Glimpse (25 page)

I played absently with my locket and checked the map on my phone. ‘Almost there. We should hit the road again in a minute, then we’ll be at Dalsham. Are you ready?’

‘I’ve been prepared for two hundred years,’ he said, but the relaxed tone had gone from his voice. He rolled his sleeves back down and pulled on his gloves.

We left the fields, and stepped onto the road that led into Dalsham. The road was narrow, like all the others we’d walked along, but unlike the others it was completely overhung with trees. After the open, sunny fields it was like stepping into a tunnel.

I shivered as we hit the cooler, darker air. What little light broke through the canopy dappled the concrete like ripples on water. I fell quiet, clamping my satchel to my side.

Zachary went quiet too. His pace slowed. Then, without warning, he stopped altogether.

I stopped too, alarmed. ‘What is it?’

‘This is the place.’ His voice was low. ‘I recognize it from my nightmares. This is where I killed Philip.’

Shivers prickled up my spine. I hadn’t realized this journey was about Philip. I’d thought we were coming here to look for Bess. ‘Are you sure?’

His mouth was a thin line. ‘If a thousand years passed, I’d remember this place.’

He started walking again, more slowly than before, as if he didn’t want to miss a single leaf on the trees around us, a single shadow between the trunks.

I followed him, my mouth dry. For the first time, I considered what would happen if Zachary didn’t find what he was looking for, after all this build-up. My disappointment when I’d come to Hulbourn and not remembered my childhood had been the disappointment of only months of hoping; Zachary’s would be the disappointment of centuries.

I monitored my skin for Glimpses as Zachary scrutinized the road. I didn’t sense anything.

‘Philip probably won’t be here, you know,’ I said, trying to prepare him.

‘Good. I want him to be gone. It’s tortured me for years, the idea that he could be stuck like me.’ Zachary glanced at me, his face carved out of marble. ‘Tell me if you sense anyone.’

I nodded, and turned my focus fully on my skin. I had goosebumps, but not from Glimpses. I couldn’t help trying to imagine Zachary here, two and a quarter centuries ago, surrounded by four corpses.

‘The soldiers took Philip’s body this way.’ He nodded further down the road. ‘I hid in these trees—’ he gestured to his right ‘—and watched them. The crossroads aren’t far.’

He sped up. I followed. The crossroads came into view up ahead. The tree canopy had tried, but failed, to reach over all four roads, and the centre of the crossroads was lit up by a cross-shaped patch of light.

Zachary broke into a jog, as if he couldn’t wait a moment more to get this over with. I picked up my pace to match his, but tingling skittered across my skin, making me stumble.

Oh no. My heart stuttered along with my feet. Please let me be imagining it.

I sprinted to catch up with Zachary. With every step, the tingling got worse. I opened my mouth to shout, to warn him. Philip or not, we were running towards a Glimpse.

But it was already too late. Zachary’s steps faltered. A man-shaped Glimpse stepped from the trees up ahead.

Zachary jolted to a halt, as if his boots were fixed in the concrete. I caught up, looking first at him – his shoulders heaving – and then at the Glimpse.

Beyond the patch of light at the crossroads, the Glimpse-man wandered into the road, his pace bored and unhurried. He hadn’t noticed us yet. His hair was the same as Zachary’s – longer, but the same red gold, with the same gentle curl. His build was the same, slim yet strong. And when he turned his head towards us—

Zachary gasped and stopped breathing.

The Glimpse-man’s face transformed from blank boredom to rigid attention. His mouth opened in a silent O as his eyes met Zachary’s.

The universe narrowed to contain only them. I watched, an outsider, as Zachary’s face went slack. Whatever was beating through his blood – happiness, distress – it had eclipsed his whole world.

Zachary took a step forwards, as if he was moving through treacle. The man mirrored him.

‘Philip?’

The man’s face crumpled. ‘Zachary . . .?’

And then they lurched towards each other, running and stumbling. They collided in the patch of light, embracing violently, muffled shouts and cries and incoherent words.

It was too much to hold in. I yelped too, on the road on my own.

I pressed my fingers to my lips, holding in the tears that choked my throat. My vision blurred, and I blinked frantically to clear it. At the crossroads, the sun had got brighter, as if shining a spotlight on the brothers. I wanted to believe that it was; that two ghosts, who the natural world ignored, were, for a moment, the most important thing in it.

