Clam Rock was infamous for one reason only: the reef surrounding it. Razor Reef had claimed more ships and more lives than all the other rocks and reefs put together, and was more than likely where all those cannibalised sailors met their gruesome ends...

Nobody really knew for certain whether any sailors had actually been forced to eat each other to survive after being shipwrecked, or even where it was supposed to have happened. Whether the story was true or not, nodding to the dark granite memorial was a Haarville superstition that everyone observed.

Manx paused and gazed up at Gushet House, Haarville’s grandest building, and home to Ma Campbell. He noticed how the haar appeared to linger just above the building’s step-gabled roof, but then his eye was drawn, as always, to the round top-floor window, set into the apex of the wall. It was formed of six segments of different-coloured glass, and more than once, he fancied he’d seen a pair of unblinking eyes gazing through the dandelion-yellow pane.

Madame Bonbeurre baked delicious buns and pastries, but her kitchen was notoriously chaotic. “Freshly baked chaque matin – every morning!”

She turned to Fantoosh. “As long as you keep picking limpets, there’ll be limpet buns for lunch!”

The classroom had once been filled with desks. However, for many years the number of older people in Haarville had far outweighed the younger folk, and it was ages since there’d been more than two pupils enrolled at the academy, so the surplus furniture had been used for firewood long ago.

Lunchtime lasted forty minutes, which was just enough time to get to the Sinking Teapot, order two Monday specials, fill Fantoosh in on the Baggits, and get back in time for afternoon lessons.

Unusually for a Monday the café was almost full to bursting, its bleached wooden tables crowded and noisy. As they weaved their way to the last free table, the excited chatter reduced to hushed whispers and Manx felt every eye follow his progress.

Manx raced up from the harbour, and within a few minutes was tearing around the stone well in the centre of the town’s small main square. He took the granite steps leading up to Burgh House two at a time, and hammered on its heavy wooden doors until finally one opened a crack.

“I have to see the Elders,” he panted.

“You can’t,” snapped a voice. The door slammed in Manx’s face. He banged on it again...

If Father G was running late, it meant he’d almost certainly got carried away at Nine Stitches buying up bundles of gull-feather boas and yet more mother-of-pearl fripperies, egged on, no doubt, by Betsy Lugstitch. The shop owner’s idea of a perfect Saturday afternoon was to charm Father G into purchasing more accessories than he could possibly need for a year of performances as his glamorous drag queen stage character, Gloria in Excelsis.

Manx breathed deeply, savouring the heady, sweet scent of the shop. Decade upon decade of amberose devices gently humming away had left an indelible smell. It had sunk deep into the dark wooden panels lining the walls, and the green woollen curtains hanging at the bay window. Even the oak floorboards, salvaged centuries before from a wrecked ship, now gleamed like honey on hot toast, imbued with years of amberose.

Entering the library always had the same effect on Manx, and despite the urgency of their visit, today was no exception: no matter how cold outside, how heavily the haar pressed down, or how damp and miserable he felt, happiness simply rolled over him here. That, and it was as toasty as five pairs of mittens.

Manx’s shoulders sagged. He’d completely forgotten that Death Day was fast approaching. The whole town would soon be gearing up for the most important day of the year, when they all made their annual pilgrimage over to St Serf’s chapel to celebrate their dead ancestors. Manx spent the whole twelve months looking forward to the moment the model of his family’s ship, the Amber Rose, was carefully lowered from the chapel’s vaulted ceiling. Then he’d take out all the heirlooms and trinkets it kept safe, mementos collected over the years by his ancestors, and think of them.

And of course, after the memory ship ceremony, there was the massive celebration picnic to enjoy too. He and Fantoosh always took that part of the planning very seriously.

Fantoosh switched off the lantern and was handing it to Manx when out of nowhere, the Unfortunate Flounder tipped sideways. They were thrown against the side of the boat, whilst above, Nathan screamed as he tumbled down through the open hatch, landing with a splashing thud. A split second later, the hatch crashed shut and the hold was plunged into darkness. As the boat rocked back the other way, there came the unmistakable sound of a heavy metal chain sliding across the wooden deck...

Crossing the bridge over the burn itself was equally fraught, and it wasn’t until they were in Phlegm Town that they let go. Manx couldn’t resist a quick look behind him. Despite the murky air, he could still make out the eerie pulsating beam from the harbour’s perpetual light tower, doing its job of marking the harbour entrance for Sheila Giddock when she returned from her daily fishing trip. Then Manx noticed that the fog draped over Haarville seemed to throb with an orange glow, as if a giant heart was beating slowly somewhere inside.

