‘What?’ Kira clutches Jay to her, crushing him on instinct. Jay grunts. ‘That’s not—what?’

She meant to be venomous, spitting like before. She means to, but the shock won’t let her. She sounds the way she imagines they craved: breathy, stunned, and bested. ‘That can’t—I…’ She flounders, swallows, her mouth half-open. ‘I saw him die.’

You did, the Whispers croon. They’re drifting back into Carol’s room, whipping their wind to a moan through the wall. And yet, he’s alive.

The chalet creaks. The wind lifts to a dramatised keen, throbbing, heady, hot. Kira could be underwater, a balloon outside her mind. Jay groans. A vein thumps in her temple. She plants her feet to stay upright. The wind moans. The Whispers roar. She could pass out, left by gravity, hit by unseen energy blasts. The pressure is a vice.

With a keening crescendo, everything drops.

The air leaves Kira’s lungs in a puff, and she sags. In her arms, Jay slumps. The chalet settles around them.

The super sinks to the natural, and Whiteland slinks away.

‘Jay!’ The door slams open, and Carol flies in. Kira lets her snatch him. Her father’s alive?

Her ears ring. She barely dares to think the words, to inch around the concept. The room around her blurs. If he’s alive, where’s he been? And why would Carol not say?

Time to come home, girls.

Tears barrel up her throat. Whirling around, Kira shoulders past Romy, colliding with Callum in her haste to leave. Jay’s room is angular. The walls are too close. Too full of people, too small. Too warm.

‘Kira!’ Romy grasps her arm, but Kira jerks away. Down the stairs. She has to go. Her lungs are crushed, yet again, collapsing after a crash. Her head is a whine in a tunnel. Dad.

It’s a joke. It has to be. Kira stumbles down the creaking stairs. The Whispers must be lying.

It hits her like a slamming door, shoved by a gust of wind. Staggering, she reaches for the wall. The house in Devon. Mathew alive. Gran and Gramps dead. Time to come home, girls.

He’s the other thing that’s escaped. He’s Milo.

No, no, no, no, no. Anxiety billows up inside her, and she pushes off the wall. Thoughts upon thoughts upon thoughts rattle round. He’s not. He can’t be.

‘Is Jay okay?’

Kira’s senses rush back. She’s stumbled into the living room. Karl and Julia blink from the couch. Why?

She’s the adult. Kira forces her breath. Sharp bursts are not enough: In, two, three, four. Out, two, three, four. She’s the adult, and after the bedlam, the twins need reassurance.

‘Yes,’ she manages, pushing her hair back. Heavy and wet, it drags her down, in curtains of orange blossom. ‘He’s okay, but he…’

She stalls. Julia bites her thumb. Karl’s eyes are moons. How is she the adult? In the last few days, she’s had less control than in the previous nineteen years.

‘He had a horrible nightmare,’ she finishes, in her best preschool voice. Behind her, Romy thumps down the stairs. ‘I think you should give him a hug.’

With a nod, Romy hops out of the way. ‘He fell asleep at his computer,’ she says. ‘And he didn’t think he’d wake up. It made him start screaming.’ She rubs her arms with a Scooby-Doo shudder. ‘You’ve both had horrible nightmares, right?’

Fervently, Julia nods. A little more cautious, Karl does the same.

‘Right.’ Kira offers Romy a small, grateful smile. ‘Everyone has. If you remember the worst dream you’ve ever had, the creepiest, scariest stuff, you’ll know how scared he is.’ Catching Romy’s eye, she tilts her chin toward the stairs. ‘He’ll appreciate the hug.’

Scrambling to her feet, Julia thunders up the stairs in a one-girl stampede. Karl casts Kira a sceptical look, but obeys. Kira’s chest twinges. He knows it’s a lie, and not a very good one. It doesn’t explain the slamming doors, or the wind inside the chalet, but the truth is more than a nightmare. The truth takes place in the day.

Upstairs, voices rise and fall. The television chirps to Tom and Jerry. Tom is doing his damnedest to lure Jerry out, and with a prick of disbelief, Kira shakes her head.

