Then a voice shouted, ‘Uncle! No!’
Jem opened her eyes. There was a girl standing in front of the bear. She was about Jem’s age and impossibly pale, with curly black hair. She wore a short black velvet dress with a grey collar. She tilted her head at them, frowning, looking both curious and angry.
‘Who are you?’
‘I’m Jem, and this is Tom, my brother.’ Jem was surprised that she managed to blurt out any words at all.
The girl took a few steps towards them.
‘My name is Mirabelle, and you shouldn’t be here.’
Mirabelle
The girl was extremely quiet, and the boy talked too much.
That was the conclusion Mirabelle drew as they made their way to the house. Despite all that had happened to them, the boy seemed a little too confident and chatty for her liking. Even as he talked, she could see him looking around, as if trying to take everything in. It made her suspicious.
The girl, on the other hand, seemed a lot more reserved. She constantly rubbed the cuff of her moth-eaten cardigan between her thumb and forefinger, her eyes flitting nervously between Mirabelle and Uncle Bertram in his bear form. She was still trembling a little, and her clothes were plainly old hand-me-downs. Mirabelle wondered where her parents were. Both of the children looked famished. The boy in particular looked a little sickly and seemed to be relying solely on nervous energy to keep him going.
‘We’re very grateful to you and your pet bear for rescuing us from those things,’ said the boy.
Pet bear? Those things?
‘Those things, as you call them, are the Flowers of Divine Lapsidy,’ said Mirabelle.
‘Flowers? Interesting. I’ve never come across flowers like that before. What are they exactly? And what is this place? It all seems very—’
‘How did you get in?’ asked Mirabelle.
‘There’s a hole in the world,’ said the girl before her brother could say anything.
Mirabelle locked eyes with her. ‘A hole?’
The girl nodded, looking almost apologetic.
‘Yes, a great big rip in the air. We saw your house through it.’
Mirabelle felt a flicker of unease. ‘Where did you see this opening?’
‘At the top of the path where those . . . those flowers were,’ said Jem.
‘Our car ran out of petrol near the spot in the forest where we found it,’ said Tom.
‘So, nobody else from the village opened the way for you?’ said Mirabelle.
‘What village?’ asked Tom.
Bertram gave a little panicked snort, and Mirabelle could feel her own disquiet about the whole situation growing. These two clearly knew nothing about the village of Rookhaven, and the fact that they had somehow passed through the Glamour without the use of a key was not normal.
Uncle Bertram slipped round the side of the house while Mirabelle led Jem and Tom up the steps towards the front door. A small flurry of ravens wheeled around the roof, their cawing strange and hollow in the night air. Mirabelle caught sight of their one-eyed leader glowering down from a cornice, then he seemed to lose interest in them and flew up to be with his brethren as they flitted through the holes in the roof at the far corner of the house.
‘This is a very nice place,’ said Tom, coughing into his hand. ‘Who lives here?’
‘My family and I,’ said Mirabelle, opening the front door and ignoring his gaze.
They stepped into the cool dark of the hallway. Mirabelle noted the way the two children looked at their surroundings: Jem blinking in disbelief, her mouth widening in astonishment as she took in the vastness of the house before her; Tom looking almost hungry. He wiped a hand across his sweaty brow and seemed to drink everything in. His eyes roved over the staircase’s ornate alabaster settings, and the convolutions of the chandelier above, its barbed iron arms twisting in and around each other like the branches of a tree.
‘That looks heavy,’ he said.
Mirabelle knew full well that he meant ‘expensive’.
A shadow unpeeled from the murk and the two children took a step backwards as Uncle Enoch revealed himself.
‘And who, may I ask, do we have here, Mirabelle?’ he said, his voice sonorous but with a hint of steel.
Tom cleared his throat and tapped his chest. ‘I’m Tom Griffin, and this is my little sister Jem.’ He fought back another cough.
Enoch ignored him and instead glared at Mirabelle. ‘They’re not from the village.’
‘No, Uncle,’ said Mirabelle. She noted the brief flicker of concern on his face, which only added to the disquiet she’d been feeling since encountering the two children.
She was about to tell him more, but she was taken by surprise when Tom took a step towards Enoch and held out his hand.
‘Tom, no,’ gasped Jem.
Tom ignored her and looked cheekily at Enoch. ‘And who might you be?’
Enoch raised his head back and looked down his nose at Tom while continuing to speak to Mirabelle.
‘How did they get in?’
‘They came through the Glamour. I found them on the Path of Flowers.’
Enoch looked horrified. ‘Impossible!’
‘That’s where I found them,’ said Mirabelle.
Mirabelle had never seen Enoch like this before. He looked angry and confused, and perhaps even a little bit frightened. The sight made Mirabelle feel suddenly cold.
‘Strangers,’ he said, shaking his head in disbelief.
‘Perhaps they could stay, just for a little while,’ said Mirabelle. ‘Their car has run out of petrol . . .’
Mirabelle trailed off because Enoch looked astounded by her comment.
‘They are not from the village,’ he repeated slowly, as though she had failed to understand something.
‘I know, Uncle.’ She understood his fear, and she shared it, but seeing how terrified the girl, in particular, had been after the flowers’ attack had softened her attitude towards the interlopers.
‘Only those from the village
