The Armed Man

I drifted lusciously out of sleep the next morning and opened my eyes. I was stretched out, spread eagled and grinning like a happy cat. This bed was so much more comfortable than the one before. I don’t know why. It seemed spongier. The pillow wasn’t jute, either, and that did help. I felt so warm and relaxed that I really didn’t want to wake up properly, until I smelt something cooking in the next room. Breakfast seemed to drag my eyes open. I opened my eyes and came face to face with both Fitz’s book collection and a dressing gown that I was pretty sure hadn’t been there that morning. There was something else in the pocket. I put a hand in and pulled out a piece of glass. And a chess piece. Someone had pinned a note to it. I was startled to see that it was handwritten.

Benedict, it started, in scrawled but legible pencil, this is yours. I found it last night. Hope it fits. The writing was all over the place. Handwriting. Handwriting. They used to teach us handwriting at school. We didn’t even need it.

In keeping with the slightly vintage theme that the morning was starting to take on, I decided to have a look at those books. I’ve started to see books a lot more often, recently. They used to give me quite a shock. I picked the dressing gown up off the concrete dusty floor and shrugged it on. It was worn and blue and came to below my knees. They made sense, though, to be honest. Now, it just isn’t worth finding your TCD and charging it on rationed electricity. It’ll only get stolen. And nothing’s sent to them any more, anyway.

I padded over. They was far more highbrow than I had expected. Fitz seemed to me more of a Viz sort of person, but some of these were beautiful.

There was a window, it turned out, if you could call it that. A long, grimy skylight ran the full length of the ceiling and, I’m guessing, into the rooms behind. It didn’t give out much light, but by what little it did I could see a bookshelf, a chair and a large wooden chest. They were all gorgeously made.

I got to my feet with my blanket draped around me like a cloak and touched one of the shelf’s wooden sides. These were an occurrence. It felt so solid and wooden. Not all the same wood. Inside, it was full of what you’d expect- there were some well thumbed Hillman and Georges, Harry Potter and a copy of Emma. More surprisingly, Dostoevsky, and what looked horribly like Pasternak. Perhaps he wasn’t joking when he said he’d almost joined the Crommies.

There was a picture there, too.

“Benedict?”

I jumped, my finger still on the spine of Doctor Zhivago. I snapped it back and tried not to look
guilty. Rag was standing with her head around the door, peering politely at me.

“Er, hello.” I said, in a bewildered manner.

“Rosie said to come through and wake you up. Breakfast is ready.”

“Right. Thanks.” I couldn’t bring myself to call her ‘Rag’. It seemed too cruel. I took off my
blanket, dropped it lightly back onto the bed and followed her through to the living room. Fitz
was sitting there, along with what looked like half the contents of a primary school, wearing
blanket cover over his shoulders like a toga. He looked up and gave me an eager ‘sup’ nod as
soon as he saw me.

“Sleep okay?”

“Great, thanks. Sofa wasn’t too bad?” I rubbed my eye with the hell of my hand. Something
smelled wonderful.

“Bearable.”

“Breakfast.” Rag pushed a plate into my hand. “It’s not much. And, yes, it is real.”

I looked down at the chipped plate she’d just thrust at me and saw some rather burnt eggs,
some tomatoes and a single, lone sausage. I hadn’t seen sausages for months.

“I did the eggs.” She said readily.

“Where the hell did you get this?” I asked her in amazement, sitting back down in the place I
had the previous night. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen food like this.

“Someone’s opened a little farm down the road. It’s not a lot, but they’ve got plants, and a few
hens. They charge well.”

Fitz nodded keenly, his mouth full of egg.

“And Rosie should be through soon. She’s doing the last of the washing up.”

I ate in a sort of marvelled silence. Back with the Royals, at home, at base, more often than
not we couldn’t get out. The bread all went dry and congealed, and the dry food and rat
packs they kept all started to taste identical, after a fashion. Sometimes we ran out of them.
We invented our own method of catching rats when the going got really tough. The house
was ancient, it was full of them.. All you had to do was lie in wait with a piece of cheese or
something else too rotten to eat in front of your rifle and blow their head off whenever they
came close. Monstrous waste of food and ammunition, and they tasted dreadful. Food,
honest to God, real, proper food like this I could have died for.

Rosie’s well-upholstered form came through the door that led from the kitchen, drying her
soapy hands of an old tea towel that she’d tied around her waist. Everything she was
wearing was just as threadbare as it had been yesterday. I thought of my clothes. I couldn’t
wear them again.

“Well, thank God that that’s all done.” she said finally. “Hello Benedict, love. How did you
sleep?

“Well, thanks.” I tried not to spray sausage over the place when I spoke. “These are lovely.”

“Good.” She beamed at me. “Where’s Gypsy?”

Rag sat up and looked around like a meerkat. “Not sure. She should be here.”

“Did she come back?”

“I did see her.”

“She’ll want to eat, won’t she?”

Fitz and Rag both looked awkwardly at one another.

“She might…” Rag ventured cautiously. “As her yourself.”

“Ask me what?”

That was a new voice. I turned around stiffly.

Gypsy was, in every way, what Rag wasn’t. For a start, she was taller and fuller figured.
She had very long, very thick wavy dark brown hair and eyelashes framing her very green
eyes. Like Rag, Fitz and Rosie, she was wearing what looked like rags, but she somehow
managed to make it look like a fashion statement. She didn’t, however, look very happy.

“Are you eating or not?”

Gypsy looked coolly at the remaining food on Rag’s plate. “You know, I don’t think I will.”

I was surprised, very slightly, at her voice. It was disappointingly, boringly English. I’d been
expecting something a bit more exotic.

“Suit yourself.” shrugged Rag, sitting back and looking unperturbed. “You might want to,
though. It’s meant to be cold again today.”

Gypsy didn’t say anything. She regarded me coldly for a few moments, then moved off and
swept out in one movement. She seemed to leave a sort of echoing silence behind her.

“We don’t like her very much.” Fitz explained, chasing egg around the plate with some
sausage. I heard Rosie clear her throat dangerously, but she didn’t say anything else. Rag
was smiling secretly to herself.

Fitz seemed to have picked up on the awkward vibes he’d caused, because he stood up
suddenly and announced he was going to take the plates through. Rosie almost fell off her
chair in shock.

“That’s very generous of you.”

“I’m feeling very generous today.”

Not knowing what to do, and seeing an opportunity ask the question I’d been dying to ask
since I first heard what they called her, I followed him through.

“Why do they call her Rag?” I blurted out as soon as the door had closed.

He turned around with a mouth full of sausage. “Hm?” he inquired brightly.

“Rag. Why do you call her that?”

“Oh.” He swallowed quickly and, by the looks of it, painfully. “That. I invented that.”

“Why?”

“Skinny.” he shrugged. “Bit of a waste of space.”

I must have looked a bit shocked. He must have seen me looking a bit shocked.

