‘Don’t even tell the moles.’

‘I promise.’

‘Good.’

‘Go on then. Who are you?’

‘My name’s Malik Hussein. I went to Rowhurst School in Kent. I’m fifteen years old. And most of the time I wish I was dead …’

THE HUNTER

Chapter 19

19

‘I’d been hunting the night I found you.’ Malik’s voice was quiet and scratchy in the darkness. ‘I’d followed a group of grown-ups to the river. Got half of them and the rest got away.

‘I was on the bank of the river, under the motorway bridge where it crosses over, and I sat down there and I stared at the water and it was dark, black, and I thought, What’s the point? What’s the point of doing what I’m doing? Night after night, day after day, hunting them down, killing them. And I was good at killing them. I’m the hunter. But I couldn’t see a point to it any more. There wasn’t a bit of me that didn’t ache, that wasn’t tired or hurting. I just thought there wouldn’t ever be an end to it and I would never be normal again. I was an animal. A kicked dog. Couldn’t go near kids, and I wasn’t a grown-up, despite what I looked like. I couldn’t see any point to life. It was just hard work and pain.

‘I was going to throw myself in the river. I thought about it, thought about drowning. Under all that black water. It would be an end to it all. Jannah. And then I saw another grown-up. He was one I’d been hunting for days, and he’d always got away from me. He was a big, ugly, dangerous bastard and I thought – well, at least if I can kill him it would be one good thing before I died. I was like a dog who can’t stop chasing a stick.

‘So I followed him and he went over the bridge to Monkey Island, and I knew there were more of them about because I can smell them. I can sense them. Sometimes I think I can even hear them, inside my brain. Chattering. Squeaking. Whispering. But I know that’s just me being mad. I knew there were lots of them, though, and they were hunting too. There was blood in the air. There was killing that night. They’d found some kids. I knew that much. So I went over the bridge and into the hotel. There was one down in the lobby, the reception area, a mother, eating something. I took her out quickly then went up the stairs, following a trail of blood. Found another two in a corridor. They had your friend, the little boy.’

‘Monkey-Boy.’