40 
There were hundreds of jivvies, sweeping and winding, herding the huntsmen in like sheep. The swirl of black wings gathered Nox along with them. There was no escape. They could only move where Whistler wanted them to go. Nox was forced to land, and people pressed into her on all sides. Finally, the jivvies slowed, and the huntsmen were squashed together inside the broken boundary wall.
Whistler plunged from her perch and, with a shriek and a piercing flash, returned to her natural form.
‘Better,’ she said, wiggling one ear with her good hand. ‘Such a ruckus is war.’
Gracie, astride the white wyler, moved to her side.
‘While I’ve got you here,’ said Whistler, playfully, ‘I’d like to give you a choice.’ The way she spoke the word made it clear that there would be no choice at all. ‘Your cowardly leaders are still hiding inside,’ she continued. ‘But it’s you I want to talk to. I want to tell you why you’re here, and when I’m done, you will have a decision to make.’
Ottilie held her breath. She could feel Nox tense beneath her, muscles coiling to spring, but there was nowhere to go. The jivvies were above, with hundreds of other dredretches surrounding them.
‘Thirty years ago, almost to the day, I told your king that I had placed a hex on him,’ said Whistler.
Ottilie couldn’t believe what she was hearing. After all this time, all her wondering, Whistler was going to tell them about the hex.
‘I told him that for three decades he could send no man to fight to defend his lands.’ She smiled madly to herself. Still proud, three decades later, Ottilie thought.
‘Any external threat to his kingdom had to be resolved by other means,’ Whistler continued. ‘I told him that if he broke the rules I had set for him, he would die.’
There was something strange about Whistler’s wording. She was making it sound as if the hex wasn’t real.
‘My nephew, Varrio Sol, is a violent, power-hungry man. But you know none of that. You were only children, after all, when you were ripped from your homes,’ she said. ‘I turned one of the most violent kings in Uskler history into the most peaceable king in Uskler history.’ She paused. She found Ottilie in the crowd and looked her squarely in the eye. ‘But what does this have to do with you? Well, you’re the exception.
‘When your great king heard about this threat’ – she flapped her sleeves, gesturing at the dredretches – ‘this western invasion, he had several paths available to him. He could have given his life for his kingdom and sent an army to defend his people. Of course, coward that he is, he did not take that road.’ Whistler laughed. ‘No Usklerian army can operate outside the king’s command. If he told his people the truth, he would have been dethroned. He could have chosen that path – stepped down and given the crown to his heir, who could have freely sent armies to meet the monsters. Or he could have kept his crown, and armed women instead. But you know the choice he made.’
It was everything Ottilie had suspected. She and Alba had been right about all of it.
‘He kidnapped young boys from all across the kingdom,’ said Whistler. ‘He had them trained to hunt these monsters. He spread the lie of the rule of innocence among your leaders and trainers, to scare them into hiding behind your scrawny, still-growing bodies.
‘He created the Narroway Hunt and, in so doing, gave me thirty years to experiment and amass this army.’ She waved her arms, sleeves swinging. ‘An army that will be the ruination of his precious kingdom.’ Whistler leaned towards them, her voice rasping with derisive glee. ‘But here it is, here is the truth: there is no hex.’
Ottilie was frozen, listening hard. For so long she had wanted to know, to understand.
‘Magic is not so simple, so specific,’ said Whistler. ‘But in his ignorance and cowardice, he believed my lie, not daring to risk his life, to question, to test. I will allow him this, I made a convincing show of it … but, all the same, it is my great pleasure to reveal to you what a fool and coward is the man who wears the crown.’
Ottilie could see it on her face, the elation, the release.
‘This is just the beginning,’ said Whistler, raising her voice. ‘I said I would give you a choice and here it is.’
Ottilie tensed.
‘Now: join me.’
High on the parapets of Fort Richter, against the backdrop of dark cloud, Ottilie saw bone singers emerge, their grey robes rippling in the wind.
‘You will become immune to the dredretch sickness, to run wild through the Narroway without fear. Live freely and safely in my new world. Please me, and I’ll give you a guardian, a partner, a pet.’ She waved at Gracie. ‘You will gain power over them, learn to see through their eyes. Accept my gifts. Join me. Or fight for a king who sacrificed you for the sake of his own power.’
No-one moved. Not a twitch.
Whistler waited.
There was only silence, and then, in the silence, the beat of bodies. Weight falling. Running. The pounding of hooves. The rattle of wagons. Ottilie stood up in the saddle and craned her neck to look through a gap in the wall.
The Fiory footmen had arrived.
They charged up the field towards the trapped huntsmen. Ottilie saw Hero bounding, a streak of white, and Billow thundering just behind with Ramona on his back. At least fifty Fiory girls sprinted in her wake. Skip was at the head, her cutlass raised to the sky. Somewhere in the throng Ottilie saw Alba’s braids flying as she ran. Soaring above them was a black owl. Maeve.
The canopy of jivvies lifted and tore down to meet the reinforcements. The dredretches surrounding the trapped huntsmen followed.
Nox leapt. Ottilie gripped her fur tight as she scaled the chunk of wall behind them. Reaching the top, she launched into the air and soared out over the field, ready to defend the new arrivals. Below, a wagon burst open and Captain Lyre jumped out.
‘What are you doing?’ Ottilie heard Wrangler Voilies shriek. ‘Don’t stop here, take us in to safety!’
Ottilie landed beside the wagon and yelled inside. ‘You can hurt them. It was all a lie. You can help!’
