Midnight's Twins

by Holly Race

  Something stops me from telling anyone what using my power costs me. It would be admitting a weakness, and proving Ollie right, neither of which I will do unless I have no other option. And anyway, what does a little pain matter when Medraut is inflicting all kinds of horrors on people? So I put up with the headaches, the nosebleeds and the occasional ear bleed, and ignore Ollie’s silent glances when he spots me wiping away blood or rubbing my forehead.

  Eventually, he cracks. He storms into my room one Sunday, just after we’ve both woken up from a training session. I can barely focus on him through the migraine ravaging my head.

  ‘For God’s sake, Fern, you’re going to seriously hurt yourself!’ he hisses. Both of us are aware of Dad getting ready for his shift in the bathroom next door.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I say, my tongue struggling to move.

  ‘Really? So you won’t mind me doing this.’ He swipes a pile of books from my desk. They land on the floorboards with a thump that ricochets around my skull. I can’t help but wail.

  ‘What do you care anyway?’ I spit, already regretting what I’m about to say but unable to stop myself. ‘You didn’t care when I was being burned alive.’

  Ollie laughs wildly. ‘You’re never going to let that go, are you?’

  ‘Why should I?’ I stand unsteadily. ‘You nearly got me killed and you’ve never been punished.’

  ‘You really think that?’ he says, his eyes bright and hard. ‘If you really think I haven’t been punished then you’re even more blind than I thought.’

  Dad’s face appears in the doorway, his beard still flecked with toothpaste. ‘What’s going on?’

  Ollie pushes past him.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say truthfully.

  A few days later I find out. The answer lies on a quiet road near my house, in a bundle surrounded by bullies.

  27

  It happens when I am walking home after school. I’m mulling over my day at school. I had entered Bosco to find that nearly every girl there was wearing exactly the same accessories: the same nail polish, earrings and elaborate plaits. The boys, too, had subscribed to an unofficial uniform – each wearing grey chequered shirts with the sleeves rolled to the same length. I had asked someone if I’d missed a school memo, but he only laughed at me. The effect was subtle but distinctly creepy, making me feel as though I was still in Annwn, inside someone else’s vision of a school.

  As I round a corner, still wondering whether something as simple as clothing could have anything to do with Medraut, I spot Jenny and her gang, and freeze. It’s a scrum. They are pushing someone backwards and forwards. I try to shout at them, but like the last time I saw Jenny in the flesh, I am frozen in fear. Then they vomit out their victim. With a lurch, I recognise him. Ollie. He lands in a crumpled heap in the middle of the road, moving feebly. Jenny bounces out of the group to wrestle his schoolbag off him. My first instinct is to run. But I can’t leave Ollie in the road like that.

  ‘Oi!’ A woman has her phone out in one hand and is wrangling her child with the other. ‘Oi! I’m calling the police!’

  Jenny and her harem look up and scarper. I duck my head, hoping they won’t recognise me.

  ‘Are you okay, dear?’ The woman pulls her little boy along as she approaches Ollie.

  ‘Mmm,’ Ollie mumbles as he struggles to get to his feet.

  ‘I’ll call the police, all right?’

  I run up behind her. ‘There’s no need,’ I say. ‘He’s my brother. I’ll take care of him.’

  I grab Ollie and his schoolbag, and half carry him down the street, ignoring the woman’s objections. I don’t ask him any questions, and he doesn’t offer any explanations. But I am intrigued as to why my good-looking, popular brother has become like me – an untouchable.

  At home, with an icepack on his head and antiseptic cream on his grazed hands, Ollie starts to come back to himself.

  ‘Don’t say anything to Dad.’

  ‘Obviously.’

  He hobbles towards his bedroom. I’m not having that. ‘Why has Jenny got it in for you?’

  Ollie scowls. ‘Do you want the actual truth, or something that’s going to fit in with your cosy little view that I’m the devil incarnate?’

  ‘I do not –’

  ‘It’s because I rescued you,’ Ollie snaps.

  This is such a ridiculous statement that I laugh. ‘When? When did you “rescue” me? When you called me a witch?’ My voice rises. ‘When you led me to the Flats to be burned alive?’

