Abstract: Embodiments are directed to sharing namespaces across file system clusters. A file in a spoke file system may be determined based on a command provided to the spoke file system such that the file may be associated with an inode mask. Data blocks associated with the file may be determined based on the command and the inode mask such that the data blocks may be absent from the spoke file system. Requests for leases may be generated based on the absent data blocks such that each lease request corresponds to a portion of the absent data blocks Employing the leases provided by a hub file system to: copy the absent data blocks from the hub file system where each portion of absent data blocks may be associated with a lease; updating the inode mask to include the leases and each copied portion of absent blocks.