The Sacrifice

  ‘I can’t tell you much. It was all really weird. Matt’s kids called him Wormwood or the Green Man. He seemed to have some sort of control over the other sickos.’

  ‘You think that’s where they were all going earlier? To this Wormwood?’

  ‘Could be,’ said Hayden. ‘As I say, the ones on the streets, the pointers, looked like they were signalling to each other somehow.’

  ‘Things are changing.’

  ‘D’you know what you’ll do in the morning?’ Hayden sounded very tired.

  ‘I’ll get together an army and we’ll march over there and sort it out. Crush any sickos that might be left. Drive the rest of them into the river.’

  ‘And what about Matt?’

  ‘He’s not my business. My business is to get rid of the no-go zone. We make all the streets safe between here and the cathedral and then carry on, into town, right up to the Houses of Parliament. I’ve got no beef with Matt. He can stay in charge for all I care.’

  ‘What about all the food he’s got? All the stuff in that warehouse?’

  ‘It’s his. I ain’t no thief. I ain’t gonna go in and jack his stash. That being said, I might just tax him a little for my hard work. I’ll do a deal with him. We protect him, he gives us a few groceries. If he don’t want to play ball then we’ll see about slapping him down. But he’s more use to us keeping a lid on things. We need kids there, Hayden. We need safe places all through London. Like that girl Nicola you was telling me about. Things is opening up. We got to go with it.’

  ‘He’s got so much stuff in there, Jordan. You should of seen it.’

  ‘I will see it,’ said Jordan. ‘Thing is, though, we start in on that, we might go soft. We got to keep on scavenging, keep on trying to grow stuff, training to fight. We got to build for the future, not live on the scraps that the grown-ups left us.’

  ‘But he’s got some good stuff there,’ said Hayden.

  Jordan straightened up.

  ‘Don’t worry, Hayden,’ he said, making ready to go back down. ‘We gonna taste some of that sweet stuff, no doubt about it. Now get some sleep. We gonna be busy in the morning.’

  72

  Nicola was getting ready for bed. She had her own room in the Palace of Westminster. It wasn’t like they were short of space after all. The place was huge. There were loads of rooms here she’d never even been in.

  Her room wasn’t all that big. She didn’t need much. There was a wardrobe for her clothes, a bookcase for her books, a bed beside a low table where a candle burned. It was dry in here. Safe. It got freezing cold in the depths of winter, as they had no heating, but that was the same everywhere.

  Wasn’t too bad tonight.

  She was standing at her mirror, brushing her long red hair and thinking of the boy who had come earlier. Ed, with his armour and his scar. She wondered if she’d ever see him again. It had been an unusual day to say the least, what with all the oppoes out on the streets. Even Ryan and his hunters had been freaked out by it all and normally nothing fazed them. She’d stayed up late, talking to some of her Cabinet about it. Going over the day’s events.

  Things were changing, that was for sure. She couldn’t fight it and she knew they couldn’t live in this false bubble they’d created forever. Playing at adults, taking votes, passing laws and hardly ever leaving the grounds. Sooner or later the kids had to stop hiding from the grown-ups. Take London back. Start to live normal lives.

  And if they were going to survive they’d have to start having children of their own. One of the girls here was pregnant. And she was terrified. Everyone was. How were they going to deliver a baby, for God’s sake? Would the girl survive? Would the baby survive?

  Nicola laughed. It was crazy. People had been having babies for thousands of years, hadn’t they? It couldn’t be that hard. Mice did it. Flies did it. Monkeys did it. But she’d read enough books to know that in the past having children was dangerous. There were a lot of things that could go wrong. Without doctors. Without medicine. Without somebody who knew what they were doing.

  Sooner or later Nicola would have to find a boyfriend, settle down with him, decide to have children, take that scary plunge.

  In a way life after the disease had been a big game. You didn’t have to worry about all the old problems any more. But she knew they couldn’t go on like this forever.

  Change was coming.

  Real life was returning.

  And she was thinking of Ed. He’d seemed intelligent and decent, certainly knew how to look after himself.