‘You’re a child charmer,’ Romy remarks, placing a hand on her hip. Kira turns. Romy’s earlier fury is muted, but its afterglow is clear, setting her face in guarded jags as they meet each other’s eyes. ‘What—’

Looking away, she opens her mouth, slowly letting it close. Her expression dulls and tenses.

‘What happened up there?’ The words are stilted. A decision seems to settle. ‘Are you…’ She stares through the banister. Her lips pucker, work, and smooth. Kira suppresses a hangdog grimace. Romy’s trying so hard. ‘Are you okay?’

She could sail in on a riptide of sorrys. She could, and maybe she should, but Romy needs to know. ‘No.’ Kira steps toward the couch, closer to Tom and Jerry. Her voice barely touches her lips. ‘But not because of that. Well, kind of. What happened was the Whispers’ fault. They’re—’

‘The ones that sucked up Mum.’

Kira blinks.

‘I know, right?’ Keeping the words low, Romy spreads a sarcastic hand. ‘My new knowledge has no bounds. The Whispers, the ones that watchers talk to. Carry on.’ She shifts her weight.

Kira shifts, too, toying less than idly with the loops on her jeans. Romy is cutting her eyes around the room, to the Buddha, the raquettes, anywhere but her. Kira twists her mouth. She can hardly blame her.

‘I think that Jay was eavesdropping.’ She lowers her voice to a breath. ‘The Whispers were talking to Carol, heard him listening, and thought they’d teach him a lesson.’

‘A lesson?’

‘Yes.’ A door creaks on the landing, and Kira glances up. Hurry. ‘That seems to be what they do. Just before they left, though, they said something to me.’

Romy folds her arms. ‘Like what?’

Kira’s attention flicks to the TV. Fooled and tricked, Jerry is trapped, shut in an airless box. She chews on her cheek. To repeat it means validation, and validation means… ‘That Dad’s alive.’ She drops her eyes. The words feel more like stolen breaths than things she’s chosen to say. ‘He’s alive, and Carol knew.’

Tom forgot to weight the box; Jerry is peeking out. Kira tweaks her belt loops hard.

‘Dad’s alive,’ Romy repeats. Slowly, Kira looks up. Her sister’s face is very still. ‘How?’

Kira tugs on the loops. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Do you believe them? The Whispers?’

Pinching, harder. ‘I don’t—’

‘Actually, it doesn’t matter.’ Romy blinks, swinging her gaze to Kira’s. ‘I think we should leave. Now.’

Pausing mid-tug, Kira frowns. This was not the response she expected. ‘You do?’

Romy nods, twice. ‘Yes.’ Her stance hardens to confidence. ‘If she’s keeping things like that from us, I don’t want to stay. Our crazy deadly peril doesn’t hang around for liars.’

Liars. The word stings. Kira tucks it away. ‘You believe the Whispers, then? About Dad?’

Romy regards her evenly. ‘Is our crazy deadly peril worth the risk?’

Silence. Then, ‘No.’

All of a sudden, the way is clear. She’d been wondering since liquor-gate if maybe they should leave; when she made this plan, she hadn’t known about the twins, the police weren’t after her, and her grandparents hadn’t been killed. It’s been less than a day, yet here they are, storm-blown and breathless; she can’t keep this family boxed in her and Romy’s chaos.

And if they can’t be sure that Carol is honest, about Whiteland, the police, their dad…

‘Let’s go.’ Kira’s voice is hushed but firm. ‘While we’re alone, and—’

Up the mountain, the train starts to whine. Romy’s eyes widen. ‘And while the train’s coming,’ she says. ‘Holy—go!’

She kicks into action. Kira follows instantly, boots on, coat on, cracking open the door. Collecting her bags, her last look lingers. She’ll have to jettison the clothes upstairs, but other than that, she has everything.

Go.

Go, before she changes her mind. Before Callum comes down, to catch them sneaking off. Before the guilt can hit.

She’d feel worse if she stayed.

Romy is almost at the ice-crusted arch. Muffled curses puff in her wake, and Kira slides down after her. Sun-slick snow, glittering, blinding. Ice shards spray her ankles. Three feet to the hedge. Two.

