One For Sorrow

by Sarah A. Denzil

  “I’m sure.”

  When he reaches out and brushes a few fingers down my cheek, I begin to wonder if this is the true start of something real between us. It’s as though a barrier has been knocked away, and we’re free to finally meet each other for the first time.

  But it can wait.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  It’s my first dreamless sleep in months.

  It had been raining when I went to bed, with the raindrops pattering against the glass. When I wake, the raining has stopped, but there is a rhythmic sound in my room. Breathing.

  The sharp edge of a knife rests against my throat.

  “Hi, Leah.”

  It isn’t possible. I checked every lock and every window before bed. After the news, I was so sure that I was safe, to the point that I sent Seb away, but now my worst fear has come to pass. It leaves me with a strange sense of calm spreading all the way over my body. This was inevitable, and I’ve always known it.

  “Hi, Isabel.”

  She shifts her weight from one foot to the other. I can’t see her in the dark, but I can hear her soft breathing. I know the knife she holds to my throat is far sharper than any of the knives in my kitchen, because I feel a slight trickle of blood run down my neck.

  “What did you do to the cows?” I ask.

  “They’re quite stupid animals,” she replies. “Easily led. A little bit like you. Time to get out of bed, sleepyhead. Go slowly now, because I’m not moving this knife even a little bit, and I definitely don’t want to slice your head clean off. At least not yet.” Her voice is almost exactly like I remember it, filled with positivity and innocence, but the slight change creates a new edge to it, one of malice.

  “How did you get in the house?” I ask.

  “After the police were done, there was a gap of a few hours where the door was still broken and no one was around. They’d already searched everything, dusted the whole place for fingerprints and photographed all your not-so-pretty belongings. The forensic team had dismantled their white tents and cleared away their tools. There wasn’t a church mouse in the entire cottage. I slipped in, went upstairs, and I waited.”

  “You lived in the attic?” I should be trembling with fear, but I’m strangely calm as I sit up in bed, moving slowly enough for her to be able to track the knife with my movements. Then I flick on the lamp by the bed so I can see what I’m doing.

  Isabel stands close to me, with her right arm outstretched, keeping the knife trained on my skin. She’s dressed in plain jeans and a blue jumper, both clean but crumpled. Her hair is different again, now short and bleached blonde. The innocence of her usual facial expression has moulded into cold determination. There’s more life in her flushed cheeks and bright eyes than there ever was before.

  Now I see it.

  The extra weight around her middle, the dull grey sportswear, the pastiness of her skin, the mousy hair colour—it all made her seem so insignificant and harmless. It’s strange how your first impressions of a person can so dramatically alter your view of their past behaviours. I knew all about the crime she’d supposedly committed, but the past became diluted by the way I saw her day in, day out, that innocent creature with a gentle heart and wasted talent, locked in a cell like a bird in a cage.

  “You took your time coming back from the hospital. You’ve no idea how ravenous I am for a decent meal. But first we have a job to do. I want you to stand.”

  I know that every part of Isabel is enjoying telling me what to do. Being in control suits her.

  “Put this on.”

  She tosses me the dressing gown that was slung across the bottom of the bed. I pull it on over my nightie.

  “We’re going to take a walk.” The lamplight catches her eyes as she smiles down at me.

  For the first time, I feel afraid.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  As I walk slowly, she slips behind me and rests her elbow on my shoulder, guiding me forwards with her free hand on my waist. Her body feels harder than I thought it would. Has she been exercising? Preparing herself for this moment?

  “You’ll see.”

  We negotiate the stairs and the hallway into the kitchen. The house is dark and quiet, sadly missing Seb’s presence. At least Tom isn’t here.

  “Put on your Wellington boots. It’s going to rain and I don’t want you getting cold.”

  “You’re so thoughtful,” I say, letting the sarcasm drip heavily into my words.

  “I know. I am, aren’t I?”

