She read on: “This author advises avoiding all contact with cliffcrawlers where possible. They are foul, filthy creatures. However, if it is inevitable, remember that cliffcrawlers are sightless. Their forked tongues ‘smell’ the air and are incredibly accurate when detecting blood, but relatively insensitive to anything else. The simplest solution to maintaining the upper hand is stealth and ensuring no drop of blood is spilled. They are strongly repelled by fire and in a tight spot this can be used as a deterrent.

“Aggression: eight out of ten. Danger posed: eight out of ten. Difficulty to disable: nine out of ten (assuming an average-sized congregation of two thousand individuals).”

“An average of two thousand?” said Six. “Did you misread that, or . . . ?”

“No,” said Twelve. “It’s what it says.”

“Right,” Five said slowly, eyeing the ever-narrowing space before them. “So, do we think this is an average-sized congregation, or . . . ?”

“Bigger,” Six said firmly, nodding at the oozing walls. “Look how much slime there is.”

Beneath Five, as though sensing his discomfort, Charger snorted and tried to shimmy away toward the light. Five pulled him up with a scowl. His hands were shaking, but his voice was light when he next spoke. “You know, being eaten alive by cliffcrawlers has really never appealed to me. Not before I’ve passed my Blooding anyway.”

“Well, we’d better avoid getting bitten, then,” Twelve said, tucking the book back into her bag and shaking her head. There’d been one picture in particular she wished she hadn’t seen.

“Great idea,” Five said, rolling his eyes. “And how do you propose we achieve that?”

For a moment, the three huntlings and Dog all stared into space, thinking.

Twelve’s eyebrows shot up and she plunged her hand into the very bottom of her bag, triumphantly pulling out the wooden box she’d taken from the armory.

Five gave an amusingly high-pitched squeak when he saw it. Widge poked his head above her collar to see what was happening, made a remarkably similar sound and vanished.

“That is not what I think it is?” Six gaped, backing Surefoot away.

Dog craned his head around to see and yelped in shock.

“I think,” said Twelve, weighing the box, “that it’s exactly what you think it is.”

Chapter

Seventeen

“Firesprites?” said Five.

“Firesprites,” Twelve confirmed, ignoring their reactions and feeling quite pleased with herself. “I brought them for emergencies.”

“Them being here is an emergency!” Five exclaimed. “Are you mad?”

“I agree with the boy,” Dog said, disbelief written over his face. “To the firesprite, destruction is . . . play!”

Twelve frowned. “They can’t be that bad or they wouldn’t be in the lodge.”

“They are that bad,” Five snapped, “and, if you studied your history, you’d know the debate about keeping them inside the walls lasted years.”

“Although,” Six said slowly, catching Twelve’s eye, “they can be controlled if you hold your nerve.”