Darwin was losing at cards.
"You're cheating," he said, throwing down his hand. "There's no way you got three queens again."
Across the worn table, a boy with sharp elbows and a gap-toothed grin leaned forward. He was skinny, all angles and nervous energy, with reddish-brown hair that stuck up in three directions no matter how much Mrs. Hale tried to flatten it.
"Not cheating. Just better than you."
"Tommy, I literally saw you take a card from your sleeve."
"That was a different card. For luck."
"That's not how luck works."
"That's exactly how luck works. You make your own."
Darwin lunged across the table to grab the deck, and Tommy scrambled backward, cackling, cards scattering across the floor. They ended up in a heap near the window, half-wrestling, half-laughing, until Mrs. Hale's voice cut through from the kitchen.
"Boys! If you've broken something, I'm putting you both on dish duty for a month!"
They froze. Looked at each other. Silently agreed to blame the wind if anything was actually broken.
Tommy had been at the orphanage for three years, arrived when he was seven, same as Darwin and Marcus had been left as infants. He didn't talk about where he came from. Darwin didn't ask. That was the unspoken rule here: everyone had a before, and the before was nobody's business unless you offered it.
"New kid coming today," Tommy said, gathering up the scattered cards. "Heard Mrs. Hale talking about it."
"Another one?"
"Cart's supposed to arrive before lunch."
Darwin shrugged. New kids came and went. Some stayed, some got adopted, some ran away. The orphanage on Barrow Hill had a way of collecting strays.
"Hope they're not weird," Tommy said.
"You're weird."
"Yeah, but I'm the good kind of weird."
----
The cart was old and rattling.
Darwin and Tommy watched from the upstairs window as it creaked up the long drive. The man driving didn't look like a regular delivery: no uniform, no company markings. Just a weathered face and a hat pulled low.
"Can't see who's in the back," Tommy said, pressing his nose against the glass.
"Move over."
"You move over."
They jostled for position until the cart stopped at the front steps. The driver climbed down, walked around to the back, and lifted out a single bag. Then he reached up and helped someone down.
A girl. Small. Maybe eight or nine. She stood on the steps like she wasn't sure the ground would hold her weight.
"She looks scared," Darwin said quietly.
"Everyone looks scared when they first get here."
"Not like that."
Tommy didn't have an answer for that.
They watched as Ingrid appeared at the front door, moving slowly, the way she always did, like she was conserving energy for something important. She spoke to the driver. Coins changed hands. The driver climbed back up and drove away without looking back once.
The girl stood in the entrance hall, small and round-faced, with soft golden-brown skin and a cloud of dark curls that seemed to have a life of their own. Even from up here, Darwin could see her eyes, warm and light brown, the color of honey held up to sunlight.
But there was something in them. Something that made him feel cold.
Mrs. Hale crouched down to the girl's level. Darwin couldn't hear what she said, but he saw the girl's mouth move.
No sound came out.
----
The new girl didn't speak.
Not the first day. Not the second. Not the third. She sat in corners during meals and flinched when people moved too quickly. Her eyes tracked movement the way a rabbit watches a hawk, always alert, always ready to run.
"She looks creepy," Tommy said on the second day, picking at his dinner.
"She's scared."
"Same thing."
"No it isn't." Darwin stabbed his fork into a potato. "Scared people act different. They're not trying to be weird. They just can't help it."
Tommy looked at him strangely. "How do you know?"
Darwin didn't answer because he felt it was a dumb question.
The other children whispered about her. Pointed. Made up stories about where she came from, each one darker than the last. A few of the younger ones were scared of her. Most just ignored her.
Darwin found himself watching her. Not obviously, just glances across the dining hall, moments when their paths crossed in the corridors. She never looked back. Never seemed to notice anyone at all.
On the third day, everything changed.
Darwin was crossing the dining hall, tray in hand, when he saw it happen.
A boy sat at one of the far tables. He looked the biggest in the room and he took up space like a coiled rope lean, sharp-elbowed, with a face all jagged angles and eyes that didn't blink often enough. He leaned back in his chair, tapping a silent, agitated rhythm on the wood, and tracked the new girl as she moved.
Darwin knew him. Everyone knew him. He'd been at Barrow Hill long enough and arrived as a toddler, stayed as a child, and now a teenager bitter and sharp-edged. The story went that a family had wanted to adopt him once. Years ago. They'd come to visit, seen him playing in the yard, started the paperwork.
Then they'd seen the twins.
Two infants with strange marks on their foreheads, sleeping in matching baskets. The family had asked questions. Ingrid had said things Darwin never learned. And somehow, by the end of that visit, the family had left without signing anything. Without taking anyone.
The boy had been six years old. Old enough to understand what had happened. Old enough to blame.
He'd never forgiven the twins for it. Never said it out loud—but Darwin could feel the hatred every time those cold eyes landed on him. Every sneer. Every muttered "freak."
Now those eyes were fixed on the new girl. Testing. Probing for weakness.
Darwin saw him scoop a spoonful of porridge from his bowl. Saw him take aim.
The oats hit the new girl's dark curls with a wet splat. She didn't react. Didn't flinch, didn't cry, didn't even look up. Just sat there, staring at her plate, while the porridge dripped down the side of her face.
A few of the other children laughed. The older boy grinned.
Something inside Darwin went cold.
He was across the room before he knew he was moving. His tray clattered to the floor somewhere behind him. He didn't care. His hand closed on the boy's collar and pulled.
The older boy hit the floor with a satisfying thunk.
The dining hall went silent.
"Leave her alone," Darwin said. His voice was quiet. Cold. "Or we're going to have a problem."
The boy scrambled to his feet, face red. He was bigger than Darwin, older, heavier.
"You can't-"
"Yes I can."
They stared at each other. Something in Darwin's eyes made the older boy step back. Later, he would tell the others that Darwin's eyes had looked wrong for a moment, darker, somehow, like storm clouds. But no one believed him.
"Freak," he muttered. "You and your brother both."
He left.
Darwin turned to the new girl. She was staring at him with those wide honey-brown eyes, porridge still dripping from her curls.
"I'm Darwin," he said.
"Lena," she whispered. It was the first word she had spoken since arriving.
----
After that, Lena followed Darwin everywhere. A small quiet shadow at the edge of his vision. He found he didn't mind.
One evening, while they were carrying firewood in from the shed, Marcus stopped mid-step.
"Darwin."
"What?"
"That plate Mrs. Hale dropped yesterday. You caught it before it even left her hand."
Darwin shifted the logs in his arms. "So?"
"So you were across the room. You weren't even looking at her."
"Good reflexes. I've always been like this."
Marcus didn't answer. His eyes stayed on Darwin a moment too long.
Darwin threw a piece of kindling at him. "Stop being weird."