The Sacrifice (44 page)

‘She’s right,’ said
Brendan and he walked over to stand at Tish’s side.

‘Bren … ?’ Ed frowned
at him.

‘With two of us we stand a
chance,’ said Brendan. ‘We can do it.’

‘Brendan, you don’t have
to … ’

‘I’ll show you I’m not a
coward. I
do
care about other kids. You can tell Jordan bloody Hordern what I
am. What a mistake he made.’

‘Bren … are you
sure?’

‘Me and Tish,’ said Brendan.
‘We’ll hold them long enough, then follow on.’

‘He’s right, Ed,’ Will
shouted over. ‘We need you.’

Ed didn’t have long to make a
decision. They needed to get moving again. What was more important? Him doing the right
thing and taking a stand here? Or rescuing the kids he’d come for?

And there was Wormwood.

It felt wrong, to be balancing up a
sicko’s life against two kids, but … 

Ed felt deep down that Wormwood was
important. He had a power over the other sickos. He knew stuff.

What was most important?

‘Get a move on,’ Macca shouted.
‘There’s more coming.’

Ed swore. He had to see this through or it
would all have been a waste of time. A waste of Adele’s life.

‘OK,’ he said. ‘You got
it, Bren. Hold the bridge with Tish. Just for a few minutes. No longer than you have to.
We’ll try and kill as many of the sickos on the way as we can.’

‘Come on!’ It was Macca again.
Ed glanced back at the walkway. It was solid with bodies, flowing down from St
Paul’s. He swore again. What the hell must Brendan and Tish be thinking?

‘Spread out,’ he said, marching
to the head of his group.
‘Me, Hayden, Kyle and Macca first.
Will, you come behind with the goblin and the little ones; keep eyes in the back of your
head. If any sickos get past Bren and Tish I want to know about it.’

‘OK, Ed.’

‘Let’s go!’

Tish’s hands seemed to be working on
their own. Chopping at the Nephilim who came close. Why had she said it? Why had she
volunteered for this suicidal job? There were so many sickos. Had she really thought she
could survive this? Or had she been hoping to get to heaven? To wash herself in the
blood of the Nephilim. To wash away the sin of bringing Sam and The Kid to the
Temple?

What she had done was wrong.

She felt like being sick.

There was a limit to what she and Brendan
could do. It was a losing battle. If there had been ten of them, side by side, they
could have blocked the bridge and kept the Nephilim back all night.

But there were only two of them. The
Neph’ could get round the sides, and if Tish turned to stop them more pressed in
at the front.

How had she ended up here, with this boy she
hardly knew? Was she going to die here with him? It seemed like months ago that
she’d set out for the Tower of London with her friends, but it was only really a
few days.

They’d had such high hopes. Matt had
fired them up, inspired them with dreams of glory. They were doing God’s work.

So this was God’s work then, was it?
Cutting down these diseased pus-bags?

She remembered leaving the cathedral, with
all the musicians playing them down the steps. Dawn breaking over the buildings to the
east, turning the sky a brilliant pinky-grey. How proud she’d
felt … 

And how quickly it had all gone wrong once
they were over the Wall, chased by the Neph’, running, getting split up. Half the
group had gone back to St Paul’s, but Tish had pressed on with Louise and the
others. And one by one they’d been picked off until, hoarse from shouting for
help, they’d managed to get into the office building near the Tower, where Louise
had been wounded.

Ed had killed Louise and saved Tish. He
couldn’t save her now, though. He was gone. Why go through with this pain any
more? She could lie down here, go to sleep and wake in heaven. Maybe all that Matt had
told her would come true. Maybe everything he had filled her head with was true.

She’d always had a strong faith. Since
she was tiny she’d felt that there was a God up there watching over her. Smiling
down. It was what had kept her going through the really bad times.

But Matt. He’d twisted everything.
What he’d filled her head with was poison. If she really believed in what he said
then why was she here? Why wasn’t she in the Temple with him and the other
believers? Why had she deserted him?

Why was she here?

To show Matt. To show him he was
wrong
.

She prayed to God now. Not for herself. It
was too late for that. But for Sam and The Kid.

For them to get safely away.

