‘This pain will drive out your pain. You cannot hurt me. I take the pain and forget your wounds. You try to eat us … Not me. Not me …’
THWACK.
Eventually Shadowman was right behind Matt who still hadn’t heard him. He was too caught up in his own world of pain and madness.
‘He has written the word on me. I have his mark on my forehead. He will protect me. You have tried to eat me. But I am strong because I love the Lamb. Speak to me. Drown out their voices. Let me hear your voice, strong and clear. Tell me what to do. Speak to me. Make them shut up.’
‘You were bitten,’ said Shadowman, and Matt jumped – as if God really had spoken to him. He threw himself face down and writhed on the cold floor. And then he realized it wasn’t God, it was Shadowman, and he got his act together. The whole mad-monk persona was gone, and in its place was one severely hacked-off boy.
‘What are you doing here?’ he hissed, fixing his dark, glassy eyes on Shadowman.
‘I came to pray with you, brother.’
‘No, you didn’t. I pray alone.’
‘We can all pray. He’s not your God. He belongs to all of us. I was going to pray to him to give me answers, just like you.’
‘You’re a liar.’
‘Am I? I got my answers.’
‘Liar.’
‘You were bitten,’ said Shadowman. ‘Only explanation. You’re not communicating with God, you’re hearing sickos in your head. You’ve got some of their bugs in you. I’ve seen it in others.’
‘You’ve seen nothing. You’re not a believer. You will never see or hear.’
‘Not like you, no,’ said Shadowman. ‘I’m not hearing the white noise of parasitic ultrasound. Flies calling to flies. But, you know, seeing and hearing are what I do best.’
Matt got up, stood hunched over, his eyes disappearing into black sockets made deeper by the candlelight, his muscles knotting and unknotting. Shadowman had faced stronger enemies. If Matt wanted a fight, he was ready.
‘You’ve been bitten in the arse by one of them,’ he said, and watched as Matt instinctively put a hand to his backside before he could stop himself.
‘When did it happen?’ Shadowman pressed on. ‘A while back, I expect. Right at the beginning. You’ve got over it and you’ve learnt to live with it.’
‘I am the word of the Lamb. I will order you punished for this.’
‘No, you won’t. Right now this is a secret between you and me,’ said Shadowman. ‘I can keep it that way. I don’t need to tell anyone. But if you kick up a fuss then I start talking and your secret is out. You’re not a holy man – you’re just sick. Or maybe that’s the same thing. Whatever – I’m guessing you want to keep your secret for a while longer.’
‘I can order you silenced before you say anything,’ said Matt.
‘You can try. But I don’t see anyone here’s gonna pull it off. I’m the Shadowman. I’m a killer.’
Shadowman moved in on Matt who shrank away from him, looking around for some help. His followers were all up the other end of the abbey. He could cry out, but that might seem a little undignified for this poor man’s pope.
‘I was not bitten,’ said Matt, almost pleading now.
‘I can prove it,’ said Shadowman. ‘One simple way.’
‘Keep your hands off me!’ Matt had a hint of desperation in his voice, but Shadowman moved in quickly, twisted Matt round and yanked his leggings down just far enough to expose ugly, puckered scarring in the unmistakable shape of teeth marks on one pale buttock.
‘That must have hurt,’ he said and pulled the leggings back up before shoving Matt away. Matt skittered across the floor and glared at Shadowman, like a trapped animal.
‘Don’t tell anyone,’ he said.
‘It’s no big deal,’ said Shadowman. ‘We all have our crosses to bear. I just wanted to make sure. So when was it? Before or after you gassed yourself?’
Matt shook his head. He wasn’t going to say anything. Shadowman felt almost sorry for him.
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘I’ve got nothing against you. Or what you do. Apart from all that weird stuff about sacrificing other kids, but we’ll let that go.’
‘I help people,’ said Matt.
‘Yeah. Guess so,’ said Shadowman. ‘You give these kids something. I don’t want to interfere in that. As I say, I can keep this secret, just between you and me. But you’re gonna have to talk.’