Philip and Zachary broke apart. It took all my self-will not to run towards them, to give them this moment alone. Philip’s hand was on the back of Zachary’s neck, keeping him close. They spoke in low, urgent voices, for a long time. Finally, Zachary looked at me, his eyes wide and shining wet. ‘Elizabeth, come over here.’

I walked over to them, biting my lip with sudden nerves. Philip watched me with obvious fascination. I looked back with equal interest. I saw now that his eyes were the same green as Zachary’s, though the whites were red with tears. His lips were thinner and framed with a rakish moustache that looked too old for his young face. His clothes were elaborate where Zachary’s were simple – long boots, a red corduroy waistcoat, a long black velvet coat with huge lapels that framed his neck.

I had never felt like I was with a 200-year-old boy when I was with Zachary. But I could feel the weight of the years rolling off Philip.

‘I’m so happy we found you,’ I said. The words felt frivolous – there were no words big enough for this moment – but I backed them up with a huge smile.

I had only to look at Zachary’s face to know I was feeling a thousandth of what he was. I’d never seen so much elation, so much pain.

‘Sweet girl—’ Philip’s voice was rocky ‘—you must be an angel. You have brought my heaven to me.’

My throat tightened. All I could do was maintain my smile.

Philip turned his gaze back to Zachary, his hand still wrapped around the back of his neck. ‘My little brother. Whose life I ruined by my selfishness. Who I thought I would never see again. I believed I had been locked out of Heaven, separated from him forever as punishment—’ Philip choked up and bent his head, unable to continue.

Tears rolled silently down Zachary’s cheeks. He didn’t even take his eyes off Philip to blink them away.

‘I came with you by choice,’ Zachary said, his voice both soothing and insistent. ‘I am to blame. I attacked you—’

‘God damn it, Zachary.’ Philip dragged his velvet coat sleeve across his eyes. ‘I refuse to hear another word. I caused that situation. I put a gun in your hands. I am the only one to blame.’ He turned his swollen eyes to me. ‘You are an angel, and you were sent here for my brother. I am elated that, although he is like me, he is not alone.’

I blushed. ‘I’m not an angel. Zachary’s my friend; I’ll be there for him—’ I thought of Bess ‘—for as long as he needs me.’

Zachary caught Philip’s wrists. ‘Come back with us. I know a way you can leave this place. We’ll return – tonight, tomorrow, as soon as is possible, and take you with us.’

‘All these years, I have desired nothing more—’ Philip smiled ‘—than to know you had survived the life I doomed you to. In seeing you again, all my prayers have been granted; it seems impossible to desire more. But, of course, I will come with you.’

Zachary beamed, and looked at me. ‘Let’s go now. Philip, come with us towards the inn, as far as you can.’

Philip smiled, but for a moment didn’t seem like he was going to. Then he nodded, and we walked together back down the road. His boot heels tapped firmly, slowly, on the concrete, as if there was all the time in the world.

He turned his face to Zachary’s, and it shone, like he’d brought the sun from the crossroads with him. He placed an arm over Zachary’s shoulder; an arm that seemed to have become more translucent.

‘I love you, my brother,’ he said. ‘You have brought me more peace today than I dreamed was possible.’

Misgiving stirred inside me, because I could see the mossy shade of Zachary’s clothes through Philip’s almost-glowing body.

Philip smiled, and he was so bright, it was like looking directly at the sun. My vision glowed bright white and red and black. When the glowing shapes faded, Philip was gone.

Zachary stopped. He turned a slow circle, the ghost of a smile still on his face, as if by keeping it there he could force what had just happened to not be true. ‘Philip?’ he said.

My breath caught in my throat. I spun too, looking for his brother – I couldn’t help myself, though my mind was a step ahead of my heart.

I knew already that Philip was gone. Really gone. The tingling had vanished from my skin like a candle being snuffed out. Glimpses didn’t just disappear like that; they had to walk away.

I wanted to be wrong.

‘Philip?’

‘Zachary,’ I said, through the lump in my throat. ‘I don’t think he’s—’

‘No, Elizabeth, don’t say it.’ His smile had gone now, his face whiter than bone. He sprinted back up the road to the patch of light at the crossroads. ‘Philip!’ he shouted.

