And just like that, there he was, sitting slouched in his reclining chair, a skinny spectral presence in a grubby T-shirt and baggy shorts. His flyaway hair floated around his bony head as though he were underwater, and his eyes were dark and brooding. He glowered at me, but his heart wasn’t in it. For the first time since I’d known him, he looked old and tired and defeated.

“Why did you do it, Edwin? What did you think you were doing? Why didn’t you tell me you were planning to snatch my living self out of the past?”

“The Merlin Glass said you were what the family needed to fight this war,” I said. “But . . . you must have known I was going to do it. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I didn’t remember!” The ghost of old Jacob looked sadly at his empty television set, and brief images flickered across the dusty screen of the living Jacob in his own time, doing all the simple everyday things the living do . . . all of it just a jumble of memories, gone in a moment.

“So much of my past is lost to me,” Jacob said softly. “My life is so long ago, now. After I died I spent centuries here, just sitting and waiting . . . waiting for the important thing I had to do . . . waiting for so long I finally forgot what it was I was waiting for. I knew you were important, from the first day I set eyes on you, as a child. I remembered, eventually, that I had to help you seize control of the family away from the Matriarch, but I still didn’t know why. There’s more to me being here, Eddie, than just the destruction of the Heart. There’s something I have to do, something important . . . but I don’t know what!” He looked up and fixed me with a steely glare. “But I do remember one thing now, Eddie. You brought me here, to this time, to die. You made me, or will make me, what I am.”

“How?” I said. My throat was dry, my voice just a whisper.

“I don’t know. Let’s just hope it’s a good death. For the family.”

“No,” I said. “I won’t let that happen.”

“You can’t prevent it. In fact, you mustn’t.”

“I could send you back. The living you. Just open the gateway and . . .”

“But you won’t. Because you need me.”

“Jacob . . .” I said.

He nodded gruffly. “I know, boy. I know.”

“You were my first real friend,” I said. “And apart from Uncle James, the only real family I ever had. You and James were the only ones I ever cared for. And now you tell me I’m going to be responsible for your death too? No. No, I can’t let that happen. Not again. I killed one father; I can’t kill another!”