Jonathan’s mouth dropped open.
Tristyan gripped the countertop. “Isaac—Isaac Thatcher?”
“Isaac Hudson,” Flick said. “When they found him, he had a letter with his name on it—”
“Hudson was my wife’s middle name,” Tristyan said. “Her mother’s surname. She was Aspen Hudson Thatcher, and I took her surname when I chose to leave mine behind…”
The two of them stared at each other.
Flick could see it clearly now. The deep brown eyes that were her own father’s, in another head. The curve of his chin, the rise of his knuckles on his broad hands.
“You look like her,” Tristyan said, breaking the silence. “My Aspen. You…” His eyes suddenly shone. He came around the chair, eyes on Flick as though she might disappear if he so much as blinked.
“I have her Study of Particulars,” Flick almost whispered. “Aspen’s Strangeworlds Society book. I read her name in the front. She’s my—”
“Grandmother,” Jonathan said.
Flick looked back at Tristyan, who was leaning against the chair, his hand braced on the back of it as he gazed at her. “And—you’re—”
“I didn’t know you even existed,” Tristyan said softly, reaching out a hand.
She stepped toward him, then stopped. “What happened to my dad?” she asked. “Why didn’t you keep him? Why didn’t you want him? You kept your daughter, but gave him away—why?”
“We had no choice,” Tristyan said. “The twins were of different worlds.”
“You belong to the world you’re born in,” Jonathan said.
“No. Not always,” Tristyan said. “Sometimes you belong elsewhere. The twins were born here, and they were thriving at first, but then… Isaac got sick. Nothing could make him better. I tried, and so did others. Aspen decided to take him to her world in search of more doctors.” He shut his eyes for a moment. “Isaac started to recover as soon as she took him through the suitcase. He was meant to be in her world. When he was well again, Aspen came back for Clara. But as soon as Clara was taken from this world, she sickened in the same way. They were born together. But the multiverse intended for them to live apart.”
“But Aspen could have gone with him!” Flick’s voice cracked. “His mother could have stayed with him in her world, and you with Clara in yours!”
“I wanted Aspen to stay with Isaac, truly I did.” Tristyan shook his head. “But that isn’t how the story goes, in this case. Aspen chose to remain here. We asked Nicolas Mercator to find a good home for Isaac, and he promised to.” His expression darkened. “Being left outside a police station is not what we thought would happen.”
“He was never adopted.” Flick’s tears started to brim. “He lived in children’s homes until he was eighteen, and then he was on his own until he met my mom and they had me.…” She brushed the wetness from her eyes angrily. “You never once wanted to check on him?”
“Of course I wanted to,” Tristyan said. “I’ve thought about him every day since the day we left him. But what good would it do him to meet me? To learn he’s from another world? That his mother is already dead, his sister moved away, and his father a lonely old man with nothing to offer? What good would that do anyone at all?”
“He’d know he has a family,” Flick said. She walked away and then back again. She felt utterly torn, stretched in two different directions.
Tristyan looked at her with those familiar eyes. “I would very much like to be your family now. If you’ll have me.”
One half of Flick wanted to run out of the door, or back into the suitcase and slam the lid. The other wanted to go over to this man, this grandfather she had never known, who looked so very sad and lonely, and hug him.
In the end, she stood still. “I don’t know what to think about this.”
Tristyan gave a laugh that was barely more than a breath. “Likewise. This is… I mean, I always hoped Isaac would have a family of his own, but to meet you…”
Flick stared at her hands. Hands that had wrought magic and ended worlds. Was this the explanation for her magical ability? Tristyan was from another world, and so a part of her was too.
“What are you?” she asked. “What am I?”
Tristyan’s eyes sharpened. “You’re mostly human. Your grandmother Aspen was, for certain. And I assume your mother is. But at least one quarter of you is something else.”
“And what is that?”
