference.’
‘Perhaps you should get checked out. Medically.’
The door opened and a couple walked in. They were holding hands, but only had eyes for Lewis. The woman gasped and put a hand to her mouth. The man did a strange sort of bow and then another, deeper one.
‘Where are all these people sleeping?’
‘Wherever I am,’ Lewis said, brightening a little. ‘I don’t like to be alone, so they stay with me.’ He reached out and patted the head of the influencer, who made a weird little cooing noise.
Bee followed her guide out of the fields and along a dusty track. They passed a loaded cart dragged by oxen with gold horns and no driver, and a group of young women who watched them silently from underneath jewelled headscarves. At the end of the track, the landscape changed abruptly. Featureless red earth stretched out as far as the eye could see to a flat horizon. Bee looked at her guide and shook her head. She opened her mouth to tell the farmer what she needed, but found she could not. Her lips were sealed shut by some power greater than her own.
Her guide was smiling in a way that suggested she was in trouble. He had led her the wrong way on purpose, she realised, too late. There was no such thing as too late, though. That was something Bee knew in her bones. Whatever she could see in the future, there was only ever right now. And right now could not be too late. It was all there was. Bee bowed her head and dropped into a deep curtsey. She couldn’t draw on her sisters, not this far from home, but she was still the eldest. And experience counted. When she straightened, she told the guide what he would see and what he would hear, using the strength of her own conviction.
The guide’s eyes widened in understanding. She no longer required lips to form a command.