The Nightmare Game (16 page)

The others crowded down behind her. Lorn heard them gasp as they saw her sitting there. And then there was a terrible, angry silence. If they'd spoken, she might have tried to invent some kind of explanation, but she dared not speak into that anger.

Zak came down the ramp last, with Bando beside him. Lorn crouched where she was, staring up at the two of them. Bando looked puzzled and confused, but it was impossible to tell how Zak was going to react. His face was calm as the others parted to let him through and the first words he spoke were for someone else.

“Perdew,” he said. Not looking around but staring steadily at Lorn. “Perdew, your fingers are burning. Throw the wood away.”

Perdew glanced down impatiently, as though he hadn't felt the fire. Then he tossed the wood into a corner, throwing it hard so that it burst apart, loosing a shower of sparks.

Zak let the sparks die in the air. Then he said, “There has always been a punishment for stealing food.”

Bando caught his breath, but Lorn could see that he still hadn't understood. He was waiting for Zak to turn on him. When he found out he was wrong, he wouldn't stay silent, she knew. He would take the blame for what he'd done.

But he'd never cope with the punishment.

“We can only live because we share everything,” Zak said gravely. “That is the bond that holds us together. You've broken that bond, Lorn, and you can no longer be part of this community. You are not welcome to share our warmth and food and stories.”

That was the moment when Bando realized what was happening. He let out a great roar. “No! It wasn't her! She didn't do it!”

“Be quiet, Bando.” Zak spoke without looking at him.

“But you don't understand!” Bando shouted. “Lorn hasn't done anything wrong. I took the food
for
her! It was me!”

Zak didn't speak. He just looked questioningly at Lorn, his shadowed face grim in the flickering light of the torch.

Lorn made her decision. “Thank you, dear Bando,” she said. Looking down so that she wouldn't have to see his face. “Thank you for trying to protect me. But I have to take my own punishment.”

“No!” Bando roared again. “You didn't—”

Zak turned, with a look so terrible that even Bando was silenced. “Enough!” Then he turned back to Lorn and motioned with his hand. “Stand up.”

Lorn's legs were stiff and numb from the cramped position in which she'd fallen asleep. She scrambled up and held herself steady with one hand on the wall.

Zak waited until she was still. Then he said, “Who are you?”

“I'm Lorn,” she said uncertainly.

Zak shook his head. “Who are you?” he said again. “What is your name?”

Then she understood that he was taking away the name he'd given her when she first came to the cavern. The name that made her belong and kept her safe.

“My name is Hope,” she heard herself say. And as she said it, she felt her identity dissolving. The quick cleverness that had let her run everything when Zak and Cam were away on the journey. The power of telling stories that had come when she needed it. The friendships, the sense of purpose. Even the words fell away. When she spoke again, her tongue scooped awkwardly around her mouth. “I'm Hope Armstrong.”

Zak stepped sideways and waved toward the ramp. “Hope Armstrong, you must leave this place,” he said. His voice was entirely dead, without any expression. “You may take with you as much food and water as you can carry. That discharges all our debts to you for the work you did when you were one of us. From now on, we owe you nothing. You will live on your own. Outside.”

“No,” Lorn whispered under her breath. She knew what the punishment had to be, but hearing it spoken was almost unbearable.

“NO!” Bando shouted, a hundred times louder. “No! It's not fair!” Stepping up to Lorn, he put an arm around her shoulders, turning to stand beside her, with his face to the others. “Don't you know what happens if you send people outside when it's cold? They
die
. I have to carry them away from the cavern and throw them into the ravine. And then the steel birds and the plated creatures and the snakes—” His voice broke and he shook his head again.

“She can't stay here,” Zak said.

Blando glared back defiantly. “If you send her outside, I'm going with her!”

Dear precious, simple Bando. It was all Lorn could do not to cry. He didn't understand how important he was to everyone else, how much they depended on his strength. He had no idea of bargaining or blackmail. What he said had come straight from his heart and he meant it. If she went outside he was going, too.

But the others couldn't afford to lose him.

“There must be justice,” Zak said softly. “That's what gives us the strength to keep the rules when things get hard.”

Bando's arm tightened around Lorn. She could tell that he didn't really understand what Zak was talking about.

But she did. Gently, tenderly, she loosened the arm from her shoulders and stepped sideways, turning to look at Bando. “I'm not Lorn anymore,” she said. “My name's Hope Armstrong. That's what you have to call me. Say it, Bando.”

He hesitated, but she kept looking at him until he obeyed, shaping his mouth carefully to the unfamiliar words. “Hope Armstrong.” He said them staring straight into her face and she felt the name cling to her.

“You can let Hope Armstrong go, can't you?” she said calmly.

Bando nodded, looking bewildered. Still not understanding, but registering a difference. In the air around them, Lorn felt a faint movement of relief from all the others.

It gave her the courage to ask for what she wanted. They owed her something extra now. Turning toward them, she stared at the rows of angry, unrelenting faces.

“I am Hope,” she said, “and you've turned me out of the cavern. I accept that. Only—please don't shut me out of the tunnels, too. I'm trying to find out how to finish my story. I'll never know how it ends if you make me go outside, above the ground. Let me stay in the tunnels instead. You can block up the hole through the wall, to keep me out of the storeroom.”

“You won't have any chance of surviving there,” Perdew said gruffly. “Not once you've run out of food.”

“You think I could survive outside in the cold? On my own?” Lorn gave him a long, straight look. “There's no chance, is there? But if I can stay in the tunnels, at least I'll understand my life before I die. What do you say?”

No one answered, but she sensed something—some faint slackening of tension—that made her feel they were listening. One by one, the others turned to look at Zak, waiting for him to make the decision.