‘Hell!’ Romy slips, sprawling. Grabbing the hedge, she scrabbles back up, slapping the snow from her legs. ‘We’re so…’

Kira skids to her side, colliding with her shoulder. The train is still whining…

…Straight on by.

‘No!’ Spilling through the arch, Romy lurches down the stepping stones. ‘We’re getting on! Hey! Stop, on my—’

‘Stop!’ Kira echoes, shouting over “life.” She hoists up her bags, waving like a maniac.

The power lines crackle. A chaffinch calls. The trundling turtle trundles away.

‘Sacrilegious wildebeest!’ Romy runs after it, past the hut to the platform’s end. She slips on a patch of ice, throwing out her arms, but it makes no difference; down the mountain, the whining fades. ‘Dammit.’

With a gusting sigh, she folds like a camel, sitting where she stands by the hotel fence. Ditching her bags in a snowdrift, Kira does the same. Dammit. Dammit, dammit, dammit. Their fleeting action is scuppered…and by trying to leave without a word, they’ve scuppered things even more.

‘We’—Kira drops her head to her hands—‘are the worst runaways.’

Romy snorts. ‘It’s not like there’s a handbook.’ Plucking at the snow, she flicks it at the hut. ‘“How to flee when you’re framed for murder.”’ She glowers as her missiles ricochet back. ‘“How to sneak out, perfect your timing, catch your connections, and never get caught.”’

‘We’ve exhausted our quota for that.’ Kira drags her knees to her chest. She shouldn’t have sat in the snow; Callum’s right. Her clothes are the absolute worst. The jeans skim her ankles, and the skin there is pink. ‘It’d be a cliché to achieve it again. Unless we walk, we’re stuck for an hour.’ She pauses for the shortest of seconds, then, ‘Romy, what are you on?’

Romy’s shoulders draw in like the strings of a corset. ‘No time like the present, is it?’ She shakes her head at the snow. ‘What are you on? You’re Wonder Woman. Or, I don’t know, Buffy.’

‘Krav Maga since the summer. Your turn.’ Kira tilts her head. ‘You know what you said about peril and liars? I know this isn’t the best time, and I know I’m one of those liars, but I’m also your sister.’ She shuffles closer. Romy tenses. ‘If I know, you don’t need to hide it. I owe you a hell of a lot, and by that I mean turning on Wonder Woman.’ She pauses. ‘Or Buffy.’

Romy looks at her under her lashes. ‘Turning on Wonder Woman?’

Kira graces this with silence, and for a while, that’s all there is. The exuberant chaffinch, chirruping away. The drone of a plane. The whump of snow falling from a branch.

‘Same as before.’ Romy finally sighs. Kira’s insides deflate. One dejected balloon that she’s right, one for relief it isn’t worse. ‘But now I have a hip flask.’

‘Filled with…?’

‘Red Label.’ Romy tosses a shard of ice at the hut. ‘Blame Ryan for that. The rest is the curse of ADHD. Before they diagnosed me, all I did was scavenge.’

Kira summons a tiny smile. ‘You never had ADHD.’ She shuffles nearer through the snow, resting her head on Romy’s. Her chest fills with air again. They’re never this close. ‘But I’ll blame the diagnosis. Happy to, in fact.’

Shifting a little, Romy’s corset draws tighter. Is she pushing it? The closeness? Her sister has every right to reject her.

‘Goddamn doctors,’ Romy mutters. With a sigh, and another, she loosens. Kira’s chest does, too. ‘Back then, they hit me with anything. “Hey, your parents disappeared, you have this.”’ She leans into Kira, an inch, a tad. ‘“And this. Would you like some drugs? Oh, you’ve got history with drugs? Catch ’em all.” You’—she taps Kira’s nose—‘got off lightly. Three months of anxiety meds, when you should have been on them for six. What a scam.’

Smiling, Kira removes the finger. ‘Personally, I see it as less of a scam and more of a lucky break. Cocktails aren’t my thing. And’—she nudges Romy with her shoulder—‘at least they didn’t find issues with my joints and put me on pills for arthritis.’ Snow showers Kira’s head, and she flinches. ‘Hey! I only speak the truth!’

