Cadence heaved an impatient sigh, looking at her watch. ‘Lam, we really need to—’
‘Wait.’
SPLAT! Bzzzzzzzzz …
Morrigan and Cadence watched in horror as, farther down the corridor, one of the boys from the Sorcery Department sprayed a shaken-up elixir bottle all over a passing senior scholar. The older girl was engulfed by a wave of black tarry liquid which, on contact with her skin, turned into … bees. Angry, buzzy bees that swarmed to her as if she were covered in pollen. She ran down the hall, shrieking and trying to bat them away, while the sorcery boys chased after her and tried to help, half laughing and half horrified.
Lam finally lowered her hand.
‘Carry on,’ she said, sauntering past Morrigan and Cadence with a very I-told-you-so look.
Morrigan hadn’t ever had a class on Sub-Two before – although she went there most days as that was where the dining rooms, kitchens, and the Commissariat were. The rest of Unit 919 was already waiting outside the assigned classroom when Morrigan, Cadence and Lam arrived.
‘Crime and Donuts,’ said Hawthorne, turning around to face the others as he held out an arm across the door, barring their entry. ‘That’s my final guess. Anyone else? Last chance.’
‘Oh, just open the door,’ Thaddea groaned, pushing past him.
The room was small – maybe a quarter of the size of a regular classroom – and empty. It was also very dark. Morrigan felt around on the wall as the group made their way inside.
‘Where’s the light switch?’ she asked.
‘Ow! That was my foot, Francis, you klutz.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t see—’
BANG. The door swung shut behind them, and the group fell silent.
‘Where’s our teacher?’ Anah whispered in a voice that shook a little.
‘Shhh,’ said Lam quietly. ‘Watch the wall. It’s about to begin.’
CHAPTER TWO
A Carefully Manoeuvred
Sequence of Events
A few silent seconds passed in the darkness and then the wall came to life with vivid, moving images. Morrigan blinked into the sudden brightness.
They were watching a projected film of a night she remembered well.
Nine children were lined up outside the Wundrous Society. A huge, elaborate tapestry made of real flowers covered the gates and twisting green vines formed the words:
Come in and join us.
The members of Unit 919 stood dumbstruck, watching their past selves of a year ago and wondering what this new strangeness was all about. Most of them, anyway.
‘Does my hair really look that fluffy?’ Hawthorne whispered in Morrigan’s ear.
‘Yes.’
He nodded. ‘Cool.’
‘What’re we meant to do?’ asked the on-screen Thaddea. The on-screen Morrigan peeked sideways at her, looking smaller and more intimidated than she remembered feeling.
And then something happened in the projection that made Morrigan’s skin turn instantly to gooseflesh, all up and down her arms. Something she didn’t remember.
She felt a hand grip her wrist as Cadence came close and said, ‘What … are they?’
Even if Morrigan had known the answer, at that moment she couldn’t have made her throat form words.
The nine unwitting members of Unit 919 stood outside Wunsoc at midnight on Spring’s Eve, excited and expectant, waiting breathlessly to begin their new lives as members of Nevermoor’s most elite organisation.
And all the while, behind them, crawling out of the darkness, were dozens of … Morrigan didn’t know what they were. Monsters, she supposed.
They were dark-scaled creatures, fleshy and many-limbed, not quite unnimals but barely human. They crawled on the ground, pulled along by powerful forearms, and dragged long, muscular tails behind them. Their strangely humanoid faces were angular and wide, their eyes as black as their scales, glittering like beetles.
Morrigan had never seen anything like them in her life. They were like an experiment gone wrong. Snakes turned nearly human … or vice versa. Even looking at them on film, she felt a visceral, primitive urge to run. Yet she was frozen to the spot.
‘Is this a joke?’ asked Anah. Her voice was high-pitched and tremulous. ‘Is this some sort of horrible joke? Because it’s not very funny.’
She turned and ran for the door, but found it was locked.
‘This isn’t FUNNY!’ she shouted again.
The rest of 919 instinctively drew closer together, watching in creeping horror as the snake-like creatures slithered up behind their on-screen counterparts. If Morrigan hadn’t lived this night herself, if she didn’t know how it ended, she’d be convinced she was about to watch herself and her friends get attacked and eaten by monsters.
It didn’t happen, of course. Seconds before the prowling creatures would have reached them, more figures came out of the darkness – human figures this time, sorcerers in black Wunsoc cloaks – and silently herded the beasts back into the shadows, wielding firelit branches and swinging strange smoking talismans.
Improbably – impossibly – the Unit 919 of the past hadn’t noticed any of this. Their eyes were fixed keenly on the gates as they creaked open, inviting them into a secret world of opportunity and adventure.
All except Lambeth, Morrigan noticed. She watched her carefully on the screen. Lam stood at the end of the row of children, peering back into the darkness, her eyes wide with terror.
‘You never said anything,’ Morrigan said quietly, turning to look at Lam. The light from the projection illuminated her face. ‘Why didn’t you tell us?’
Lam’s chin trembled a little. ‘I … it just … seemed kinder not to.’
The nine children marched eagerly into the grounds of Wunsoc, all but Lam oblivious to the danger behind them.
Morrigan exhaled in relief, looking at Hawthorne and Cadence in the dim classroom, and they stared back at her in mute bewilderment. At last, with the gates shut behind them and the monsters no longer visible, it felt like some air had returned to the room. Then an amplified voice spoke over the footage, and they all jumped in shock.
‘I suspect you are all wondering why you’re here.’
Morrigan knew those brittle tones. It was Elder Quinn.
Gregoria Quinn was one of the High Council of Elders, the three most revered people in the Wundrous Society. The High Council was elected by all members of Wunsoc at the beginning of each Age, to lead and govern them until the next. Morrigan could see why Elder Quinn had been chosen for this honour; she may have been small and frail and very, very old, but she was a formidable woman. Her fellow Elders – Helix Wong and Alioth Saga – were nearly as impressive, Morrigan thought. (But not quite.)
‘For many years,’ Elder Quinn’s voice echoed around them, ‘the Wundrous Society has had one mission. One unified, secret purpose, expressed in two discrete yet equally important tasks. We call this purpose, for want of a grander title, Containment and Distraction.’
‘So … not Chips and Dip,’ whispered Hawthorne and, absurdly, Morrigan had to clap a hand to her mouth to suppress a hysterical giggle.
‘Shhh,’ said Cadence, elbowing her in the ribs. ‘Look.’
Elder Quinn spoke while the footage continued – of an inauguration night that was entirely different from the one they had experienced. And yet it was the same night.