The bird-woman tilts her head and surveys me with rheumy white eyes. A glistening transparent film slides over her eyeballs like a tiny shutter opening. The strangeness of it fills me with revulsion, yet somehow I’m not afraid.

The woman raises a scrawny arm and I watch entranced as her fingers dance on the air, her talon-like nails clicking together. The tiny flicking motion does something to me and I feel my mind slow, like it’s full of feathers. I fight the urge to close my eyes and she steps behind me and clamps a damp hand to my forehead, pulling me back into her. She smells brackish, of rock pools and vast windswept beaches, and I feel as if I’m being held by the sea. A rhythmic guttural sound emanates from her throat, then she cackles and a rush of seawater closes over my head. My mind rocks shut like a clam and everything goes black.

17

I open my eyes to find myself back in the attic bedroom, red light seeping through the curtains and Tom breathing heavily in the next bed. Hideous shadowy creatures prowl the corners of my mind and I press my face into the pillow. It was just a nightmare. Tom’s safe and so is my mother. I turn over, and a weight shifts at the bottom of the bed. The bird-woman peers at me and I cry out.

‘Sh-sh-shush now.’

She reaches a hand towards me and I scramble up the mattress, my heart pounding, as massive feathered wings open from between her shoulder blades. I blink at her in disbelief, taking in her razor-sharp cheekbones, long hooked nose and milky-white eyes. The veins under her skin glow in the red half-light, giving her an oddly mottled appearance. Something about her seems incredibly old, ancient even. My nerves stretch out with the seconds; her existence is so impossible I can’t trust my own mind. If I screamed, would Tom wake me and say I’ve been dreaming or would he see her too?

A soft grunting noise comes from the back of her throat, the words stuttered and barely comprehensible. ‘Am I m-much ch-changed?’ Her mouth briefly widens, her pale lips stretching thin before wrenching upwards. It’s a strange parody of a smile and yet something about it – about her – is disturbingly familiar.

She clamps her hands onto my knees and crawls up the bed, her sharp fingernails digging into my legs. My muscles tense and I hold my breath as she leans close, her long, dirty hair hanging over my body. Freakishly white eyes search mine as if she’s looking for something buried inside me. I start to cover my face and she notices the red mark on my wrist and smiles with something like recognition. She reaches to touch it, but I snatch my hand away.