Surrender. It's the only idea in my head. The last thing Marketta said to me, co-operate fully and I'll have no reason to take my investigation into your family any further...
If I do exactly what they tell me to do, then maybe, just maybe, they'll leave the twins alone.
Impossible to shake the feeling that I'm in a weird piece of street theatre. I'm inside a horse drawn carriage. It's not like anything I ever saw before. Kinda like a bus. The thick coats of paint peel away in places revealing a strata of renovations going back through time. It has glass windows. The panes are different. Some are almost opaque. Some seem brand new. I guess it must have been some kinda transport vehicle in the Victorian times.
I can make out the sounds of a team of horses up front. Somewhere a driver shouts a command and we lurch forward, pulling toward the school gates and out into the road. The trial was hours ago, they made us wait here until nightfall. The crowds have thinned, but people are still watching us. Media drones follow the carriage.
The other prisoners and me, we're on benches. All in grey tracksuits, our wrists bound. We're a desolate crowd. Not even making eye contact, let alone talking.
(NOTE: Does Ursula give up Ms. Grigore earlier? Or does she do it during the trial?)
I can't remember what it is like to not feel scared. The fear has made a home inside the pit of my stomach, wrapped itself around my spine and grown bitter flowers in my skull. I can't hear my own thoughts. What would mom do?
Look out the window. Try to memorise the route. Build a map of London in your head.
One of the other women is praying. Another softly weeps.
When the hunters talk to each other, I try to catch what they're saying. I can't piece together any meaning. And the streets of London seem endless. Can't hold them all in my head.
Hours pass this way.
We go through checkpoints. We pass through military barriers, built during the civil war. I remember things Grandma said when I was only half listening, too busy working on my projects. West London is like a gated community. London is not a city, it's a bunch of towns stuck together. Some of them are rich and some of them are desperately poor.
And I realise we're in a poor neighbourhood now. The people are very different. And I can tell, when the river appears here and there between buildings, that we're headed for docklands, because we're headed East, and I can see glimpses of famous London buildings, telling me that the city centre is not far away, on the north side of the Thames.
We stop. For the first time since we left my school. The hunters up ahead are arguing. The voices get louder, angrier. There's a problem.
An opportunity to escape? And if I do? No. The twins are relying on me, surrender. Let it happen. Confess to everything. It's the only way.
When we finally start moving again, we turn sharply towards the river and we trot slowly past the smoking remains of two turned over haulage trucks. The road we were on has been blocked, media drones and TV crews stand in front of fires broadcasting. Regular polic everywhere. I see a human arm poking out from under a wrecked motorbike. There's been some kinda big fight here. Maybe a robbery. We are making a detour.
Civilisation seems to fall away the closer we get to the dockland slums. Grandma said this place was a refugee camp for people from the home counties escaping the civil war. What she didn't say was that they hate witches here so bad they burn them alive in the streets. I found that out from Ty. He showed me clips when I said I didn't believe him. Could be deep fakes I guess.
The hunters driving the carriage and the teams ahead and behind us are clearly nervous. They keep arguing sporadically. Then without warning, the media drones following us fall out of the sky. They're shot through with crossbow bolts.
There's a massive gateway, constructed out of salvage, bits and pieces of industrial wreckage, burnt out cars and piles of old tires. There is a heated argument between our drivers and the men manning the gate. I guess they are negotiating passage.
"If they take us through Riverside we'll be lucky to survive the night. Make your peace."
It's the school librarian, she says her piece and then bows her head. She seems serene. I wonder who she's thinking of.
Then the carriage moves forward, and we enter the Riverside slums.
Seething humanity. Even late at night, the streets are crowded. Outside the shanty town that they have built from the remains of war torn buildings and old dockland industrial sites, is thronging with adults and children. Every type of hustle you can imagine is taking place at once. Shoeless children cough and shiver under street lamps, skin turned sickly yellows and greens by the new plague. Our pace is agonisingly slow. And the locals are furious that we are here.
A bang. The first object hits the side of the carriage. And it starts up a steady rain of smaller and larger thuds and bangs. After a minute, the first window shatters and the librarian slumps, hit in the temple by a half brick. A year 11 girl leans in to tend to her. We all at once flatten ourselves to the carriage floor. We are too many to fit, so end up piling awkwardly on top of each other, holding our arms over our heads.
I hear a whip cracking. I hear people scream in pain. We speed up. The horses are panicking. There is an awful shudder and jolt as the carriage bounces up and down, something or someone caught under the wheels.
Then we stop dead. There is a sound like a sports crowd. Someone takes up a chant.
"The hunters protect the witches! Hunters protect the witches!"
Another shout.
"We represent the Republic of London! We are authorised to use lethal force! Stand back!"
Now the carriage is rocking from side to side. The whole world seems to be turning over and over, and every lurch it seems for a few seconds that the carriage will not right itself and we will spill out into the night. We're grabbing onto each other, but I'm thrown anyway, I black out, and then my senses slowly re-awaken, head throbbing, and I see Ms Grigore screaming and writhing.
Think Ursula. Think. I see cheap, refurb cyberArms. All kinds of first gen tech, hackable as anything. If I can really reach out and control a cyberLeg, surely I can do this. I try to summon the glitch, to whisper those words, to focus my fear and rage. Nothing happens.
Arms, so many arms, pulling her body through the smashed window of the carriage. And then she is gone. The whip crack sounds of gunfire echo through the night. The rocking stops. I hear a crowd stampede. I pull myself up to the window, looking for her. But she's gone. An armed regular police escort has arrived, dropping into the slum on airBikes.
All I can hear, as we continue on, is the sound of Ms Grigore's lullaby.
###THIS NOVEL IS IN OPEN BETA###
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Cyberwitch Academy: Learn or Burn
Science FictionImagine you wake up one day and discover that your body is a cursed organic computer. To make matters worse you keep getting possessed by AI demons. You know you can use their power, if only you could figure out how. But the clock is ticking, becau...