‘It was at school, early on,’ said Matt, becoming normal again. Becoming what he was – a frightened and confused boy of fifteen. Not much different to Shadowman.
‘A dinner lady did it,’ said Matt, slightly ashamed. ‘She got to me. I never told anyone. Didn’t know what they’d do. I killed her for it and soon afterwards we all ended up in the chapel. A bit like this …’ He looked around at the carved stone pillars and ornate wooden benches. ‘I started to feel … hot in the head. Started to hear things. To see things. It’s all true, though. What I tell people. I was given visions. They got more intense after I breathed the holy smoke.’
Matt grabbed Shadowman’s shirt.
‘It doesn’t change anything,’ he said urgently. ‘You mustn’t tell people. They have to believe in me.’
‘Trust me. I’m not telling anyone,’ said Shadowman. ‘I can see what you do for these kids. I just like to know the truth.’
‘I am the truth,’ said Matt, letting go of him, and Shadowman could see that he was losing him as he slipped back into his madness. What was he? A holy fool? A mad seer? A fake or a fakir?
Didn’t really matter. They were all of them doing whatever it took to get by. Shadowman moved back in on Matt, held his gaze.
‘You stay onside now, yeah?’
Matt nodded.
‘Be one of us. One of the good guys. If we need you to say things for us you’ll go along with it, yeah? We have to win this and we’ll use whatever weapons we’ve got. Including your words. You can claim you saw the blood moon in your dreams. A vision. Whatever. But what it means – that might be for others to decide. You get me?’
‘We are all servants of the Lamb,’ said Matt.
‘I’ll take that as a yes.’
Matt nodded.
Shadowman smiled and walked away. There was still a red glow from outside. The blood moon was still up there. So what did it mean? Was it a portent? Or was it just a freak atmospheric condition?
He’d seen it all, but he had to admit that this one was new, and he was more than a little spooked.
34
Yo-Yo looked around at the hunters. Shadowman could see she was scared of them, with their leathers and their masks and their dogs. She kept close to him. He put a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
‘They’ll get us safely back home,’ he said, and now Yo-Yo looked nervously up at the sky.
‘Moon’s gone,’ he said. ‘Sky’s a nice clear blue.’
‘Let’s move out,’ Ryan shouted and as they set off Shadowman went over to him.
‘You didn’t need to come back for us,’ he said. ‘But thanks.’
‘No worries,’ said Ryan. ‘You see the moon last night? That was well mad.’
‘Matt preached a sermon on it,’ said Shadowman. ‘Was a message from God apparently.’
‘Yeah?’ Ryan looked up at the sky, his spotty face shining and greasy. ‘You know, sometimes I wish God would say things in a way we could understand. He needs to be a lot clearer. So the moon’s red – what does it mean, God?’
‘Matt could tell you,’ said Shadowman. ‘But I’m not sure you’d understand that either.’
Ryan laughed. ‘The only thing I understand,’ he said, holding up his blade, ‘is this.’
It wasn’t far to the museums from the abbey, but there was no direct route. They could stick to the main roads and go the long way round – straight up through Victoria to Hyde Park Corner then left down the Brompton Road though Knightsbridge – or they could cut off the corner and use the backstreets. That way was shorter, but
meant smaller roads and lots of twists and turns.
In the past none of them would have considered the second route for a moment – they’d learnt to stick to wider roads, straight lines with good visibility. Now, though, with the streets empty, Ryan was taking them on the shorter route, cutting between Belgrave Square and Eaton Square and then across Sloane Street and on to Pont Street.
‘Don’t like to get too close to the palace an’ all,’ he explained to Shadowman. ‘Don’t trust David. We’ve had some bad run-ins with him before now.’
The hunters let the dogs off their leads and they scampered away in all directions, happy to be out and about in the early morning. The boys moved fast, but Shadowman knew that they were keeping alert, their senses tuned. Months of surviving on the streets had taught them deep survival skills.
