‘Where should we go?’ Mark said as they emerged on to a dark street. Ahead of them, Allie could see the lights of the high street. ‘What’s in this town anyway?’
Mark had been her closest friend before she came to Cimmeria. They’d been arrested together several times, tagging bridges and schools. He’d shown her a side of London girls like her rarely saw – a world of rebellion and anarchy.
The main thing they’d had in common in those days was anger.
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve never really been anywhere but the hospital.’
When his eyebrows winged upward his piercing glittered. ‘Well, come on.’ He pulled her with him towards the lights. ‘Let’s find an offie and a place where you can tell me all your troubles. I want to know more about those battle scars.’
Allie nodded and followed him down the street. ‘Right-o.’
‘Right-o?’ Mark imitated her accent with open incredulity. ‘Right-o?’
‘Oh shut up,’ Allie laughed, giving him a shove. She hadn’t realised her accent had changed so much while she’d been at school.
After that she tried to sound less posh.
The high street was lined with expensive-looking boutiques. Mark shot the piles of silk and cashmere in the shop windows bilious glances and grumbled under his breath about ‘snobs’ until they found an off-licence in a side street.
‘I’ll go inside and see what’s on offer.’ His eyes swept over Allie’s decidedly underage features. ‘You better stay here. If we go in together they might get curious.’
She waited in the cold, stomping her feet to keep warm until he reappeared a few minutes later carrying a plastic bag. She could hear the cans rattling inside it.
‘Right,’ he said, looking around. ‘We need a venue.’
For nearly ten minutes they trudged up and down the quiet streets looking for a drinking spot until Allie spotted a narrow cobblestone lane leading to a quiet churchyard.
The ancient church building was surrounded by spotlights illuminating its crenellated bell tower but the graveyard around it was ghostly and dark. They found a damp wooden bench sheltered beneath the sprawling branches of an oak tree and settled down.
Pulling out two cans of cheap cider, Mark handed her one. He popped his own can open and took a deep draught then sighed with pleasure. ‘That’s better.’
Allie followed his lead. The fizzy, apple-flavoured alcohol went down easily, warming her insides. After a while she stopped shivering. Maybe sitting outside wouldn’t be so bad after all.
After they’d drunk a little, Mark turned to face her. ‘Now. What happened to your head?’
There was no way for him to know how huge that question was. How long the answer could be.
She took a long, deep gulp and let the fire of the alcohol burn through her veins.
‘There’s this group,’ she said, ‘at my school. I’m in it. It’s all secret. We train in lots of weird stuff…’
‘What weird stuff?’
Crumpling an empty can, Mark tossed it into the grass. Instinctively, Allie winced. But she told herself to get over it. Mark was the way he was.
She needed time to think. So she up-ended her own can, finishing it off in a few swallows, then gave a loud belch.
‘Nice one,’ Mark commented as he opened a fresh can.
‘Thank you,’ she said primly. ‘Weird stuff like self-defence. Martial arts. How to kill people with your hands.’
His can half open, he stopped and stared at her. ‘What? Seriously?’
‘Seriously.’ Shoving the empty can back on the bench next to her she held out her hand for a new one. With a puzzled frown he handed one to her. ‘All the kids in this group are from super-rich, powerful families. And there’s this man who wants to take over that group and the school and… me.’
He was looking at her with new caution, as if she might bite. ‘Is this some sort of a joke, Allie? Because if it is —’
‘It’s not a joke, Mark.’ Her voice was sharper than she intended and she tried to calm down. ‘It’s all real. I promise you.’
But he didn’t appear convinced. ‘So this man, he wants you… why, exactly?’
Allie’s mouth opened and closed again. He had her there. Because even today she wasn’t entirely certain what Nathaniel wanted from her. ‘It’s something to do with my family and his family. Some sort of a fight and I’m just a small part of it…’
It sounded unconvincing and she knew it. She could see the puzzlement in his eyes. But he had to believe her. She needed him to understand. Without his help she was lost.
