Ella raised a hand and tried to shout to them, her voice lost in the chaos of noise and bumbling bodies. She raised both hands, called out and was knocked to the ground by a fat mother. The breath went out of her and she felt light-headed and dizzy. As she tried to stand, another mother fell on her. It felt like she was at the centre of a shoal of fish being attacked by sharks. The grown-ups were being herded into a tighter and tighter ball. And more and more bodies were trampling on Ella, falling on her, crushing her. She couldn’t breathe – she couldn’t speak – she couldn’t see Malik.

Where was he?

What had happened to him?

There were bright flashes in her eyes, right inside her brain. Her vision was flickering and blurry. The stink of the grown-ups, the hot, close heat of them, was like a foul gas in her nose and mouth. She was losing touch with reality. Thought she saw two fathers scooped up in a net.

Two golden twins on horses.

Malik rising up … a sword swinging down.

Malik falling.

Her fault. It was all her fault.

And she was dying here.

Someone had to help her.

She opened her mouth wide and it was like she’d opened a door and her soul was sucked out of her.

She felt a terrible emptiness.

And slipped away.

19 DAYS EARLIER

Chapter 30

30

‘Don’t put that in there, Macca, you moron. Stick it on the roof. It won’t fit inside.’

Ed was in a foul mood. He was getting ready to set off in search of Ella and he still didn’t know who was coming with him from the museum. If anyone. He had his mates from the Tower, Kyle and Macca and Will. They’d come this far together and weren’t going to split up now. So it wasn’t going to be some mad solo expedition. And they weren’t going to be on foot this time.

They had a car. A people carrier. A lovely big fat blue Chrysler Voyager, large enough to seat seven comfortably, eight or nine if they were willing to squash up.

Getting a car had been the idea of one of the museum kids. Boy named Boggle. Apparently nobody could pronounce his name or spell it properly and they reckoned it looked like a jumbled-up bunch of random letters, like in the word game Boggle.

Ed used to play it with his family. A long time ago. But Boggle himself had never seen it, let alone played it. Ed had asked Boggle if it bothered him, but Boggle told him he’d been called a lot worse.

He also told Ed that Ella and her friends had left in a car. Which was news to Ed. Boggle had made him swear not to tell anyone else.