  Isabel leans down with me as I pull on the bright pink boots. God, they look ridiculous in this situation, but if I have any chance of escaping, thick boots might not be the worst choice of footwear. After putting on the boots, we walk together towards the door. My eyes scan the surface of the table for anything sharp I can slip into the pocket of my dressing gown. There’s a small dinner knife, but I need to distract Isabel to get it.

  “It was clever, slipping into the house like that. But it was risky. What would you have done if you hadn’t hidden in the attic?”

  “Oh, the same. It just wouldn’t have been quite so clean and tidy.”

  A shudder ripples through my body as I wonder what that might have entailed. I have visions of Isabel leaving my house drenched in blood, smashed windows behind her. Or Isabel with orange dancing in her eyes as she watches the house burn.

  I bump into the table leg and Isabel’s knife cuts slightly deeper into the skin on my neck.

  “Watch what you’re doing,” she snaps. “You’re not supposed to die yet. If this knife slips, it could sever your artery, you idiot.”

  But as she’s busy chastising me, I slip the knife into my pocket. It’s not much, but it’s something.

  “Unlock the door for me,” Isabel says calmly, gesturing to the keys resting in the bowl next to the door.

  We move together as I retrieve the key and push it into the lock, almost as though we’re slow dancing together. Her body brushes against mine, and I’m ashamed of the pulse that shudders up my spine. The biting chill of October cuts through my scant clothing as we exit the house, and rain begins to sputter down from the knitted clouds above. There’s no moon or stars, merely foggy darkness. I don’t know what time it is, and that leaves me feeling disorientated. She has the upper hand in every way, and all the control.

  “You’re not doing too badly for yourself, Leah,” Isabel says as we walk out of the garden and up towards the moors. “A hunky farmer has been staying with you, that brat of a brother is out of the picture, and you’ve got yourself a job. It’s a demeaning job in a shop for people richer than you, but it’s still a job. Well done, you!” She talks to me in the saccharine voice of a patronising adult talking to a child, setting my teeth on edge.

  “You’re also doing well for yourself. You’re free, you’re obsessed with me, and you’re jeopardising your freedom by taking the time to come and kill me. Even I wouldn’t be that stupid.”

  “Even you,” she agrees. “I have my reasons.”

  “Care to share?”

  She whispers in my ear. “Maybe later.”

  I wince as her hot breath tickles the hairs on the back of my neck.

  “Why did your brother confess?” I ask. “Did you kill James?”

  “Keep walking, Leah. We’ve got quite a way yet.”

  “Why did Owen bring the head to my door? Why didn’t you do it yourself?” I’m not sure whether I’m asking to keep her talking, or whether the curiosity is burning me so badly that I need to know.

  “Concentrate.” Her word is a hiss in my ear, caressing against my skin like the flick of a snake’s tongue.

  We’re out of the farmlands and into the moors now. Isabel must have memorised this route, because it’s tricky in the dark. She’s even moved the knife an inch away from my throat in case I slip. The footpath continues up an incline, and although it isn’t a difficult path, there are still a few slippery rocks to negotiate. It’s a route I’ve walked many times.

&nbs
p; “You’re taking me to the abandoned farmhouse,” I say.

  “Do you remember when you told me about this place?” she replies. “You walked up here in your sleep and woke up amidst dust and cobwebs.”

  “I wasn’t well,” I admit. “Neither are you.”

  “I’m fine. You’re completely bonkers, but I’m just fine. I’ve chosen the path I want to take, and it’s this one right here with you. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  “It’s not the path I want to take, Isabel. I want a happy life with people who love me. Maybe you could have had that once.”

  She lets out a snort. “I believe you’ve met my family, so you already know how absurd that statement is.”

  “We make our own families.”

  It’s the first thing I’ve said that gives her pause; I can tell, because her step falters. Is it possible that there’s still a shred of humanity left inside her?