Tristyan stood straighter, putting his shoulders back. “We are called the Seren,” he said. “And it is my people who created schisms.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Strangeworlds Travel Agency had a rather different birth than we were anticipating. It arrived during the Pandemic Lockdown of 2020, when shops were closed and schools were shut and no one was traveling very much at all, magically or otherwise. Without having such a fantastic team of publishers and supporters behind me, I don’t know where I, or my books, would be! So this is a huge thank-you not only for all the work that has gone into The Edge of the Ocean, but also for all that which helped Flick and Jonathan to take their first magical steps into our world. To everyone who read The Strangeworlds Travel Agency and took Flick and Jonathan into your hearts, I send so much love and gratitude.
I owe a thousand thanks and more to the team at Hachette Children’s Group, including my wonderful editor, Lena McCauley, who has helped The Edge of the Ocean make as big a splash as possible. I am proud to be part of your crew! Also my publicist Dom Kingston and marketing whizz Beth McWilliams, both of whom have worked themselves silly in this challenging new world of virtual events and video calls. To the rights team, who have ensured that Flick and Jonathan still get to travel to new countries, I thank you so much! Flick’s dream of traveling has come true for her after all.
The Strangeworlds Travel Agency wouldn’t have gone anywhere without the tireless efforts of the amazing booksellers who put it into the hands of readers—booksellers rock! To all the independent bookshops that put The Strangeworlds Travel Agency into the window, into readers’ hands, and into their hearts, I can never thank you enough. A special thank-you must go to the QBD booksellers in Australia, and also Dion, Louise, Tsam, Gavin, Layla, and Helen for all their support; it really means the world to me. Likewise to the bloggers who gave up their time and space to talk about my book: thank you so much to Steph Elliott, Jo Clarke, Imi, Samantha Thomas, Scott Evans, and ReadingRocks for all your loveliness. Shout-out to Peter and Steve as well, for once again being excellent sensitivity readers. I owe you so much.
Thank you to Samuel Perrett and Natalie Smillie for once again turning pages of words into a beautifully designed book with a cover to die for. Thank you as well to the artists who took Strangeworlds and made their own art with it, particularly Joel and Andrew—your fan art and creations are amazing.
To everyone in my Strangeworlds support bubble, thank you for putting up with my nonsense and hourly crises. Particularly Darran, Alice S-H, Nick, Charlie, Alice O, Hux, El, Mia, Olly and Sana, all of whom have received more than their fair share of terrible memes this year. And, Nicole, my partner in grime, you know which bit of this book was written especially for you.
Thanks to Michael Sheen for growing an excellent beard and providing the inspiration for Captain Burnish. Thanks also to Klaus Badelt and Hans Zimmer for producing the Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl soundtrack, which I have played approximately seven million times while writing this book.
To my agent, Claire Wilson, who really is as wonderful as the legends claim, I owe a pirate’s hoard of gratitude and thanks. I will sail under your flag to the edge of the world and back again.
And to my family, for the space and time and listening ears, I love and thank you all. And Anton and Joseph, I love you both more than I can say. Let’s set sail for the next adventure.
More from this Series
Strangeworlds Travel…
Book 1
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
L. D.
LAPINSKI lives just outside Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire, England, with her family, a lot of books, and a cat called Hector. L. D. first wrote a book when she was seven; it was made of lined paper and tape, and it was about a frog who owned an airplane. The Edge of the Ocean is her second published novel.
LDLAPINSKI.COM
Aladdin
Simon & Schuster, New York
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www.SimonandSchuster.com/Authors/L-D-Lapinski
Also by L. D. Lapinski
Strangeworlds Travel Agency
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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First Aladdin hardcover edition August 2021
Text copyright © 2021 by L. D. Lapinski
Jacket illustration copyright © 2021 by Matt Rockefeller
Map illustration copyright © 2021 by Natalie Smillie
Originally published in Great Britain in 2021 by Hodder and Stoughton.
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Design by Heather Palisi
Jacket design by Heather Palisi
Jacket Illustration Copyright © 2021 by Matt Rockefeller
Library of Congress Control Number 2021940380
ISBN 9781534483545 (hc)
ISBN 9781534483569 (eBook)
The Edge of the Ocean Page 22