  ‘It wasn’t meant to go that far!’

  ‘I was tied up there for hours, and you just walked away!’ The sense of betrayal wells up inside me, every bit as raw as it had been that day.

  ‘I was the one who called the police,’ he spits.

  I stare at him. ‘They said it was a neighbour who saw the flames.’

  ‘It was me. I made an anonymous call. Jenny worked it out over the summer.’

  I reach for something that makes sense. ‘So you got scared you’d be expelled and wanted to save your own skin, big deal. You never do anything unless there’s something in it for you.’

  Ollie laughs hollowly. ‘What, unlike Saint Fern? You’re the most selfish person I know. You convince yourself that everyone around you is awful so you don’t ever have do to anything for them.’

  ‘I helped you today, didn’t I? I didn’t have to do that!’

  ‘Yeah, and I bet you’re going to hold that over me for the rest of my life as well.’

  ‘So this is the big punishment you got?’ I can feel tears coming now and I don’t want them because I am not upset, I am furious. ‘You get the same treatment you dealt me for five years? Big deal! You’ve still got all your friends in Annwn. You’re still Dad’s favourite. In a few years you get to walk out of school and begin again. I’m always going to have this,’ I point to my burn, ‘reminding everyone what happened to me.’

  ‘Why do you think I haven’t told anyone that Jenny waits for me literally every day after school? Because I know I deserve it, okay?’

  Ollie moves away, running a shaky hand through his hair. Then, suddenly, he turns back with a surge of energy and manhandles me out of his room.

  ‘You pushed me away, Fern. Not the other way around. You love looking like you do. If you wanted to you could’ve got contacts, but you didn’t. That burn scar just gives you another excuse to behave the way you do. I bet it was the best thing that ever happened to you. You wanted me to bully you, because it gave you a better excuse to hate me than the real reason – I just fit in. I belong and you don’t, you never have, you never will, and you’ve never forgiven me for it.’

  The door slams shut in my face.

  I spend the evening torturing myself over Ollie’s accusations. I rack my brains to remember whether Ollie ganged up on me first, or whether the distance between us predated that. I was always aware of the differences between us – I knew that people were frightened by my looks and even though he tried to hide it, Dad just seemed to click with Ollie – but I didn’t hold it against my brother, I’m sure I didn’t. The neighbourhood kids never made me feel like an outcast exactly, but in all of our games in the park, I’d be the villain. The wicked witch. The snow queen. The mad albino. It had been fun at first, but after a while I started to get annoyed. One time, Dad told Ollie to get the others to give me a go as the hero. The other kids agreed – they’d do anything Ollie told them, frankly, the lemmings. But the role didn’t fit me at all. My attempt at a rousing speech fell flat. When I led the attack on Freddie Burroughs’s’ evil fortress of doom my group fell into chaos and we ended up losing. It was just easier for me to be the bad guy after that. I looked the part.

  On our first day at secondary school, Ollie and I held hands tightly as we entered. I remember it because Dad still has the photo on the wall in the hallway – my face is turned away from the camera, my sky-blue coat flapping behind me. Ollie is grinning cheekily back at Dad, as if to say, ‘We’re going to have a ball.
’ That was the last day I was truly happy.

  That night, alone in my room, I let myself admit what I’ve been denying for years.

  I miss him.

  What’s more bittersweet is that I start to realise that the distance between us maybe isn’t, after all, solely Ollie’s doing. He did draw away from me, but for every step back he took, I leaped in the opposite direction. I was protecting myself, but maybe the wall I built was too high, too wide. Maybe I should have given Ollie a chance.

  When I enter Tintagel and see my brother for the first time after the argument, I can tell immediately that things have shifted between us. In the stables, he silently holds Lamb’s reins for me while I swing into the saddle. If he’s busy chatting when we’re being taught something important, I tap him on the leg with my scimitar instead of enjoying his floundering when the teacher asks him a question.