“Listen, you might like her now but trust me, you live with her as long as I have and all of a
sudden, anthrax is preferable. ”

“No, I just wondered why she was called that. I thought her parents didn’t like her or
something.”

Fitz snorted into some sausage.

“I wouldn’t blame them. She’s actually called Rebecca. Don’t call her Rebecca. She won’t
thank you.”

“Paper’s here!” Rosie trilled from next door. Fitz threw the remaining sausage back into the
pan he’d stolen it from and straightened up.

“Anyone asks and I’m blaming that on you.”

“Mm. Thankyou.” I looked down tastefully at the remains of his food as he walked out, looking
very self-assured and lightly enquired if there was anything worth reading.

You could get shot for that.

I watched him retreating. That picture on his bookshelf. That could only be his brother.

The thing is, I know that man.

“Oh!”

Rag, for the second time in an hour, walked in and surprised me. Although this time, it looked
like she was just as astonished as I was. She also looked slightly guilty

“Have you had enough? I don’t think you ate at all last night, did you?”

“I’m fine. That wasn’t me.” I added hurriedly, gesturing with flying hands at the remains of
sausage in the pan. They were starting to congeal slightly.

“Oh, I know. It’s one of Fitz’s usual tricks. And he doesn’t think we know. Still.” She added
brightly, popping half a sausage into her mouth with a flourish. “Waste not want not.”

I looked at her in what must have been a disgusted manner.

“What? If I don’t have it, someone else will” she justified, and waved her hand at the rest of
the pan. “Feel free.”

“Er, thanks.”

“Suit yourself, then.” She leaned against a rough wooden table doubling up as a kitchen
worktop and eyed me. “Vesely. That’s a strange name.”

“It’s Czech.” I said automatically, without even asking how she knew what my surname was.

She looked mildly surprised. “Oh. Are you Czech?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t sound it.”

“I don’t remember it. I’ve lived here a long time.”

“Were your parents Czech then?”

“My dad was.”

She nodded. “I went to Prague, once. Have you ever been?”

“I might have done. I don’t really remember.”

“So where were you born?”

“Liberec.”

“Oh. I’ve never heard of it.”

“It’s pretty.”

She was silent for a bit. Looked away. Then she looked up again. I could see a question in
her eyes.

“Fitz said you served under Jude McCullough” she stated bluntly.

“Yeah. I did.”

Rag looked impressed.

“Wow. Fitz told me. I thought he might have been making it up. He likes having me on.” She
looked, for a fleeting second, mildly disappointed. I guessed that she probably didn’t have an
easy time of it with Fitz. He struck me, even in the short time that I’d got to know him,
someone that was hard to get on with if he decided not to take a shine to you.

“My parents were Royalists.” She added, changing the subject in an offhand way. I
remembered with an uncomfortable, icy grab at my insides that her parents had been killed
as well. I nodded sagely at the floor.

“Not actively. They kept quiet about it. They’re dead now.”

“I heard.”

I instantly regretted saying that.

She looked at me for a few, very stretched seconds. Not with any particular expression, per
say. Just a very long, very somnolent look, like somebody who’s seen it all. “Yours too?” She
asked, finally, in a voice too old to belong to her.

“I think.” I said, thinking I hope at the top of my voice inside my head. I really did hope they
were safe.

“When?”

“Two years now. About.”

She nodded resignedly. “Eleven months.”

A horrible silence filled the air, one that you felt that you just needed to break somehow. I felt
words in my throat, but they just didn’t seem to want to come out. I couldn’t even think what
they might be.

“It must be hard.” I forced finally. It sounded so anonymous that I couldn’t face saying
anything else.

“Well. It could have been worse.”

I was rather hoping that a similar sort of quiet didn’t creep its way in again, because I could
feel its fingers start to work their way into the room. I needn’t have worried. What little
gathering silent there might have been in the corners was soon dispelled when Fitz burst his
way in.

“Oh.” He stood stock still, sensing something had happened. In the corner of Rag’s ugly eyes,
I could see tears starting to form.

“Come in. Have food.” I moved aside from the cooker, some ancient affair I’d been using as a
prop. He looked at it vaguely, but shook his head.

“Rosie always gets cross. Listen Rag-”

She turned her glistening, reined eyes on him.

“Are you going to take the children out? You don’t have to.”

But she shook her head at him, and said in a steady voice that I couldn’t have managed, “No,
they’ll be wanting me. I’d better go. ‘Scuse me.”

Fitz moved aside silently, an almost concerned frown creasing his forehead. He looked at
me, blank and strangely puzzled as soon as the door shut behind her.

“What did you do to her?”

“Nothing!” I flooded out. “She just started talking about her parents. There was nothing-”

He held up his hand for me to stop me, smiling lightly. “Don’t go getting all defensive on me.
She gets like that sometimes. There’s nothing any of us can do.”

“Is there anyone there to help her?” I wondered, accidently out loud. I would have tried to
stop myself but then, I realised, I actually wanted to know the answer. I looked at Fitz in
interest.

“She gets a lot of help.” he said shortly. “She and Rosie are close. The one you’ll have to
watch out for is Gypsy.”

“Gypsy?”

He nodded curtly. “Just take my advice. I wouldn’t get to close to her.”

I thought back to her positively aloof manner this morning and wondered how on earth it
would be possible for this to happen.

“She doesn’t seem happy.”

“She’s pretty bitter.” he answered simply. “She was going to go to Heidelberg when all of this
kicked off. Really looking forward to it. Of course, then the scanners went haywire and she
couldn’t get out, and when they all got fixed and the ports were re-opened, she’d missed her
chance. She was pretty cut up about it.”

“What about her family?” My conversation with Rag was still hot in my mind.

Fitz shrugged. “She’s not particularly forthcoming. She might have some. She might not.
Frankly, if she were my daughter, I wouldn’t want her back in a hurry.” He pressed his
eyebrows together thoughtfully. “Actually, that sounded awful. Forget I said that.”

I tried with every fibre in my body to fight back a small and spiteful smile. I did outwardly try
not to find this particular brand of cutting humour funny. Inwardly, of course, I thought it was
hilarious.

Fitz straightened up and crossed the room with meaningful strides to a small and dreary
window in the side of the wall. From what I could make out from under the grease and other
industrial waste, there was a wall behind it.

“Grey again. Looks like it might be a nice day.”

“What’s out there?” Curiosity getting the better of me, I walked over in his wake and squinted
through the painfully grimy glass.

“Courtyard.” was Fitz’s short answer. On top of the wall, I could see wire.

“Don’t want anyone climbing over, really, do we?” he asked in what would be a good natured
manner, seeing my expression. “It was here before we were.”

“Mm.”

I looked out at the wire and the grey sky beyond. I could see the sun, barely, white and
circular like a paper cutout. It looked dejected at not being seen any more.

“I’m aware that this might sound a bit of a strange request,” a voice in my ear said, “but you
couldn’t flick that lightswitch for me, could you?”