  She laughed again. No point in having silly schoolgirl fantasies about him. He might be dead now for all she knew. Hadn’t he gone back into the badlands?

  There was always David, over at Buckingham Palace. She knew full well that he was obsessed by her. David was a catch as her mum used to say. He was powerful, in charge of all those kids. But she didn’t have the slightest interest in him on that level. Couldn’t force herself to fancy him. Had no desire to link up and be like a queen from the Middle Ages, marrying some king just to make a strong alliance.

  The thought of kissing David …

  She made a face in the mirror. Pretended to gag.

  But Ed …

  Well, Ed had a weird face with that scar; somehow, though, it didn’t bother her. She’d never gone for the boring pretty boys, had always been attracted to the outsiders, the ones who were different. The ones her mother didn’t like.

  She got into bed, flinching at the coldness of the sheets, and kicked her legs to warm them up. She blew out her candle. Lay there in the dark.

  Wondered once more if she would ever see Ed again.

  73

  Ryan cursed as his dog shifted in her sleep and her legs twitched, scrabbling at the floor.

  ‘Be still,’ he growled and slapped her. He was having trouble sleeping tonight. He had trouble sleeping most nights.

  He and his hunters and their dogs were all piled on top of each other on the floor of a big old house near Victoria station. The hunters lived alongside their dogs. The dogs kept them warm and safe.

  They never stayed anywhere long. Didn’t want any wandering grown-ups to get their scent. Plus, the buildings got pretty filthy. They never did any cleaning and just left rubbish where it dropped. The dogs always picked a room to use as a toilet and in a few days the place would be stinking worse than a grown-ups’ nest. So they’d move on, break into somewhere else.

  Why not? There was no shortage of empty buildings, was there?

  On the whole they had a good life. Getting food and anything else they needed off the more settled kids in exchange for helping them out. Plus, there was always stuff to be found on the streets.

  And Ryan was king of the streets around here. He could walk proud and free wherever he wanted.

  He was respected.

  But at night, when it was dark, with them all huddled together, mixed up with the dogs, living like animals, he felt very lonely. He could never tell anyone. He was Ryan Aherne, the meanest bastard in London, with a mask made out of a dead father’s face and a string of trophy ears hanging from his belt.

  He missed his mum and his dad, though.

  He lay there on his back and pictured how it had once been. Sitting at his computer, using Facebook, drinking Coke, watching horror DVDs with his dad, eating his mum’s food and chatting about stuff.

  He’d sometimes pretend that he was back in his old bed. In his old room with all his things. If he closed his eyes tight he could remember exactly where everything had been, how it looked. His TV, his posters, his DVDs and computer games, his weights, his football trophies.

  His mum and dad sleeping next door.

  Sometimes, like tonight, he let himself cry.

  And it helped a little bit.

  74

  ‘What are they doing?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Are they all right?’

  ‘I don’t know, David. How could I be supposed to know? I mean, they’ve never done
this before, yeah?’

  ‘I’ll say it again. Are they all right, Pod?’

  ‘Well, er, no, they’re not all right, are they? They’re grown-ups. They’re sick. They’ve never been all right.’

  ‘You know what I mean, Pod.’

  David was with his head of security in the royal bedroom at Buckingham Palace. They called the room that, not because it had been where the queen had slept, but because it was where they now kept what was left of the royal family. The six men and women were in various stages of decay. They smelt awful. David had tried to house-train them, but they still went to the toilet whenever and wherever they wanted.

  ‘They’re still alive,’ said Pod. ‘They just stand there, though, not moving.’

  David raised his candle and let its light fall on the strangers’ faces. Normally they would have backed away, shielding their eyes. Tonight they didn’t react at all. Just stood there with their heads tilted back, their arms held stiffly in front of them. Still as a bunch of royal waxworks at Madame Tussauds.

  ‘How long have they been like this?’

  ‘Not too sure, mate. One of the guards looked in on them sometime late this afternoon. Saw them like this, yeah? And when he came back an hour later, they hadn’t moved. They haven’t shifted for ages now.’

