I kneel by her. She’s been shot in the back but blood is coming out of her mouth and nose. I say, “Sorry, Sameen.”
She doesn’t say anything, just looks at me. I slit her throat.
More blood. Blood everywhere. My hands are dripping.
I stand and look back at the Hunters, making sure they see me. There’s one of them whom I notice not far from the front. I just get a glimpse of her. But I know it’s her. My sister, Jessica. It was her trap.
I know I can outrun them. I’m in shock but my body’s strong, stronger than ever. I don’t need to think when I run. I don’t want to think. Just run. I break to the left. Going hard and fast away from Nesbitt, Gabriel, and Greatorex, drawing the Hunters after me.
Red
You can’t let yourself think too much about numbers; how many are dead. There’s a lot. There always seems to be another one. You can’t let yourself think about much really. You need to just keep walking. But every time you think there won’t be any more bodies you come across another. A woman, a man, all members of the Alliance, all dead, usually shot in the back.
You’ve ended up in a gentle valley and a few rebels must have run down here. There are bodies lying in clumps, as if they surrendered but were then shot, some shot in the head—executed. You count them. It’s the only thing you can do. Nine of them.
If Marcus had been alive, if Annalise hadn’t shot him, most of these people would be alive too. Marcus would have been able to slow the Hunters enough. Kill enough of them. These deaths are on Annalise’s head.
Still, you need to get out of the valley or you’ll be dead too. The Hunters will come back this way to check they haven’t missed anyone.
It starts to rain as you climb up the side of the valley and into the next one, down its steep side and through the old trees. Between the trees are rounded, moss-covered stones and the floor is deep with ferns: it’s a lush, green, and beautiful place. You sit, too tired to go on. The ferns arch over your head and the rain patters down. You rub your face. And inside you feel on fire. Marcus’s heart has already given its Gifts but it has exhausted you and it’s doing something else to you too.
You bow your head and the rain runs off you, rivulets of red, to join the mud and the blood around you.
You want to sleep but when you close your eyes you see it all again: Annalise pointing the gun at Marcus, the Fairborn going into Marcus, cutting into his skin, you pulling his ribs apart and all the blood and everything that you had to do.
You would never have had to kill Marcus, would never have had to do all that, if it hadn’t been for Annalise.
You lie in the rain. Going over it again and again. There’s nothing else you can do today. But tomorrow will be different. Tomorrow you go after her.
Acknowledgments
Half Wild is my second published book, and writing (and rewriting and rewriting) it was a completely different experience from that of Half Bad. I really must plan my next story a lot more before I jump in. I’m extremely grateful to everyone in the great teams at Puffin and Viking for their help in getting this story out of my head and on the bookshelves—and not just bookshelves in the UK and US but around the world (even in places I have to Google to find out where they are). As always my agent Claire Wilson has been a star.
In case you’re interested, the quote “I see wars, horrid wars, and the Tiber foaming with much blood” is a translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, “bella, horrida bella, et Thybrim multo spumantem sanguine cerno” (6.86–87), which I found as a result of reading through Enoch Powell’s “Rivers of Blood” speech, and then looking up (with the help of Google) the original “river of blood” quote. I think it is more appropriate in Half Wild than as mistakenly used by Powell (http://edithorial.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/how-enoch-powell-got-vergil-wrong.html).
European travel is a great thing and I did hope to do at least some in my research for Half Wild. Sadly time was not on my side so I had to rely on my memory of places (Spain, Basle, that lake with the iceberg in Norway), Google, and the AA’s online Route Planner for all my fictional journey routes and times.
Thanks, too, to all the lovely, friendly Half Bad fans and my followers on Twitter, and especially those who helped with the names for my White Witches. I received ideas from the following: Lisa Gelinas @InkdMomof3; Jan P. @janhpa; Caitlin @caitlingss; Charli @Charli_TAW; Artifact #1 @themefrompinata; Daniel Rowland @danialii; Fiction Fascination @F_Fascination; Oswaldo Reyes @readers WRITER; Emily Ringborg @RingEmily; Colleen Conway @colleenaconway; Damien Glynn @damog7; Finlay and Ivor @tmbriggs; Jo Porter @joanneporter_1; Caroline Pomfret @CazPom.
But I eventually chose the names:
– Sameen, suggested by MSA @MsaMsa85; – Olivia, suggested by Renee Dechert @sreneed; – Claudia, suggested by Jayd Amber @dragonslibrary.
I hope I’ve included everyone. Apologies if I’ve missed you off that list.