I jogged after him. I didn’t know what to do. I felt empty, as though I’d witnessed a miracle and then someone had turned off the light. I couldn’t begin to imagine what this was going to do to Zachary.

I went straight up to him and caught his hand, holding it tight. His eyes searched every inch of the landscape around us. He even looked up at the sky, as though his brother might be there.

‘I don’t understand.’ His voice was broken. He finally turned his eyes to me. ‘Are you able to sense him? Can you tell where he’s gone?’

I shook my head, knowing each shake was a jab to his chest. ‘He’s gone. Completely. I’m so sorry.’

Zachary’s eyes widened, then he scrunched them shut.

I grabbed his other hand. I was trembling, but I forced myself to hold his fingers firmly.

‘Philip thought he’d been denied Heaven for destroying your life,’ I said. ‘And you proved to him today that he hadn’t. You showed him you were okay. Maybe that’s all that was keeping him here – his guilt over you.’

I didn’t know if what I was saying was true, but it felt right. I knew there was somewhere else that ghosts were meant to be, whether it was Heaven or Hell or somewhere, something, else entirely. Philip’s fading had felt natural, like a beam of light disappearing when the sun goes behind a cloud.

Still, it was too terribly tragic. I imagined meeting my mum and then losing her again, and my eyes welled again.

Zachary kept his eyes closed for a long moment, but as the minutes passed, the heave of his chest grew shallower and more regular.

His eyes were damp when he opened them again, but I could see the storm had passed. ‘Let’s return home.’

I nodded, and gave his hands one final squeeze before letting go.

We walked back up the road and into the field. The sky had darkened as if it, too, was in mourning, and there was a new chill in the air. I thought vaguely that it might rain, and that I had no umbrella, though it was impossible to care.

Zachary only took a few steps into the field before he stopped walking and pressed his hand to his face, overcome with emotion again. Without thinking, I went to his side, and we wrapped our arms around each other. He was light in my arms, but solid enough for me to feel the tremble of every muscle.

We cried together for a long time. I thought of Philip’s loneliness and of his release, of Dad’s grief and his recovery, of not remembering Mum and how that might one day have to just be okay. I wanted all this heartache over, for me and for Zachary.

I didn’t notice when we both stopped crying, I just realized that the pain had gone. In its place, I was filled with a bittersweet peace. It felt so right to hold Zachary like this, even though I wasn’t the one meant to be in his arms. I wished, just for one moment, that I could be Bess, that this could be more than a snatched moment that was never meant to be mine.

Zachary had fallen still too. He unfolded his arms from around my shoulders, as though he’d hugged me in his sleep and had only just become aware of what he’d done. He gave my forehead a slow, deliberate kiss as he stepped back, and it felt like being brushed with a golden feather.

‘Philip spoke the truth when he said you are an angel.’ His eyes were clear of tears, but soft with emotion. ‘You returned my brother to me; you gave Philip peace; you have given me the world again, literally.’ He opened his hands and looked around him, as if to lay the existence of the trees, of the sky, at my feet.

I smiled. ‘I dug up a bone, Zachary. That’s all I did.’

‘No. It’s not.’

I looked down at the grass. I bit my lip, then looked back up at him. ‘I can’t imagine how hard today must have been for you. But I’m glad Philip’s moved on. It feels like it was the right thing.’ I sought for the courage to ask the question that had been floating around my mind. ‘Don’t you ever feel like . . . you’d want to follow him?’

Zachary inhaled, as though surprised. ‘Why would I?’

‘Because that’s what spirits do. It seems to me that Philip stayed here because he felt so guilty over you, and when he found out you were okay, he was able to leave. You . . .’ I sought my mind, not wanting to say the wrong thing. ‘There must be some reason why you haven’t moved on too. Maybe for you it was Philip too – you felt guilty about what happened, just like he did.’

‘I have no desire to leave, Elizabeth.’

‘Yes, because you still have to find Bess. But when you find her . . .’ I trailed off. The lump returned to my throat.

‘I can make no promises about what will happen to me. After what we saw—’ he gestured back at the road, and I knew he was thinking of Philip’s fading ‘—I cannot pretend to know how my existence works. Yet I can tell you that I am not done with this world. Look at it.’ He gestured again at the trees and sky, and then he gestured at me. ‘Look at you.’ His voice softened. ‘How could I want to leave any of this?’