Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children
Page 31
“Don’t try to make me feel better!” she said. “It’s your fault this is happening!”
“Ten minutes ago you said you were glad!”
“Ten minutes ago Miss Peregrine wasn’t kidnapped!”
“Will you stop!” said Hugh. “All that matters now is that the Bird’s gone and we’ve got to get her back!”
“Fine,” I said, “so let’s think. If you were a wight, where would you take a couple of kidnapped ymbrynes?”
“Depends on what’s to be done with ’em,” Enoch said. “And that, we don’t know.”
“You’d have to get them off the island first,” Emma said. “So you’d need a boat.”
“But which island?” asked Hugh. “In the loop or out of it?”
“The outside’s getting torn apart by a storm,” I said. “Nobody’s getting far in a boat over there.”
“Then he’s got to be on our side,” Emma said, beginning to sound hopeful. “So what are we larking about here for? Let’s get to the docks!”
“Maybe he’s at the docks,” Enoch said. “That is, if he ain’t gone yet. And even if he ain’t and we somehow manage to find him in all this dark, and without getting holes ripped through our guts by shrapnel on the way, there’s still his gun to worry about. Have you all gone mad? Would you rather have the Bird kidnapped—or shot right in front of us?”
“Fine, then!” Hugh shouted. “Let’s just give up and go home then, shall we? Who’d like a nice hot cup of tea before bed? Hell, as long as the Bird ain’t around, make it a toddy!” He was crying, wiping angrily at his eyes. “How can you not even try, after all she’s done for us?”
Before Enoch could answer, we heard a voice calling us from the path. Hugh stepped forward, squinting, and after a moment his face went strange. “It’s Fiona,” he said. Before that moment I’d never heard Fiona utter so much as a peep. It was impossible to make out what she was saying over the sound of planes and distant concussions, so we took off running across the bog.
When we got to the path, we were breathing hard and Fiona was hoarse from shouting, her eyes as wild as her hair. Immediately she began to pull at us, to drag and push us down the path toward town, yelling so frantically in her thick Irish accent that none of us could understand. Hugh caught her by the shoulders and told her to slow down.
She took a deep breath, shaking like a leaf, then pointed behind her. “Millard followed him!” she said. “He was hiding when the man shut us all in the basement, and when he lit out Millard followed!”
“Where to?” I said.
“He had a boat.”
“See!” cried Emma. “The docks!”
“No,” said Fiona, “it was your boat, Emma. The one you think nobody knows about, that you keep stowed on that wee strand of yours. He launched off with the cage and was just goin’ in circles, but then the tide got too rough, so he pulled onto the lighthouse rock, and that’s where he still is.”
We made for the lighthouse in a dead run. When we reached the cliffs overlooking it, we found the rest of the children in a thick patch of sawgrass near the edge.
“Get down!” Millard hissed.
We dropped to our knees and crawled over to them. They were crouched in a loose huddle behind the grass, taking turns peeking at the lighthouse. They looked shell-shocked—the younger ones especially—as if they hadn’t fully grasped the unfolding nightmare. That we’d just survived a nightmare of our own barely registered.
I crawled through the grass to the edge of the cliff and peered out. Past where the shipwreck lay submerged I could see Emma’s canoe tied to the rocks. Golan and the ymbrynes were out of sight.
“What’s he doing out there?” I said.
“It’s anyone’s guess,” Millard answered. “Waiting for someone to pick him up, or for the tide to settle so he can row out.”
“In my little boat?” Emma said doubtfully.
“As I said, we don’t know.”
Three deafening cracks sounded in quick succession, and we all ducked as the sky flashed orange.
“Do any bombs fall ’round here, Millard?” asked Emma.
“My research concerns only the behavior of humans and animals,” he replied. “Not bombs.”
“Fat lot of good that does us now,” said Enoch.
“Do you have any more boats hidden around here?” I asked Emma.
“I’m afraid not,” she said. “We’ll just have to swim across.”