She held his gaze. ‘I know it sounds crazy, Mark, but it’s real. He’s dangerous. Last Christmas he killed my best friend.’
He looked stunned. ‘Wait. Are you telling me a girl got axed at your school?’
Allie tried not to remember how Jo had looked as her life ebbed away but she couldn’t make that image fade.
‘I found her. It was bad, Mark. So much blood…’ Her voice trailed off.
For a long moment he sat staring at her as if looking for assurance that he could believe her; he didn’t seem convinced by what he found.
‘But, Al, why didn’t I read about it in the papers? Posh bird gets done at some boarding school – that’d make headlines.’
His tone was dubious and Allie’s heart sank. He didn’t believe her.
‘They covered it up,’ she explained, knowing even as she said the words how crazy they sounded. ‘They always cover things up.’
He didn’t appear convinced. Opening her new can, she took a long draught. If only she could drink enough to make everything better.
Mark was still trying to figure things out. ‘Come on. How do they do that?’ he asked. ‘I mean, how do you cover up a murdered rich girl?’
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted, helplessly. ‘They just… do it. Lots of really powerful people went to my school. They can do things like that.’
‘Is that how you got hurt?’ He gestured at the scar on her hairline. ‘Were you with her?’
‘Gabe – the guy who killed my friend – he’d tried to grab me once before and my friends protected me.’ Something about that bothered her – something important – but the cider was doing its job and almost as soon as the thought arrived it slipped from her drunken grasp. She frowned at the can in her hand.
‘Then what happened?’ Mark nudged her.
‘Gabe came back,’ Allie said quietly. ‘He and another guy stabbed Jo and then kidnapped me. Put a bag over my head and threw me in a car and drove me away.’
Mark had gone still.
‘But you see… I’ve had this training now in self-defence. So I knew how to hurt them. So I did.’ She nodded to herself. ‘I hurt them.’
Mark’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed nervously. ‘What did you do?’
She spoke without emotion. ‘I jumped over the seat and shoved my nails in the driver’s eyes so he couldn’t see, and he screamed but I didn’t let go, and Gabe hit me, but I didn’t let go, and then the car flipped over and I broke my arm and my knee and my head and stuff.’ She took a drink. ‘But I got away.’
‘Bloody hell, Allie.’ Mark looked stunned – maybe even a little afraid. ‘I mean… What the…?’
‘But it didn’t matter, don’t you see?’ She leaned towards him, her gaze intent. ‘I got hurt trying to help Jo but it didn’t matter because he killed her anyway. He killed her and I loved her and now she’s dead and it’s all my fault.’ She stopped suddenly. ‘My fault.’ She repeated it again and decided it was true. ‘My fault. All my fault.’
An icy tear rolled down her cheek and she swiped it away with an impatient gesture.
There was so much she wanted to tell him but couldn’t. She wanted to tell him how Night School made her take chances. That it made her risk her own life and other people’s lives. Being in Night School made her arrogant and stupid. It had created a wall between her life and Jo’s life so Jo didn’t tell her th
ings. Like that Gabe was writing to her. That he wanted to see her. So Allie never had the chance to stop her from going to meet him that night. The night he killed her.
It was too hard to explain to an outsider. And besides, there was something else he needed to understand.
‘I had to get out of that school because they haven’t done anything about it – that’s why I called you. One of them helped Gabe. Someone opened the gates for him, you see? Someone on the inside. But whenever I bring it up they just go on and on about how I need help “dealing” with what happened.’ She made sarcastic air quotes around the word to show what she thought about that. ‘They said I should leave it to them. So I did. And they have done nothing.’
She took a long drink of cider then fixed him with a determined look. ‘So I have to do this on my own. For Jo. I have to find Gabe and whoever helped him. And I have to punish them.’
They talked on the bench until they ran out of cider. She was in the middle of explaining how she’d escaped from the school when Mark glanced at his watch and swore.