‘Exactly.’ Romy snaps out finger guns. ‘God, they screwed around so much. I ended up prophetic.’ She flattens invisible wallpaper, smoothing the air with her hands. ‘The self-fulfilling kind. Roll up, roll up, I’m feeling ADHD-positive and in need of their drug cocktail. Go science.’

Rueful, Kira huffs. ‘They were idiots to give you it. Actually, I thought they’d stopped.’ She studies the side of Romy’s head, and pauses. Further away, the chaffinch peeps. ‘I thought you’d stopped.’

‘Mmm.’ Romy pulls a face. Extending her legs, she toys with the rip in the knee of her jeans. ‘I had, which is why I said blame Ryan. Once he went supernova, I didn’t know what to do. It took me too long to get rid of him, and in the meantime…’

She lifts her shoulders: see for yourself. Kira stares. ‘So all of that’s true?’ She sits up straighter, sniffing the air. From the hotel drifts a cheesy aroma, decadent and dense. ‘The housewife, chauvinistic, 1950s switch?’

Romy’s mouth pops open. ‘How do you know about that?’ She plucks at Kira’s clothes. ‘Are you magic, too? Is it in here? That’d be the icing on the cake, that would.’

With a laugh, Kira wriggles away. ‘No. You know the huldra—Fiona—posed as you?’

One, two, click. ‘Ah.’ Romy ducks her chin to her chest, and shudders. ‘Aha. Ho. Creepy.’

Jarred, Kira blinks. Aha, ho, creepy? Considering her fury, this is close to uncanny.

Is it really, though? Or is it more Romy than ever? Shutters down, curtains drawn, every internal bottle corked. It’s how she deals with the world and every dog it’s ever owned.

‘Creepy’s one word for it,’ Kira says.

‘Yep.’ Romy draws her chin back up. ‘But it means I don’t have to explain it.’

Kira huffs. ‘Every cloud.’

‘Exactly.’ Romy waves a hand. ‘So yeah. I started defying Ryan, going out more, binging like I used to, and after a while I thought hey, why not renew my prescription? The doctor didn’t even question it.’ She shakes her head. ‘No wonder the country’s going to hell. The whiskey, okay, I’m not really trying, but I’m slowly coming off the Dexedrine.’

She clicks her finger guns again, as if to say, I’ve got you there. ‘I’m used to the effects, so it’s not really worth it. Doesn’t last long, and isn’t fulfilling.’ She nudges Kira, winking with a grin. ‘A bit like Peter, eh?’

Kira’s insides squirm. ‘Thanks for the reminder.’

‘Anytime.’ The grin turns to amazement. ‘God, what are we?’ She spreads her arms wide. ‘Everything’s light-years on from screwed, and I’m joking about addictions and sex.’ She drops her arms to the snow with a slap. ‘Wow. What are we doing?’

Here it is, again. ‘Coping.’ Kira wriggles around with a frown. Her legs are bitten with cold, and she’s lost all feeling in her butt. To top it all off, her hair is freezing. ‘Denying. Putting our hands over our ears. Something tempting but unhelpful.’ She tilts her head, innocent. ‘A bit like your addictions.’

Romy flicks her arm. ‘Oh, what a genius. I—who are you?’

Her voice pogoes. Kira looks round. Watching behind the hotel fence is the wild woman from the train.

Kira chills even more. From the way she stands, with her feet firmly planted, she should be shrouded in mist, or wearing a cavernous hood. The Exorcist, or Assassin’s Creed. As it is, she’s in combat boots, psychedelic leggings, and a cavernous jumper, and with her black Brave hair flying, she tenses and vaults the fence.

If she’d been gunning for murder, they’d both be dead. The newcomer sits beside them, cross-legged on the tiny platform, before Kira feels more than surprise. Mouth open, Romy stares.

‘I was trying to look threaten.’ The woman leans back on her hands, angling her curiosity toward them. ‘Did it work? Would work more if…’ She gestures at the cobalt sky. ‘Blue not scary.’

