and they had to guard him night and day to make sure he wouldn’t attack them again.
They’d come as near to the coast as they could. Then, they sent an SOS for the captain and the crewman to be rescued and left the cargo ship aboard a small lifeboat with a modicum of food and water. Had it not been for Niall’s powers they would have got lost, unable to control the raft, but Niall used the song to force the wind and the waves to take them up the east coast to Edinburgh, where they moored in great secret. Mike struggled to believe that he was still alive, after days and days on a boat that looked and felt as if it might capsize at any moment.
They never knew what became of Captain Young and the wounded crewman, and whether anyone believed their story about a giant squid attacking the ship.
“A few more minutes and we’ll be at Sarah’s house,” said Mike, checking the map he was holding. “Niall, I was thinking …”
“Yes, I wonder about that too.”
Mike stopped suddenly. “What? You know what I was thinking? Can you read minds, is it a power of yours?” he asked, horrified.
“No, I can’t read minds!” Niall laughed. “I just know you so well by now that I know what you’re about to say.”
Mike frowned. “Are you saying I’m predictable?”
“Very.”
“As in, boring?”
“Yes, that too. I know what you’re going to say next: shut up Niall.”
“Shut u … Oh, for heaven’s sake!”
Niall patted his friend’s shoulder as they walked. “Just messing with you, Mike. It was written all over your face – you’re wondering if Sarah has found out that Sean is not Harry. If you know what I mean.”
“Just as well you don’t read minds, you’d know what I really think of you.”
“You fancy me.”
Mike laughed. “In your dreams. Anyway, yes, I was wondering about just that. I remember that Harry warned Sean about Sarah’s diffidence. But you’d think she’d understand the whole situation by now.”
“The unforgiving Midnights.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“My mum knew someone who knew Morag Midnight. A distant cousin of ours, Amelia Campbell. She ended up somewhere in Australia or New Zealand, I think. Isn’t that where Sean is from?”
“Yes.”
“Anyway, Amelia was in awe of the Midnights, and not always in a good way. That’s what she called them, ‘the unforgiving Midnights’.”
“Harry was a Midnight, and he was the kindest person I’ve ever met.”
“No wonder he didn’t speak to the rest of them, then.”
Mike nodded and shrugged. “You have a point.” He pulled his collar up as high as he could. “Jesus, I’m done in, man. This weather is brutal.”
“You need to eat something. Come on, I’ll go and get breakfast for us. With our last—” Niall counted the coins in his pocket, “—five pounds and forty-four pence. You wait here.”
“You can be useful, sometimes.” Mike let himself down onto a bench, heavily, his rucksack tipping horizontal on the pavement.
“I was sent to you by the angels, Mike.”
“Ha ‘bloody’ ha.”
Niall crossed the road to the first coffee shop he saw. It was uncommonly busy for that time of the morning, somewhere between breakfast and lunch hour – overflowing with mums and prams, students with no lectures or bunking off school, and office workers on their tea breaks. Niall stood in the queue, looking left and right, watching for possible threats.
There were some suspicious looks. He’d slept in the same clothes for days, had the straggly beginnings of a red beard and smelled of some foul Himalayan Pine deodorant they had bought in the chemist’s to cover the fact they hadn’t showered since they got off the boat.
After twenty minutes of queuing, Niall finally got his hands on two bacon rolls and two white coffees. That meant they had twenty-four pence left, unless they found Sean soon. They couldn’t use any of their cards, of course, they’d be easily traceable.
Mike bit into his roll at once. “Oh man, this is good. What took you so long?”
“The world and his granny are having a coffee this morning.”
“The world and who?”
“His granny.”
“Can you please make sense when you speak to me?”
Niall laughed. “Right-o. By the way, this is our last meal. After this, it’s pickpocketing for me.”
“Fine. Just don’t get caught.”
“That’s not like you, Mr we-can’t-do-this-it’s-wrong!”
“What’s the alternative? Find a job, with no documents?”
Niall nodded, chewing. “We should have taken those.”
“They had tentacles all over them, I’d like to remind you! Now get a move on.”
They swung their rucksacks over