Savage Wings: Book Three of The Whitechapel Chronicles

Chapter 31

The darkness numbed me like a sedative straight to the bloodstream.

The candle had flickered to nothing a while ago and I hadn't bothered to re-light it, instead preferring to remain here in the dark, feeling comforted by how it enshrouded me as soon as the flame had died. Not far from where I sat, Amy lay asleep, her deep contented breathing like the most soothing of lullabies. It felt good to hear it; to hear her finally at peace from the insanity that had raged through her veins and it felt good to just sit here, wrapping the darkness around me like the most soothing of bandages. I needed the come-down now, balancing out the tremendous high I'd experienced in that room as the power had surged through me, filling every space with its light.

What are you? What are you? 

Amy's astonished cries still whispered in my ears. I could still picture her startling eyes, free from the tiny bloodshot veins that had caged them, her face free from the madness and hunger that had twisted it into a mask of such desperate hatred. I could still hear the sound of the door being opened, the tiny window that had been fractured into a glass jigsaw puzzle finally falling free from the wood and showering the floor with tiny razor shards. I could still see Harper's stricken face, miraculously burn-free this time, and the stricken faces of those that had crowded behind him to stare dumbfounded into Amy's cell.

"It's done," I had said. "It's over."

"Goddammit," Harper said after a few stunned seconds, as he'd staggered towards me. "You actually did it. Of all the insane, screwed-up things I've seen people do in my lifetime, that's got to have been fucking craziest yet." Then he'd hauled me to my feet and clutched me to him in a hard, almost bone-crushing embrace and I'd noticed how his body trembled slightly as he did so.

When the shadows trembled in the hallway outside from room where I now resided, I glanced up to see him standing there, his face guarded as he leant against the doorframe.

"There's a meeting. They want you there," he said, his tone almost apologetic and I knew immediately he wasn't apologising for dragging me to the meeting in the first place, but for what the meeting was going to entail. It had been inevitable, of course, and even I was surprised that I'd been left alone for so long. I knew I'd have to face the firing squad at some point.

I sighed, climbing to my feet and taking one last reluctant look at the sleeping Amy. "Well then I guess I'd better not keep them all waiting."

I hadn't kept them waiting at all but they looked impatient none-the-less when I walked into the school hall where they had all congregated. I must admit, I did raise an eyebrow when Harper turned in the direction of the hall, rather than the usual science lab meeting point but it became all too painfully clear why, when he pushed open the double doors and I found that everyone had been invited to this meeting. Everyone. Not just Fenton and Edward and their generals, but all the survivors from Brandon's attempted Second Cleansing, the survivors from Oxleas, everyone that we had grabbed along the way and taken with us in our effort to leave the northern side of the city. Even Lucius was there, sat on the side of the stage, his short legs dangling over the edge and noticeable gap around him where others seemed to be giving him a wide berth.

The room fell silent as I entered and I was immediately transported back to my school days, when I'd walked in late to assembly one morning and had to file past the whole school, under the scrutinising, beady gaze of the teachers who'd sat up high on the stage, like devilled birds on a perch. As I approached the gathering, I heard the teenage Megan in my head chanting don't trip, don't trip, don't trip. I didn't trip - thankfully - but that didn't make the short walk across the hall any less torturous. People stood or sat on the floor, some sat on the few plastic-backed chairs that remained intact, but all watched me approach with a stifling mixture of trepidation and fear that made every step feel like I was wearing shoes of lead.