Every breath leaves Romy’s body and returns like a kick in the head.

‘I said you had bigger problems,’ Jay mumbles. She ignores him. Everyone ignores him. ‘I’ll go keep the twins upstairs.’

He scoots away. Romy stares at the TV, through the screen. She could be a head and nothing else. Her body doesn’t actually exist, a series of numb lumps crudely sewn together. Tug her and the stitches tear. Tug again, she’s ash.

‘Gran…’ she mouths, lifting a hand to her hair. It shakes like she’s back in withdrawal. ‘Gramps…I—Kira—’

The TV’s moving on. ‘No.’ She scrapes her nails from her hair to her face. ‘It’s wrong. They’re—no, they’re not.’

The remote, thrown on the sofa. Romy lunges for it. Flick: the next channel is The Big Bang Theory, the next a squealing cartoon, the next an old repeat of Top Gear, but on the next she finds it.

It’s a cheap thrills news show: DEVON SLAYING. A sleepy beach town, slapped with gore. The theme from Midsomer Murders wobbles into her head, a jaunty, countrified X-Files. Seventy-five-year-old Helen McFadden and seventy-nine-year-old James, found murdered on the living room sofa. Above them, an odd symbol, and a message telling some girls to come home. This was home to Dutch massacre suspect Kira McFadden, granddaughter, and her younger sister Rosemarie, so—

‘Turn it off.’ Callum spins around. Romy jumps; she’d forgotten he was there, forgotten Kira was there, slumping to the floor. Why is Kira on the floor? ‘Turn it off,’ he shouts, and it’s close to a snarl. The remote is snatched from her hand, the television silenced. ‘Jesus. Kira?’ He crouches beside her. She stares at the floor. ‘Kira, are you okay? Ah, that’s stupid.’ He rubs his chin. ‘Jesus.’

‘What’s going on?’ Carol sweeps in. Riding a rush of cold, stuffing a feather into her pocket, she tightens her dressing gown and fixes on Romy. ‘You’re upright. What happened?’ She glances at the floor, at Callum holding Kira. She doesn’t seem to know he’s there. ‘What happened, Romy?’

Earlier, Romy vented everything she could. This woman put knowledge in her head, of things she doesn’t remember, and in the process, unlocked what she does. Although she gets it, as though she’s watched a film and absorbed the facts, she doesn’t get how she gets it. It’s a distinct sense of déjà vu, like she never saw the film, though she must have.

Goddamn it all to hell, it’s confusing. Fucked. Romy’s heart thumps in her stomach. After she yelled at Carol in her overwhelmed tipsiness, and after Carol gave as good as she got, not to mention the Julia debacle, they should be at loggerheads, whatever those are…but as Romy looks at her, all she sees is worry, and all she has inside her is pain.

So much for the tipsiness. So much for the high.

‘Our grandparents…’ she chokes. Her voice catches, eating itself. ‘Died. They died.’

The word is a feeling, and the feeling is a fiend. Now she knows why Kira’s on the floor. Papillon of winter light, are we dead when we have died? Slapping a hand to the sofa back, Romy forces her lumps to move. They’ll give out. All of her will give out. Fleshy piles of horror, puddled on the rug. She needs to sit. To fall.

Around the table with its burnt-out candles, around the cat-scratched arms. Three little children, sitting on a bed. A killer came in, and now they’re—

‘…Dead.’ Callum forces his voice to work. Romy’s collapsed on the couch, and Kira’s starting to worry him. ‘They’ve been killed.’

Romy gasps, the gasp of impending tears. Kira flinches into him. So she is still in there. Thank God. ‘Sorry.’ He hugs her to him, far too tight. ‘That was—insensitive. Beyond insensitive. It was on the news. And Kira…’ He shakes his head. Even with last night’s paper, it’s unreal. Unbelievable.

Carol could be cut from stone. ‘And Kira?’

Callum rests his lips on Kira’s parting. ‘The police are looking for her. They’ve already connected it with Holland.’ He dips his forehead to her hair. ‘Maybe they were thinking she ran away to England, and now…’ He closes his eyes. ‘God, this escalated quickly.’

‘But they’re not looking for me,’ Romy whispers.

Slowly, Callum looks up and round. He can just about see her, her mouth half open, a girl abandoned and lost in the rain.

‘Should they be?’ Carol asks.

Streaked with tears and mascara, Romy’s eyes drift to his. One second, two, then the knowledge hits them both.

‘The guesthouse.’ He sees her realise, the whites of her eyes growing glittery and large. ‘They’re still sat there.’

Sat, propped, wooden dolls. The image knocks on his lungs with a thud. Three bodies, undiscovered, long past smelling of rot. Bloated, bloody, blue.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Callum murmurs. Romy coughs a sob.

