know why she was there or what she was trying to do. She would forever be remembered as the idiot who defied a citywide lockdown to go outside on the most dangerous night of the Hollowpox and consequently got herself murdered. People would say she deserved it.
‘All right.’ Squall drew closer to her, speaking loudly over the din of roaring, shrieking, cawing Wunimals. ‘It’s almost time. Wait for my signal.’
‘Your signal to do what?’ Morrigan yelped, jumping backwards as a huge, mottled green snakewun opened its jaws wide and hissed, striking out at her.
‘What do you do when you are being chased by a bear?’
Having recent experience in this field, she could answer definitively. ‘Run.’
‘No. You make yourself bigger than the bear.’
‘How am I supposed to—’
‘It isn’t just Wunimals you’ve been gathering,’ Squall interrupted, with a nod to the encroaching horde. ‘Look around you. Focus.’
Once again and with great effort, Morrigan let her eyes relax until they were nearly closed … and Courage Square lit up. The shimmering white-gold Wunder she’d gathered on the rooftop had travelled with her, just like the crowd of Wunimals – and like the crowd, it had grown exponentially. It was blinding.
‘What do I do with it?’
‘Something big. Use what you know, what you’re good at. It doesn’t have to be perfect, it only has to be big. Enough to draw the Hollowpox out of every single Wunimal here, all at once. Like sucking the poison from a wound.’
Something big. Something big.
Morrigan racked her brains and came up with nothing. Squall had been right about her. She was light-years away from where she ought to be.
She felt frozen to the spot. It was as if her fear had grown roots and dug down into the ground. ‘I – I can’t do it. I haven’t learned enough yet, you said so yourself.’
Squall’s face snapped towards her quite suddenly, eyes flashing.
‘Now is not the time to be small!’ he roared. ‘Where is the Morrigan Crow who reignited the dead fireblossoms? The girl who brought down the Ghastly Market, who conducted a glorious symphony of death in the Museum of Stolen Moments? Where is that Morrigan Crow? Bring her back!’
‘That was different! I didn’t plan any of that, it just happened, I can’t—’
‘MORRIGAN! MORRIGAN, I’M COMING!’
Morrigan turned towards the frantic, distant voice, looking over the jungle of green glowing eyes.
She hadn’t imagined it. There on the horizon, impossibly, was a gigantic grey blur bounding down the centre of Grand Boulevard towards Courage Square.
‘FENESTRA!’
Her heart jumped up into her throat as Fen reached the square and without hesitating, leapt right into the throng, pouncing from space to space and leaping over the backs of the Wunimals to get to her. Morrigan had never been happier or more worried to see anyone in her life.
‘Fen, BE CAREFUL!’ she shrieked as a flock of birdwuns circled above the Magnificat’s head, taking turns to dive-bomb her.
But Fenestra barely seemed to notice them. She landed deftly in the space in front of Morrigan, turning to bare her fangs at the Wunimals with a ferocious yowl.
Without stopping to think, Morrigan stooped low, and ran a line of fire across the ground between Fenestra and the Wunimals and all the way around, enclosing the three of them – her, Fen and Squall – in a bright flaming circle.
‘What are you doing here?’ Fen snarled at her. ‘What were you thinking, running off like that, jumping off the rooftop, you could have been—’
‘I had to!’ Morrigan said in a rush. The flames surrounding them grew higher and closer. Sweat ran into her eyes, making it difficult to see, and the Wunimals became a blur beyond the wall of fire. ‘I’ll explain later!’
‘If your idiot mates hadn’t broken down that door in your room—’
‘My— Who are you talking about?’
‘That obnoxious boy and the other … there was someone else with him … I forget—’
‘Cadence! Hawthorne and Cadence broke down my station door?’ Morrigan didn’t think she could be more afraid in that moment, but her fear somehow spiked, sharp and cold in her heart. ‘Are they okay, has something happened?’
‘They’re fine; they were worried about you,’ Fen said in a rush. ‘Came running into the lobby shouting your name, said some other friend had seen you in a dream or a vision or something … surrounded by fire and teeth. They tried to make me bring them to find you, but—’
‘Lam,’ Morrigan whispered.
And in the middle of the madness, she felt a peculiar moment of peace. A