Laurence looked at the pigeon on Patricia’s shoulder, pecking at the air and babbling, and his eyes narrowed like he really wanted to say something snarky.

“Almost too late,” the pigeon said. “Practically too late.”

She tried to ask, again, why it was too late, but the bird flew off—although maybe like it wanted her to follow. In any case, nothing would be worse than standing in front of the shuttered Bench Bar obsessing about everyone who had been silenced, one way or another. “We need to follow that bird,” she told Laurence, who shrugged, like why not? So we’re following a bird now.

She took off up the hill, away from Mission, keeping the pigeon in sight as it kept wheeling and then soaring uphill again. The pigeon led them up a tiny staircase, set in the hillside, and then to a tiny lane that zigzagged through trees. The street got smaller and smaller until it was just a pathway through a terrace clogged with willows and banyans, big low-slung branches putting their leaves in her face as she raced to keep the pigeon’s messy wings in sight.

The pigeon banked and went up another tiny outdoor staircase, rising into darkness. The trees collided over the stairs, their branches packed so tight Patricia kept losing sight of the bird they were chasing. She grabbed Laurence’s hand as the staircase turned into a loose dirt slope going upwards, and the trees became wider and even tighter-packed. Bark thick as tire treads, branches like barbed wire. They masked the sky. She spent all her concentration steering Laurence and herself on a clear path. The slope grew steeper and steeper until it was vertical, and then it flattened. Patricia glanced behind her and couldn’t even see the path they’d come from.

Patricia realized with a jolt that she hadn’t been this deep into a forest since the time she’d become a bird, back before Kanot had taken her away to Eltisley Maze.

“My GPS is having a meltdown,” Peregrine said.

Now that they had deep forest all around them, the pigeon seemed chattier. “So I’m not sure if I ought to be bringing your friend along,” it said. “My name is Kooboo, by the way.” At least, that’s what the name sounded like.

“My friends are very respectable,” said Patricia, including Peregrine in that. “And I’m guessing it’s too late to worry about bringing outsiders. Are we going to the Parliament? I’m Patricia, and this is Laurence. And that’s Peregrine that he’s holding.”