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T he young woman was quite beautiful, lean, somewhere in her twenties.

She had startling blue eyes. Her long thick black hair was mottled with grey, white and streaks of brown.

It must have cost her a fortune at the hairdressers.

On the other hand, right now, her skin was also starting to mottle and she was covered in goose-pimples.

Rose could hear water running in the bathroom.

‘I don’t know who you are, and what you’re doing, but can you at least put a something on,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve got enough problems today as it is without coping with a naked burglar. Either leave or put my dressing gown on.’

‘I’m Sky,’ said the woman. Her accent had a hint of something Scandanavian. ‘What’s a dressing gown?’

Rose passed it over. ‘It’s this. Now bung it on, keep quiet, stay here and I’ll deal with you afterwards. Don’t touch anything.’

‘I’m Sky and I want to see Simon.’

‘What do—’ Rose couldn’t continue. She heard the bathroom door unlock and growled. At the moment, Mrs McPherson seemed more of a risk than Sky. She stepped out in the hall. Sky followed. She had struggled with the belt and was hugging the dressing gown round her.

Mrs McPherson’s eyebrows rose.

‘This is Sky,’ said Rose, trying to make the best of things. ‘She’s come to see Simon all the way from Denmark and we’re putting her up. She’s getting over the jet lag.’

If it sounded ridiculous to her, what must it sound like to the other two? She risked a look at them. Mrs McPherson’s eyebrows had dropped to a slight frown. Within the fluffy red dressing gown, Sky was tense, her eyes narrowed.

‘I think I’ll leave you to it,’ said Mrs McPherson.

‘Yes,’ said Rose. ‘We’re still a bit topsy-turvy…. ’

‘Uh-huh,’ Mrs McPherson replied making for the front door. ‘Perhaps later. Just remember, Kirkglen is a unique place. We like things as they should be.’

Rose closed the door and watched through the frosted glass until Mrs McPherson had driven away. She turned to address Sky, but Sky had gone back down the hall and was leaning against Simon’s door.

‘Listen,’ Rose said, pulling at her. ‘Come and tell me who you are and what’s going on.’

The woman turned. In her face was a pain like a disease, loss and feeling lost, her features at once old and childlike.

For a few seconds, Rose felt she was looking into a mirror.

Not one that reflected the mask she’d worn every day for a year: calm, sensible Rose coping like she always did; but a mirror of the raw grief and fear in her soul.

‘Come on,’ coaxed Rose more gently. ‘Simon’s asleep at the moment. Let’s get some clothes on you and you can tell me why you’ve broken my window and given an old witch something to gossip about.’

‘She’s not a witch. She’s worse,’ whispered Sky.

She allowed herself to be pulled back from the door and into the sitting room while Rose went to get some clothes.

Some days made less sense than others and this was one of them. Either Rose had a naked burglar intent on pneumonia, or Sky was someone else altogether. Within the last year, anything had seemed possible.

Rose rummaged around until she found some old things a size too small. It was pointless lending Sky one of her bras. It would have been like offering a couple of hammocks to a pair of dormice, and Sky seemed to struggle enough just putting a tee-shirt on.

‘Was I right about Denmark?’ asked Rose, sitting on her hands to stop herself from dressing Sky as if she was a child. ‘I’m sorry if I was wrong.’

‘I don’t know, I guess,’ Sky answered from inside a sweat-top. ‘I just got here. All this time, all this terrible time, I thought I’d never see Simon again and now I’ve found him and you won’t let me see him. And I only have today.’

Something tugged at Rose’s memory. In a video call during that last expedition to Denmark, David had mentioned that a woman with a crush on Simon kept turning up at the camp wrapped in a blanket. He’d never said her name.

‘Look,’ said Rose, ‘it’s not that simple. Simon’s ill today and …’

‘I know he is. I know why he is. I was there.’ She hunched her hands between her knees and looked round, catching sight of the wedding photo. She paused. ‘I was there.’ She reached out to touch Rose. ‘I was there when it happened. David was your man wasn’t he?’

‘You can’t see Simon,’ Rose insisted quietly. ‘You don’t understand. It wouldn’t be safe.’

Sky stood up. ‘It’s you that don’t understand. I know what he is. But today is the only day I can see him. He won’t hurt me. It would be impossible.’

She ran for Simon’s door, shoving against it with her shoulder. Rose sighed. What could be the harm? Every precaution had been taken. If Sky really did know, nothing could make it worse. If she didn’t, it would be another thing to deal with. Good old Rose.

‘Stop,’ she said. ‘I’ll unlock the door.’

Inside, black-out curtains were tightly shut. The metal frame around the bed looked skeletal in the gloom. Through its bars, in the small light from the hallway you could just see Simon’s back curled away from them. The bones on his spine jutted out through the long grey hair.

In his sleep he turned over to face them and snarled slightly, his lips drawing back from sharp incisors.

Rose had expected Sky to gasp or exclaim, but she made no sound.

It still shocked Rose, all these months past. Twelve times she had drugged him before bolting his cage for twenty-four hours and yet she had not got used to it.

Every time she saw her brother like this, she felt overwhelmed.

She reached out to comfort Sky but the woman had stepped forward to push her slender hand through the bars.

‘Don’t…’ warned Rose, reaching out. ‘He might bite you!’

‘He won’t,’ said Sky. ‘And if he did, it wouldn’t hurt me.

’ Stroking Simon’s head, she started to sing under her breath.

Without being able to hear the words, the song made Rose think of wide skies, of forests, of wildernesses but mostly of longing; an echo of the cold emptiness of David’s side of the bed.

Simon’s ruined eyes, such as they were at this moment, opened slightly.

They were amber, flecked with red. He seemed to wake from his dream and to focus slightly on Sky, rolling his head under the caress.

For a moment he wept, tears rolling down his muzzle.

And then his eyes closed and Sky’s song got softer until it was a whisper and she stopped.