Now, Kira stares, too. What planet is this person from?

Romy points a finger. ‘I recognise you.’

The finger starts to wag. Kira curls her toes in her shoes. Please don’t let this be the grand return of nervous cockiness. She could be an assassin.

She could be Fiona.

Kira shoulders this away. If they think like that, they’ll never trust anyone.

‘You worked at the hotel.’ Romy glances behind her, back in its direction. Clearly, she doesn’t have the same reservations. ‘When it wasn’t some weird dorm.’

The young woman shrugs. ‘I still do. But yes, is not hotel now.’ She waves a blind hand at it. ‘Is…’ She cocks her head to one side. ‘For sleeping. For school. My mother got old and grumpy and sold. We live in house behind it. She one of cooks there, I help with organisation and kids. I know you, too.’ She settles a flat black gaze on them, irony sparking like a torch in a tunnel. ‘You made madness, then disappear.’

Romy grimaces at Kira. ‘Thanks for the reminder.’

One, two, click. Kira’s stomach drops. It’s surreal no longer hoarding secrets; Romy remembers everything.

Including her crooked part. How is she possibly coping? A sick taste coats Kira’s tongue. How is Romy dealing with the violence, with the ghost that lodged in her head? With losing control, causing chaos, snapping their dad’s—

Their dad. The waitress. ‘Our father always talked to you in German,’ Kira realises, scooping up the distraction where it lands in her lap. Her heart was drooping to her useless shoes: their dad. Alive? ‘He never remembered you were Turkish. You’re…’ She struggles for a second. ‘Tanya?’

The young woman moves her head, side to side. ‘Talie.’ She readjusts her glasses, black-framed and thick. ‘I don’t remember your names, but not a problem. I help.’ She leans forward rapidly, linking her fingers on her boots. ‘You’re in trouble. Me and my mother, we know. If we didn’t hear shouting today, or see internet, we still know. We feel.’

Romy’s eyebrows fly. ‘You feel?’

Shivering, Kira hugs her torso. This damn, accursed cold. ‘What do you mean, you feel?’ She pauses. It’s going to sound stupid, but this tired, and this cold, there’s no better question. ‘Are you psychic?’

Romy scoffs. ‘That’s all we need.’

‘No, seriously.’ Kira turns to her, defensive. Of course she sounded stupid; whether or not it’s true, it sounds like a question from a dated kids’ show. ‘I haven’t had the time to tell you, but there’s a…’ She flicks her fingers in the air. ‘A kind of psychic bug going round, which makes me not sound crazy. I’ll explain it later.’

Romy’s eyebrows fly higher. ‘Jesus Christ, you’d better.’

Kira turns back to Talie. ‘Are you, then? Psychic?’

Talie’s curious expression returns, unfurling like flower petals warming in the dawn. ‘There are more things than watchers in this village, girls.’ She taps her nose, a film noir conspirator. ‘Did you never get bedtime stories? No.’ Her face flits with shame. ‘You grow up with these things, you forget others know some. Or none. My mother—you remember?’

Lowering her eyes, Kira nods, her chest pulling tight. How could she forget? They terrorised Hazal’s hotel, triggered her wrath, and in return, received face-melting alcohol and an extension of their stay. She’s more than flitting with shame.

‘Yes.’ Talie nods. ‘She remember you, too.’ Her eyebrows arc for the briefest moment. A frisson of heat flushes Kira’s cheeks. Shame, shame, shame. ‘Anyway, my parents are Chlause. They hide between worlds near Whiteland. The best word…’ She screws up her face. ‘Traitor. No. Devil? No.’

‘This is sounding good,’ Romy mutters.

‘Outcast!’ Talie claps her hands. The reverb echoes off the hut, off the mountains, off the snow. Kira winces. ‘Yes. Outcast. Not quite Whiteland, not quite real. Human, but not all. How, why, someone probably tell you. Is long history. Anyway—’

‘Wait.’ Romy holds up her hands. ‘You’ve lost me.’ She glances at Kira. Kira shrugs, turning her mouth down. ‘Us,’ Romy clarifies. ‘You’ve lost us. Klause? Whiteland outcasts? Whiteland has outcasts? I thought it was, you know’—she makes a thinking gesture with her hands—‘literally do or die.’

