Calum followed Brix through the rocks. “I suppose that’s the right way to be, but it feels kinda weird. Where I came from, I couldn’t leave a sketchbook lying around without someone ripping my designs and selling them on.”
“That’s ’cause you’ve been surrounded by cunts.”
Brix regretted his crass bluntness as soon as the words were out, but Calum merely shrugged.
“You’re probably right. In fact, you are right. Maybe that’s why I’ve found it so hard to draw these last few years. Remember when we used to get a crate in, and some JD, and a bunch of us would draw all night, collaborating the fuck out of everything we did? I miss that.”
“Then you’ve come to the best place. We have drink-up-draw-downs all the time. Don’t plan ’em, they just happen.”
“Sounds good to me. Oh wow, we’re nearly at the top.” Calum drew level with Brix and peered over the edge of the path. “That’s a long way down.”
“Give it a minute.”
Brix grabbed Calum’s arm and pulled him up the last few steps of the path and out onto the cliff that had been the top of the world for as long as he could remember. “My dad brought me up here when I was born and dangled me over the edge, presented me to the sea or some shit. Tradition for Lusmoore babies.”
“Always knew there was legend in you somewhere.” Calum winked, then turned to the view—the grey sky, the misty clouds. The crashing waves below, and the miles and miles of moody-blue ocean. It was like nothing else on earth, and Brix wondered if Calum could feel the Cornish magic Brix had been born with. The fabled histories that were still sung out loud by the choir of old-school fishermen who hung around the Sea Bell.
“Don’t be daft, boy. Emmets aren’t like us. You’ll see when you go on chasing your dreams to that big city you’re always blathering on about.”
Brix’s long dead grandfather’s views on non-Cornish folk reminded him that he’d promised Calum a story. He caught up with him as he drifted to the edge of the cliff to peer cautiously at the deadly rocks below. “Ever told you why they call me Brix?”
“Nope.” Calum didn’t look away from the crashing waves. “It’s always screwed with me, though. I know you did your apprenticeship in Brixton, but Jordan told me you were Brix way before that.”
Brix found a grin, forcing back the bad taste in his mouth that just a mention of Jordan’s name brought. “My dad called me Brix. Apparently he took me to London once, and Brixton was the only name on the Tube map I could read. I wanted to go there, but he dragged me to the dogs in Walthamstow instead, grumpy old git. Reckon he thought the name would wind me up, but I loved it, and now . . . it’s who I am.”
“Who were you before?”
“Benjamin. Did I never tell you that?”
Calum shook his head. “Nope. It makes sense now, though. You could be a Benjamin.”
“Not in this lifetime.” Brix shuddered. “Learning to write was a whole lot easier once I’d lost a few letters.”
“Eh? How old were you when you went to London with your dad?”
“Too old to not to be able to read the whole map or write my own name, put it that way. I was twelve before I had those down.”
“It doesn’t show.”
Brix snorted. “Why do you think I went into business with Lena? I couldn’t do what she does on my own. Can barely make sense of the booking system, let alone all the taxes and crap.”
“Bet that’s not true. You’re not stupid, Brix.”
“Oh, I know that; least, I do these days. Just had a different start to most emmet folk. Different kind of education, I guess.”
“What the hell is an emmet?”
Brix retrieved his hip flask from his inside pocket and took a swig before passing it Calum’s way. “An emmet is an outsider . . . a non-Cornish person. Some Porthkennack folk believe none of you should be let over the border.”
“What do you think?”
“I reckon the world would be a darker place without the souls that keep us warm.”
Calum shivered and swigged from the flask. “You must need a lot of them to stay warm around here.”
Brix let the turbulent sea reclaim his gaze. “You’d be surprised. You can come up here wanting to jump and go home a few hours later with a new skin. This place is magic, and it’s in my blood. Without it . . . well, who knows where I’d be.”
Calum paced the spare bedroom in Brix’s cosy cottage. Voices and laughter filtered up from the kitchen, but despite Brix’s open invitation, he felt no urge to join them. In fact, the thought of traipsing downstairs and presenting himself to Brix’s mates made him want to throw himself out of the nearest window.
