Samantha Shannon - The Bone Season

“Yes.” I paused. “Am I fired?”

“Fired? By the zeitgeist, dolly, of course not! I’ve been waiting years for you to put your talents to good use. You’ve bloomed like the ambrosial flower you are, my winsome wunderkind.” I pictured him taking a celebratory puff of his cigar. “Well, well, my dreamwalker has finally entered another dreamscape. And it only took three years. Now, tell me—were you able to save the voyant?”

“No.”

“No?”

“They had three ’geists.”

“Oh, come now. No medium could control three poltergeists.”

“Well, this medium managed. He thought I was an oracle.”

His laugh was soft. “Amateurs.”

I looked out of the window at the tower. A new message had appeared: PLEASE BE AWARE OF UNEXPECTED UNDERGROUND DELAYS. “They’ve closed the Underground,” I said. “They’re trying to find me.”

“Try not to panic, Paige. It’s unbecoming.”

“Well, you’d better have a plan. The whole network’s in lockdown. I need to get out of here.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that . Even if they try and extract his memories, that Underguard’s brain is nought but a hashed brown. Are you certain you pushed him all the way to his hadal zone?”

“Yes.”

“Then it will take them at least twelve hours to extract his memories. I’m surprised the hapless chap was still alive.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying you should sit tight before you run headfirst into a manhunt. You’re safer with your Scion daddy than you are here.”

“They have this address. I can’t sit here and wait to be detained.”

“You won’t be detained, O my lovely. Trust in my schmooze. Stay home, sleep away your troubles, and I’ll send Nick with the car in the ante meridiem . How does that sound?”

“I don’t like it.”

“You don’t have to like it. Just get your beauty sleep. Not that you need it,” he added. “By the way, could you do me a favor? Pop into Grub Street tomorrow and pick up those Donne elegies from Minty, will you? I can’t believe his spirit is back, it’s absolutely—”

I hung up.

Jax was a bastard. A genius, yes—but still a sycophantic, tight-fisted, coldhearted bastard, like all mime-lords. But where else could I turn? I’d be vulnerable alone with a gift like mine. Jax was just the lesser of two evils.

I had to smile at that thought. It said a lot about the world when Jaxon Hall was the lesser of two evils.

I couldn’t sleep. I had to prepare. There was a palm pistol in one of the drawers, concealed under a stack of spare clothes. With it was a first edition of one of Jaxon’s pamphlets, On the Merits of Unnaturalness . It listed every major voyant type, according to his research. My copy was covered in his annotations—new ideas, voyant contact numbers. Once the pistol was loaded, I dragged a backpack out from under the bed. My emergency pack, stored here for two years, ready for the day I’d have to run. I stuffed the pamphlet into the front pocket. They couldn’t find it in my father’s home.

I lay on my back, fully clothed, my hand resting on the pistol. Somewhere in the distance, in the darkness, there was thunder.

I must have fallen asleep. When I woke, something seemed wrong.

The æther was too open. Voyants in the building, on the stairwell. That wasn’t old Mrs. Heron upstairs, who used a frame and always took the lift. Those were the boots of a collection unit.

They had come for me.

They had finally come.

I was on my feet at once, throwing a jacket over my shirt and pulling on my shoes and glovelettes, my hands shaking. This was what Nick had trained me for: to run like hell. I could make it to the station if I tried, but this run would test my stamina to the limit. I would have to find and hail a cab to reach Section 4. Buck cabbies would take just about anyone for a few bob, voyant fugitive or not.

I slung on my backpack, tucked the pistol into my jacket pocket, and opened the door to the balcony. The wind had blown it shut. Rain battered my clothes. I crossed the balcony, climbed onto the kitchen windowsill, grabbed the edge of the roof, and with one strong pull, I was up. By the time they reached the apartment, I’d started to run.

Bang . There went the door—no knock, no warning. A moment later, a gunshot split the night. I forced myself to keep running. I couldn’t go back. They never killed amaurotics without reason; certainly not Scion employees. The shot had most likely been from a simple tranquilizer, to shut my father up while they detained me. They would need something much, much stronger to bring me down.

The estate was quiet. I looked over the edge of the roof, surveying it. No sign of the security guard, he must be on his rounds again. It didn’t take me long to spot the paddy wagon in the car park, the van with blacked-out windows and gleaming white headlights. If anyone had taken the time to look, they would have seen the Scion symbol on its back doors.

I stepped across a gap and climbed onto a ledge. Perilously slick. My shoes and gloves had decent grip, but I’d have to watch my step. I pressed my back to the wall and edged toward an escape ladder, the rain plastering my hair to my face. I climbed up to a wrought iron balcony on the next floor, where I forced open a small window. I tore through the deserted apartment, down three flights of stairs and out through the front door of the building. I needed to get onto the street, to vanish into a dark alley.

Red lights. The NVD were parked right outside, blocking my escape. I doubled back and slammed the door, activating the security lock. With shakey hands I pulled a fire ax from its case, smashed a ground-floor window, and hauled myself into a small courtyard, cutting my arms on the glass. Then I was back in the rain, clambering up the drainpipes and windowsills, barely holding on, until I reached the roof.

My heart stopped when I saw them. The exterior of the building was infested with men in red shirts and black jackets. Several torch beams moved toward me, glaring into my eyes. My chest surged. I’d never seen that uniform in London before—were they from Scion?

“Stop where you are.”

The nearest of them stepped toward me. In his gloved hand was a gun. I backed away, feeling a vivid aura. The leader of these soldiers was an extremely powerful medium. The lights revealed a gaunt face, sharp chips of eyes, and a thin, wide mouth.

“Don’t run, Paige,” he called across the roof. “Why don’t you come out of the rain?”

I did a quick sweep of my surroundings. The next building was a derelict office block. The jump was wide, maybe twenty feet, and beyond it was a busy road. It was farther than I’d ever tried to jump—but unless I wanted to attack the medium and abandon my body, I would have to try.

“I’ll pass,” I said, and took off again.

There was a shout of alarm from the soldiers. I leapt down to a lower stretch of the roof. The medium ran after me. I could hear his feet pounding on the roof, seconds behind mine. I was trained for these pursuits. I couldn’t afford to stop, not even for a moment. I was light and slim, narrow enough to slip between rails and under fences, but so was my pursuer. When I fired a shot from the pistol over my shoulder, he ducked it without stopping. His laugh was swept up on the wind, so I couldn’t tell how close he was.

I shoved the pistol back into my jacket. There was no point in shooting; I’d only miss. I flexed my fingers, ready to catch the gutter. My muscles were hot, my lungs at bursting point. A flare in my ankle alerted me to an injury, but I had to keep going. Fight or fly. Run or die.

The medium leaped over the ledge, swift and fluid as water. Adrenaline streaked through my veins. My legs pumped, and the rain thrashed at my eyes. I leaped over flexi-pipes and ventilation ducts, building up momentum, trying to turn my sixth sense on the medium. His mind was strong, moving as fast as he was. I couldn’t pin it down, couldn’t even get a picture from it. There was nothing I could do to deter him.