Lewis met his gaze. ‘You know.’

  Luke started to say ‘I really don’t’, but then he stopped. Lewis couldn’t be talking about that… There was no way he was still upset about that. ‘Freya?’

  Chapter Fourteen

  Luke hadn’t thought about Freya for a while. He had questioned her when Lewis had first disappeared, of course, and given her his mobile number in case Lewis got in touch with her first. He knew her as his brother’s live-in girlfriend and had written over any other previous identity she might have held. Yes, they had technically been a couple for a few months. Nothing serious. But they had broken up long before she and Lewis became a thing.

  Lewis was looking at him like there was something he was supposed to know about or apologise for. He had nothing. To avoid saying ‘Freya?’ again, he asked whether they were back together. Which, as soon as the words were out, he knew had been a mistake.

  ‘Yes, we’re just back from a cruise,’ Lewis said, his voice heavy with sarcasm. ‘It’s the perfect relationship.’

  ‘And that’s my fault, somehow?’

  ‘Not that,’ Lewis said ‘But before, yes.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Really?’ Lewis shook his head. ‘You don’t remember having a little word with my girlfriend? Telling her that she could do better? That I wasn’t good for her?’

  ‘I don’t,’ Luke said, honestly enough. He could believe he had said those things, or words very like them, but he didn’t remember the specific occasion. There were times when he saw the couple out and about, when a few drinks were taken. Not every memory was crystal clear. It really was like a different life. He felt like he was a different man. But he didn’t believe that Lewis was hanging onto resentment. Not about that, anyway. ‘Since when did you care what anybody said about you?’

  The door to the pub swung open. Fiona walked in, holding Hamish in her arms. She was closely followed by Esme. Their cheeks were all pink from the wind and they looked healthy and wholesome in a way that struck Luke anew. It was the contrast with thoughts of his old life.

  ‘This should be good,’ Hammer said. He took a sip from his pint and leaned back in his chair.

  Esme was standing stock still in the middle of the room. Her gaze went from Lewis to Luke and back again.

  Luke stood up to greet her. He realised that Lewis was doing the same. His brother had turned on his charming smile and it made Luke want to punch him all over again.

  ‘Esme,’ Luke said, crossing the distance between them as quickly as possible. ‘This is Lewis.’

  Esme held a hand up in greeting. ‘It’s good to see you. We’ve all been worried.’

  ‘Have you?’ Lewis cut his eyes to Luke. ‘That’s nice.’

  ‘Not really,’ Fiona said in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘This is Hamish.’ She hoisted the baby up in her arms and he took one look at Lewis before turning to bury his face in Fiona’s shoulder.

  ‘Cute kid,’ Lewis said. ‘We were just catching up. Would you like to join us?’

  ‘We don’t want to interrupt,’ Esme said, her eyes on Luke.

  ‘Nonsense,’ Lewis started pulling out chairs. ‘We were talking about old times, but I’d rather hear all about you.’

  Luke felt every muscle in his body tense. He had forgotten that Lewis was smooth.

  Esme gave him one of her assessing looks.

  The door opened again and Bee walked in.

  It was past lunchtime, so Luke didn’t understand why the village was gathering. Then he realised that Hammer had been a while at the bar. Plenty of time to text everybody and let them know there was a show on.

  ‘Meeting,’ Bee said, dispensing with preamble or social niceties. ‘You might want to be elsewhere,’ she said to Lewis.

  ‘Why?’

  Bee smiled gently, as if dealing with a difficult child. ‘Because we’ll be talking about you.’

  ‘I’ll stay,’ Lewis said, turning up the wattage on his smile. ‘Then I can answer any questions.’ He spread his hands. ‘I’ve got nothing to hide.’

  Luke snorted.

  * * *

  Esme kept sneaking glances at Luke’s twin brother. It was stupidly obvious, but she found herself cataloguing their similarities. Even while she knew they were genetically identical, she couldn’t stop marvelling at every detail. The matching shape of their earlobes, the exact shade of blue of their eyes.