  ‘Get someone to stay in here with them,’ said David. ‘Let me know if anything changes. This lot are important to my plans. I really don’t want them to die on me.’

  ‘I’ll put two of my best guys on it.’

  ‘I’m going to bed,’ said David. ‘I just hope tomorrow’s a better day.’

  ‘God, yeah, it’s been, like, well weird today,’ said Pod. ‘With all those strangers mooching about. There’s been one stood over the road by the statue of Queen Victoria in exactly the same position as this all day. Even right through the thunderstorm, yeah? She’s still out there now, I think. Something’s going on all right.’

  ‘Yeah.’ David pinched the bridge of his nose. He felt a headache coming on. ‘Listen, Pod,’ he said. ‘If there’s still a stranger doing a clothes shop dummy impersonation outside the gates in the morning, do me a favour, will you? Go out there and kill it for me, will you? Yeah? I mean you personally. See to it for me.’

  ‘OK, yeah, sure, no problemo.’

  ‘I just want everything to be back to normal,’ David said angrily.

  ‘Normal. Yeah. No worries.’

  David yawned and gave a final cold look at the bloody royal family. Why did things have to change? Why couldn’t everyone just do what he told them?

  Why couldn’t things be normal?

  75

  Shadowman had never brought anyone here before. It was his secret place. His safe house.

  ‘I only use it in emergencies,’ he explained to the kids who had rescued him.

  ‘It’s well cool, Dylan.’ The big bony-headed boy with the vicious axe was nodding appreciatively. When they’d asked him, Shadowman had told them his real name, Dylan Peake, too tired to lie any more. He’d let all his defences down and now here they were. In his base.

  ‘Is this where you were headed when we found you?’ asked Ed, their leader, who was horribly disfigured with a scar down one side of his face. He’d been stained black from head to foot with blood when they’d met. But now they’d washed and had changed into some clean clothes that Shadowman had dug out for them. Mostly stuff he’d found there when he’d broken in.

  ‘I wasn’t really headed to anywhere,’ said Shadowman. ‘I was headed from. Just trying to, you know, get away. Too knackered to think straight. Those bastards had been chasing me for miles. All the way from Kilburn.’

  ‘Kilburn?’ said the bony-headed boy.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Shadowman. ‘It’s crazy, I know. They wouldn’t give up. Wouldn’t stop. As many as I killed, more joined them. I couldn’t risk trying to get in anywhere to hide. At night. In the dark. Could have been strangers hiding in any of the buildings.’

  ‘Strangers?’ Ed asked.

  ‘Grown-ups.’

  ‘Sickos.’

  ‘Sickos?’ Shadowman smiled. ‘Yeah, sickos. I like that.’ He felt the smile dying on his face. ‘They’ve changed,’ he said. ‘They’re acting … ’

  ‘I know, we’ve seen it,’ said Ed. ‘They’re acting more intelligent.’

  ‘They’re not acting, though, are they?’ said Shadowman. ‘They are more intelligent.’ And he started to tell Ed all about St George and his army. Their organization, their purpose. They swapped notes on the sentinels or pointers as Ed called them. And Ed told him a little about the green stranger they had in tow. Shadowman felt like he was on the verge of understanding something. Like this was all going to make sense to him. If only he wasn’t so tired. Aching all over.

  ‘Sickos … ’ Ed settled back in his chair and wriggled his toes. ‘We’re going to have to deal with them one day. But right here, right now, let’s forget all about them for a time, yeah?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Shadowman closed his eyes for a moment and enjoyed the feeling of peace.

  Forget about the strangers.

  Forget. Everything.

  76

  Ed’s socks had holes in them and they stank, but it felt good to have his boots off and his feet warming by a fire. He’d smash into a shop tomorrow and get a fresh pair.

  Dylan had this place nicely set up. It was an upstairs private members club in a narrow backstreet near Trafalgar Square, all leather sofas, carved wood, bearskin rugs and oil paintings. A fire burning in the fireplace. It had more security than the Bank of England and was well stocked with food, water and weapons. Dylan was sharing. Ed understood how hard that must be for him. This was his crib. A bolthole like this could mean the difference between surviving and dying. He must have been very happy the day he found it. It hadn’t been wrecked or looted. It was a fortress.

