Hollowpox The Hunt for Morrigan Crow - Jessica Townsend Page 0,20
other hand, favoured their father’s side of the family – sturdy, yellow-haired Viking stock.
‘We’ll bring Morrigan home later,’ Dave was telling Jupiter.
‘Oh, don’t worry about that,’ said Jupiter, gesturing vaguely in Fen’s direction. ‘I’ll send my housekeeper to collect her.’
Dave cast a nervous sideways look at Fen, who’d overheard Jupiter’s magnanimous offer of her services and was glowering at them both. ‘Er – are you sure about that, Captain North? We, um … we really don’t mind.’
‘No honestly, it’s fine,’ Jupiter assured him. ‘Truth be told, Magnificats are pretty rubbish at housekeeping. But she’s on the payroll, and if I don’t send her on the occasional errand she’ll snooze her nine lives away. Right, Fen?’ he called out to her with a wink.
‘Tonight you sleep with the fishes,’ she growled.
‘That means she’s going to put sardines in his bed,’ Hawthorne whispered loudly to his mum, smiling fondly at the Magnificat. ‘Classic Fen.’
‘How-tawn,’ said Baby Dave, tugging insistently at Hawthorne’s red jumper as they made their way out of Courage Square. ‘How-tawn, pick me up. I tired.’
‘No, Baby Dave.’ He shook her off. ‘You’re a big girl now. You’re almost three! Almost-three-year-olds have to walk on their own legs like everyone else.’
The toddler was not happy to hear this, and Morrigan could understand why. (After all, she thought Hawthorne might have a better chance of convincing Baby Dave she was a ‘big girl now’ if he and the rest of his family stopped calling her Baby Dave.)
Davina glared up at Hawthorne from beneath her pale blonde eyelashes. ‘HOW-TAWN!’ she growled in a voice that made Morrigan jump. ‘PICK ME UP! I TIRED!’
‘Oh, fine,’ he said, and stopped to heave her into his arms with great effort. She sat there beaming contentedly at the crowd, like a small but statuesque Viking queen surveying her subjects, as they followed Hawthorne’s dad through the turnstile at a busy Wunderground station.
Adult Dave had suggested they circumvent the post-battle crowds by avoiding Courage Square’s nearest station, Caledonia Circus, and heading straight for Greenery Gate instead. He hadn’t counted on most of the people at the battle having that same idea. When they reached the busiest part of the station, of course, Baby Dave got bored of being carried and insisted ‘How-Tawn’ let her down immediately.
‘Hold hands! Single file!’ Hawthorne’s dad shouted at their group as they made their way through the maze of stairwells and down to the platform. ‘Form a human chain! Don’t get – pardon me, madam, I’m just trying to keep this lot togeth— Oh, well excuse you very much! All right, team, don’t let’s lose each other – oof!’
It was a lost cause. The crowd was a sea that had taken on a life of its own. A train arrived at the platform and a new wave of passengers spilled out of its doors. Those waiting paused just long enough for them to disembark before surging instantly forward, everyone eager to board so they wouldn’t have to wait an agonising two whole minutes until the next train came along.
Somewhere in this mess, one hand slipped out of another and the Swift family’s human chain was split in two. Morrigan watched as Cat, Dave, Helena and Homer got swallowed up by the momentum of the crowd and pulled to the open doors of one carriage, while she, Hawthorne and Baby Dave were pushed to the next.
‘Where’s Baby Dave?’ Hawthorne’s dad shouted in a panicked voice. Meanwhile, Cat was trying to elbow people out of the way to get back to them, to no avail. ‘Who’s got Baby Dave?’
‘We do!’ Morrigan called back from farther up the platform. She tightened her grip on Davina’s pudgy, sweaty little right hand (the left was firmly in Hawthorne’s).
Dave looked clammy and anxious, his eyes bugging out of his head as he jumped up and down in the crowd, trying to keep sight of them while he shouted instructions. ‘RIGHT, STAY TOGETHER, YOU THREE! WE GET OFF AT TUCKER PARK PLACE! THAT’S TWELVE STOPS AWAY! DID YOU HEAR ME?’
‘I know where we live, Dad!’ Hawthorne shouted back, rolling his eyes. ‘We’ll be fine!’
The carriage was full of chatter and high spirits, even though they were all crammed in like pickles in a jar. Someone down one end started a rousing chorus of ‘Green is the Colour of My Cheer’, and seconds later a round of ‘Zoom Goes the Big Red Sleigh’ started at the other end, and the two competing groups managed to merge and harmonise quite pleasantly