Talie lifts one shoulder. ‘Every place has outcasts,’ she says, as if this should be plain. ‘This world, that world. Chlause are both, and none, for a long time. Over the world, too; wherever Whiteland is, they are. And you say it wrong.’

She lets out an oddly feline hiss. Kira flinches back. ‘What?’

‘Ch.’ Talie hisses again. ‘See? Chlause. They are your help. Me and my mother, we talk, after seeing the trouble. Like that, seeing, I think you say psychic. Feelings, dreams, knowing. We don’t know, and then boom!’

She throws up her hands. Kira flinches again. Something about this girl is strange, melodramatic, vaudeville. As overdone as the hiss.

‘Boom,’ Romy repeats flatly.

‘Yes.’ Talie drops her hands. ‘Then we know, like we always did. Anyway, we talk, and we think: if more trouble comes to you, you go to Urnäsch.’ She pushes her glasses up her nose. ‘Hidden place, for Chlause. They can hide you, too.’

A quick silence falls. The explanation appears to be over, and Kira stares, at a loss for a response. Talie looks pleased with herself; she could be a caricature of satisfaction, tapping one boot with a square-cut nail and staring out at the mountains. Are they missing something vital?

The silence stretches on. ‘Did you know you see Mont Blanc from here?’ Talie nods at the powdered range above the lake. Romy turns. Kira doesn’t. She did know that, and this all feels off.

‘Why would you want to help us?’ she asks. ‘I don’t mean to be rude, but you’re right. We’re in trouble, and we don’t know who to trust.’

Romy nods. ‘Also, why would the Chlause help us?’

‘And,’ Kira adds, ‘if they’re hidden, how do we find…’ She searches for the other name, but it’s gone. Lamely, she finishes, ‘Them?’

In an accurate imitation of Romy, Talie wags a finger. ‘Too many questions.’ She leans forward again. ‘I am not interview. I help because you do nothing wrong. They help because you are close to outcast. And you find them near the forest.’ She tips her head back. A lone crow coasts above the station hut. ‘Bad weather coming.’

She points at it. Romy doesn’t look. ‘How do we find the Chlause?’

Talie eyes her shrewdly. ‘Patience.’ She nods toward the road. ‘When it’s dark, walk straight from car park. Walk past the chairlift, walk, walk, all the way to a chalet. Almost black, very old. Stop there. Wait there.’ In one swift movement, she pushes up to standing. ‘They find you, take you, and hide you.’

‘Wait.’ Romy scrabbles from the snow to her feet. She’s just about taller than Talie’s solid confidence, but somehow, she’s frailer, small. ‘Kira’s right; you could be anyone. You could be Fiona. The huldra,’ she amends. Talie settles into a look of amusement. ‘We named her Fiona. Short, not very interesting story.’ She folds her arms. ‘Not to sound cliché, of course, but how do we know we can trust you?’

Talie glances behind her. Apart from them, the village is quiet, as bright as a Christmas snow globe. ‘In one minute’—she swivels back—‘Callum come down the garden.’

Guilt unspools in Kira’s gut. Romy merely scoffs. ‘That’s easy.’ She shifts her weight to one hip. ‘And even if it wasn’t, it doesn’t count as trust.’ She jabs her chin. ‘What’s next?’

Talie laughs, a short bark. ‘Okay.’ She mirrors Romy’s stance. ‘Then this: three days ago, your father left Whiteland.’ She regards them both evenly. ‘With Fiona. He is alive, and he is bewitched. You say this? I like it. Bewitched. In a spell. That is not psychic, but it is trust. Carol told my mother. Now, I need to go.’

As sharply as she arrived, Talie turns and walks away. ‘Kids come back today,’ she says, vaulting over the fence. ‘Goodbye.’

She lets herself in through a side door. Kira frowns in her wake.

Romy huffs. ‘Well she,’ she says, ‘was what I call weird.’