  She had always been fascinated by siblings. Thinking about parents was just too painful and something she had filed away long ago, but siblings. Peers who shared DNA and parents and childhoods. Identical twins were another step closer even than that. She wondered what it was like to share a likeness, as well as all the other stuff. The childhood memories, the verbal shorthand, the shared jokes. Even the irritations, the old arguments and flash points. She envied it all.

  Luke looked tense. Lewis looked at ease. They wore their hair in the same style, slightly long and messy, and that added to their striking resemblance. Luke had a scruff of day-old stubble, but Lewis’s was almost a beard. Luke had a thin white scar on his left temple. It extended from the corner of his eye upwards and was only visible in certain light. Esme couldn’t see it at this distance, but it made her wonder what distinguishing marks Lewis carried. Not that she was worried about mixing them up. Lewis was so clearly not Luke.

  Just to be sure, she began cataloguing their differences. Lewis was a fraction bulkier than Luke. Like he lifted heavy things on a regular basis. His smile lifted up a fraction higher on the left, while Luke’s was lop-sided to the right.

  Seren came out from behind the bar, wiping her hands on a striped cloth. She stood next to Esme. ‘Bloody hell, it’s freaky.’ Her voice wasn’t quite quiet enough and Esme winced inside. She understood that this was the flip side of having a ready-made playmate, a sibling that truly couldn’t be physically or mentally closer to you. The way that the world would always see something eerie in your sameness. The way you would always be compared and contrasted and judged. Sensing Luke’s discomfort, she felt ashamed of her own fascination.

  ‘You should go for a walk,’ Luke was saying to Lewis. ‘Meetings are for residents.’

  ‘Insiders and outsiders?’ Lewis asked. ‘I know that game. Surprised to find you playing it.’

  ‘It’s not a game,’ Luke said stiffly.

  Hammer looked at Bee.

  ‘We will ask you some questions and then we will have our meeting. There is a beautiful walk around the bay that you can enjoy.’

  Lewis looked as if he was going to argue, but he seemed to think better of it.

  Once everyone had taken their seats and Fiona had settled Hamish on a blanket on the floor with a selection of toys, Esme asked Lewis if he was all right.

  ‘I’m fine, thank you for asking,’ Lewis replied.

  ‘That’s good,’ Bee said. ‘I know our Luke has been concerned. He is very important to us, to our community. Which is why I offered to help.’

  Lewis focused on her. ‘You got me out?’

  A slight dip of her chin. ‘I called in a favour.’

  ‘Well that clears up that mystery,’ Lewis said. ‘I take it I owe you now?’

  Bee didn’t answer.

  Matteo wrote on his notepad and pushed it across the table. Lewis read it. ‘What are my plans? Dunno, mate.’

  ‘Back down south?’ Luke interjected.

  ‘I’ve not really had a chance to think about it,’ Lewis said, barely glancing at Luke. Esme could feel his gaze land on her and linger there. Her cheeks flushed.

  ‘But it’s you I owe, right?’ Lewis asked Bee.

  ‘Why does it matter?’ Seren broke in.

  ‘Lydia Crow was there. And then I was released. I need to know if I owe the Crow Family.’

  Bee shrugged. ‘I called in the favour. You’re clear. Unless you made an extra arrangement.’

  ‘What do you do for work?’ Seren asked. ‘Any skills?’

  ‘Plenty,’ Lewis said. He didn’t actually wink at her, but he might as well have done.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ Luke muttered under his breath.

  ‘How long have you been here?’ Seren asked.

  Lewis looked at Bee. ‘One night?’

  She nodded. ‘We have a two-night limit for visitors.’

  ‘Well, that’s normal,’ Lewis said sarcastically. ‘You sound completely—’

  Luke interrupted him before he could finish. ‘Could you give us a minute?’

  ‘Since you asked so nicely.’ Lewis pulled on his jacket. ‘I’ll go for a stroll, then. Lovely day for it.’

  Once the door closed behind him, Esme felt some of her tension ease. It was exhausting being hyperaware, and she realised how little she had to experience that state these days. How relaxed and at home and safe she generally felt.

  ‘So,’ Hammer said, directing his question to Luke. ‘When’s your brother leaving?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Luke said. ‘You heard him. No plans.’