  “I feel sorry for you because you never got the chance,” I continue. As I talk, my foggy breath steams the space in front of us. My words are punctuated by my breathing as we continue up the hill, my legs tired from the long climb. “If Owen did kill Maisie then your family is foul. All of you are damaged, and I think I know why. It’s your father, isn’t it? He’s the one who has turned you both into the people you are now.” I want to say ‘monsters,’ but decide against it. “Your childhood was taken away from you. Were you told to lie about what happened to Maisie? Were you told to say you forgot to protect your brother? Why was he the one who got to be free?”

  “You know nothing about it,” she says.

  “Then tell me. Maybe I can understand. Maybe telling me will lift a weight that you’ve carried all these years. I don’t know who you are, Isabel, but I would like to find out.”

  “Spoken exactly like someone who would say anything to save her own life.”

  The house is barely visible through the dark, its outline a crumbling square up ahead. We’re completely isolated now, surrounded by the moors on every side. Even if I shout and scream at the top of my lungs I’ll never be heard from here.

  “What about all the time we spent together at Crowmont Hospital? What about then?” I ask, hoping to keep her talking as much as I can.

  “It was all an act.”

  “All of it?”

  She hesitates. “Yes.”

  Isabel pushes me into the house, roughly shoving me with her hands. The knife is behind me now, its point jammed into my side, just far enough to hurt but not quite hard enough to break my skin. She ignites an electric camping light, and the room is flooded with a soft glow. In the centre of the room is a chair with rope already arranged around the arms.

  Opposite the empty chair is another chair, but there is a person sitting on this one. Isabel pushes me so that I face that person, and for the first time, I scream.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  APRIL 2017

  “Do you remember?” I asked.

  She nodded. Her shoulders were slumped and her mouth was slightly open, as if in shock. “I… I want to tell you.” Her bottom lip trembled as she spoke.

  I took a step closer. “You can trust me.”

  “I know I can.” She moved towards me. “Please, hear my story.”

  “I will,” I said.

  And before I knew it, I was moving into her room.

  But then I hesitated. “I can’t go into your room; it’s against the rules. I need to stay out here so I can do my job professionally and effectively,” I replied, moving back to my chair. The words came tumbling out as though they were rehearsed, and they made me sound like I was in control, but inside I felt unsure of myself. The truth was that I was exhausted, and I wasn’t sure I was thinking straight. This great mystery had fallen into my lap when I’d taken this job, and any piece of the puzzle was like a lifeline for me. I needed to know.

  “Don’t you trust me?” Isabel sounded hurt. Her small voice carried all the notes of a wounded animal. She even sniffed away a few tears. “After all this time? You know I’m not dangerous. You know who I truly am. I’d expect some of the others to treat me like a freak, but not you.”

  “I do trust you,” I said. “But I want to keep you safe, that’s all.”

  “Please come into the room. I don’t want anyone to overhear. What I want to say is all for you, Leah, because I trust you more than anyone else in this world. Do you understand?”

  I nodded, and I can’t deny that the words felt good to hear. Trust wasn’t a feeling that came my way very often. I lived with a teenage boy who hated to tell me about his day, and I’d spent years with two parents who never trusted anything to me, not even their love, which felt good to admit. Even about Mum.

  “All right. One minute. That’s all.”

  Knowing that the CCTV cameras in the hallway would be monitoring this very moment, I went against all my better judgement and stood up from my chair. It scraped back more loudly than I would’ve liked, but it was the middle of the night, and I hadn’t heard anyone moving around the hospital for hours.

  My heart was beating too fast as I stepped into the room, and I could feel the alcoholic sweat seeping from my pores, all the wine coming out of me. When I glanced down at my hands, I saw that they were trembling beneath the fluorescent light inside Isabel’s room.

  “I was eight years old the first time I found one of Daddy’s pictures.” Isabel sat on her bed with her hands folded on her lap. She was bent over, making her body appear smaller than ever, especially with her recent weight loss. “I didn’t understand what I was looking at or why he would have drawn an image so terrible. I didn’t understand why anyone would want to hurt another person like that. I was so innocent, you see.”

  “You were a child,” I said, taking another step closer. “You were innocent. What was the picture of?”