“What?”

“Lightswitch.” Fitz was looking at me very expectantly. “Beside you.”

I turned around, puzzled. There was one there, half hidden behind dirt and a coat rack, but I
didn’t expect it to do much. I flicked it and, predictably, nothing happened. Fitz was looking at
me in something like triumph.

“Excellent. Come on,” he said, merrily all of a sudden. “No use you moping around here all
day.”

“There’s not a lot else to do.” My eyes were still fixed on the sky and the sun, even though
they were beginning to hurt. I wondered what it would feel like to be hanged.

“Yes there is, and you’re looking dangerously thoughtful. Nothing good ever came out of
thinking too much. Oh. You need clothes.”

I looked down. The dressing gown, however thoughtful it might have been, was not warm,
but I don’t see why this should concern him. I looked back up at him, puzzled.

“Don’t look at me like that. You can’t wear that for the rest of your life. I’ll go and see Rosie.
Come on.”

He turned, made a beckoning motion with his hand. When he got to the door and realised that
I hadn’t followed, he turned back. “Are you coming, or aren’t you?”

“I thought you said that you were going?”

“And how am I meant to know what size you are?”

I hung my head, didn’t look at him, followed him out the door. Rosie was there, reading the
paper and frowning very slightly. She didn’t even move when the door slammed behind me.

“We’re going into the clothing store, just so you know. Don’t get all gung-ho and burst in there
if you hear something.”

She nodded without looking up.

This place was like a rabbit warren. Every time you thought you’d reached a dead end,
another one branched straight out again. It was like being inside a lung. Fitz walked us a
good few yards further than where I’d slept the night before and up to a door that had been
locked, previously. I could see the iris scanner by the frame.

Of course, there was no electricity- and even if there was, I sincerely doubt that it would
have worked. Fitz pushed his way easily through and waited for his eyes to adjust.

“Be careful, you can’t see well in here.”

The skylight, the same one that ran through the bedrooms, seemed cleaner here. I blinked a
few times, making out more and more cardboard boxes as I did so.

“Rosie guards this place with her life. Keeps it the best kept secret you’ve ever known.”

“Where’s all this come from?” I broke away from him, looking round trousers and jumpers and
jackets and dresses and gloves and hats and shoes and socks and mantles and shirts and
shorts like I’d never seen them all before. There must be a hundred thousand dollars’ worth
of goods here.

“I don’t know. I think Rag helped, she knows every warehouse from here to Manchester.”

“Do you?”

“One. Or two. It doesn’t matter, with all this. You start digging through. Take as much as you
like, God knows there’s too much in here anyway.”

I didn’t feel I should be wasting clothes. They were such a luxury. We tried to conduct a raid
on a warehouse once. We were quite literally outgunned.

It was winter, but it was perpetually winter. I didn’t want to show up. Black, grey, cream and
navy. That’s all we ever wore, but something scarlet was poking out of a battered box in the
corner, to the left. I’ve always had a bit of an affiliation for red. I leant over and pulled at it,
expecting to be disappointed. A beautiful, thin wool jersey fell out.

“If you like.” Fitz was ferreting away, and had already put aside a small pile of his own. “It’s
the safest colour to wear, I suppose.”

Oh. Yes. That.

Our armbands were blue. Ours were coloured, royal and ink. Theirs were scarlet red, tied
around their arms like pirates. I couldn't wear red.

“I’ll look like a Bolshie!”

“It’s better than looking like a Royalist. If you like it, take it. You’re the only one it’ll fit.”

Feeling like a traitor, I draped it over my arm. I needed other things, too. A coat. Shoes, socks,
underwear. Essentials. I set about gathering these and trying to cover my jumper up with
them. The red still came through.

“How much will I need?”

“As much as you like. Rosie washes, it’s not like you’ll need replacements for anything once
you’ve got it.”

“What’re you doing, then?”

“Helping you.” he said, as if it were obvious. “I didn’t come here for the good of my health,
you know.”

I started, dumbfounded.

“I’m not all bad.”

I never said you were” I managed to say weakly. I couldn’t make my mind up about Fitz.

“I reckon you’ve got enough. What do you have there?”

I held out my arm.

“Seven socks. Interesting. And you’ll need firmer boots than that. There-” he pointed with his
foot towards a thick black pair by the door. “those’ll do. I should probably show you back to
your room as well.”

“Where is it?”

“Next to mine, probably. Will they fit?”

The boots he had pointed to looked suspiciously uniform. “I don’t know.” I lied quickly. “I don’t
think I need any.”

Fitz raised an eyebrow, but didn’t actually say anything. Fitz had the most highly arched
eyebrows that I have ever seen. We left, back down the corridor, turning off differently this
time to where the bedrooms were. Fitz stood for a minute, like he was trying to mentally work
out which one I was most likely to be in, before kicking open the door on the right. There was
a mattress there.

“How right was I?”

My blanket, the old blanket I’d bought from the safehouse that had been with me on the street
was there. It looked far cleaner than I’d seen it since I was home.

“Rosie must have washed that. It was in a pretty sore state beforehand. Where do you want
these?”

I looked around, dithering. The mattress on the floor was the only furniture there. There
wasn’t even an alcove to put them on.

“We’ll bring a table or something through, perhaps.” he said, leaving them in a pile on my bed.
“I can find you one pretty easily.”

“Thanks?”

“Don’t mention it. Get changed.”

“Why?”

“Because you don’t want to be wandering around London in your dressing gown. People will
think you’ve gone mad.”

“Why will I be wandering around London?”

“I’ll come back for you in a few minutes. Come out sooner, if your bearings aren’t too
scrambled. I’ll be in the living room with Rosie.”

He shut the door and I stared down at my newly acquired belongings. It was grey outside.
There was a grey jumper and some washed out jeans. I pulled them on. There were a lot of
jumpers, looking at them. I must have a subconscious love of wool somewhere. My hair felt
horrible. I’d have a bath first thing when I came in, I hated being dirty. I found and un-knotted a
pair of socks. One was lilac, but I didn’t think it would matter. No-one would be seeing my
feet. I covered them with a pair of ankle high and strangely new looking Converses, and then
no-one would be any the wiser. I ran my fingers through my hair. Stopped. Looked at my
hands. They were pale, translucent, dappled with veins and vessels. I’d never seen such
sorry hands. I rifled back through the clothes pile for the pair of black, fingerless gloves I
thought I’d put in, and pulled them on to cover them up. My fingernails were bitten.

I got lost at first, but could find my way from Fitz’s room once I found it. He smiled at me when
I came in.

“There you are. Have a scarf.”

Out of nowhere (and, literally nowhere) he had managed to produce two scarves. One was
made of thick, coarse navy wool and the other, thinner and softer looking, was a delicate
shade of crimson. I felt a sudden and inexplicable aversion to it instantly.

“No disrespect meant,” Fitz was still looking at me expectantly, “but where on God’s green
earth have they come from?”