But he wouldn't do it. He stepped across to stand beside Lorn, so that he and Bando were flanking her, one on each side. From there, he stared back at the expectant faces, challenging them.

“What's your answer? Do you agree to what Hope has asked?”

They shifted uneasily for a moment. Then Perdew muttered, “Yes. Yes, she can stay down here.”

As though he'd given them permission, the others joined in, muttering their agreement in grudging, embarrassed voices.
If Cam dies in the cold, Perdew will be the new leader,
Lorn thought. In a strange, detached way, because it couldn't matter to her anymore.

Now that they'd decided, the atmosphere was suddenly easier. Annet came forward, reaching up on tiptoe to untie a half-empty net from the ceiling.

“Let me help you collect the food you need,” she said. “Let me help you, Hope.”

She opened the net and held it wide. But it wasn't Lorn—it wasn't Hope—who filled it full. All the others began to move toward her, picking up grains and nuts and seeds. They pushed food into the net until it bulged so much that Annet struggled to tie the top. Cam snatched up a couple of bat furs and bundled them together.

“You'll need these, too,” she said gruffly. “And a shell of water as well. Don't worry about getting them through the passage. We'll take them for you.”

Lorn stood back while Cam and Perdew took the supplies through the wall together. When they came back, she took a long breath and stepped up to the little gap in the stones.

Everyone was watching her. Cam and Zak. Bando. Annet and Dess and Perdew and Tina and—all of them. They were the only group of people who had ever looked after her and needed her and listened to her. She didn't know what to say to them.

“Go now,” Zak said. Not harshly. He came forward and put both his hands on her shoulders. “Go now, Hope Armstrong, out of this group forever, to live on your own. May you find food and water and shelter whenever you need them.”

Lorn bent her head, acknowledging what he'd said. Then she went down on her knees and began to crawl through the wall.

As she came out into the darkness beyond, she could already hear the others shifting stones behind her. Dragging them across the storeroom and jamming them firmly into place so that she wouldn't be able to move them from the other side.

Standing up, she hoisted the net onto her shoulder and tucked the blankets under one arm. Picking up the shell of water in her other hand, she began to walk off down the tunnel, on her own.

By himself, Tom would never have gone there. Not for any of Emma's sensible, careful reasons, but because he was afraid.

When they'd met beside the park on Wednesday night, Magee had hardly said a word. He'd just held out the little white card and—stared. But his stare had gone through everything, right into the inside of Tom's head.
No,
Tom had thought, when he looked down at the card.
No, I'm not coming to see you. I'm not as stupid as that.

And yet . . . something powerful was pulling him there. If Robert was right—if Magee really was the man from the plane—then maybe he had some link with the headaches, too. And the bruises. And the blurred, erratic vision. If he understood those, then wasn't it stupid
not
to go and see him?

Left to himself, Tom might have hesitated for ages, torn between his fear and his need to know. But Robert tipped the balance. When he said they were going to see Magee, Tom didn't argue. He simply got on his bike and pedaled.

 

STEPNEY SQUARE WAS A GROUP OF SHABBY LITTLE SHOPS, OUT on the east side of the city. They cycled toward it down a long, straight road lined with cheap terraced houses. As they approached the square, Tom could see a bizarre red haze, glowing warm against the dingy shop fronts.

At first he thought it was some kind of optical illusion and he blinked once or twice, to try and clear his eyes. The red mist shimmered and shifted, like wisps of fog in the wind, but it didn't disappear.

Gradually, as they cycled closer, the thickness at the center of the haze resolved itself into individual figures. There was a group of teenagers hanging around outside the shops, laughing and chatting together. When Robert and Tom pulled up beside the curb, they stopped talking and drew together, suspiciously.

Robert looked wary, but Tom could see it was all right. He grinned at the boy in the middle of the crowd. “We're looking for someone who lives down here. Are there apartments over the shops?”

The boy nodded and jerked his head toward an archway halfway down the row. He was cautious, but not unfriendly, and it was a perfectly good answer. Tom replied with a grin and a nod, thinking that was an end of it.

But there was another boy on the edge of the group, outside the red warmth that surrounded the others. A boy with a gray, nervous face and a smile that was too eager.

“I'll show you,” he said loudly. “Follow me.”

“It's OK.” Tom smiled and shook his head. “We're fine.”

But the boy wasn't going to be put off. He attached himself to them, with another ingratiating smile, trotting along beside Robert. Tom dropped back into third place, listening to their conversation but not joining in.

“Nice bike,” the boy said. Reaching out as if he wanted to touch it but not quite connecting.

“It's not bad.” Robert wasn't really paying attention. He was trying to find the street numbers on the shops ahead of them. “It's a bit small now.”

“Must be difficult,” the boy said, “being so tall.” And then—hastily—“But it's great, of course. You ought to play basketball.”

“I do play basketball.”

Robert didn't say it unkindly, but the boy's face went red and he started to apologize. As though it mattered.

And it did matter to him. Because everything mattered too much. Nothing was ever easy and natural. Tom could feel that unhappy awkwardness jabbing into him, settling under his ribs into a sharp, familiar pain.
Not again,
he thought.
Why now? This is all trivial stuff.

But it wasn't trivial to the boy. He wanted to make friends, to be useful and important to them. Tom could feel him wanting it so much that he got everything wrong.

He was asking questions now, still trying to foist his help on them. “Which apartment are you looking for? It's probably someone I know.”

“Don't worry,” Robert muttered. “We can cope.”

“But I could just—”

“We're fine, thanks. We can sort ourselves out.”

Robert was starting to sound impatient and Tom felt the boy shrink inside. He knew they didn't really need him, but he was desperate to stay with them. He'd made a big deal out of offering to help, and all the others had heard him. Being sent away now would make him look stupid.