  ‘He can’t stay here.’

  ‘You get to decide that, do you?’

  ‘Don’t fight,’ Seren said.

  ‘Keep it civil,’ Fiona added. ‘There’s a bairn present.’

  ‘I tried a spell to bring Tobias back,’ Esme said. Partly to change the subject and partly because she wanted everyone to know that she wasn’t just sitting around. She was trying to fix the situation.

  ‘Did it work?’ Seren asked.

  ‘I don’t think so. I could tell something was happening. It felt like I was pulling something in, but then the line went slack. It just all stopped.’

  Fiona pulled a sympathetic expression.

  ‘Regarding Lewis,’ Bee said. She looked at Luke. ‘You are our Book Keeper. And he’s your flesh and blood.’

  Luke’s voice was rough. ‘I’m glad he’s not dead. But I don’t trust him.’

  Bee nodded. ‘Thank you for your candour.’

  ‘Is he dangerous?’ Esme didn’t know she was going to ask the question until the words were already out of her mouth.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Luke replied. Miserable.

  Matteo was writing. We all have a past.

  Bee read it and nodded. ‘This is a place of sanctuary.’

  Esme thought their duty was to provide sanctuary to those seeking it. And they were usually unusual in some way. Gifted or, as in the case of The Three Sisters and Fiona and Euan, not exactly human. Although Luke didn’t appear to have any particular ability. Except his affinity with the bookshop. ‘Is that what he wants?’ She directed this to Luke.

  ‘I have no idea.’ His voice was flat.

  ‘Well,’ Seren blew out a breath. ‘Lewis doesn’t seem to have any plans to stay long-term. Maybe we just let him bide a while.’

  Fiona raised an eyebrow. ‘What about the wards?’ She looked at Esme. ‘Do you have to do something to allow him to stay?’

  Esme shrugged. ‘The island chooses. And I guess he’s got tonight, anyway. If this is only his second night?’

  ‘That’s the answer,’ Bee said, and everybody turned to look at her. Without Tobias, she was the de facto leader, Esme realised. ‘The island decides.’

  * * *

  Tobias wasn’t sure how long he had been walking, but he knew that his throat was dry with thirst and his lips felt cracked. The relentless heat on the top of his head had brought on a pain in his temples that pulsed in time with his footsteps. He knew that he didn’t need to feel these discomforts. A long time ago, he had been above such earthly challenges. He was still above them, he knew that, and he only had to remember. But at the same time, the headache was joined with a sharp pain behind his eyes and the sensation drove away the thought. He felt further from the memory and the self that floated above the physical. No, that wasn’t right. Not above the physical, but dissolved in it. Subsumed in it.

  The self and the physical self. Why had he been thinking about that? The pain pulsed in his head. All matter was just tiny little bits and those little bits didn’t have containers. The containers were also made of tiny little bits. Everything was the same small pieces. This seemed like a really important thought, and Tobias tried to hold on to it, but the pain behind his eyes had moved from a stabbing sensation to a white-hot light that filled every part of his vision and every corner of his mind. As his thoughts were burned away by the terrible white light, Tobias had just enough room left for one tiny thought. He ought to be afraid.

  Chapter Fifteen

  After the meeting dispersed, Esme asked Luke if he wanted to come back with her.

  He shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, his face strangely blank. ‘I’d better head back to the shop. I don’t know whether Lewis will go back there or…’

  ‘Okay,’ Esme said. ‘That makes sense.’ She wanted to ask if she should go back to the shop with him. She felt as if things ought to be more certain with Luke. They had slept together and that had felt like a seismic shift for her. Maybe it wasn’t the same for him, though? Even before that, they had been in an easy routine. Spending evenings together, at her place or his, but there was something about Luke’s manner that told her today was different. Of course it was different, she chided herself. His long-lost twin was here.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Luke was pushing a hand through his hair, shoving it away from his face in a gesture that seemed almost angry. ‘I can’t leave him in the shop on his own.’

  Esme’s stomach dropped and her skin had broken out in goose bumps. ‘It’s okay,’ she said quickly. She remembered placating Ryan. Trying to placate Ryan. Failing to placate Ryan and all that came after.