“Swim across and what?” said Millard. “Get shot to pieces?”
“We’ll figure something out,” she replied.
Millard sighed. “Oh, lovely. Improvised suicide.”
“Well?” Emma looked at each of us. “Does anyone have a better idea?”
“If I had my soldiers …” Enoch began.
“They’d fall to bits in the water,” said Millard.
Enoch hung his head. The others were quiet.
“Then it’s decided,” said Emma. “Who’s in?”
I raised my hand. So did Bronwyn. “You’ll need someone the wight can’t see,” Millard said. “Take me along, if you must.”
“Four’s enough,” Emma said. “Hope you’re all strong swimmers.”
There was no time for second thoughts or long goodbyes. The others wished us luck, and we were on our way.
We shed our black coats and loped through the grass, doubled-over like commandos, until we came to the path that led to the beach. We slid down on our behinds, little avalanches of sand pouring around our feet and down our pants.
Suddenly, there was a noise like fifty chainsaws over our heads, and we ducked as a plane roared by, the wind whipping our hair and blowing up a sandstorm. I clenched my teeth, waiting for a bomb blast to tear us apart. None came.
We kept moving. When we hit the beach, Emma gathered us in a tight huddle.
“There’s a shipwreck between here and the lighthouse,” she said. “Follow me out to it. Stay low in the water. Don’t let him see you. When we reach the wreck, we’ll look for our man and decide what’s next.”
“Let’s get our ymbrynes back,” Bronwyn said.
We crawled down to the surf and slid into the cold water on our bellies. It was easy going at first, but the farther we swam from shore, the more the current tried to push us back. Another plane buzzed overhead, kicking up a stinging spray of water.
We were breathing hard by the time we reached the shipwreck. Clinging to its rusted hull, just our heads poking out of the water, we stared at the lighthouse and the barren little island that anchored it, but saw no sign of my wayward therapist. A full moon hovered low in the sky, breaking through reefs of bomb smoke now and then to shine like the lighthouse’s ghostly double.
We pushed ourselves along the wreck until we reached the end, just a fifty-yard swim in open water to the lighthouse rocks.
“Here’s what I reckon we should do,” Emma said. “He’s seen how strong Wyn is, so she’s in the most danger. Jacob and I find Golan and get his attention while Wyn sneaks up from behind and gives him a belter over the head. Meantime, Millard makes a grab for the birdcage. Any objections?”
As if in answer, a shot rang out. At first we didn’t realize what it was—it didn’t sound like the gunshots we’d been hearing, distant and powerful. This was small caliber—a pop rather than a bang—and it wasn’t until we heard a second one, accompanied by a nearby splash, that we knew it was Golan.
“Fall back!” Emma shouted, and we stood out of the water and sprinted across the hull until it dropped out from beneath us, then dove into the open water beyond it. A moment later we all came up in a cluster, panting for air.
“So much for getting the drop on him!” Millard said.
Golan had stopped shooting, but we could see him standing guard by the lighthouse door, gun in hand.
“He may be an evil bastard, but he ain’t stupid,” Bronwyn said. “He knew we’d come after him.”
“Not now we can’t!” Emma said, slapping the water. “He’ll shoot us to bits!”
Millard stepped up onto the wreck. “He can’t shoot what he can’t see. I’ll go.”
“You’re not invisible in the ocean, dummy,” Emma said, and it was true—a torso-shaped negative space bobbed in the water where he stood.
“More than you are,” he replied. “Anyhow, I followed him all the way across the island and he was none the wiser. I think I can manage a few hundred meters more.”
It was difficult to argue, since our only remaining options were either giving up or running into a hail of gunfire.
“Fine,” Emma said. “If you really think you can make it.”
“Someone’s got to be the hero,” he replied, and walked off across the hull.
“Famous last words,” I muttered.
In the smoky distance, I saw Golan in the lighthouse doorway kneel down and take aim, leveling his arm across a railing.
