Weyward — Chapter 44: Kate

44

KATE

Kate puts her hand to her mouth, tasting blood.

Below her, the floorboards creak as Simon stalks through the cottage. ‘Kate?’ he calls. ‘I know you’re in here. Come on, Kate, you can’t hide from me.’ She can hear him opening cupboards then slamming them shut again.

There is the crash of porcelain on wood from the kitchen. He swears loudly.

She listens to the click of the back door opening. He’s looking for her in the garden again. Kate takes the opportunity to light some candles, fingers trembling. The shapes of the attic emerge under the orange glow of the guttering flames. The bureau. The shelves, with their glass jars of insects.

Being surrounded by Aunt Violet’s things makes her feel a little bit stronger.

She needs the police. She pulls her phone from her pocket and dials 999, listening for the sound of him coming back into the house. The reception in the attic is patchy and the connection drops out after the first ring.

Swearing under her breath, she tries again. ‘Emergency, which service do you require?’ She opens her mouth to speak. The back door clicks again. ‘Hello? Which service do you require?’ The footsteps are in the hallway now. They stop. She hangs up the phone.

There is no sound other than the beat of her heart in her ears. Kate thinks he must be directly beneath her. She is gulping at the air now, her breathing fast and ragged. What if he can hear it?

He must be looking at the trapdoor. Wondering what it leads to.

Wondering if it leads to her. Tears sting her eyes as she remembers all the

times he’s hurt her. She touches the scar on her arm. All those years she’s lost. Six years of cowering from him, of letting him tell her she is stupid, incompetent. Worthless. The fear is replaced by a hot bolt of fury.

He’s not going to hurt her again. He’s not. She won’t let him.

And she won’t let him anywhere near her child.

The footsteps start again. She hears him walk into the sitting room.

There’s a faint creak as he settles onto the sofa. She can picture him, staring at the window, waiting for her to come home.

Kate shifts position, slowly and carefully. She looks at her phone: the reception bar flickers. She needs to get help – she should have dialled 999 as soon as she saw those messages, but her mind was too blurred by panic, by the need to hide. And now it’s too late for her to call. He’ll hear her, and discover her hiding spot.

She wipes her bloodied hand on her trousers, then types out a quick text to Emily.

Please can you call police. Abusive ex-boyfriend at cottage. Hiding in

attic.

Kate holds her breath.

Message failed to send.

She tries to re-send it, greeted again and again by that cold, impersonal

sentence.

She’s on her own.

There must be something in the attic she can use to defend herself.

Something she can use as a weapon. If only she’d thought to grab the fire poker from the sitting room.

She lifts one of the candles and looks around, searching for a crowbar, a hockey stick … anything.

The candlelight passes over the bureau, catching on its golden handles.

She sees something that she didn’t notice before.

She crawls to the bureau, as slowly and quietly as she can, sucking in her breath.

There is a W carved onto the handle of the locked drawer.

She pulls the necklace out from under her shirt, slips it off. The engravings match.

Kate runs her fingers over the pendant. There is a tiny bump at the bottom of the pendant, barely visible. She presses it, holding her breath.

Nothing happens.

She presses it again.

This time, the pendant springs open with a snap. Not a pendant after all.

A locket. Inside is a rolled piece of paper. She lifts it out carefully, revealing the small golden key.

The paper looks white and fresh, as if it has been placed there recently.

She unrolls it, heart thumping in her chest.

The handwriting has changed: become more refined, elegant, but still she recognises the spidery loops from the note she found in the Brothers Grimm

book.

Aunt Violet.

I hope she can help you as she helped me. That is all it says. No reference to who the mysterious ‘she’ might be. But as she carefully turns the key in the lock, Kate thinks that she knows already.

She eases the drawer out, little by little, terrified that it will creak and alert Simon to her presence. She doesn’t breathe until the drawer is open

enough for her to see inside.

A book.

She lifts it out of the drawer, inhaling the scent of age and must. As she holds the book in her hands, she hears the first drops of rain fall on the roof.

The leather cover is worn and soft. It looks old. Centuries old.

She opens it. The paper – it isn’t paper, she sees now, but parchment – is delicate. Diaphanous, like an insect’s wings.

The writing is faded and cramped, so that at first it is illegible. She holds the candle closer, watches the words form. Her heart beats faster as she

reads the first line. ‘Ten days they’d held me there …’

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