Chapter 17
An unfriendly wind rattled the loose guttering on the farmhand’s cottage, adding to the cacophony of noises that were keeping me awake. The walls creaked. The fridge hummed. A tap dripped somewhere, and the fan on the wood heater just wouldn’t shut up. Identifying each sound didn’t help me to tune them out the way I once had. Had I ever even noticed a watch ticking at night before? It wasn’t only the sounds either. The place smelled weird. Like old food and soap and antiseptic and peanuts, and yet I knew that Aunt Lily had been living there and would have kept the place rigorously clean. The scents weren’t overpowering, just very unfamiliar. And why did I feel so alone? It wasn’t like I hadn’t been sleeping alone all my life, so why was I feeling so … bereft? Maybe because Aunt