“I’ve had this one for ages.” He lifted the arm with the red one draped over it. “So don’t even
think of taking it. Rosie’s got a steady supply in one of the storerooms. Stockpiled wool
before it was rationed. And I told her she was mad… Anyway. I thought you’d like the
colour.”

He threw the thicker, rougher one at me and it wrapped its way around my head like thrown
scarves do. I detached myself from it and looked at him in thanks.

“You’re actually quite soft, you know that, don’t you?” I told him, wrapping it gratefully around
my neck and the lower part of my face.

“That’s a bit assumptuous of you,” he said, doing the same thing with his. “I could have filled it
with broken glass.”

I’m pretty sure the itches I was getting from it were more to do with the material.

Fully muffled, he stepped out in front of me. With half of his face covered, he looked like a
bandit might. “Ready?” He said thickly. I nodded.

“You still got your service pistol?”. I had, but I didn’t know where it was. This news did not
seem to please him.

“Take one of ours. For now.”

“It was in the bag I had when I came in.” I tried weakly. His left eyebrow raised several
centimetres above his right.

“What bag?”

I felt a slow, sinking feeling in the bottom of my stomach.

“Don’t worry. Where did you say they were?”

He walked over to one of the large metal filing cabinets standing unhappily a few paces
down the corridor and punched in a code to one of its drawers. It sprung open.

“Here.” he said, handing me something small and grey and not at all as good as my old one
was. “Will that do?”

“I suppose.” He tossed it over to me, and I looked at it, slightly disappointed for a few
moments.

“Safety’s on. It should be loaded.”

“Thanks.”

“You don’t seem particularly enthusiastic.”

I made a small and dissident noise in my throat, but I don’t think he heard it under the scarf.
Then again, he might have, because he looked at me just a little longer and a little harder then
he would have normally. I got the feeling that he wasn’t in a good mood.

He turned on his heel and walked out quickly and quietly. I could hear Rosie banging about
next door. I wondered if she knew. Realising that I’d be left behind if I didn’t jolt out of reverie,
I followed him out.

I used to have a holster. Stupidly, I didn’t remember to pack it the night that I left. I wish I had
now, as I struggled to find somewhere out of the way to leave my gun, where it couldn’t
accidently go off and kill me. Fitz was striding on ahead. I noticed then that he was dragging
behind him one of those old wooden trolley things that they used to give children to play with
back in the olden days.

“Oi!”

I jogged lightly to catch up with him. He did stop, he did turn around and he did wait for me,
though, which was more than some would have done. Even if his eyebrow was up all the
time.

“Rosie didn’t see you, did she?”

“No. Look, what was that? And what it that?”

“This?” He shook the handle on the trolley. It rattled slightly. “My preferred method of
transport, of course. I thought you’d like to get your bearings a bit. Not that there’s much to
see.” He stopped and squinted up at the very grey sky. “We might see Rag if you keep your
eyes peeled.”

“Why, what’s she doing out here?”

“Took the kids out. They like going on walks. Become unbearable if they don’t get out.”

“What, like dogs?”

“’Cept they make more noise.”

The warehouse didn’t get any prettier from the outside. It was a fat, squat, ugly building made
from the same colourless concrete that coated the inside. On a corner, joined to another,
identical one on the right. There were broken windows, some that were boarded up, but on
the whole it wasn’t as bad as others that I’d seen. Certainly the ones I’d grown up in.

“You didn’t have it too badly here, did you?”

“Not particularly. That’s why Rosie chose it. This sector’s been quiet for a while now.”

“So I see.”

“Anyway. Don’t wander off, because I can’t promise anything. I doubt you’ll be able to find your way back again.”

“It wasn’t exactly high on my list of priorities.”

We passed a small, hemmed in courtyard, and from the furtive movements and whispering
coming from inside, I guessed it was probably a safehouse. They stopped still as we drew
nearer and a hand shout out to rip off the ‘Remember Birmingham’ poster stuck onto one of
their wooden walls.

“Bless them” said Fitz, in uncharacteristic fondness. “They genuinely don’t think that we
know they’re there.”

I smiled wanly towards the floor.

We carried on like this for an uncomfortably long time. Every now and again, Fitz would point
out a particular road or building that he thought I’d like to know something about. Some of it I
found interesting. Most I didn’t. I don’t think I can remember any of it now, which is a shame
because I’d have loved to have shared it with you.

I can tell you, however, that the greyness did give way. They’ve probably made some effort
to repair everything now, with a bit of luck, so I’ll tell you what it was like. If you’ve having
some trouble imagining what I’ve been saying, imagine this: everything, everything, was
either grey or graffiti coloured. All of it. It just looked drained, strangely anaemic for a city.
The only colour came from posters, and there were posters here in abundance. More
protests about Birmingham, naturally. Adverts for Sally’s Army and the food banks. Posters
urging us to donate what little we had for those, and I quote, ‘less fortunate’ than us (this
made me laugh). But what really interested me were the newer ones. Ones that must have
literally sprung up overnight. The thing was, you see, the thing that made me curious was
that all of them bore a strangely lifelike sketch of Jude’s face.

“They’ve been up there for a while, now.” I heard Fitz say drawing parallel to me. “I saw
them when I bought you back.”

I didn’t answer him.

Some were hanging orders. Some were gloating that they killed him. One, in particular, I
noticed had done its utmost to distort his features, make him look twisted and hawklike before
writing ‘We did it!’ in jubilant letters over the top. But the majority? Well.

I couldn’t believe it at first. I couldn’t believe that I knew him. They had made him out to be a
hero, some sort of martyr. They’d drawn him head down, what little you could see of his
eyes was melancholy, yet he still looked somehow heartbreakingly heroic. They were the
first pro-Royal posters I’d seen for a long time.

“D’you know who did them?” I asked finally. My voice didn’t sound like my own.

“No.” Fitz answered quietly. “Come on, Benedict.”

I tried to protest, but he cut me short. “You don’t want to be seen hanging around here. I don’t
care who did it, it wasn’t right. They’re just ripping open a healing wound.”

I glanced back quickly, with a strange emotion in my chest.

“Can’t we just-” I was going to say ‘take one’, but it sounded pathetic even inside my head.
Fitz was right, even though I never wanted to admit it. I never wanted to admit that I was
wrong again, but he had turned to go by now. He reached the end of the road and hesitated.
I heard him chide me along like a child. Obediently, but more reluctantly that I could have
thought possible, I followed him.

“I forgot you haven’t seen them. If that impressed you, you should see the square.”

I tried to keep up with his strides.

“It’s like a paper storm. No-one’s very happy. And with the whole Birmingham anniversary
coming up... No, thank you.”

A Sally’s Army worker in blue trotted out in front of us and shook a bucket expectantly. Her
round, kindly face fell when Fitz shook his head.

“Not even your toy, my love? Make a child very happy, I’m sure.”