  Luke looked away, his gaze on the sky above the cottages. When he turned back, his face was softer, more familiar. ‘I don’t know how to handle this.’

  ‘You two need some time,’ Esme said, her speech automatic as she struggled to calm her haywire central nervous system. ‘You’ll catch up. You’ll talk. It will be okay.’ She shoved her shaking hands into her pockets.

  He nodded, distracted, and already turning away. ‘I hope so.’

  Once she was home, Esme sat at the kitchen table with a mug of lemon balm tea and talked to Jet. He was sitting on the table, where he wasn’t really supposed to be, washing an outstretched leg. She updated him on the arrival of Luke’s twin brother and the ensuing village meeting. Then, without realising the words were coming, she told Jet that Luke didn’t seem happy to see Lewis. That, after him spending so many months searching and worrying, it seemed a bit of a strange reaction. ‘And then,’ she finished, ‘I wonder if I actually know him at all.’

  * * *

  Bee knew she had to approach Lucy carefully. Her youngest sister was skittish. And dangerous. She didn’t usually pay attention to the humans on the island, but the arrival of The Book Keeper’s twin might be enough to change that, especially with them all off kilter from Tobias’s absence. Diana had pointed to the back garden when Bee had asked where she was and so that was where she went.

  The day had been overcast, but the sky had cleared in time for the sun to set. Dramatic purple and red bled across the remaining clouds and the air was scented with the undergrowth. Foliage and flowers tangled from the crowded pots and the small mossy green rectangle of the old lawn was dotted with small specimen trees that had grown together, branches mingling until they were one big biomass and it would be impossible to say where one species ended and another began.

  Lucy was sitting in the middle, underneath the tangled branches and bright green leaves. Her sister looked well. Her skin was smooth and untroubled, her lips a luscious red. These two facts hardly ever changed. The real indication of her health lay in her eyes. They could become entirely black until they appeared to sink into her pale face like stones beneath a deep lake.

  Before Bee could broach the subject of Lewis, Lucy spoke. ‘I don’t feel him.’

  ‘Tobias?’

  Lucy nodded, quick. Her head tilted as if listening for something. ‘Do you?’

  Bee wished she had a different answer, but she could only give the truth. ‘No. Not since he disappeared.’

  She turned her face to the setting sun and wondered whether Tobias could see the same one. It wasn’t likely, she knew. He was Elsewhere.

  ‘When will he come back?’

  ‘I don’t know. The witch tried a spell, but she doesn’t think it worked. We might have to get him ourselves.’

  She wasn’t looking at Lucy, but could sense her fear. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘Hopefully he’ll find his own way.’

  ‘Maybe it would be better if he didn’t.’ Diana had arrived in the garden on soft feet.

  ‘Don’t say that!’ Lucy rose from her seated position. Her hands were curled into fists.

  ‘I want him back,’ Diana said. ‘But if Tobias can walk a path back to us, all on his own, that means something else could do the same.’

  ‘We should be looking for him,’ Lucy said. ‘He would look for us.’

  ‘Would he?’ Bee wasn’t sure. Tobias was even older than The Three Sisters. And he had been half-asleep for the last couple of centuries. It would be a mistake to assume they knew anything.

  ‘I said we should look,’ Diana said.

  Bee closed her eyes. Two against one. She knew when she was defeated.

  * * *

  They kept the mirrors shrouded. If any one of them sat in the middle, the other sisters would appear in the mirrors on either side. They didn’t need to be physically together, they were always inseparable, but when they sat together, each looking into their own mirror, they could see further than any of them could alone.

  ‘He is Elsewhere,’ Bee said as she pulled the thin fabric from the mirrors. ‘What more can we hope to know?’

  ‘When he will return,’ Lucy said, the pout threatening again.

  ‘You might not like the answer,’ Bee said. ‘Are you sure you want to know? The islanders are upset as it is. I don’t want you making things worse.’

  Sharp white teeth in a red, red smile.

  ‘Sisters,’ Diana said, placating as always.

 

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