Page 65 of Valour

“It might. Yes.” She smiled ruefully through her tears. “I said I’d sit outside his tent until he agreed to come inside.”

“There is a blizzard going on out there! Are you mad?”

“Oh, probably.” She sniffed. “He wasn’t going back outside, was he?”

“No, he was about to go into your cabin.”

Hester slumped. Thank God. “Ohhh ouch, this is painful.”

Winston knelt and tucked both of her feet under his jumper, against the warm skin of his stomach.

Hester smiled and wiped her eyes, then tipped her head back and let out a long sigh. “Thank you.”

“You silly goose,” he said, shaking his head and smiling up at her.

Charlotte couldn’t sleep. Had tossed and turned all night. Hester was curled up on a cot at the end of the cabin, snoring loudly. Of course, she didn’t mind having Hester in with her. It was nice to have company, but the snoring, the groaning of the ice against the hull and the howling of the blizzard outside all conspired to keep her awake.

She sat up in bed and looked out of the window over the miles of moon-soaked ice. She squinted, unsure of a black speck on the floe. She pressed her nose to the cold glass, trying to focus on it. And then she gasped. It was a hole in the ice. With a pile of clothes next to it.

She stifled a scream, dashing to the end of her bed, reaching out a hand to shake Hester awake. Then she stopped. Couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. Hester was curled up on the cot. Arching from her back were huge feathery wings. Charlotte screamed properly then, her heart pounding against her ribs as she scrambled back on the bed.

Hester gave a final loud snore and then shot upright. “Shit. What is it?”

“Wings.” But the wings had vanished. Had she been seeing things? That was the only plausible explanation. They had been poring over the book of shapeshifting animals before bed, and it had obviously worked its way into her brain. But what was out the window was surely not in her mind. “Look.” She pointed at the window to the ice hole.

Hester climbed onto the bed and looked out of the window. “Oh God.”

It did not take them long to rouse the crews, and they all stood out on the ice, in the dark, staring at the hole.

“They are Victor’s clothes,” Septimus said, face drawn and pale. The eyes of the Intrepid’s crew fixed on Hester, who stood by Charlotte’s side.

“Don’t look at me. I’m not murdering your men. This is ridiculous!” Hester said, folding her arms.

“It is no secret that you do not like Victor,” Septimus said, glaring at Hester from under dark brows.

“It couldn’t have been Hester. She was in my cabin asleep all night,” Charlotte said. But who could have done this? She was sure none of the Valour’s crew were the murdering type. The edges of the ice hole glinted pale blue, and Charlotte noticed markings on one side. Lots of little circles. “Look at that.” She pointed the markings out.

Septimus crouched to inspect the hole. “What on Earth would make marks like that?”

Mei shuffled closer. “Almost looks like sucker marks. You know, like an octopus or squid might make.”

Septimus frowned. “But why would he take his clothes off and then get dragged into a hole by an octopus? It makes no sense.”

Charlotte hugged her arms around herself. The siren in the book was pictured next to a giant squid. She exchanged a glance with Hester. She didn’t like Victor particularly, but surely no one deserved to be dragged naked into an ice hole to their death. Tears welled in her eyes.

“I er…thought I saw someone,” Frank said, tugging at the hem of his coat.

Septimus rounded on him. “Who? What did you see?”

“I saw Odette leave Victor’s cabin. I heard…singing.”

Charlotte’s hands began to shake. She stuffed them under her armpits. “But there is no Odette. Charlie said that none of us match her description.” She thought of the picture of the siren in her book of myths. Surely it couldn’t be true.

“I believe what Charlie said was ‘none of the Valour women have tits like hers’,” Hester said in a deadpan tone.

Everyone stared at the hole in the ice, the air hanging heavy.

Charlotte woke a few hours later, darkness still cloaking the cabin, her face cold, breath misting in front of her. She peered over the edge of her sleeping bag at Hester, asleep and snoring on the cot at her feet.