“Another time. Put plenty of space between her and us.” He muttered to me, looking quite
disgruntled at whatever his trolley thing was being referred to as a ‘toy’. “Here.”

He stopped so suddenly that I almost ran into the back of him.

“Just vault over the fence, they don’t mind. I’ve done this loads of times before.” He jumped
up, got his fingers inside the mesh and leapt over the top with all the skill and grace of an
expert. He landed on both feet lightly and grinned at me through the fence webbing.

“Are you sure we can do this?” I looked around nervously for some sort of Keep Out sign.
The metal here had been stripped away long ago. All I could see were the remains of an old
industrial estate and Fitz’s almost mocking grin from the other scrapheap fence. I horrible
thought struck me.

“This isn’t why you asked me to bring a gun, is it?”

“No,” he said lightly. “That was just precaution. This was, however, why I wanted you to
come with me. Now are you going to help me, or are you going to stand there and worry?”

I knew which one sounded more tempting but sadly, I don’t think I had a choice. I scanned the
area one last time for someone that might see (silently hoping that there might be), but there
was no-one. Not even the Sally’s Army woman we’d passed a few streets ago could be
bothered to follow us.

“Benedict!” Fitz hissed.

Dithering, I grabbed the fence. It was one of the ones that’s made of those thick wire
diamonds just too small to put your feet through. I let go and tried again, jumping up like Fitz
had done and trying to catch hold of one of the higher sections. All I succeeded in doing was
bending my fingers back and crashing into it with a horrible noise. I heard Fitz make a sound
close to despair.

“Okay, okay. Pass me your gun.”

I groped around in my back pocket for where I’d left my pistol (perhaps unwisely) and
passed it under, through one of the gaps in the mesh. He took it from me deftly.

“Now try again, and for the love of God himself, be quiet!”

He’d switched again to looking suddenly murderous. The idea that he might be slightly bipolar
flickered across my mind. It wouldn’t have surprised me. I mounted the fence again, trying my
best not to rattle it. It was old, and I could see that the green metal posts that they’d used to
pin it to were rusting under their paint. How these hadn’t been stolen I had no idea. I shot an
apprehensive look at Fitz.

“Come on!”

Sighing, and praying inwardly to whoever would listen, I tried again. The fence creaked
ominously. I waited a few fractions of a second to gather my strength, and then did my best
to pull upwards and haul myself over as quickly as I could. I fell down the other side and
landed in a disgruntled heap at Fitz’s feet. He didn’t look impressed.

“Could you be any louder?”

“I thought you said it was alright!” I defended. My lower back hurt. I stretched myself out on
the earthy ground for a bit and hoped that it would sort itself out.

“I said I’d never been caught before.”

Black sinking feeling.

The ground was pleasantly cool under my back. I lay there, silently burning and trying to
console myself that this wasn’t breaking and entering. Any number of excuses were floating
through my head.

“But if they didn’t want us here,” I began slowly, “they’d have electrified the fence, right?”

Fitz was silent.

“Fitz?”

I could see him moving some wood grimly out of the corner of my eye. He still didn’t say
anything. Gradually, it sunk in.

“No!”

I sat bolt upright, earth falling uncomfortably from the back of my shirt. “Why on earth did you
bring us here?”

“They haven’t got their own generator. They obviously don’t think themselves that important.
Plus-”

he dragged a particularly large beam of wood out from a pile of others, staggering slightly
under its weight, “I waited until after ten.”

“Oh, and that makes a world of difference. What if we get shot?”

He span round slowly to face me, raised an eyebrow and leant artfully on the beam of wood
he’d been moving. “You were in the Resistance Army.”

“I fought. I was never a thief.” I spat.

He gave me a very long, cool look.

“You can help me carry these back,” he began, slowly and deliberately, “or you can turn
around and you can go. I don’t mind which.”

I watched him for a few more moments, my heart going in and out of what felt like spasm.
Eventually, without even realising what I was doing myself until I was half way through, I
nodded.

“Come on then.”

I picked myself up lightly. Fitz had turned his back to me again and was trying to lift off what
looked like the bonnet of a car. I stood beside him gingerly.

“Get the other end of this.” he said gruffly. Wordlessly, I obliged. There was an obvious flaw,
though. While Fitz had been doing this for God only knows how long, I’d spent the best part
of two years running in and out of houses and getting lost. He was far stronger than I was.

“There.” He grunted, tossing it to the side fairly easily and without warning. I almost had my
fingers taken off. Fitz, however, stood and surveyed what he’d uncovered with his hands
on his hips.

“Two years’ worth of wood. Worth taking with us. Check and see if any of it’s rotten.”

This wasn’t a pleasant job.

“I don’t think so.” I gasped, straightening up again a few moments later, wiping my hands on
the back of my jeans. It was disgusting, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do with them, and I wasn’t keeping wet wood on my hands any longer than I needed to. I dared a glance at
Fitz, my hands resting on my knees and hoping I looked too pitiful for him to ask me to do
anything else. He didn’t seem fooled.

“All of it?”

I nodded.

“Good man. Help me get some of it out, then.”

I grabbed at one of the more easily moveable planks, sticking out at a right angle from all of
the others. It was heavier than I anticipated. Embarrassingly, in the time it took me, grunting
and swearing in the most unattractive manner, to free that one, Fitz had managed to release
three and stack them all neatly on top of one another. I was marvelling at this when mine
came free with a sudden crack, and I almost fell over backwards. I steadied myself on one of
the more sturdy rubbish piles and surveyed the rooftops hurriedly.

“They won’t have heard that.”

Fitz was well on his way to dragging out a fourth.

“How are we going to get all of these back?”

Don’t think I’m slow, now. The thought had occurred to me quite some time ago, I’d just been
too frightened to ask it. That, and ‘what on earth are we doing this for?’. I’d had to tell myself
it was firewood.

Fitz looked meaningfully at the red trolley he’d left on the other side of the fence. It hit me.

“Oh.” I remember cursing myself slightly for being so thick. I turned, with my face burning,
away from him to start digging out another one.

“I wouldn’t worry, Benji. I think we’ve got enough.”

I thought that I’d heard him wrong.

“Benji?” I turned to look at him, who was doing his best to fit planks of wood through the
gaps in the fence.

“Yeah, I thought of a new nickname for you.” he looked at me, “You couldn’t keep expecting
me to call you Benedict, could you? Far too many syllables.”

I didn’t know whether to be flattered or slightly frightened.

While Fitz turned and started muttering to himself suddenly, I dragged one of the only two
planks I’d managed to get free to the fence and started trying to get them over to the other
side. It wasn’t as hard as I thought, actually. There was a small hole on the left side of the
fence by the wall that was keeping it upright that I guessed had been made by Fitz for this
very purpose. Once you’d hoisted them up there, posting them through was a relatively easy
affair. I remember thinking that I’d have amazing arm muscles after this.

“That the last?”

“Of mine, yeah.” I wiped some sweat off my brow with my scarf.