On any other Saturday, the transformation would take hours, with Father G fussing over which gown to wear for his regular weekend suppertime drag show at Lumpsuckers, Haarville’s ever-popular fish bar and restaurant. Choosing the perfect wig was usually a major operation, with his entire collection called into service before the perfect match for “the mood” was found.

But there was no such dallying this week. Manx dashed around with armfuls of shell necklaces, boas and high heels, whilst Father G grabbed at random and threw them on. The result was, of course, nothing less than spectacular, which left Manx wondering if his guardian needed to make quite so much fuss every weekend.

A thick haar had filled Kipper Lane and was rolling uphill towards Nethergate. It was just the sort of weather that discouraged even Haarville’s hardy townsfolk from venturing out, and when Father G returned from a quick nip round the corner to Da Silva’s grocers to fetch provisions, his raincoat dripped a damp trail from the door, through the shell curtain and into the kitchen.

Having heaved their belongings over the threshold, Manx closed the door on the nose-wrinkling stench of Ratfish Wynd. But if the stink of the air outside the Lange Fluke’s entrance was memorable, the first intake of the air inside would stay with Manx for ever. He had to fight to keep down even the few drops of limpet water he’d hurriedly swallowed before the Elders had arrived to escort them out of the shop.

Manx found himself staring into a pair of milky-white eyes framed by lank grey hair. A flickering light shone off two stubby teeth and revealed deep wrinkles in the old woman’s pallid face. She relaxed her surprisingly strong grip and reached down, lifting the source of light from the ground. It was an actual gull lamp – a fulmar, by the look of it, minus its head and with a burning wick shoved down its neck into the fat within.

A small, yellow-furred tongue uncurled from within the woman’s mouth and licked dryly at her lips. “Ha! Look who be creeping down Crab Gulley,” she said in a gruff, breathless voice.

Apart from a few bedraggled gulls, the quayside was deserted. It was stinking, of course, due to the mass of decaying seaweed piled up in what had once been Phlegm Town’s working harbour, so Manx took the precaution to breathe through his mouth to avoid the pungent whiffs wafting up from below.

Father G took a deep breath. “There’s strangers in Haarville.”

Manx almost toppled over onto the puffs himself.

“Outsiders,” said Father G. “Two of them! They came over the causeway.”

“The causeway?” repeated Manx.

“Yes, the causeway.”

“The causeway that’s so dangerous only a deranged squid searching for a lost tentacle would attempt to cross?”

“There’s only one causeway, Manx.”

Manx felt himself go giddy. He held himself steady against the table.

“But… there’s been no outsiders in Haarville since…”

“Since I arrived,” said Father G. “Forty years ago.”

“Every Haarville family came from somewhere else originally. Even mine. There wouldn’t be a Haarville if my ancestors hadn’t been shipwrecked here after they left Ireland.”

Sometimes, Manx wondered whether the Burgmaster and the rest of Haarville’s Elders had forgotten that it was his ancestors, Sarah and Finnick Fearty, who founded their town over two hundred years ago, after their ship, the Amber Rose, was wrecked just off shore.

Father G chewed another ragworm segment. “All I know is that I wasn’t greeted so warmly when I arrived in Haarville: the only place I could find lodgings was Phlegm Town.”

“I didn’t know that,” said Manx. He rarely ventured across to the dingier, more run-down part of Haarville, but if the wind was blowing in the wrong direction, everyone was treated to a blast of Phlegm Town’s many foul stinks and putrid pongs.

Father G pursed his lips. “The Elders were clearly discombobulated to discover a twenty-something, six foot, brown-skinned, female impersonator in their midst. They’d never seen anyone like me before. I’d probably still be festering there if your grandparents hadn’t sponsored me as an apprentice here.”

Manx sprinted along the harbour wall, slipping on a piece of slimy seaweed and crashing into a stack of lobster baskets.

"For Neptune’s sake!" he gasped under his breath, untangling himself from the netting and rope.

Everything Manx wore smelled richly of Amberose too, even his favourite yellow oilskin smock, which he’d found washed up in Limpet Bay last year. With a bit of mending it could now fend off the very coldest wind, the absolute wettest rain, and the thickest, most bone-chilling winter fog – but it was no match for fragrant amberose.

Ice-cold water dripped from the low, overhanging gables either side of the wynd. Trying to avoid them, whilst also side-stepping broken cobbles and decomposing rat corpses, wasn’t easy, especially with eyes smarting from the rancid reek of decay and rotting seaweed.