I wake all in a hurry, thrashing my arms around and jumping up, pulling myself out of a frozen sea as a massive old iron boat comes right at me, darkened hull creaking beneath sheets of ice. The mast is a mass of icicles that could fall at any moment and on the deck are legions of strange, shadowy creatures, all of them watching me with glowing eyes.

‘Owl?’

Out of the darkness, my mother’s eyes, round and bright. She comes towards me and puts her hands on my arms, pushing me back to sit on the edge of my bed as the familiar shapes of the room come into focus.

‘What was that?’ she asks.

‘Uh. Dreaming.’

‘Did you try the incantation again?’

‘No.’

‘Where were you, Owl?’ Her voice is soft with relief, or worry, I can’t tell which. I try to keep my mind on the here and now but memories of last night keep crashing over me, one after the other. Frozen puddles. The bridge beneath the moon. Jack Frost, striding towards me over a sea of ice. The tree. Alberic.

‘Owl?’

‘What time is it?’

‘Six.’

I groan and fall back on to the bed. ‘Need more sleep . . .’

‘I’ll wake you in an hour. And Owl?’

‘Mmm?’

‘We’re going to talk, tonight. I’ll even buy the pizza and the ice cream.’

‘Mm. ’Kay’

She lets out a small huff of impatience and leaves me to it.

It’s warm in the flat this morning. I feel like I could lie here forever and let all the busy buzzing thoughts float around just outside of the part of my brain that cares.

And later there’ll be pizza and ice cream. A proper family evening. I mean, without my father, of course. Can’t imagine him sitting there with cheese all down his chin.

Mallory!

I roll over, grab my phone and look at it.

Oh, no. Three missed calls and two texts, all from Mallory last night.

Hey, can we talk? Know it’s late, been a rubbish evening . . .

Where are you?

I said I’d text her and I completely forgot.

So sorry,

I text, my tongue stuck between my teeth as I consider the lie I’m about to tell her. I can’t exactly describe all that happened in a text, can I?

Was revising, fell asleep. See you in a bit? Sorry it was awful Mall, big hug xxxx

I press ‘send’, a niggle in my belly from lying to my best friend. I’ll tell her everything, I decide. As soon as I’ve made up for not being around last night. I’ll get her to believe me, somehow.

The second I see Mallory, standing on the corner of the lane, leaning against the wall with her arms folded, I know it’s not going to be the day I tell her about my father.

To be honest, it’s kind of a relief. I walk up to her knowing that I don’t have to even try to explain everything that happened last night: how Jack looked, the power that came from him, how I ran away straight into Alberic. I still don’t know how I feel about it all. Jack’s not the father I dreamed of, that’s for sure. He wasn’t even like the man I pictured when Mum told her stories. She always said he was wild, I just didn’t know what that really looked like until last night.

So, I’m just going to lie through my teeth.

Normal is back on the table.

‘Hey, Mall,’ I say.

‘Hey, Owl.’ She sounds really distant and weary.

‘Sorry about last night.’

‘’S’all right,’ she says with a glance at me as we start walking. ‘You look terrible, you must be coming down with something.’

‘Yeah, probably,’ I snuffle. ‘But, anyway, do you want to talk about it?’

She doesn’t speak for what seems like a really long time, and I’m starting to feel a bit awkward, wondering if I should ask again or change the subject, when she finally opens up.

‘It was just so weird,’ she says. ‘The house was really quiet, and Mum was doing all the usual things – you know, making dinner, asking about school, moaning about work – but it all just felt wrong. Then Dad phoned me just after dinner, and she left the room because she knew it was him. And he was all forced-jolly about Uncle Simon’s spare room smelling of socks, and how he hoped I was going to do my homework . . . and I felt a bit like screaming then, because what does that really matter right now? Anyway, then Mum came in and she didn’t ask about him but she was acting all awkward, like she didn’t know what to say, so I told her about the socks thing and she made this comment about Uncle Simon always being a bit juvenile, as though that’s what Dad is being like . . .’ She trails off, shaking her head. ‘And I just felt so angry with them both for messing things up and then not even talking about the right things, y’know? Like it’s all business as usual and nobody’s got any feelings about anything!’

‘It sounds really awkward . . .’

‘Yeah. It was.’ She huffs and tucks her chin into her scarf. ‘It’s so cold today!’

‘Freezing,’ I say, though to be honest it hadn’t really occurred to me. Maybe it’s a Daughter-of-Jack-Frost thing? I pull my hat on anyway and hunch my shoulders a bit, scuffing my feet along the frozen pavement. After a moment Mallory threads her arm through mine and it feels good. Like she’s helping, even if she doesn’t know it.

I will tell her. Just not yet.