“Look out!” I shouted, but it was too late.
A shot rang out. Millard screamed.
We all clambered onto the wreck and raced toward him. I felt absolutely certain I was about to be shot, and for a moment I thought the splashes of our feet in the water were bullets raining down on us. But then the shooting stopped—reloading, I thought—and we had a brief window of time.
Millard was kneeling in the water, dazed, blood running down his torso. For the first time I could see the true shape of his body, painted red.
Emma took him by the arm. “Millard! Are you all right? Say something!”
“I must apologize,” he said. “It seems I’ve gone and gotten myself shot.”
“We have to stop the bleeding!” said Emma. “We’ve got to take him back to shore!”
“Nonsense,” Millard said. “That man will never let you get this close to him again. Turn back now, and we’ll certainly lose Miss Peregrine.”
More shots rang out. I felt a bullet zip past my ear.
“This way!” Emma shouted. “Dive!”
I didn’t know what she meant at first—we were a hundred feet from the end of the wreck—but then I saw what she was running toward. It was the black hole in the hull, the door to the cargo hold.
Bronwyn and I lifted Millard and ran after her. Metal slugs clanged into the hull around us. It sounded like someone kicking a trash can.
“Hold your breath,” I told Millard, and we came to the hold and dove in feet-first.
We pulled ourselves down the ladder a few rungs and hung there. I tried to keep my eyes open but the saltwater stung too much. I could taste Millard’s blood in the water.
Emma handed me the breathing tube, and we passed it among us. I was winded from running, and the single breath it allowed me every few seconds wasn’t enough. My lungs hurt, and I began to feel light-headed.
Someone tugged at my shirt. Come up. I pulled myself slowly up the ladder, and then Bronwyn, Emma and I broke the surface just enough to breathe and talk while Millard stayed safe a few feet below, the tube all to himself.
We spoke in whispers and kept our eyes on the lighthouse.
“We can’t stay here,” Emma said. “Millard will bleed to death.”
“It could take twenty minutes to get him back to shore,” I said. “He could just as easily die on the way.”
“I don’t know what else to do!”
“The lighthouse is close,” Bronwyn said. “We’ll take him there.”
“Then Golan will make us all bleed to death!” I said.
“No, he won’t,” replied Bronwyn.
“Why not? Are you bullet-proof?”
“Maybe,” Bronwyn replied mysteriously, then took a breath and disappeared down the ladder.
“What’s she talking about?” I said.
Emma looked worried. “I haven’t a clue. But whatever it is, she’d better hurry.” I looked down to see what Bronwyn was doing but instead caught a glimpse of Millard on the ladder below us, surrounded by curious flashlight fish. Then I felt the hull vibrate against my feet, and a moment later Bronwyn surfaced holding a rectangular piece of metal about six feet by four, with a riveted round hole in the top. She had wrenched the cargo hold’s door from its hinges.
“And what are you going to do with that?” Emma said.
“Go to the lighthouse,” she replied. Then she stood up and held the door in front of her.
“Wyn, he’ll shoot you!” Emma cried, and then a shot rang out—and caromed right off the door.
“That’s amazing!” I said. “It’s a shield!”
Emma laughed. “Wyn, you’re a genius!”
“Millard can ride my back,” she said. “The rest of you, fall in behind.”
Emma brought Millard out of the water and hung his arms around Bronwyn’s neck. “It’s magnificent down there,” he said. “Emma, why did you never tell me about the angels?”
“What angels?”
“The lovely green angels who live just below.” He was shivering, his voice dreamy. “They kindly offered to take me to heaven.”
“No one’s going to heaven just yet,” Emma said, looking worried. “You just hang on to Bronwyn, all right?”
“Very well,” he said vacantly.
Emma stood behind Millard, pressing him into Bronwyn’s back so he wouldn’t slide off. I stood behind Emma, taking up the rear of our strange little conga line, and we began to plod forward across the wreck toward the lighthouse.