‘What?’ Allie peered at him drunkenly.
‘The bloody train.’ He yanked his phone out from the pocket of his jacket. ‘We’ve missed it.’
‘Oh bugger.’ Allie had drunk too much cider to be helpful but she tried to look focused as he typed things into his phone. ‘When’s the next one?’
For a long second he stared at the screen. Then he swore again with more vigour.
‘Tomorrow.’ He sounded disgusted. ‘That was the last useful train tonight.’
Allie stared at him open-mouthed.
‘Tomorrow? What are we going to do?’ Her head had begun to throb and, without the shield of a constant stream of warming cider, the cold penetrated through her layers of clothing right down to her bones. ‘Is there a bus?’
Mark typed more things into his phone then shook his head. ‘No buses.’ He shoved his phone back into his pocket hard, as if it had betrayed him. ‘Stupid country town. We’re stuck.’
‘But’ – Allie looked at the gravestones surrounding them, suddenly aware she was surrounded by dead people – ‘we can’t stay here all night.’
Mark stood up stiffly, the last can falling from his lap on to the ground with a dull clang. ‘The first train goes at half six tomorrow. We’ll be on it. Let’s go and find a place to crash for a few hours.’
That was easier said than done. They had no money for a room. And after spending twenty minutes searching for an unsecured door or vacant building they returned to the churchyard, feeling increasingly hopeless.
Allie’s headache had worsened; she shivered uncontrollably. It was only then they thought to check the church door. To their surprise, it swung open silently.
‘Home sweet home,’ Mark whispered as they stood in the doorway looking in at the dark nave.
It wasn’t much warmer inside the old stone building than it was outside but at least there was no wind.
After fumbling for the switch, Mark turned on the lights just long enough to gather the covers off the altar tables and collect all the candles he could find as Allie stood by the door, her arms wrapped tightly around her torso. After that, he switched the lights off again and used the glow of his phone to light their way.
‘Don’t need a nosy vicar coming over to see who’s praying so late at night,’ he explained.
They stretched out together in one corner with the gold and purple satin cloths draped across them like oddly festive blankets. Placing the candles on the floor around them, Mark lit them with his cigarette lighter.
As she stared into the flickering shadows surrounding them, Allie’s teeth chattered.
Mark wasn’t much of a hugger ordinarily, but when she burrowed her way into the crook of his arm he didn’t object.
‘What happens tomorrow?’ she asked.
‘Tomorrow you’ll come to London with me and we’ll find some place for you to stay. I know some guys who have their own flat – I’m sure they’d let you kip on the sofa. Then… we’ll figure something out.’
His voice was gruff and Allie could hear the doubt in it. He wasn’t certain about this at all.
She knew he hadn’t entirely believed her story – he probably thought she was drunk and exaggerating. Or losing it completely. But at least he was still offering to help her.
As she watched the candle flames shudder, she tried to imagine living with his friends. Being alone in the world. Sleeping on dirty couches surrounded by strangers. Trying to figure things out on her own.
Had she made a terrible mistake?
FIVE
‘Right back here.’
The sound of strange voices and heavy footsteps on stone woke Allie with a start from an awful dream in which Jo cried out for her but she couldn’t find her anywhere.
Her eyelids seemed stuck together and her head pounded with nauseating intensity. She rubbed her eyes and they fluttered open to an extraordinary vision – bright yellow, vivid blue, green, and red light flooded the room, blinding her.
It was like being in the middle of a rainbow.
‘What the…?’ Squinting, she shaded her eyes with her hand.
Mark grumbled in his sleep as her elbow dug into his ribs.
‘Sorry.’ She said the word reflexively just as she recognised the stained glass, the pulpit, the flickering candles melting into pools of wax, and the crowd of people standing around them.
‘Oh bollocks. Mark.’ She shook his shoulder hard. ‘Wake up.’
Without opening his eyes, he swatted her hand away. ‘Don’t. Jus’ fell asleep.’