“You get over there, then. God forbid you take as long as you did last time.”

I gave him a quick two-fingered salute when I was sure that he wasn’t looking and tried to
negotiate the fence again. It seemed taller from this side.

“Just get your foot in there and swing over!” Fitz called from the far side by the wall,
delivering his seventh plank of wood. I half thought about shouting back what else did he
expect me to do before I remembered where we were and what we were doing. Horrible
things happened to thieves nowadays.

I crossed the fingers that it didn’t hurt to cross and dug my foot into the highest diamond it
could reach. The pain at this sudden contortionism almost took my breath away. It vaguely
crossed my mind that I probably looked hilarious, before I dragged my hands up and tried to
do something with my other leg. It got a foothold, eventually.

“While we’re young!”

I could have sworn that I felt both of my shoulders dislocate as I pulled myself up and over.
My hands were screaming. I didn’t fall down the other side either, this time.

I could see Fitz surveying me, wearing that cool one-eyebrow-up expression. In the blink of
an eye, he jumped over and landed lightly, with catlike grace.

“You’re obviously well practiced.” I remarked dryly.

“What do you think I’ve been doing for the past two years? Not all of us can be gun-wielding
heroes, you know.”

I wouldn’t have hesitated to punch him there and then, if it hadn’t been for the fact the was
grinning cheekily. Instead, I fixed him a hard stare.

“Not in the best taste, perhaps.”

He gave me a backward shrug and went to load up that ridiculous trolley thing that he’d
brought. I sincerely hoped that no-one saw us on the way back.

“Where did you find that thing, anyway?” I asked. I could feel the expression of distaste that
was sitting on my face like cold porridge, but I didn’t bother removing it.

“Here.” He said, after the briefest of pauses while he picked up another plank and popped it
on with strength that put mine to shame. “Found it.”

“And you decided to bring it with you, why?”

He shrugged again. “I needed transport. It was here. Besides, it isn’t like anyone I know is
going to see me, is it? There, I think that’s the last.”

He proffered me the handle. “You want to take it back?”

“Is that a joke?”

“Is it in good taste?”

I glared, taking it from him anyway. The metal felt cool against my burning hands. It seemed
only fair, as he had bought it all the way here. He smiled at me.

“Carry on down the road we came up. We can turn off and go a different way after that,
there are loads of routes back.”

I nodded silently.

There were huge blocks of concrete around us, and none of them looked very stable. Them,
and those horrible things that look like they’ve been made out of corrugated iron. The trolley
squeaked as it bounced along.

All at once, there was a huge clattering behind me. I jumped up like a startled hare.

“You’ve lost one.”

Something behind me dragged. I turned and saw Fitz pulling an escapee plank back up to
where I was standing.

“It does that sometimes. It’s really annoying. Either that, or they hit the back of your legs.”

“Mmm. Nice of you to give it to me.”

“You could have had it on the way here. You never asked.”

We trundled along merrily for a couple of minutes. Every now and again the trolley would hit
something in the road and wood would go everywhere. Fitz and I swore a lot whenever this
happened. Also, it had that uncanny knack that everything you’re lumbered with seems to
have, where the longer you carry it, the heavier it gets. I kept having to swap hands.

“You okay?”

“Fine.”

“Oh, good. You just looked a bit-”

Whatever I looked a bit like, I’m never going to know. He saw it before I did, but my eyes
followed his to where it lay. They lay. It lay. Two feet, sticking incongruously out into the
street. The rest of it was hidden behind a large, green rubbish bin. I didn’t even want to look.

“Jesus.” he said softly.

I stayed stock still. Fitz edged forward. I could hear his feet dragging. Not like me. Every fibre
in my body was poised to run.

I knew when he could see it, because he stopped stone still. His entire body seemed to
tighten.

“Jesus.”

“What?” I whispered.

“Nothing. Let’s get out of here.”

But he didn’t move.

I couldn't help it. Dreading each step more than the next, I was walking forwards. I didn’t
even know quite how it was happening. I seem to remember feeling like my head was full of
cotton wool or something, like I wasn’t quite there. My mum used to put it down to growing.
Now I don’t know. When I got close to Fitz, shocked and silent as myself I think he was, he
didn’t make space for me.

It was the woman from the Salvation Army. The woman from the Salvation Army lying on the
floor, propped against a wall. The woman from the Salvation Army slick with blood. Her head,
her head sat at a grotesque angle, like an awkward puppet, on what was left of her neck.
Her mouth was slightly open, and her eyes stared very blankly into the middle distance, not
focusing on anything in particular. Her neck had been split from ear to ear.

“Good God. Don’t look, don’t even look.”

I needed chiding. My eyes seemed irrevocably glued to her against my will. I knew this work.
I had seen this work. This was Gore Crow work. It took a great deal of self control to move
away from her. There was blood on the tip of my right toe. I remember this.

Fitz was having the same problem as I was. I flitted my gaze between the two of them. It
was hard to tell who looked the most surprised. He looked up and our eyes met.

“Benedict, let’s go.” He said in a shocked undertone. “We can’t be here.”

In the corner, she oozed.

He ripped himself out and away. I followed a very swift suit, the cart bouncing pathetically
along behind. We kept giving it nervous glances. It all seemed so silly now.

Things always seem to be louder when you don’t want to be heard, and now was a very
good time to be silent. The noise and the constant bloody creaking of that thing was playing
merry havocking hell with our nerves. That was fresh, there’s no doubt about it. That was
fresh. Warm. Oozing. Not quite finished.

I heard a crack. Utter, utter terror hit me.

The idea hit me so brutally that it physically hurt.

We’d disturbed it.

It was stalking us.

“Benedict?”

I tried to shush him, but I was too scared to move.

“Benedict, why have you stopped?”

I could see Fitz turn around. That was good. I couldn’t see behind me. I didn’t even want to
know what was skulking there.

“Benedict!” He hissed, not wanting to move his mouth too much. He glanced over nervously
behind himself. He needn’t have, because I was watching there.

Uncomprehending terror spread into his face.

“Benedict, what have you seen?”

He sounded low and close to tears. He suddenly looked it, too.

We looked, petrified at each other and didn’t even dare to breathe. My heart kept getting
tighter.

Somewhere, a car drove off.

How this broke the spell, I still to this day have no idea. We weren’t alone any more, I
suppose. I’m putting that down as the official reason anyway, because both of us heard it and dared cheery, teary grins that grew and grew until we were laughing. It was like turning on a light.

“What-what-was all that about?” He asked me, still shaken, as we walked down another
bomb strewn road three quarters of a minute later. The adrenaline was making us tremble.

“I thought I… heard something.” I finished pathetically. “I thought we’d disturbed him.”

He shuddered. “That wasn’t stealth that did that.” We both looked around. “It’s creeping me
out, talking about this in the open. That wasn’t professional. That was… that was-butchered.”

His voice cracked on the last word.

“Come on.”