“Ten minutes ago you said you were glad!”
“Ten minutes ago Miss Peregrine wasn’t kidnapped!”
“Will you stop!” said Hugh. “All that matters now is that the Bird’s gone and we’ve got to get her back!”
“Fine,” I said, “so let’s think. If you were a wight, where would you take a couple of kidnapped ymbrynes?”
“Depends on what’s to be done with ’em,” Enoch said. “And that, we don’t know.”
“You’d have to get them off the island first,” Emma said. “So you’d need a boat.”
“But which island?” asked Hugh. “In the loop or out of it?”
“The outside’s getting torn apart by a storm,” I said. “Nobody’s getting far in a boat over there.”
“Then he’s got to be on our side,” Emma said, beginning to sound hopeful. “So what are we larking about here for? Let’s get to the docks!”
“Maybe he’s at the docks,” Enoch said. “That is, if he ain’t gone yet. And even if he ain’t and we somehow manage to find him in all this dark, and without getting holes ripped through our guts by shrapnel on the way, there’s still his gun to worry about. Have you all gone mad? Would you rather have the Bird kidnapped—or shot right in front of us?”
“Fine, then!” Hugh shouted. “Let’s just give up and go home then, shall we? Who’d like a nice hot cup of tea before bed? Hell, as long as the Bird ain’t around, make it a toddy!” He was crying, wiping angrily at his eyes. “How can you not even try, after all she’s done for us?”
Before Enoch could answer, we heard a voice calling us from the path. Hugh stepped forward, squinting, and after a moment his face went strange. “It’s Fiona,” he said. Before that moment I’d never heard Fiona utter so much as a peep. It was impossible to make out what she was saying over the sound of planes and distant concussions, so we took off running across the bog.
When we got to the path, we were breathing hard and Fiona was hoarse from shouting, her eyes as wild as her hair. Immediately she began to pull at us, to drag and push us down the path toward town, yelling so frantically in her thick Irish accent that none of us could understand. Hugh caught her by the shoulders and told her to slow down.
She took a deep breath, shaking like a leaf, then pointed behind her. “Millard followed him!” she said. “He was hiding when the man shut us all in the basement, and when he lit out Millard followed!”
“Where to?” I said.
“He had a boat.”
“See!” cried Emma. “The docks!”
“No,” said Fiona, “it was your boat, Emma. The one you think nobody knows about, that you keep stowed on that wee strand of yours. He launched off with the cage and was just goin’ in circles, but then the tide got too rough, so he pulled onto the lighthouse rock, and that’s where he still is.”
We made for the lighthouse in a dead run. When we reached the cliffs overlooking it, we found the rest of the children in a thick patch of sawgrass near the edge.
“Get down!” Millard hissed.
We dropped to our knees and crawled over to them. They were crouched in a loose huddle behind the grass, taking turns peeking at the lighthouse. They looked shell-shocked—the younger ones especially—as if they hadn’t fully grasped the unfolding nightmare. That we’d just survived a nightmare of our own barely registered.
I crawled through the grass to the edge of the cliff and peered out. Past where the shipwreck lay submerged I could see Emma’s canoe tied to the rocks. Golan and the ymbrynes were out of sight.
“What’s he doing out there?” I said.
“It’s anyone’s guess,” Millard answered. “Waiting for someone to pick him up, or for the tide to settle so he can row out.”
“In my little boat?” Emma said doubtfully.
“As I said, we don’t know.”
Three deafening cracks sounded in quick succession, and we all ducked as the sky flashed orange.
“Do any bombs fall ’round here, Millard?” asked Emma.
“My research concerns only the behavior of humans and animals,” he replied. “Not bombs.”
“Fat lot of good that does us now,” said Enoch.
“Do you have any more boats hidden around here?” I asked Emma.
“I’m afraid not,” she said. “We’ll just have to swim across.”