Shadowman smiled. He only had to drop Yo-Yo off at the V&A and the rest of the day was his. He fell back to where she was struggling to keep up. Her other friends had decided to stay at the abbey, but she was missing Sam and The Kid. She was panting slightly, trying not to look slow or weak. Shadowman was just wondering whether he should ask Ryan to slow down when one of the hunters raised his hand and they all stopped.
‘What is it?’ Shadowman called out. And then he saw – the dogs were coming back, tails between their legs, fur up. They looked spooked.
‘What’s the matter with them?’ asked Yo-Yo. ‘Why are they scared like that?’
Ryan put a finger to his lips. Shadowman listened. The day was quiet. He realized that no birds were singing in the trees. But then, as he concentrated, he heard something, a distant rustling, rushing sound, like something being dragged over gravel. He gave a questioning look to Ryan, who shook his head. He didn’t know what it meant either.
‘What do we do?’ asked one of the hunters.
‘I dunno, Zulficker,’ said Ryan. ‘You got the best ears of any of us. You know what that sound is?’
Zulficker shrugged.
‘Is a new one.’
‘We should go on,’ said Shadowman. ‘Safest place will be the museum if there’s trouble.’
‘Why would there be trouble?’ Yo-Yo asked, her eyes very wide. ‘You told me it would be safe to go and see my friends.’
‘You’re safe,’ said Shadowman. ‘But we always have to be careful.’
Yo-Yo switched her attention to Ryan. ‘Are we safe?’ she asked.
‘Dunno,’ said Ryan. ‘Probably nothing. Best to start running, though.’
The hunters got their dogs back on their leads and they hurried up the road. At first Shadowman couldn’t tell if they were running towards the sound or away from it. As they neared the end of the road and it opened out into a square, however, the sound got noticeably louder. Without saying anything, the hunters formed into a protective squad round Yo-Yo, who was clutching her violin case as if it was the most precious thing in the world.
‘Maybe it’s nothing dangerous,’ she said to Shadowman, her voice made broken and jerky by the running. ‘Maybe it’s a good thing?’
‘Let’s hope. The streets have been empty for days. No reason that should suddenly change now.’
What if St George was on the move, though? That was the thought that was lodged in Shadowman’s head. What if he’d brought his army this far already? What if that swishing noise was the sound of a thousand feet scuffling along the road?
‘Could it be people?’ said Yo-Yo. ‘Maybe children, like us?’
Shadowman didn’t need to answer her because, as they reached the end of the road, they saw sickos appearing from among the trees in the middle of the square. They were marching relentlessly forward, bringing their terrible stench with them. Yo-Yo screamed. And, as more sickos emerged from all sides, Shadowman understood that the noise was indeed being made by people shuffling along.
Was this St George’s army, though, or something different?
‘We have to go round them,’ he shouted and Ryan didn’t need to be told twice. He called to his guys and they ran back the way they’d come. When they came to the next major junction, they turned off to their right, still hoping to move in the general direction of the museum. Shadowman paused briefly to look back. The sickos weren’t hurrying to follow them, but they were still coming on. Nothing was going to stop them.
The kids ran hard along the road, but they hadn’t gone far when they saw more sickos ahead.
‘They’re everywhere,’ shouted Zulficker, slowing to a halt. Wherever the kids looked there were more sickos filling the streets. Ryan picked the quietest-looking road and raced down it, the others following. Shadowman soon lost his bearings as they pounded up and down the tangle of streets, trying to find a way through.
He could see that Yo-Yo was getting tired. He was tired himself. His lungs and throat were burning. His leg wobbly. It was the sudden short bursts of energy that were draining him. Constantly switching direction, going one way and then the other. Yo-Yo was struggling to keep up and now she tripped and stumbled. Zulficker caught her and scooped her up in his arms, carried her against his chest.
Finally they could run no further. They were trapped. Cut off in a gently curving crescent next to some public gardens. There were sickos everywhere they looked.
