Chapter 1

A Peculiar Morning

Even before he got out of bed, Nicolas Bennett knew this was going to be strange day. A strange day indeed.

It was Saturday, and it was the 31st of October. Halloween. And, as it so happened, it was also Nicolas’ birthday. His twelfth birthday.

But those things weren’t strange. The strangeness was how the daybegan. And how it began—bizarrely and in a most unexpected, peculiar way—was with a shadow.

***

After waking, Nicolas yawned and lay quietly in his bed, watching the paleness of the early morning light cast sleepy silhouettes against his attic bedroom’s walls. Over the high lip of his bed’s footboard, Nicolas could see his room’s single, small, round window. Sparkling frost trimmed its panes and made the comforting weight of his bed’s tattered old quilt feel especially warm and safe.

On most weekend mornings, Nicolas loved to lie still in bed and spy on the world as it woke up. Bright sunrays would slip through the gloomy shades of the woods beyond his home, and birds would begin to chat busily with each other as if discussing the past week’s news. Nicolas would feel the wall behind his headboard gently rattle as his father, Peter Bennett, strode from the house to “shake out his legs” with an early morning stroll. Nicolas’ mum, Sarah Bennett, would sing softly to herself, bustling about their small kitchen and making a “fry up,” a scrumptious breakfast of thick bacon, poached eggs, fried tomatoes and mushrooms, fried bread with butter, Cumberland sausage, and hot mugs of tea. The family’s cat, Thomas (which his father called “Sir Thomas More”), would be scolding the family’s dog, Jasper (which his father called “Jasper Carrot”), for lying across the threshold of the side door, waiting for father’s return, and blocking Thomas’ way of escaping to the outside world. On most weekend mornings, Nicolas loved to lie still in bed and let the world wake up around him.

But this morning felt different.Peculiar.

The night before, a suspicious, cold fog had crawled into the nearby woods. Now, as the dawn slowly awoke, the fog’s chilly fingers lingered, groping through the hedgerow at the edge of the family’s small sheep pasture. A snap of early winter weather had blown in from the darkness of the Irish Sea, and the birds were keeping quiet in their nests. Nicolas’ father hadn’t left the house yet, and Nicolas couldn’t hear his mum bustling about the small kitchen making breakfast. The small farmhouse felt especially hushed. Silent.

Nicolas lay in his bed, looking out at the early morning, the wintry fog, and the dreary sky. He imagined he was all alone.

***

A shadow suddenly filled his room’s small window. It bobbed and jerked about in shudders and shakes, blocking out most of the morning’s first light. And, with startlingly force, the shadow began striking the window’s glass.

The flurry of violent strikes on the glass made Nicolas jump. He was sure the window was going to break, and for a moment, he even imagined he heard a loud pop and crack. The noise was thunderous in the small attic bedroom, as if someone was throwing stones at the small window. Nicolas was gripped by an overwhelming urge to plug his ears and dive safely under his bed’s thick quilt.

But he didn’t. Nicolas didn’t plug his ears. He didn’t hide. Instead, cautiously, he sat up. Straight up.

He stared at the window. The part of Nicolas that made him sit up was deeply curious, and his eyes seemed to be in control of the rest of his body. In spite