  “I’ll show you.” Isabel stood up from the bed and walked around me to get to her desk. She rummaged through a few illustrations piled up on the surface and lifted one to examine. She stood there for a moment, contemplating the image between her fingers, then she sidestepped to the left and walked straight towards me with the paper still in her hand.

  When she got close to me, I took another step back closer to her bed. “What is it?”

  She moved again, and I moved one more pace back so that my legs were touching the side of her bed. Then she raised her arm and passed me the picture.

  I took it slowly from her and, at the same time, she pushed me back onto the bed. Before I had time to react, she moved catlike to the ground, lifted a long, thin object—some sort of rope—and wrapped it around my wrist.

  “Isabel, what—?”

  Before I could say another word, a sharp implement was jammed beneath my chin, pressing my head up.

  “In case you’re wondering, I spent a lot of time making this shiv, and it is sharp enough to make you bleed. Here.” She pressed the implement into my collar bone beneath my blouse, and a small red flower of blood bloomed there. I winced at the sharp pain, though it was little more than a pinprick. It was a display of strength, not intended to truly hurt me.

  “Don’t do this, Isabel,” I warned. “You’ve been doing so well. I… I sent an email to the police telling them I thought you were innocent. If your father is behind all this he’ll be arrested and you’ll be freed. If you let me go now, I won’t say anything about this. You won’t be punished.”

  But she simply smiled. “You’d like it to be Daddy, wouldn’t you? Daddies are naughty, they deserve to be punished. At least yours did.” Quick as lightning, she moved down and tied my arm with another long rope, which I now realised was made up of strips of bedsheets. The long, narrow pieces of linen had been previously attached to the legs of the bed before being tied around my wrists, which wrenched my arms apart and pulled my chest down towards the bedroom floor. I had to lift my chin to meet her eye as she stood over me and pushed her shiv harder against my throat. I couldn’t quite make it out, but I suspected it was made from a sharpened
toothbrush handle.

  “You’ve been planning this for a long time, haven’t you?” I said as I struggled to keep my backside from slipping off the duvet cover. My arms already ached from being pulled across the length of the bed. I wasn’t sure I could remain in this uncomfortable position for much longer.

  Isabel smiled as she retrieved the paper I’d dropped while she was tying me up. Triumphantly, she held it up to my face so I could see it.

  On the paper was a perfectly executed drawing of me sitting in this exact position with my hands bound to the bed. In my mouth was a bird. A magpie.

  “Magpies are deceptive and intelligent, but you know that, don’t you?” She put the illustration back on her desk before stroking my face. When she leaned towards me, I saw the cold determination in her eyes. “Poor Leah. You have no idea what you’ve been going through. I saw it straight away. Your pinched little face, so scared, so full of pain. I smelled the alcohol on your breath, saw the dark circles beneath your eyes. I sat on this bed and I watched you hallucinate wood lice crawling along the floor. You’ve been having a nervous breakdown, dear Leah.” She took a step back and pouted. “Daddy killed Mummy, wah wah wah!”

  “Isabel, let me go or I’ll scream.”

  She lurched towards me, her face feral and terrifying, and lifted the shiv to my eye. “Do that and I’ll cut you, starting here. How quickly do you think security will get here? How much time do you suppose you have? I could gouge your eye out by then. Do you want to live with one eye?”

  It was the first time I feared for my life. Everything I had once believed about Isabel’s character was stripped away and I saw her for what she really was—a killer.

  And then she laughed. “Oh, silly me.” She hit herself in the forehead with the palm of her hand. “I almost forgot.” She bent down and collected another strip of bedding. Then she leaned towards me and forced it into my mouth, gagging me. The sight of her psychotic laughter sent shivers up and down my spine. “And I’d better take care of this.” She walked over and closed the door to her room. “We’d better work fast before they notice you aren’t there. How long is it until someone comes to give you a comfort break? Oh, I forgot, you can’t answer. Let’s get this moving, then.”