‘My god.’ Heavy and slumping, Carol leans on the doorframe. The old wood creaks. ‘Kira did tell me. I’m…I’m so sorry.’ She pinches the bridge of her nose. ‘I know that’s not enough, but I am.’

Seconds pass, five, ten; so many that Callum starts to wonder how much her next words will be forced. ‘You can…’ she begins. Pursing her lips, she gestures limply, resting her head on the wood. ‘You can stay. Here.’ She looks as though she’s lost a fight to win a wider war. ‘For as long as it’s safe for the children. On the condition that nothing’—she eyes Romy, biting, sharp—‘like this morning happens again. I’ll try and help as much as I can, because my god, you’re in a mess, but I can’t endanger them. None of this is fair on you—I’d call it downright evil—but the fallout’—she looks around deliberately, up to the ceiling and back—‘is even less fair on them.’

She’s just as insensitive as he is. Wrapped around Kira, Callum tenses. My god, you’re in a mess.

But Kira, switching back on, whispers, ‘Thank you.’

She straightens up in his arms. ‘We’d be wrong to ask for more. And we’ll leave as soon as we’ve got a plan.’ Pulling away, she climbs to her feet. Her look is flat, a waifish thing, pared and paled from 3D to two. ‘It must have been the huldra.’

No question, no spark. The dullness makes him ache. ‘I don’t see how it could have been.’ Standing, Callum glances at the couch. Romy is staring through the cat on the carpet, wilted with silent tears. ‘The tree means Whiteland, but it can’t have been the huldra.’ Edgy and hopeful, he looks to Carol. ‘Unless she’s kept some kind of…’

He waves a hand. He’d rather not say magic.

Carol folds her arms. ‘That depends on why you’re asking.’ She watches him closely, picking him apart. He tries to stay blank, but his poker face is dross. ‘Until this world takes over, which tends to happen fast, a small amount of energy will linger.’ She keeps her probing gaze on his. ‘Why?’

Kira turns her flatness toward him. She doesn’t need to echo his mother; the question brushes his cheek.

On the sofa, Romy drags in a sniff. Callum puts a hand on her shoulder. It shudders. This is the part they’ve kept to themselves.

‘Because…’ Callum ducks his head. He’s worse than Jay with negative news; if Carol hadn’t, would he have brought up Lena? Now? Ever? ‘Because the huldra was in Montreux.’

Beside him, Kira stills.

The silence is ringing. It feels like gravity. ‘When?’ Carol asks.

Callum keeps his eyes on the ground. A patch of shoe-print snow is melting, others crusting the rugs. ‘Yesterday,’ he says. ‘Me and Romy ran from it. Her. Him. God knows. It…’ He scratches his head. The question on his cheek has turned piercing. ‘It met Romy and faked being me, just like it faked being Romy. If it was here last night, then it can’t have been in Devon.’ He frowns. ‘I’m assuming.’

The leaky fridge drips. Romy sniffs, coughs, and swallows. A floorboard creaks upstairs.

Finally, Carol shakes her head. ‘It can’t.’ She rubs her temple. ‘But I wish you’d said sooner. I have to pass on that the huldra’s come back.’

Now the roaring has died, Kira’s mind is a sheet. ‘If it’s back,’ she murmurs, ‘someone else was in England.’ Soft. Muted. Dull. ‘Something.’

Slow and weighted, Carol nods. ‘It can’t be in two places at once.’ She rubs her mouth, staring off. ‘And it can’t travel faster than anyone else. What it does’—the skin between her eyebrows wrinkles—‘is continue to manipulate. If you look it in the eye, you’ll end up controlled. It actually works better out here, because no one knows to be suspicious. Ticket collectors, men in bars, whoever the huldra needs.’

Callum shifts. ‘Does it wear off?’

‘Yes.’ Carol pushes away from the doorframe. ‘As does the rest of it. For now, it can appear how it likes, and it’s strong. Not inhumanly strong, but stronger than you’d think.’ Eyeing them all, she starts up the stairs. ‘I need to check on the children. I was hard on Julia, and I’ve not seen the boys, but what I will say’—she pauses at the top—‘is that the huldra is finding you far too fast. Someone, or something, must be helping it.’ She clinks through the beaded curtain and away. ‘Something the Whispers don’t know about.’

Something inside Whiteland.

The words don’t have to be spoken. They should be a volcano, but Kira feels nothing. They’re ripples on the surface, far from the depths. They could be about a traffic jam, or snow.

The huldra’s still here; it can’t have killed her grandparents.

Her grandparents are dead.

The ocean depths beckon, but she forged a submarine. Locked the doors, bolted the hatches, barrelled through the goggling life. It roared too much, and she shut it out.

