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“I didn’t say it was true, just that there’s a rhyme,” Bryony replied. “When kids are born in town with black eyes, Estoners call them Harrow’s children, but they’re just Vaughan kids. Love children. My babysitter had black eyes like you. She vanished,but only because she split the second she turned eighteen. I think she’s waitressing in LA.”

“So it isn’t true at all.” I couldn’t tell if I was disappointed or relieved.

“I don’t know, Vaughan. You tell me. Or look in the box you made me haul out for you.”

Right. Cheeks flaming, I unpacked the dusty box, which turned out to be mostly documents, organized in accordion folders with general topics written on the labels. I set aside a stack of flyers for a school musical and a town directory. Underneath was a photocopy of a newspaper article from 1973, concerning the disappearance of a girl named Lara Pearson, age eleven. The photo matched one of the four from the envelope.

“Lara Pearson,” I said. My hand was shaking.

“I always thought it was just rumors,” Bryony said, a frown ghosting across her lips.

“Do you think... did the Other do something to her?” I asked. “To all those girls?”

“No,” Bryony said as if offended. Then, “I don’t know.” She looked troubled. “It’s just as likely your family did something to them.”

“You think my family are a bunch of murderers?” I asked. “Celia? Desmond?”

“Definitely not Desmond. Celia, though? Nobody’s that nice. She’s probably a secret serial killer,” Bryony said, and I chuckled. We stared at each other. Bryony’s breath stirred the dust that hung thick in the air, sending it swirling.

Downstairs, the door slammed. Bryony jumped a little. “Mydad,” she said. “Actually, he might know who these girls are. He grew up in Eston,” she suggested. She probably just wanted to get rid of me, but there was a note of curiosity in her voice.

We headed downstairs, dust clinging to us, and found Mr.Locke in the kitchen. “Good morning,” he said brightly, turning. Then he spotted me, and his expression froze. His next words were stilted, but at least he was trying to cover it. “What are you two up to?”

“I’m merely obeying the mistress’s requests,” Bryony said drily. “Letting her paw through Nana’s things.”

“I see,” he said. He regarded me with a troubled look. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Sort of,” I said. I was holding the photographs. I started to step forward to show him, but he flinched, and I stopped. Bryony looked between us with an appraising expression. Then, wordlessly, she took the photographs from me and crossed the room to hand them to him.

“They’re labeled ‘Harrow’s girls.’ Are those the ones you were talking about? That went missing?” I asked.

“I can’t say,” he said. He spoke to Bryony instead of to me, his shoulder turned to me like I wasn’t even there. “I’ve never seen most of these girls in my life. But I remember this one.” He tapped on the most recent photo of a shy-looking girl in a blue sweater. She had brown hair cut into blunt bangs. “Sad story. Died in maybe 2000, 2001. She was out playing by the creek during a storm and fell in. The flood carried her away. She was only seven years old. Her name was... ah, shoot. I’m getting old.” He scratched his head, thinking. “Oh, right. It was Haley. Haley Cotter.”

My breath caught in my throat. Pain bloomed behind my eye, a migraine crashing into me without warning. Agony rippled down my neck, the light suddenly stabbing at me. I grabbed the back of a chair to steady myself.

Mr.Locke stared at me wordlessly.

“Are you all right?” Bryony asked.

“It’s nothing,” I told her through clenched teeth. The pain ebbed slowly, and I straightened up. Bryony was looking at me with wide eyes. What the hell had that been?

Benjamin Locke cleared his throat loudly. “Anything else you girls need?” he asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” Bryony said quickly. She gave me a look and jerked her head toward the door. I followed her out, feeling dazed. The door had barely shut behind us when she rounded on me. “What was that?” she demanded.

“Nothing,” I said. “I just got a headache.”

“At the instant he said Haley Cotter’s name? How does that make sense?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I just...” I trailed off.

She was staring down at my hands. “You’re bleeding.”

I looked down. Blood dripped from the braceleted wounds around my wrists. I reached up to find it trickling down the side of my neck. It soaked through my blouse, right above my beating heart.

Bryony stared at me, and I knew the look in her eye. I’d seen it before, the moment before the scissor blades plunged into Kendra Norton’s staring eyes. The scissors that had been found in my bloody hands, Kendra screaming,I saw her. I saw her.

Now Bryony saw it, too—the dreadful thing inside of me.