  Long-held resentments have been aired. We understand … No, I understand better what has really been happening this last year. All the times where Ollie came home late, dirty and bitter, weren’t because he was enjoying himself with Jenny and her pack, but because they were tormenting him. I was flippant with him before, but the truth is that no one can know better than I how it feels to have your closest friends turn against you. I begin to see that Annwn is just as much of an escape from Ithr for Ollie as it is for me. We have both been protective of it in our own ways, jealous of the part each other has to play in it because we want all of its pureness for ourselves.

  But understanding cannot rewind time. We cannot go back to being friends the way we once were, a long time ago. But we can build something new; something formal rather than friendly. He can be a peer if not a compadre. So when Miss D tells us to follow her one night, we nod at each other like colleagues heading into an important meeting.

  ‘Lord Allenby wants to see you,’ Miss D says, herding us through the herb gardens and past the stables. Lamb’s grazing outside and she trots over to me.

  ‘Sorry, girl,’ I say. ‘Can’t stop.’

  She looks most put out that her attention is not being rewarded with carrots or at the very least a head scratch. Miss D leads us on, until we’re standing beneath the window of Lord Allenby’s office, and knocks on the wall. I don’t know why I’m surprised when the stone parts to reveal a concealed door. Tintagel wouldn’t be a proper castle without a few hidden entrances.

  ‘Go on, then,’ Miss D says, pushing Ollie and I through impatiently. She doesn’t follow. Before I can say anything the door swings shut and we’re plunged into darkness. Around us, little lamps of inspyre burst into life, illuminating a short staircase and another door at the top. Ollie jumps up the staircase and places his ear against the door for a moment.

  ‘Hear anything?’

  Ollie shakes his head, and knocks. A few seconds later Lord Allenby opens the door and steps back to allow us into his office.

  ‘Thank you for coming,’ Lord Allenby says, gesturing to us to sit in the chairs in front of his desk. He waits for us to settle before he speaks again. ‘A few weeks ago, Dagonet escorted a group of dreamers into this castle. You’ll know, I suspect, that those dreamers had been experimented upon by Sebastien Medraut.’

  I nod. It’s common knowledge now that the dreamers who had their tongues cut out were Medraut’s work.

  ‘What I am about to tell you is privileged information,’ Lord Allenby continues. ‘Only my most trusted lieutenants know this, but Dagonet didn’t come across those dreamers by chance. They were released, from Medraut’s fortress, by someone who has been working undercover there for some time. The Knight Captain, Samson. He got them out at great risk to himself, and it’s now been several days since I’ve heard from him.’

  My heart quickens. Samson, the person who walked into a house full of vampires on his own and lived to tell the tale. Samson, who has been mysteriously missing ever since I first set foot in Tintagel.

  ‘I need someone to help find him,’ Lord Allenby says. ‘I’m not forcing either of you. I’m asking you to enter the stronghold of someone who has one of the most twisted, powerful minds the worlds have ever seen. I’m asking you to do this on your own to avoid attention. I’ll understand if you refuse. But Samson has risked a lot already, and I want to get him out alive if I can. You two are my best hope of doing that.’

  His eyes and voice remain steady, but this is as close to pleading as Lord Allenby will ever get. I think about what he’s asking; about what I’ve seen Medraut do; about that amber monument just a little ride from where I sit, filled with the weapons of Medraut’s victims. But I also know that I’m not ready. I need more training. I need more time.

  I look towards Ollie and see the same panic in his face. Then I remember the toddler with its tongue cut out; the old woman whose mind will never be the same; my mother.

  ‘Of course we’ll do it, sir.’

  Although God knows how.

  28

  It looks like my first mission will be my last mission, if what Lord Allenby tells us is anything to go by.

  ‘We learned that Medraut had taken one of the buildings in Royal Arsenal for his own ends about a year ago,’ Lord Allenby says, ‘and I decided that it would be better to gather intelligence instead of launching some kind of kamikaze offensive.’

  Royal Arsenal was once a grid of military warehouses that sit, squat and stately, on the south of the Thames, east of the Royal Parks of Greenwich. In Ithr the warehouses have been turned into apartments, but in Annwn they’ve mostly stayed true to their history, until Medraut came along.