‘This thing,’ Romy says thickly from the couch. Turning around, she swipes at her eyes. ‘If it can’t be in two places at once, and can’t get anywhere faster than us’—she wipes her nose, too, her hand smeared black—‘how did it get to both Harvey’s and Kira’s?’ She clenches her fists on the back of the couch. Teethmarks dent her lower lip. ‘The two things happened at the same time. How the hell did it manage?’

‘It didn’t.’ Kira’s mouth precedes her thoughts. ‘Something else left Whiteland, too.’

Silence. She stares through Romy. Romy stares through her. Suddenly, nothing else can be true: on New Year’s Eve, two things escaped.

Romy’s swollen eyes skitter upstairs. This doesn’t need to be spoken, either; either Carol doesn’t know, or won’t tell them.

‘So something escaped’—Callum severs their look—‘and is ordering you to come home.’ He drops to the armchair with a whump. ‘Great. Something murderous, at that.’

Kira lowers herself to the sofa by her sister. ‘We’re assuming it meant us?’ she says, unable to muster a tone. Stare at something, anything. Purple penguin socks, given to Romy by Great-Aunt Moll, who thought she was still eleven. The toes are holey.

It’s not enough. Glazed, dazed, Kira looks around. Beside the toes, a wintry cushion, of bright-lit trees and an Arctic fox. The chalet is stuffy, the curtains closed. Sunlight fights to enter, caught and mottled by the fabric’s hue. The room is bathed in blood-light. Fitting.

The world can be revolting, but it can also be pretty as hell.

Kira sags into the couch. How was that not years ago?

‘It must mean us,’ Romy croaks. Kira looks across at her. How was it not years ago that they were furious? How much everything pales. ‘It’s our house. Our grandparents. One day after the next. And that symbol.’ She frowns. ‘I’ve seen it.’

Callum catches Kira’s eye. ‘In Whiteland,’ he says.

Reconciling, Kira adds. Romy’s knowledge, memory, life.

‘Yeah.’ Still frowning, vacant, Romy scratches her cheek. ‘Yeah. It’s too much of a coincidence. God, what do we sound like?’

Bitterly smiting puzzlement, her cry is a thunderbolt. Kira flinches.

‘Our grandparents are dead.’ Throwing her arms up, Romy lets them slap. ‘Dead, Kira.’ Her eyes are raw. ‘Sure, most of the time we wished they’d go away, but seriously? We’re sat here wondering what it means for us? Shouldn’t we be’—she slashes her hands through the air—‘doing something for them? Planning the funeral, talking to family? Dad’s family, I guess, which makes so much more sense now. We should at least be lying in the dark.’ She flumps back into the sofa. ‘Mourning. Screaming. Getting drunk.’

‘I’m wanted in two countries, Romy.’ Every word weighs more than her conscience. Kira bites both sides of her cheeks. Her throat is hot. Stay numb. Stay dull.

Our minds will end up scarier.

‘She can’t call anyone,’ Callum says quietly. ‘Or message them. They’ll find you. Both of you.’

The heat scorches, from her throat to her eyes. Kira fixes on Callum’s makeshift bed, and pushes down the roar. Numb. Dull. Flatline.

‘It’s not just about death,’ she says, lifting her gaze back up. Numb. Dull. Flatline. Cold. ‘If it was, we would be being callous, but it’s not. This is aimed at us. It’s about us. We need to figure it out.’

The stairs creak. Kira glances round. Karl and Julia tiptoe down, slipping into the kitchen.

‘My brain hurts too much,’ Romy mumbles, hiding her face in the couch. ‘Let me grieve. Let me think. I’m overheating.’

‘You can’t.’ Callum’s impatience is terse.

Kira shoots him a look. ‘I’m sorry, Romy. He means we don’t have time.’ She lowers her voice to a hush. ‘If we don’t work out what’s going on, whatever comes next could be worse. It’s already going to get worse, once the police find the guesthouse and link it to you. They’ll link you to Devon, and come full circle.’

Romy groans, but sits up. ‘It still sounds selfish.’

Kira cuts her an appealing look. ‘It’s not.’ Is it? ‘It’s really not. Once the police link it all up, they’ll be looking like crazy for us both. If we drop everything to cry…’ She sets her jaw, and swallows. Helen and James McFadden. ‘I mean,’ she says woollily, ‘if we don’t try to…’

Getting up, Callum sighs. ‘It’s been done for you to see.’ He wedges himself on the couch beside her, one arm pulling her in. Swallowing the burning, Kira lets him. ‘For us to see. Whoever.’ He drops his own voice. ‘Maybe something worse will come, but I don’t think we’ll get hurt. At least not by the huldra.’

Kira clears her clogged-up throat. ‘It could have killed us all by now.’