We cleared off, sharpish, and walked briskly all the way back home. We didn’t see another
single living soul, which was probably a good thing because we were both in such a state
that I’d have died of fright and Fitz would have shot them on the spot. I was jumping at
shadows. The minute I saw the warehouse I could have cried with relief.

Fitz, evidently, felt the same.

“God, I never thought I’d be so glad to see this place.” He leant against the door and patted the wall gratefully. “Home again, home again.”

“What do you want me to do with this?” I shook the handle of the trolley. A plank fell off. We
both winced at the sound, but neither of us bothered to pick it up.

“We’ll, er, unpack it in a minute.” He paused. “Benedict…”

I was suddenly reminded of a very different dark haired pale skinned someone, leaning with
his eyes closed and head back in a very similar manner that I’d witnessed only days before.
It was only fleeting, but I do wish I hadn’t remembered it.

“About today.”

He opened his eyes again.

“What… what do you think that was?”

I shook my head, defeated. I thought I knew. We genuinely had no idea, then.

“She was an old woman…” He looked sickened. “Never. We won’t mention this again, ever. It
never happened.”

“I’m more than willing to go along with that. I’m starting to forget already.”

He gave me a very glum sort of smile.

“Bring that in. I’ll show you where it all goes.”

I wheeled the trolley inside, and felt slightly less foolish than I had done driving it around out in
the street. The kids were back, and they had Rag with them. They seemed to have multiplied,
but that could just have been me. Rosie put her head round the door.

“I’m showing him the back room.”

She nodded, once, not stopping with the glass she was drying. Her head retracted again,
and Fitz led me round a corner that, because I’m just unobservational like that, I had failed to
notice before.

“You’ve disappeared down this once before, haven’t you?”

“It’s a corridor, not a rabbit hole. And yes, I am periodically ordered into tidying up. God
knows why, it only gets messy again.”

“No, that one never worked for me, either.”

It was a corridor not horrendously dissimilar to the rest of the warehouse; and it led into a
room not horrendously dissimilar from itself. There wasn’t a lot of light (the skylight here was
grimier than anywhere else, I noted), and it took a few moments before the hulking black
shapes lurking in each edge and corner made some sort of sense to me.

“I am willing to admit that I’m a bit of a tinker.”

I frowned and set the handle down. Imagine, if you will, a cross between a garage, a
furniture warehouse and Aladdin’s cave. There were bits of engine and engine oil all over
the floor. Finished and half finished stacks of furnishings were piled up in unconvincingly
stable heaps around the walls, and there was what looked like an old fashioned toolbox partially embedded in all of them. Fitz flicked the lights. As we’d expected, nothing happened.

“Quite a sight to behold, on a good day. Just leave the wood over there, will you? I’m not
going to need it just yet.”

I did so, looking around in a still partially awed manner. My mouth was slightly open.

“Did you do all of this?”

“Except the engines, obviously. I just like to dismantle them. Most of everything else was me.”

I couldn’t see very well, don’t forget, but I could make out the shapes of what looked like
benches and bureaus, tables and bookcases against the mess. There were stranger forms
too. It wasn’t until much later that I realised the twisted, girdered structury thing that looked
like a dead arachnid in the dark was actually a half finished chair. It was only by what little
light filtered down through the corridor that I was able to tell what the goggles were at all.

“Vintage steampunk. One of a kind.” He told me proudly, lifting them off their hook. “Made
them myself.”

They twinkled in the half light.

“Now, you wanted a table, didn’t you?”

“Or anything that’s convenient.”

He stood with his hands on his hips and regarded his handiwork with some discrepancy.

“I haven’t got a wardrobe. There’s this chest-like thing, but it hasn’t got a lid at the moment. It’s
more like a giant wooden box.”

“Can I see it?”

He picked his way over the bits of wood and caught hold of the side of what looked like a
crate. It looked ever so heavy, but from the ease in which he was pulling it through, it can’t
have been.

“Is that alright?”

It was deep and solid looking. “It looks great, Fitz. Are you sure you want me to have it?”

“Makes no odds to me.”

“Is it heavy?”

“Not particularly. I can take it through for you now, if you like.”

“I’m not an invalid.”

“Great, you can help.”

“Do you have a longer name?” I asked him as we pushed it through on our way back, after
he’d shut and all but locked the door firmly behind us. “Only I’ve got to have something to call
you during my more cross moments.”

“Rag calls me Fitzsimmons. You may only occasionally. I don’t like feeling like I’m in trouble all
the time.” He froze mid movement. “Dear God, she’s taught them how to sing.”

‘Singing’ was a bit of a strong word. She’d taught them to shout in key. Unfortunately, they
were all in different keys and it sounded awful. Fitz turned to look at me, wearing an
expression of positive distasteful alarm.

“We’re not going to have to live with this, are we?”

We carried on, apprehensively. In the sitting room, Rag was sat with her back to the fire,
directing a choir of about twenty children, all sitting cross legged and obediently on the floor,
in a loud and over the top chorus of ‘Wouldn’t You Like to be A Jellyfish?’.

“They sound like my old school choir.”

Rag saw us both and waved.

“You joining in?”

“You know, I think we’ll give it a miss. Come on…” Fitz tried to steer me innocuously
sideways into the corridor. He dumped my box, leaving me to gather everything up and throw
it all in. I found him in the kitchen, where Rosie was busy fussing over saucepans.

“You missed lunch.” She said, without looking up. “Is there anything else I can get you?”

“I’m fine.”

Fitz made a vague and uncommital noise in the back of his throat. I knew what he was
thinking.

There is nothing in the world at that moment which made me feel more ill than the thought of
food.

“She’s done well, hasn’t she?” Said Rosie brightly, ladling soapy water out of a pan absent
mindedly. “Been practising all morning. Since they got back.”

God, that water looked good.

“Yes, Rosie, they sound wonderful.” I noticed the smallest note of concern in his voice. He
was looking at Rosie with an expression of slight disquiet. She did seem preoccupied.

She noticed, looked around. With a very grim expression, she beckoned Fitz into the next
room. He followed, wide eyed.

I wanted, more than anything, to dip my poor hands into that soft looking water. They were all
sore and wretched, and skin kept pulling away from my nails. They were dirty, too. They
were too dirty. Quickly, like I was performing some sort of criminal act, I slipped them in and
relished the feeling of lukewarm gentleness it gave me. What a contrast. I whipped them out
again, spraying around the sink with bubbles and rubbed them on a tea towel until they were
red.

That burn was amazing.

I got the feeling that I probably wasn’t wanted there at that moment in time. Not wishing to
outstay my welcome in more ways than one, I went silently back to the living room. The choir
had descended into chaos.

“See they weren’t that interested then, were they?” I asked Rag, picking my way carefully
across variously scattered children. She was sitting with her head bent over what I could make out as a pair of gloves underneath her curtain of hair. There was a very morose
looking girl standing beside her.

“Hello Benedict.”