“Swim across and what?” said Millard. “Get shot to pieces?”
“We’ll figure something out,” she replied.
Millard sighed. “Oh, lovely. Improvised suicide.”
“Well?” Emma looked at each of us. “Does anyone have a better idea?”
“If I had my soldiers …” Enoch began.
“They’d fall to bits in the water,” said Millard.
Enoch hung his head. The others were quiet.
“Then it’s decided,” said Emma. “Who’s in?”
I raised my hand. So did Bronwyn. “You’ll need someone the wight can’t see,” Millard said. “Take me along, if you must.”
“Four’s enough,” Emma said. “Hope you’re all strong swimmers.”
There was no time for second thoughts or long goodbyes. The others wished us luck, and we were on our way.
We shed our black coats and loped through the grass, doubled-over like commandos, until we came to the path that led to the beach. We slid down on our behinds, little avalanches of sand pouring around our feet and down our pants.
Suddenly, there was a noise like fifty chainsaws over our heads, and we ducked as a plane roared by, the wind whipping our hair and blowing up a sandstorm. I clenched my teeth, waiting for a bomb blast to tear us apart. None came.
We kept moving. When we hit the beach, Emma gathered us in a tight huddle.
“There’s a shipwreck between here and the lighthouse,” she said. “Follow me out to it. Stay low in the water. Don’t let him see you. When we reach the wreck, we’ll look for our man and decide what’s next.”
“Let’s get our ymbrynes back,” Bronwyn said.
We crawled down to the surf and slid into the cold water on our bellies. It was easy going at first, but the farther we swam from shore, the more the current tried to push us back. Another plane buzzed overhead, kicking up a stinging spray of water.
We were breathing hard by the time we reached the shipwreck. Clinging to its rusted hull, just our heads poking out of the water, we stared at the lighthouse and the barren little island that anchored it, but saw no sign of my wayward therapist. A full moon hovered low in the sky, breaking through reefs of bomb smoke now and then to shine like the lighthouse’s ghostly double.
We pushed ourselves along the wreck until we reached the end, just a fifty-yard swim in open water to the lighthouse rocks.
“Here’s what I reckon we should do,” Emma said. “He’s seen how strong Wyn is, so she’s in the most danger. Jacob and I find Golan and get his attention while Wyn sneaks up from behind and gives him a belter over the head. Meantime, Millard makes a grab for the birdcage. Any objections?”
As if in answer, a shot rang out. At first we didn’t realize what it was—it didn’t sound like the gunshots we’d been hearing, distant and powerful. This was small caliber—a pop rather than a bang—and it wasn’t until we heard a second one, accompanied by a nearby splash, that we knew it was Golan.
“Fall back!” Emma shouted, and we stood out of the water and sprinted across the hull until it dropped out from beneath us, then dove into the open water beyond it. A moment later we all came up in a cluster, panting for air.
“So much for getting the drop on him!” Millard said.
Golan had stopped shooting, but we could see him standing guard by the lighthouse door, gun in hand.
“He may be an evil bastard, but he ain’t stupid,” Bronwyn said. “He knew we’d come after him.”
“Not now we can’t!” Emma said, slapping the water. “He’ll shoot us to bits!”
Millard stepped up onto the wreck. “He can’t shoot what he can’t see. I’ll go.”
“You’re not invisible in the ocean, dummy,” Emma said, and it was true—a torso-shaped negative space bobbed in the water where he stood.
“More than you are,” he replied. “Anyhow, I followed him all the way across the island and he was none the wiser. I think I can manage a few hundred meters more.”
It was difficult to argue, since our only remaining options were either giving up or running into a hail of gunfire.
“Fine,” Emma said. “If you really think you can make it.”
“Someone’s got to be the hero,” he replied, and walked off across the hull.
“Famous last words,” I muttered.
In the smoky distance, I saw Golan in the lighthouse doorway kneel down and take aim, leveling his arm across a railing.