‘Exactly.’ Callum taps Kira’s arm, one, two, staccato. ‘And the other thing, if there is another thing, has been close to Romy. It’s some kind of game.’

Romy tugs on a rip in her jeans. ‘Amazing.’

‘Not really.’ Callum taps Kira again. ‘You know how Whiteland toyed with us?’ Beneath his jaw, she nods. ‘That’s what this feels like. Doesn’t it? Being taunted, like a sadist with a dog. Poke it, see what it does.’

‘Poke it again, and watch it dance.’ Romy jabs her knee with a savage finger.

Humourless, Callum huffs. ‘Yeah.’ He rests his chin on Kira’s head. ‘The problem is not knowing why. Other than the huldra, and whatever wants you to come home, the rest of us are in the dark. The black hole kind, too, not some poxy midnight.’

‘Fiona.’

Callum glances up, as if expecting someone new. ‘The huldra,’ Kira clarifies, sitting up to shift around. ‘From now on, she’s Fiona. All I heard in Whiteland was huldra. Huldra, huldra, huldra, so this one needs a name. Fiona was the first one that came into my head.’

Romy snorts. ‘Fits with Shrek and Donkey.’

She catches Callum’s eye. Something twists in Kira’s chest.

Callum smirks, fleeting. ‘Fiona it is.’

‘And the other thing, assuming there is one?’ Romy crooks her fingers, air-quoting. ‘It can’t just be “the thing.”’

This time, she catches Kira’s eye. Peter, she mouths.

Kira almost smiles.

‘Liam?’ Callum suggests. ‘No.’ He clicks his fingers. ‘Milo. When has a good guy ever been a Milo?’

‘In the Tweenies,’ Karl pronounces, ghosting in from the kitchen. Scooping up the remote, he settles himself on the floor.

Callum raises his eyebrows. ‘Were you going to ask?’

‘I did.’ Karl lays his waffle beside him. ‘Carol said we could watch TV.’

Rudely shaken from its slumber, Kira’s stomach groans. The stodgy waffle is coated with sugar, smelling of syrupy heaven like nothing has before. Romy’s eyes latch on to it, too.

‘She also said’—Karl starts to gobble—‘to tell you that the bathroom’s free. And to feed Diego. He’s hiding upstairs.’

Callum cocks his head. ‘So basically, Mum wants us out of the way.’ He sniffs his shirt. ‘And while we’re at it, can we please stop smelling rank.’ He casts his eyes heavenwards. ‘Charmant. Trop sympa.’

‘They still show the Tweenies?’ Romy asks.

The Tweenies. Milo. Kira watches Julia, edging in, scuffing along in her slippers. How much more did they hear?

‘Yes.’ Darting puffy eyes at Romy, Julia shuffles around the couch. ‘On throwback thursdays.’ She presses down on Kira’s thighs. ‘All they play is old stuff, like Teletubbies, and Bagpuss.’ She tips forward for a clumsy hug, yanking Kira’s neck. ‘Thank you.’

The breath is barely there. Surprised, Kira strokes her back, gently kissing her temple. ‘You’re welcome,’ she whispers.

Julia squirms back.

‘Ahem.’ Callum pointedly looks between them. Sitting on the rug by Kira’s feet, Julia starts on her waffle.

Kira blinks at Callum. ‘What? I comforted her well.’

‘No, no, leave it on that.’ Romy nudges Karl with her foot. To Kira’s relief, Callum’s focus diverts. Scowling, Karl obliges. ‘Thanks.’ Romy nudges him again. ‘We’ll watch princess Barbies later.’

‘Hey!’ Karl exclaims, batting at her socks. The holey penguins wriggle. ‘I don’t want princess Barbies. I just didn’t want this.’

It’s something they used to love as kids, robots and dynamite. Callum gets up with a murmur of a shower, and Kira shuts her eyes. TV. Teasing. Made-up names. What are they doing? All of them? Romy, bonding, in her cynical way, over an old cartoon. She, Kira, idly listening. It’s trivial, insincere. Achingly wrong.

Which was part of Romy’s point. Then, though, they were trying to think, to figure everything out; now, normality is slinking back, as if tragedy isn’t a room. Four walls, encroaching. Ready to squash them all like bugs.

Denial. Survival. Shock. Or all three?

Romy laughs, and that makes it worse. When Kira left in August, Romy was improving, but now…Kira rubs her eyes. Something isn’t sitting how it should. The drinking, erraticism, irresponsibility. She’s lighter than she used to be, no sullen, spiteful zombie, but something isn’t right. She’s up and down, down and up.

Kira lets suspicion pool. She’s seen it all before.

She rubs her eyes again, with the heels of her hands. Romy. Fiona. Julia. Callum. She’ll work it out. She’ll work it all out.

And she damn well won’t come home.