“Hello. Hello-”

“Lucy.” The girl prompted me, not taking her eyes off her gloves.

“Hello Lucy. What’s happened here, then?”

She looked glumly up at me. I realised with a very uncomfortable jolt that I was about seven
feet taller than everyone else. In a bid not to look awkward, I sank down onto my haunches.

“Thumb’s worn through. Shouldn’t take a few seconds. There.” She handed them back with a
smile. “How was the scavenging mission? Oh, my God! Your hands!”

“They’re fine.”

“No, Benedict, they’re bleeding. Here.” She tried to catch hold of one of them to get a better
look. She probably thought she was doing good. I thought of how much filth must have
accumulated on hers and snatched mine out of reach.

“What happened?” Her voice was softer. “Did you catch them on something?”

“They’re fine.”

“No, you need something on that.”

“They’re fine.”

She looked at me reproachfully. “If you insist.” She put a new face on. “So, did you get
anything?”

“Once I found out what it was we were doing.”

She smiled, properly, for what I’m willing to bet was the first time. Rag’s smiles were like gold
dust. Rare, rarer than you can really imagine unless you’ve tried hunting for them. Once
they’re there, though, you know you’ve got the right thing.

It lingered for a few seconds. “He does that. I think he just forgets that we don’t know what
he does.”

“Yeah, well. He scared the life out of me. I thought he’d gone mad.”

“I think he is, slightly.”

“Oh?” Unable to keep my balance any longer, I fell off my crouched feet and straight onto my
back. It could have been more neatly done.

“He’s very moody.”

“Oh. Yes.” I felt the smallest bit disappointed. I’d rather expected something more secret. “I’d
noticed that.”

“Everyone has. He-”

“Is, no doubt, standing right in front of you. So I’d take those what were undoubtedly going to
be unwise words, Rebecca, and never speak of them again. Benedict, I need to borrow you.”

I looked at Rag incredulously. She looked back. There was a wordless agreement between
the both of us that Fitz could either teleport or Apparate, because he’d been in the pantry a
moment ago. I got up and followed him wordlessly.

He took me to a darker corner of the living room. The rugs and coverings that acted as carpet
for the rest of the room didn’t seem to have reached over here. He had a newspaper under
his arm.

“Found out what was worrying Rosie.”

He spread it out, uncharacteristically solemn, on his right arm. I followed down the front
page. Really, it was nothing that we didn’t already know. Evidently, nothing of any great
interest had happened in the past week, because the front page was just recycling old news
about ruins and protests and Jude. I looked at Fitz questioningly.

“Read on.”

There was a box article on clean up processes. A larger one on news from the Prov Gov. I
almost missed it a second time around. It was only the damp black smudge in the corner by it
that gave it away, in the end. Like it had been read by someone with oil on their hands. Oil or
grease. Or mud. Oil or wood mould. Pressed, hammered, almost, so it would fit, in the
smallest space of the right corner was a headline. Missing Persons.

“There are three.”

You probably know what my first thought was. I realised, with sudden and almost sickening
wretched horror that I didn’t know Edmund’s first name. After all this time. But then Fitz
wouldn’t be showing it to me to gloat over my dead. I realise that now.

There were three names, and three ages to go with them. It wasn’t exactly uncommon
nowadays, for people to wander off. People to get lost. People to turn up again. One thing
was strange, though.

Kezenia Harding……. Five Years.

“Look down.”

Four. The next one was four. The one after her, underneath, had just turned six.

“But… they’re all children.” I looked up at him again. His expression hadn’t changed at all.

“That’s exactly what I said.”

Something felt strange, but not dramatically out of the ordinary. It wasn’t very new.

“They got lost. Happens.” but my breath quickened in my throat. I knew what image would
come if I shut my eyes.

“Benedict…”

He looked at me, really, really frightened.

He folded the paper back up, glanced around, and tossed it into the grate.

“You don’t want Rag to see that. Don’t mention it to her.”

I shook my head. He smiled in a tired, grateful way and started talking again, lower than
before. “Anyway. What with that happened today and all…” He was trying to trivialise it,
make it smaller, brush it off. He always tried to make things smaller so that they wouldn’t hurt
him. Thoughts aren’t facts. They’d taught us that in Mindfulness at school. I don’t know why
that occurred to me now. But I saw a different Fitz every time he tried. He looked young.

“You told her?” I whispered, shocked.

“There are some things no-one needs to know. But I wonder if I should.”

I shook my head again, more definitely this time. “No. Fitz, no. What could she do?”

“Suppose. God, they’re disgusting.”

The violent passion that his voice had taken on was so suddenly heartfelt that I had to look,
and did so so quickly that I almost gave myself whiplash.

“Gore Crows. Murder of bloody Gore Crows. God, I-” he stared so hard at the fire in the
grate that I thought a vessel might explode.

“I hate them, Benedict.”

“I do too.” I said quietly.

“No, I mean-” he carried on, menacingly low, “if I ever see one of those creatures, after what
they did to her, I’ll-”

His sentence didn't need an end.

“I don’t think you will, Fitz.”

“How do you know?” That violence was back again. “How do you know what I’d do? I
suppose that wasn’t what they taught you when you learnt how do kill people, was it?”

I did try not to appear stung, I did.

“It’s you I’m worried about.” I ventured softly.

He snorted disdainfully.

“It is. Fitz, if one of those things sees you…”

“Why do you believe everything you hear?”

“Because I’ve seen one!”

I hadn’t meant for it to come out that violently. I hadn’t meant it to, but it did. It hung between
us, unabsorbed while he waited to take it in.

And there it was again. All that anger forgotten, replaced by the naïve wonder that made me
love him so much.

“You’ve seen one?” he said finally, his lovely eyes wide. “Benji, really?”

“You find that so hard to believe?”

“No. Sorry, it didn’t mean to come out quite like that.” He shook his head and tried again.
“Benedict, when?”

He looked so surprised. That’s not surprising. You rarely live to see a Gore Crow.

“It was a year or so ago. I was on sentry duty at the house. It, er, wasn’t pretty.”

He looked at me in a very wide eyed silence. “What did they look like?”

I shrugged. I’d been more concerned with not dying a bloody death than committing all of the
details to memory, to be honest, but some things just stay with you. I didn’t tell him this. “I don’t
know. I don’t know. I could only see its mask. Like the, the big old plague masks.” I tried to
gesture a beak.

“They do it to scare you. They succeed.”

He frowned slightly. “Jesus.”

“I know.”

“What did you do?”

“Pretended I wasn’t there,”

I can still remember it, even now.

“They didn’t do a lot. Stood around a bit and went off. Trust me, though, those things can
move.”

Fitz was very quiet.

“She was old.”

“And they’re children.”

We stood for a moment, in appalled silence. Fitz shook his head like he was trying to rid flies.

“Anyway. Bear it in mind. Don’t let these guys wander too far off, Rosie will have a fit. Have
they finally stopped singing?”