Captain Lyre nodded darkly, and drew the sword sheathed within his cane. Wrangler Morse burst from the wagon, picked up a fallen spear and bounded into the fray. Behind him, Wrangler Voilies slammed the door shut and locked the bolt.
Ottilie circled above the girls, taking down any flying dredretch she could see. Below her, Skip and Alba tackled a cleaver and Fawn shot an arrow through the skull of a pobe.
Scoot took a great running leap, diving on top of a giffersnak and pinning it with his spear. Something drew his gaze up. Ottilie knew what it was. Maestro flew overhead, casting him in shadow. When the light returned, Ottilie could see Scoot smiling. He’d seen Ned, rescued, flying with Leo.
Time moved strangely.
The black clouds swallowed the sky but were yet to yield a drop of rain. For what might have been hours, it felt like nothing had changed. The mounts from Arko arrived but, still, for every dredretch they felled, there was always another. Ottilie would have welcomed a storm, but there had been no thunder since the first crack.
Then, something shifted. Ottilie could smell it. Nox spiralled into the sky and, above the blood and horror and festering dredretch flesh, she could smell rain. She looked down and for the first time realised they were winning.
Nox circled low. A scorver was barrelling through the footmen; Ottilie shot it without blinking. A great reddish shape zoomed past. It was unfamiliar, and too fast to distinguish, but she could sense it straight away – another bloodbeast.
Preddy was nearby. He had come off his horse and was fighting a lycoat on foot. A fat raindrop landed on Ottilie’s cheek, but it almost didn’t matter anymore. The huntsmen were beating them back. They were going to win!
‘PREDDY!’ cried Scoot.
Ottilie’s head whipped around so fast her neck burned. She watched in horror as a learie pounced at Preddy, but he was grappling with the lycoat. There was no escaping it. Scoot leapt and, knocking Preddy sideways, disappeared beneath the learie.
Nox dived. Grasping the learie in her jaws, the wingerslink tossed it aside. From above, Leo shot down the lycoat. Preddy lay panting, staring in panic at Scoot, who was sprawled, unmoving, on the grass.
Ottilie jumped from the saddle while Nox was still in the air, landing hard on the ground. Her knees throbbed as she crawled to where Scoot lay.
‘Scoot?’
He saw her. She ran her hands over his wounds, trying to close them, trying to help. Scoot was deathly pale. Preddy was beside her, gripping his hand. Ottilie didn’t know what to do. She had to get him inside, to safety. She had to find Richter’s healers.
Wings flapped and air beat across her face. The world darkened and Whistler appeared. ‘Oh dear,’ she clucked.
Ottilie jumped to her feet and pointed her cutlass at Whistler. Her mind was set on a single purpose. ‘Fix him!’ she demanded, her arm shaking. ‘You can do magic. Fix him!’
‘Now why would I do that?’
Ottilie took a step closer, without a lick of fear. Whistler waved her hand and the cutlass burned so hot Ottilie cried out and dropped it.
‘Fix him, please. Just fix him!’ she begged.
Whistler sighed. ‘Well, why not?’ she said with a lazy wave of her sleeve.
Ottilie couldn’t believe what she was seeing. The wounds were glowing with a pale light; the flesh was knitting together. Scoot’s breathing eased. He looked merely asleep.
‘You just remember this, Ottilie,’ said Whistler, reaching out to grip Ottilie’s chin, her fingers like claws beneath the sleeve. ‘You remember this mercy.’
She didn’t know what to think. What had just happened? Why would Whistler do that? She opened her mouth to thank her. To say thank you to the witch who had caused all this misery. But before she could speak, a cruel smile twisted Whistler’s face.
‘Oh, I’m not finished yet,’ she said and, dropping her hand, she muttered something under her breath.
Ottilie whipped back to Scoot and cried out in horror. From the top of his head, grey flint started creeping across his skin. He was turning to stone!
‘Stop!’ Ottilie cried. ‘Please stop! STOP!’
But it was done.
‘WHY?’ she shrieked with more malice than she had ever conjured.
‘I fixed him for you, dear – where’s the gratitude?’ said Whistler.
‘He’s stone! Turn him back!’ She flung herself at Whistler, begging, clutching at her clothes.
‘He’d be no use to me if I turned him back,’ she said, prising Ottilie’s fingers from her jacket. ‘But heartstone. That’s very useful.’ She stepped towards him, but Ottilie shoved her aside and flung herself over the statue that was Scoot. ‘Don’t you dare touch him!’ she growled, the words cutting up her throat.
Around her, she felt others emerge, encircling Scoot, pointing their weapons at Whistler. The witch could have shifted them with a mere blink, Ottilie could sense it, but instead she just smiled. ‘You can keep him for now. But don’t forget, Ottilie, you’re in my debt.’
With a flash, the monstrous bird launched into the air. She felt the wind from her beating wings but didn’t watch where she flew. She was searching Scoot, looking for any tiny part of him that was still flesh.
Hours might have passed. Days even. Someone took her hand, pulling her gently back. Ned was there. He pulled his shirt loose and pressed it carefully over her hands, wiping away the blood.
‘It’s not mine,’ she said, in a daze.
‘I know,’ he said gently.
Ottilie looked down and saw Preddy rocking back and forth in Skip’s arms. Alba was beside him, holding his hand, tears streaming down her face.
Leo dismounted and stood by her side. Ottilie looked up and around in a panic. The dredretches! Gracie! Where were they?
As if hearing her thoughts, Leo looked at her.
‘They fled,’ he said blankly.