  Ollie and I have been excused from training for as long as it takes to retrieve Samson. We go straight to the stables to tack up and ride out of the castle without being stopped. The harkers open the drawbridge without questioning us. They must have been briefed.

  I thought it would be liberating to be out here in regular clothing, but somewhere in the past few months the knights’ uniform has become a precious token of affirmation. Ollie rides next to me in silence. When it becomes too much, I fish my helmet out of my saddle bag and slip it over my ears.

  ‘Hello?’ I say like a numpty.

  ‘Fern?’ Rachel replies. ‘I was wondering when you were going to get in touch. What’s it like out there with just the two of you?’

  ‘Weird.’

  ‘I bet.’

  ‘Is the road looking clear?’ I ask.

  ‘Don’t cross the river at Millennium Bridge – it keeps forgetting it exists,’ she says. ‘Otherwise it’s pretty clear, yeah.’

  I slip the helmet off again and relay Rachel’s message to Ollie.

  ‘Do you reckon it’s worth it?’ he replies.

  ‘Getting Samson?’

  He grunts.

  ‘Lord Allenby thinks so.’

  ‘You’re going to be using your power a lot. It’s going to be dangerous. I don’t like that we’re not going in together.’

  ‘It’s part of the plan.’

  ‘Yeah, I get that I’m needed on the outside to keep a lookout for Medraut, sense if anything’s changing, blah blah blah. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.’

  ‘I don’t either. I’d … I’d rather you were going in with me.’ That’s true. Ollie is now so sure of his Immral that even if my half is more useful when it comes to fighting, I think his confidence would reassure me by osmosis.

  Ollie snorts. ‘Now you decide to get sappy.’

  ‘Well, if I die, don’t tell anyone. It’d ruin my image.’

  I catch his eye and we smirk at each other. The next moment, anxiety settles on me again like a vulture. Lord Allenby’s plan was as foolproof as a plan can be, given what we know about Medraut’s stronghold.

  ‘I can’t give you a map,’ he had said. ‘Medraut shifts the layout of the buildings all the time, unpredictably. I’m afraid that’s where you’re going to need to use your intuition.’

  As if the job wasn’t hard enough.

  When we reach the cover of Canary Wharf’s skyscrapers, I look at Olli
e. ‘Time to split up?’

  He nods. ‘See you there.’

  I don my helmet and check the route with Rachel once more. The plan was for us to approach Royal Arsenal separately, so that if anyone is watching at least one of us stands a chance of not being seen. I urge Lamb into a gallop as we skate alongside the river and allow myself to forget about my quest, to forget about Ollie, to just enjoy the freedom. I reach out a hand and feel the inspyre gathering at my fingertips. A bitter wind blows grit and sleet into my face.

  ‘Fern?’ Rachel’s voice says into my helmet. ‘Looks like there might be some trouble on your route. Probably not related to Medraut but best avoid it just in case.’

  ‘Heard,’ I say. I glance at the river, then at the streets that I would need to take – ones that lead me away from my destination. I clutch a handful of inspyre and bring it down against Lamb’s shoulder. Pressing it there, I imagine it sinking into her muscles, strengthening her legs and hooves. There’s a tug at the back of my brain that travels through my neck and along my arm, down into the fur beneath my fingers.

  ‘Now fly,’ I whisper into Lamb’s mane. Her whole body gathers itself, the muscles tensing at once, then she stretches her front legs, kicks her back legs and takes off into the wind.

  ‘Fern!’ Rachel shouts. ‘Oh my God, Fern!’

  I let the harsh air cleanse my worries. Beneath me, the city turns to dollhouses. An enormous gull swoops down alongside me and squawks in greeting. Its flock joins in, and soon Lamb and I are flying amongst them as they head to richer hunting grounds.

  When the birds tire of us and decide to wheel away, I call to them with a mind-tug, and they rejoin us, compelled by my imagination. They’ll be good camouflage as I approach my destination. We turn a bend in the river and I spot it. Royal Arsenal is as grand as its name suggests, the complex of stone buildings laid out around courtyards that face the river. I steer Lamb towards the edge of the warehouses, releasing the part of my imagination that had been keeping her in the air. My head is already throbbing from the effort.