In front of them, a police officer stood with his hands on his hips, disgust in his gaze. ‘Both of you: Up. You’re coming with me.’
The local police station was in a small, squat building near a slow-moving stream at the edge of town. After a short, nearly silent ride together in the back seat of a police car, Allie and Mark were led through the utilitarian entrance.
As the police led them from the church to the car, Allie had heard someone complaining to the officers in strident tones about ‘hooligans’ and ‘vandals’.
There was a time when that would have made her proud.
Once they were in the station, the two were steered into different rooms. As she saw Mark’s blue head disappearing down the corridor, a sudden surge of panic made Allie’s heart leap into her throat. She turned to run after him but a police officer shut the door in her face.
The room where they held her was small and crowded with desks, filing cabinets and shelves. It smelled unpleasantly of mildew, but at least it was warm, and Allie’s limbs slowly began to thaw. Windows set too high on the wall for her to see out let in bright daylight.
Two officers stayed with her. One was young, with a penetrating gaze. The other was older, and had a beard that needed trimming. Neither of them seemed openly unkind.
Allie sat in a battered metal chair, facing them. The younger one was at a computer, where he typed things in using only his index fingers. The older one made notes on a pad of paper. He asked her name and age, and she answered numbly as the young one entered the information into the computer with surprising speed.
When the older one asked for her parents’ names and address, though, she pressed her fingertips hard against her aching temples.
This was so bad.
‘Please. Could you just call Isabelle le Fanult at Cimmeria Academy?’ she said after a long pause. ‘She knows me. Can I have some water?’ Her mouth was so dry it felt like her tongue was permanently attached to the roof of her mouth.
At the mention of the school, the two officers exchanged a look.
‘Are you a student at the school?’ the older officer asked. With a fatherly face and greying hair, he didn’t look threatening.
Allie nodded.
‘Now that is interesting.’ He turned to the younger officer, who was typing busily. ‘Have we ever had a Cimmeria student in here before?’
Without looking up from his monitor,
the younger officer shook his head. ‘I don’t think we have.’
The fatherly cop turned back to Allie, studying her with open curiosity. Squirming a little, Allie had a good idea what he saw – a teenage girl with dirt on her face, tangled dark hair and a pounding hangover.
‘What’s a nice boarding-school girl doing burgling a church? Couldn’t your parents just buy one for you if you really wanted one?’
The computer cop snorted a laugh.
Looking back and forth between them, blood rushed to Allie’s face. She hated being laughed at.
Tilting up her chin, she met the officer’s gaze coldly. ‘You have no idea what my life is like.’
But the cop didn’t seem intimidated by this in the slightest. In fact, he looked as if it was the reaction he’d hoped for.
‘Oh really?’ He leaned back in his chair so far the front legs came off the ground. ‘Why don’t you tell us?’
Sullen, Allie shook her head. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
‘That is a shame,’ he said, his smile disappearing. ‘Because talking about it is the only thing that’s going to get you out of here in a hurry.’
A tingling sense of suspicion made goosebumps rise on Allie’s arms. This wasn’t right. She’d been arrested several times before and the police had never acted like this. They never cared where she went to school. It was always straightforward and no nonsense: ‘What’s your name? How old are you? Who’s your parent or guardian?’
Keeping her voice steady, she held his gaze. ‘I am sixteen years old. I can’t talk to you without a responsible adult present. Call my headmistress, Isabelle le Fanult. She will tell you everything you need to know.’
‘Oh, we’ll do that,’ the officer assured her. He didn’t look so fatherly now. ‘But first we want to ask you a few questions.’
For what seemed an interminable amount of time, they asked questions and she refused to answer them. How many students were at the school? How many teachers? What were their names? What went on at the school? Any strange classes? Any odd behaviour? Anything illegal? Drugs?
Allie just stared at the floor, angry and exhausted. All she would say was, ‘Call Isabelle le Fanult. She will answer your questions.’
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