I looked at the flooded clay pits, the broken-down cars, the dead TVs, and the hills of junk. “Isn’t this the wilderness?” I said. “Isn’t this the mountains and the tombs?”

Poodle didn’t say anything. I told him, “Go on. Roll up your sleeves.”

He shook his head. I grabbed his arm. Pushed up the sleeve of his parka. There they were again, like I’d seen, the ladder of pink sticking plasters going up his wrist and arm all the way to the elbow.

I shrugged and looked at Goldie. “Well?”

Goldie looked uncertain.

“Look, it’s in the Bible,” I said. “The wages of sin is death. Right?”

Goldie nodded. Poodle too.

“And being queer is a sin. Right?”

Poodle made a strangled sound.

“That’s why we need a sacrifice. To wash the sin away,” I said. “It’s all in the Bible. The blood of the Lamb. He gave his life, that we might live.”

I ended up doing most of the work. Goldie said the words, though; I wasn’t going to let him off without even a speaking part. Poodle cried a bit when I made him put his hand in the cage, but as I explained, we needed him to make contact. And Goldie was always a talker; just like his preacher father, in fact; and once I’d explained what was needed, he managed to come up with the goods.

“This man has been infected with the demon of homosexuality. Get thee hence, foul demon; enter into the soul of this rat and leave Thy humble servant alone.”

By then, Poodle was crying a lot. I guessed it must be the demons. Or maybe it was just relief; the relief of sharing the burden; of having someone take it away. I know what that feels like, Mousey. Don’t you? It’s good to confess to someone, even if they’re already dead. Especially if they’re already dead—that way, no one gets to tell tales.

Then I drowned the rat in its cage.

Well, it worked for the Gadarene.

Part Three

PART THREE

Qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum.

—VEGETIUS

Chapter 1

1

September 15, 2005

A term at St. Oswald’s, like a good book, takes some time to reach full velocity. Like the Juggernaut, it rolls; slowly at first, but inexorably over the days and weeks of the year, usually reaching cruising speed at around the third week of the Michaelmas term, when the terrain starts to get rocky.

I suspect that this term, that moment has arrived sooner than usual. Already, the New Head has introduced certain elements that may prove most disruptive to me—not least, the arrival yesterday of the first of my Mulberry girls.