Trent Jamieson - Death most definite

I reach out my hand and it jumps up, pecks my index finger hard, much harder than is necessary, drawing blood. It'd be a hell of a lot more pleasant if the buggers just needed a handful of seed.

The sparrow drops its message, then gives my arm another savage peck and strikes out at the air with its wings. I curse after it, then my jaw drops as two crows snatch the bird out of the sky and tear it in half before it can even shriek. It forms a small puddle of ink and brown feathers on the ground. Then, with a black and furious crashing of wings, the crows are gone. It looks like human Pomps aren't the only ones doing it tough.

The message is brief. Phone.M.

I hesitate, then look at Lissa, who shrugs. "What have you got to lose?"

We both know the answer to that. But there is so much more to gain, even if it's just clarifying who my real enemy is.

I switch on my phone, holding it like it's a bomb.

It rings immediately. I jump, swear under my breath, then pick up.

"Steven," Morrigan says.

I can hear a background rumble of traffic. "Where the fuck are you?" I ask. He's not the only one who can skip over small talk.

"Look, we don't have time," he says. "The phones, they can trace them. And the sparrows, well, I'm running out of tattoos. Something's attacking them as well."

"Crows," I say. "It's crows. I just saw them then."

"If someone's using Mr. D's avian Pomps, they're more powerful than I'd thought. This just keeps getting worse."

"Yeah, it does," I say. "How do I know you're not in on it?"

There's a long silence down the other end of the line. "The truth is you don't. But how long have you known me?"

I don't answer that one.

Finally Morrigan breaks the silence. "Steven, you have to trust me. I'm telling you, Mr. D has a rival. They need to kill all the Pomps, then they can start up their own outfit. There's going to be absolute chaos. Because while that's going on, there's no one to stop the Stirrers. In fact, I believe whoever is behind this is actually dealing with the Stirrers."

I could have told him that.

"Which is why we need to get together. If enough bodies stir, the balance will tip. We're talking end of days, Regional Apocalypse. It's not far off."

That chills me. The idea had already crossed my mind, but I hadn't really wanted to consider it. I may not have the greatest knowledge of Pomp history, but I know about this. Every one of the thirteen regions has experienced one or two of these down the ages. Death piled upon death. Stirrers outnumbering the living. It's a vast and deadly reaving. And there hasn't been a Regional Apocalypse in a long time.

Sure, there's been some bloody, terrible crap that's gone on in this country, all of which could be considered that way-genocides and wars-but this would be an end to life. All life. Stirrers don't stop at people. They don't even start at them, it makes sense to start at the bottom. Everything from microbes up would go. And it wouldn't be like a motion picture zombie apocalypse, or remotely close to an alien invasion-they're a walk in the park compared to a Regional Apocalypse. Stirrers don't bite their victims, they don't need to touch an unprotected person, they don't even need to be that close to them after a certain threshold point is reached. They're like a black hole of despair, and once they've taken enough joy and light, their victim is gone and there's another Stirrer getting about, snatching even more energy from the world.

"I don't know if I believe you. Maybe you're trying to draw me out." I feel terrible because I might as well be saying this to Dad. Before last night and Don's comments I would have trusted him with my life.

Morrigan sighs. "Who are you going to believe? Look, how can I be certain that you're not in on this somehow? Steven, you need to trust me."

Well, if he's actually the perpetrator he'd know.

"We're running out of time," Morrigan says. "Meet me at Mount Coot-tha, the cafe there. One o'clock." He hangs up on me.

I look at my watch. It's 11:30 already. I explain what's just gone on to Lissa.

"I don't like it," she says, which is beginning to sound like something of a running joke.

"Neither do I. But he's right. If enough bodies stir, things will tip, and there'll be nothing left within weeks." And I'm not being melodramatic. Where Pomps are conduits to the Underworld, Stirrers are gaping wounds-they're the psychic equivalent of blowing out the window in a pressurized plane, only instead of air, you've got life energy torn out of this world and sucked into the Underworld. One or two Stirrers is bad enough, but that would be only the beginning if we didn't stop them.

I remember seeing my first Stirrer when I was five, shambling away from my father, its limbs juddering as it struggled to control the alien body which it then inhabited. I remember the horror of it-the weird weight of its presence as though everything was tugged toward it-Dad squeezing my hand and winking at me, before pulling out his knife and slicing his thumb open; a quick, violent cutting.

He walked over to the newly woken thing and touched it, and all movement stopped. It was the first time I'd ever found a corpse-all that stillness, all that dead weight on the ground-comforting.

"Not so bad was it?" Dad had said.

The first one gave me nightmares. After that… well, you can get used to anything.

Stirrers are drawn to the living and repelled by Pomps. Well, they used to be, they've been attracted to them lately, which suggests they've realized that they've got nothing to fear.

But what it means is, whether I trust Morrigan or not, I have to get to Mount Coot-tha.

Mount Coot-tha is broad and low, really little more than a hill, but it dominates the city of Brisbane. Inner-city suburbs wash up against it like an urban tide line but the mountain itself is dry and scrubby, peaked with great radio towers, skeletal and jutting in the day and winking with lights in the evening.

I have two options.

I consider climbing the mountain, approaching the lookout and the cafe from the back way, up the path that leads from a small park called J. C. Slaughter Falls, but decide against it. If it's a trap, that way will be guarded, though our competition has shown a marked disregard for subtlety. Besides, I'm exhausted; the pathway is too steep, and the name is far too bleakly portentous for my liking.

So I take another bus, in my sunglasses, my cap jammed firmly on my head, with Lissa sitting next to me not at all happy with my decision. I don't blame her, I'm not too happy with it either.

I arrive at 12:58, check the return bus timetable then head up to the lookout cafe. Morrigan is hyper-punctual, as usual. He is sitting at a table sipping a flat white and looking at his watch. The cafe is crowded with tourists. I slip off my glasses and cap, glad my coat is in my bag. The evenings are cold but, even here on the top of Mount Coot-tha, midday is too warm for anything more than jeans and a T-shirt. My shirt's damp and clinging to me already.

Seeing Morrigan actually centers me a little. In fact, I'm surprised by how relieved I feel. Here's something I know, despite Don and Sam's suspicions. Here's a much-needed bit of continuity. I'm desperate for anything that might bring me back to some sort of normalcy. Morrigan's gotten me out of trouble before. I can't help myself-I grin at him.

He doesn't grin back, just nods, and even that slight tip of the head is a comfort. Morrigan isn't one to smile that often though we've been friends for a long time. His face and limbs always move as though contained and controlled, and never more than now. There's a rigidity to him that is at once comforting and scary. Morrigan has always been a bit of an arse kicker, expecting everybody to lift to his level. A lot of people have resented him for this trait; some have even resigned over the years because of it.