Ed’s team had made it. Just. Fighting
their way across the bridge. Couldn’t have done it without Tish and Brendan
holding the sickos off behind them. And now they were on the South Bank, looking
back.

‘Look at that,’ said Will, his
voice full of wonder. In their desperation to get to the kids and follow the Green Man,
the sickos were surging down to the embankment and were pouring over the side like a
herd of wildebeest trying to cross a stream. They tumbled into the river, which was
foaming white around the falling bodies.

‘Yes!’ Ed screeched. ‘Keep
calling them, Wormwood. Bring them all on! Wipe them out. Drown the bastards.’

The Green Man closed his eyes and
concentrated.

The kids cheered, watched as the horde got
washed away. They weren’t home safe yet, though. Ed tore his eyes away from the
spectacle, put a hand on Hayden’s shoulder.

‘We’re going to split up,’
he said. ‘You head east. Make for the Tower. Go as fast as you can. Don’t
stop for anything. You were always the fastest runner. You can do it. It’s not
far. Tell Jordan what went down tonight.’

‘What do you want me to tell him to
do?’ Hayden asked.

‘Nobody tells Jordan Hordern what to
do. He’ll decide for himself. Just make sure he understands that if he wants
to come over this way he’ll need to bring an army. And tell him
once I’ve got Sam to his sister I’ll rest up then head back.’

‘We need to get out of here,’
said Macca. ‘The green bastard’s attracting every sicko in south
London.’

It was true. Sickos were advancing through
the charred ruins of the South Bank, creeping out of the streets. Ed cursed.

‘Go, Hayden. Run,’ he said.

‘All right.’ Hayden gave Ed a
quick hug then set off, sprinting east along the riverside. Ed was amazed to think that
the Tower was only about ten minutes away. A big part of him wanted to go with her, back
to the safety of those high stone walls.

But he wasn’t going to let Sam down
again. He squatted next to the youngers.

‘Are you OK to run?’

They all nodded, glassy-eyed.

‘Then let’s go.’

‘What about Tish and Brendan?’
said Will. Ed had forgotten about them. He looked up at the bridge. It was impossible to
see what was happening at the far end.

‘They’ll just have to do the
best they can,’ he said. ‘We’ll draw the sickos away from here at
least.’

‘Will they make it?’ Macca
asked.

‘I hope so,’ Ed replied, and
shut them out of his mind.

Tish was so tired she actually thought she
might pass out. She felt like she’d been on this bridge for days. She could
picture stopping and just switching off, letting everything roll over her. Not having to
deal with this any more.

In the darkness of the night her exhaustion
was playing tricks on her mind so that she couldn’t tell what was real and what
she was imagining. She kept seeing the faces of her friends, kept flinching as she
thought she’d killed one of them.

Her mum, her sister, friends from the
cathedral.

And then there was Louise, her guts hanging
out of her belly, reaching to her and pleading for help … 

Except it wasn’t her, was it? It was a
Neph’ that she’d gutted.

Gutted … 

How often had she used that word before?

I was, like, totally gutted when he
didn’t show up … 

But this is what gutted really meant. To
spill your guts.

Don’t lose your head now, Tish, she
said to herself, her mind dancing about. She and Brendan were backing slowly over the
bridge, stumbling over fallen bodies. In front of them an endless press of Nephilim. As
fast as they chopped one down, another took its place. She could see more of
them below, scrambling over the embankment like rats and splashing
into the Thames, washing away downriver.

So many.

She and Brendan were forced steadily back by
the sheer weight of the oncoming sickos. They were already halfway across the bridge.
She couldn’t risk looking behind her, to see if the rest of the way was clear, to
see if Ed’s group had got away. She had to keep concentrating as her hands rose
and fell, rose and fell, her sword cutting into the crowd of Neph’.

There was Louise again, crawling towards
her, her arm reaching out, although her hand was missing, her wrist a bloody stump.

Not Louise! Not Louise.

Think straight, Tish
. She screamed
and hacked away at the Neph’.

‘We should make a run for it,’
said Brendan. His voice sounded cracked and dry. ‘We’ve done what we had
to.’

‘OK,’ said Tish. ‘We just
turn and run, OK?’