  It was safe.

  They were safe. Ed’s strange little gang had made it here in one piece.

  Kyle was drinking warm beer, warming his arse by the fire, a bright green bowler hat perched on his head. Must have belonged to a doorman at the club or something. Macca and Will were playing cards. Small Sam, Charlotte and The Kid were chatting away madly by themselves on a huge sofa. Catching up.

  And then there was Wormwood, the Green Man, wrapped in an old tartan blanket, sitting stiff-backed in an armchair, his hands in his lap, his eyes glinting in the candlelight.

  His smell battled with the smell of Ed’s socks.

  It was mad. To be sitting this close to a grown-up. Especially one covered in fungus. A mad end to a mad day. Ed had explained to Dylan who Wormwood was – what he was – and Dylan had gone along with it. Had seemed to get it. Seemed to understand sickos. Wasn’t too uncomfortable about having one sitting in his chair.

  ‘So you reckon he might be useful?’ Dylan asked him.

  ‘Reckon so. He knows stuff if we can only make sense of it. Plus, like I said, he’s got this power over the other sickos. Some kind of mind-control thing. Telepathy.’

  ‘You really think so?’ asked Dylan. ‘You really think they’re communicating just with their minds somehow?’

  ‘What d’you think?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Dylan shrugged and shook his head.

  Ed leant closer towards him. ‘Seems to me,’ he said quietly, ‘that the disease has given them a whole new sense.’

  ‘That’s not possible.’ Will got up from the sofa and came over to the fire.

  ‘We all saw it,’ Ed protested. ‘You said yourself that the pointers looked like they were acting like aerials or something, spreading the word. And the way Wormwood made them hold back, and … ’

  ‘I know,’ said Will, cutting him off. ‘That’s not what I meant. What I meant was it’s not possible for humans to suddenly develop superpowers like in a comic. We can’t change. We’re what we are. We couldn’t suddenly start flying or walking through walls. It doesn’t work like that.’

  ‘Then how come they all seem to k
now what to do without talking to each other?’ said Dylan.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Will. ‘All I know is that people can’t change what they are. It’s not scientifically possible. But if something got into them … ’

  ‘Something like what?’

  ‘As I say, I don’t know. Something from outside. Something else that could communicate like that.’

  ‘Like a parasite?’

  ‘Yeah, maybe.’

  Ed sighed.

  ‘Man, that’s too much to think about right now,’ he said. ‘When my brain doesn’t hurt so much, we’re going to have to have a proper talk with Wormwood. See what he can tell us.’

  ‘It’s going to be difficult dragging him around with you, though,’ said Dylan.

  ‘Yeah. I don’t suppose every other kid in London’s going to be as understanding as you.’

  ‘No. I don’t suppose they are.’

  ‘Ed?’ Ed looked up to see Sam and The Kid standing by his chair. Sam looked anxious.

  ‘You all right, small stuff?’

  ‘Are we staying here tonight?’

  ‘If that’s OK with Dylan. I don’t think I could walk another step and you look like one of the walking dead if you really want to know.’

  It was true. Sam’s eyes were sunk in black pools, his lips cracked and dry.

  ‘It’s just that I want to find my sister.’

  Ed pulled Sam close.

  ‘We’ll find her, mate. We will. We’ve come this far, haven’t we? The hard part’s over. But I’m not wandering around out there any more tonight. I’ll go with Kyle in the morning. We’ll see how safe it is. When we’re sure it’s OK, we’ll head over to the Natural History Museum. That’s where we reckon Ella is.’

  ‘We can’t go out in the midday sun,’ said The Kid. ‘Not with all the mad dogs and Englishmen.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  The Kid nodded at Wormwood. ‘He don’t like the bright light and the big city. We can only move him under cover of darkness.’

  ‘Jesus, Kid, everything’s ten times more dangerous at night.’