“Look out!” I shouted, but it was too late.
A shot rang out. Millard screamed.
We all clambered onto the wreck and raced toward him. I felt absolutely certain I was about to be shot, and for a moment I thought the splashes of our feet in the water were bullets raining down on us. But then the shooting stopped—reloading, I thought—and we had a brief window of time.
Millard was kneeling in the water, dazed, blood running down his torso. For the first time I could see the true shape of his body, painted red.
Emma took him by the arm. “Millard! Are you all right? Say something!”
“I must apologize,” he said. “It seems I’ve gone and gotten myself shot.”
“We have to stop the bleeding!” said Emma. “We’ve got to take him back to shore!”
“Nonsense,” Millard said. “That man will never let you get this close to him again. Turn back now, and we’ll certainly lose Miss Peregrine.”
More shots rang out. I felt a bullet zip past my ear.
“This way!” Emma shouted. “Dive!”
I didn’t know what she meant at first—we were a hundred feet from the end of the wreck—but then I saw what she was running toward. It was the black hole in the hull, the door to the cargo hold.
Bronwyn and I lifted Millard and ran after her. Metal slugs clanged into the hull around us. It sounded like someone kicking a trash can.
“Hold your breath,” I told Millard, and we came to the hold and dove in feet-first.
We pulled ourselves down the ladder a few rungs and hung there. I tried to keep my eyes open but the saltwater stung too much. I could taste Millard’s blood in the water.
Emma handed me the breathing tube, and we passed it among us. I was winded from running, and the single breath it allowed me every few seconds wasn’t enough. My lungs hurt, and I began to feel light-headed.
Someone tugged at my shirt. Come up. I pulled myself slowly up the ladder, and then Bronwyn, Emma and I broke the surface just enough to breathe and talk while Millard stayed safe a few feet below, the tube all to himself.
We spoke in whispers and kept our eyes on the lighthouse.
“We can’t stay here,” Emma said. “Millard will bleed to death.”
“It could take twenty minutes to get him back to shore,” I said. “He could just as easily die on the way.”
“I don’t know what else to do!”
“The lighthouse is close,” Bronwyn said. “We’ll take him there.”
“Then Golan will make us all bleed to death!” I said.
“No, he won’t,” replied Bronwyn.
“Why not? Are you bullet-proof?”
“Maybe,” Bronwyn replied mysteriously, then took a breath and disappeared down the ladder.
“What’s she talking about?” I said.
Emma looked worried. “I haven’t a clue. But whatever it is, she’d better hurry.” I looked down to see what Bronwyn was doing but instead caught a glimpse of Millard on the ladder below us, surrounded by curious flashlight fish. Then I felt the hull vibrate against my feet, and a moment later Bronwyn surfaced holding a rectangular piece of metal about six feet by four, with a riveted round hole in the top. She had wrenched the cargo hold’s door from its hinges.
“And what are you going to do with that?” Emma said.
“Go to the lighthouse,” she replied. Then she stood up and held the door in front of her.
“Wyn, he’ll shoot you!” Emma cried, and then a shot rang out—and caromed right off the door.
“That’s amazing!” I said. “It’s a shield!”
Emma laughed. “Wyn, you’re a genius!”
“Millard can ride my back,” she said. “The rest of you, fall in behind.”
Emma brought Millard out of the water and hung his arms around Bronwyn’s neck. “It’s magnificent down there,” he said. “Emma, why did you never tell me about the angels?”
“What angels?”
“The lovely green angels who live just below.” He was shivering, his voice dreamy. “They kindly offered to take me to heaven.”
“No one’s going to heaven just yet,” Emma said, looking worried. “You just hang on to Bronwyn, all right?”
“Very well,” he said vacantly.
Emma stood behind Millard, pressing him into Bronwyn’s back so he wouldn’t slide off. I stood behind Emma, taking up the rear of our strange little conga line, and we began to plod forward across the wreck toward the lighthouse.