They gave it one more go, laying into the
wall of Nephilim with a final ferocious onslaught, then Brendan yelled ‘Go!’
and they turned, and they ran … 

Straight into a group of Neph’ who had
got on to the bridge at the other end.

In the confusion, unsure which way to turn,
teetering off balance, Brendan slipped in a mess of blood and spilled innards. He
crashed into the side of the bridge, cried out in pain. The Neph’ were on him in
an instant and Tish tried to haul him up, lowering her sword for a moment.

Only a moment, but long enough for both sets
of Nephilim to close on the two of them, to pile on top of them. She could feel their
warmth, their dampness, their grasping hands. And she felt a kind of peace.

Another pair of hands came down to gently wrap
themselves round her.

God’s hands.

She closed her eyes and let sleep take her
as the moonlight was blotted out by the bodies of the grown-ups, mothers, fathers,
teenagers … 

And out of the utter darkness came a
light.

She had made her sacrifice.

Ed’s crew were tramping down the
Strand, past the Savoy Hotel, dragging their aching feet along, starting to really feel
all their injuries. They hadn’t come a great distance from St Paul’s, but
the battle had seriously taken it out of them. Getting along the South Bank hadn’t
been nearly as easy as before. In calling to the sickos on the north bank the Green Man
had attracted every wandering grown-up in this part of London. The kids had had to fight
their way along and had been forced back over to the north side of the river at Waterloo
Bridge.

It had been a little easier after that.
They’d managed to outrun the few sickos who tried to follow them across and
thankfully the streets were quieter over here. The Strand was wide and open. If they
stuck to the middle there was less chance of a surprise attack. All of Ed’s senses
were on the alert, all the survival skills he’d learnt in the last year were being
used. He couldn’t allow himself to relax yet. They were making good progress, but
it was still a fair way to the museum. They had to keep pushing on, even though he felt
like he was dragging some huge dead weight behind him. The buildings on either side were
incredibly tempting. The thought of lying down and going to sleep … 

He didn’t know this area, though.
Didn’t know where the
dangers might be. Breaking in to anywhere
was a risk. The last thing he wanted right now was to disturb a nest of sickos.

Keep going. The museum meant safety. Rest. A
bed.

They came to a building with a grand archway
at the front held up by pink marble columns, and as they passed it Ed sensed a movement.
His head snapped round. There was a courtyard beyond the archway and a mob of sickos was
spilling out of it on to the pavement. They were getting bunched up in the entrance way
and jostling each other, so that they came out in a confused pack, arms pinned to their
bodies, swaying from side to side.

They reminded Ed of something.

And then it hit him. He laughed – a wild,
crazy cackle that startled the other kids.

‘What is it, boss?’ Kyle turned
to see what Ed was looking at.

‘I’ll sort them,’ he said,
slipping his red-stained axe off his shoulder.

‘Leave them,’ Ed giggled. Kyle
hesitated and the sickos came waddling into the road.

‘What are you laughing at?’ Kyle
asked. ‘You finally lost it?’

‘Probably. This has been one long
day.’

‘But what’s so funny?’

Kyle wasn’t taking his eyes off the
advancing sickos, although they were a sorry bunch and didn’t look much of a
threat.

‘Look at them!’ Ed waved a hand
towards the sickos. ‘They look like bloody penguins. Off some nature
programme.’

By now all the kids were watching the sickos
who were packed together, bumping and bumbling about in the road.
They
really
did
look like penguins and soon all the kids were laughing and jeering,
and the sickos stopped, confused.

Then the Green Man stepped out of the ranks
and walked over to them.

‘Go back, brothers and sisters,’
he said. ‘Go back.’

The sickos shuffled away, over the pavement,
between the pillars, back into the courtyard. Ed stopped laughing. His sides were aching
too much. He took a deep breath. He was shaking and light-headed.

He looked at the green furry shape of
Wormwood, his sagging bony arse. He was glad The Kid had persuaded him to bring the
weird sicko along. He’d had to argue twice with the others on the way here from
the Wobbly Bridge. Kyle in particular had wanted to ditch him when it had become clear
just what a magnet he was to other sickos. Ed had had to point out that without Wormwood
they’d never have escaped from St Paul’s. He was useful and Ed had a strong
feeling that The Kid was right – Archie was right – he might become even more
useful.