‘We have to get off the street,’ Shadowman shouted, and Ryan agreed. It was always risky breaking into an unknown house – you never knew what you’d find inside. Sickos had a nasty habit of building nests, grouping together in buildings and sleeping through the day, but the kids had no choice. There were too many sickos to stand and fight. They could protect themselves more easily indoors.
The buildings here were tall and white, four storeys high, with iron balconies along the first floors and basement wells protected by spear-topped railings.
Ryan yelled some orders and three of his guys grabbed tools from their belts, picked a front door at random and ran up to force it open. They knew what they were doing and had obviously done this many times before. It only took them seconds to break in and, as they swung the door open, the rest of the kids bundled in off the street. Shadowman waited on the doorstep until the others were all inside, keeping an eye on the sickos that were streaming towards them. Inside, the dogs were barking furiously.
Shadowman hurried in and slammed the door shut. Ryan’s B&E team had already found some furniture to jam up against the door. It wouldn’t hold the sickos forever, but it would give the kids an edge, and once again it was expertly and quickly done.
Shadowman was glad that Ryan had come back to escort him and Yo-Yo from the abbey. He usually worked alone and preferred it that way, but right now he was responsible for Yo-Yo, and the sicko threat outside was as bad as he’d ever seen it. He still didn’t know if this was St George’s army, though. Whoever they were, and wherever they’d come from, they were coordinated, organized, purposeful.
The more he thought about it, the more he reckoned it couldn’t be St George’s mob. They felt different somehow. And they weren’t coming from the north, from Kilburn. They were coming from the west and the south.
In fact, if anything, they were heading north – towards Kilburn. As if St George had called in reinforcements.
Was this what he’d been waiting for?
That wasn’t a nice thought.
Ryan was issuing orders, and his guys were going through their well-practised routine, some of them securing windows, others staying near the front door to keep it safe. Some were searching the house, making sure there were no sickos already in there. Ryan himself moved Yo-Yo up to the first-floor living room where she would be out of harm’s way. He assigned Zulficker to look after her. Shadowman had come up with them and took the opportunity to look out of the windows at the mob outside. They were milling around, staring up at the house. They reminded Shadowman of the crowds that used to gather outside Buckingham Palace whenever the royal family were due to make an appearance on the balcony. He had a sudden ridiculous urge to open the windows on to the narrow little balcony and wave at them.
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They were an ugly bunch. Rotten, diseased, scabby, maimed and mutilated. Shadowman shook his head. How were the kids ever going to get past them?
He scanned the area below. The front door was up a short flight of steps and, with the basement wells on either side protected by railings, it was the only way in.
‘Where have they come from?’ Yo-Yo joined him, looking anxious and angry. Shadowman led her away from the window.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Best not look at them. Try to ignore them, OK?’
‘I don’t like this,’ said Yo-Yo. ‘How many of them are there?’
‘We don’t know any more than you, darling,’ said Zulficker. ‘This isn’t normal.’
Shadowman took in the living room. This was a posh house, undamaged, unlooted, no signs of any human intrusion, with expensive furniture, paintings on the walls, dusty ornaments, a giant flatscreen TV hanging over the fireplace. The screen was just a black mirror now – it would never show any TV programmes again. A relic of the old world.
Ryan’s team returned, their dogs panting, and announced that the place was clean.
‘The back’s clear,’ said one of them. ‘There are glass doors from a basement kitchen out to the garden. We could leave that way.’
‘The only thing is,’ said Shadowman, ‘if we go that way we don’t have any idea what’s past the garden – might just be more of them. We could be surrounded. For the moment, we’re safe here.’
‘Can’t stay here forever,’ said Ryan. ‘And they don’t look like they’re going anywhere soon. Dom, take your team and scout it.’
Dom was a big, pudgy-faced guy who seemed to be in charge of a smaller unit. He disappeared off with his guys, but almost immediately Shadowman heard a crash and shouting from downstairs and in a moment one of Dom’s guys came running up the stairs.
‘They got in the back,’ he said, out of breath. ‘There’s loads of them down there.’
Shadowman turned to Zulficker.