Library of Souls (Page 87)

“Don’t let them escape!” Emma cried.

We tore after the wights on foot, on wing, on bearback and hollowback. We chased them through the smoking ruins of the parrot house, across ground stippled with catapulted rodents from Sharon’s insurrection, toward an arched gate built into the looming outer wall.

Miss Peregrine screamed overhead, dive-bombing fleeing wights. She pulled one off his feet by the back of his neck, but this, and more attacks from Hugh’s bees, only made the nine that were left run even faster. Their lead was growing and my hollow was beginning to fail, leaking black fluid from a half dozen wounds.

The wights crashed on blindly, the gate’s iron portcullis rising as they neared it.

“Stop them!” I shouted, hoping that beyond the gate, Sharon and his unruly crowd might hear.

And then I realized: the bridge! There was still another hollowgast left—the one inside the bridge. If I could get control of him in time, maybe I could stop the wights from escaping.

But no. They were already through the gate, running up the bridge, and I was hopelessly behind. By the time I passed through the gate, the bridge hollow had already picked up and tossed five of them across to Smoking Street, where only a thin crowd of ambro addicts was lingering—not enough to stop them. The four wights who hadn’t yet crossed were stuck at the bridge gap, waiting their turn to be flung.

As my hollow and I started running up the bridge, I felt the bridge hollow come online inside me. It was picking up three of the four wights and lifting them across.

Stop, I said aloud in Hollow.

Or at least that’s what I thought I said, though maybe something got lost in translation, and maybe stop sounds a lot like drop in hollowspeak. Because rather than stopping midair and then bringing the three kicking and terrified wights back to our side of the bridge, the hollow simply let them go. (How strange!)

All the peculiars on our side of the chasm and the addicts on the other side came to the edge to watch them fall, howling and flailing all the way down through layers of sulfurous green mist until—ploop!—they plunged into the boiling river and disappeared.

A cheer went up on both sides, and a grating voice I recognized said, “Serves ’em right. They were lousy tippers, anyway!”

It was one of two bridge heads that were still on their pikes. “Didn’t your mum ever tell you not to swim on a full stomach?” said the other. “WAIT TWENTY MINUTES!”

The lone wight remaining on our side threw down his gun and raised his hands in surrender, while the five who’d made it across were quickly vanishing into a cloud of ash the wind had kicked up.

We stood watching them go. There was no way we’d catch them now.

“Curse our luck,” Bentham said. “Even that small number of wights could wreak havoc for years to come.”

“Agreed, brother, though honestly I didn’t realize you gave a titmouse what happened to the rest of us.” We turned to see Miss Peregrine walking toward us, returned to human form, a shawl clasped modestly around her shoulders. Her eyes were locked on Bentham, her expression sour and unwelcoming.

“Hello, Alma! Fantastic to see you!” he said with overeager cheerfulness. “And of course I give a …” He cleared his throat awkwardly. “Why, I’m the reason you’re not still in a prison cell! Go on, children, tell them!”

“Mr. Bentham helped us a lot,” I admitted, though I didn’t really want to insert myself into a sibling spat.

“In that case, all due thanks,” Miss Peregrine said coldly. “I’ll ensure the Council of Ymbrynes is made aware of the role you played here. Perhaps they’ll see fit to lighten your sentence.”

“Sentence?” Emma said, looking sharply at Bentham. “What sentence?”

His lip twisted. “Banishment. You don’t think I’d live in this pit if I was welcome anywhere else, do you? I was framed, unjustly accused of—”

“Collusion.” Miss Peregrine said. “Collaboration with the enemy. Betrayal after betrayal.”

“I was acting as a double agent, Alma, mining our brother for information. I explained this to you!” He was whining, his palms out like a beggar’s. “You know I have every reason to hate Jack!”

Miss Peregrine raised her hand to stop him. She’d heard this story before and didn’t want to again. “When he betrayed your grandfather,” she said to me, “that was the last straw.”

“That was an accident,” Bentham said, drawing back in offense.

“Then what became of the suul you drew from him?” said Miss Peregrine.

“It was injected into the test subjects!”

Miss Peregrine shook her head. “We reverse-engineered your experiment. They were given suul from barnyard animals, which can only mean that you kept Abe’s for yourself.”

“What an absurd allegation!” he cried. “Is that what you told the council? That’s why I’m still rotting in here, isn’t it?” I couldn’t tell if he was genuinely surprised or just acting. “I knew you felt threatened by my intellect and superior leadership capabilities. But that you’d stoop to such lies to keep me out of your way … do you know how many years I’ve spent fighting to eradicate the scourge of ambrosia use? What on earth would I want with that poor man’s suul?”

“The same thing our brother wants with young Mr. Portman,” Miss Peregrine said.

“I won’t even honor that accusation with a denial. I only wish this haze of bias would clear so that you could see the truth: I’m on your side, Alma, and I’ve always been.”