The Hunted Read Free Page B

old bins. This was worse than pins and needles. He was being very brave. If it was her she would have been just screaming and screaming.
    ‘It’s all right,’ she said, using the same words he’d said to her earlier. Had he been lying too?
    ‘I don’t want to move my hands,’ he said. And she saw that there were bubbles coming from inside the blood. Inside his body.
    ‘If you move them a little I can see how bad it is,’ said Ella.
    ‘It’s very bad,’ said Monkey-Boy and she could hear the crying in his voice. ‘He bit me. He was trying to eat me, Ella. Trying to eat me alive.’
    ‘Well, he didn’t!’ said Ella angrily. ‘We were saved, remember. You were saved – you’re going to be all right. Just move your hands a little and I’ll see …’
    Then he did and she wished he hadn’t because she saw stuff. Awful stuff. Coming out of him. Like a nest of fat worms, grey and blue and brown and white. And then she screamed as something knocked into her hard, the torch was grabbed off her and shut down. She felt a hot hand pressing over her mouth so that her scream was strangled into silence. She was crushed to the ground, the smell of grass and mud filling her nose, and she knew that soon she would be like Monkey-Boy. She waited for it. The teeth in her skin, her bones snapping …
    Eaten alive …
    But the body on top of her didn’t move. Just lay there all hot and still, the hand holding her mouth closed. She could hear his breathing, harsh and raspy through his nose … She remembered the nose, how it had looked all mangled, the nostrils open like in a skull. She felt a calm come over her. If this was the end then she would never be scared again.
    She waited. The man breathing in her ear.
    And nothing happened.
    She was still alive. In the dark. A little disappointed that she would have to carry on being scared, carry on struggling. At last, slowly, slowly, the thing rolled off her, still holding her in one strong arm. She could seeMonkey-Boy. He hadn’t moved. He was very still. And, beyond him, moving figures. Three people, adults, coming towards them. The grown-up who had hold of her turned her head so that she was facing him – he had his fingers to his lips, shushing her.
    She swallowed and nodded. He let go of her. Moved his hands and the next thing he was holding two knives, their blades glinting.
    Were they for her?
    She didn’t think so. There had been something in his face. Something almost friendly.
    Ella heard a noise and turned back to see the three grown-ups had almost got to Monkey-Boy, and he still hadn’t moved. Was he playing dead to fool them?
    One of them, a father – she could see now – stooped over Monkey-Boy. And then, in a flappy rustle of clothing, Scarface was up and running, crouching low. He punched out at the father who dropped to the ground. One of the other two grown-ups, another father, hissed and swung his arms wildly, but Scarface dodged them, went under, then up, stabbing at his face. The father fell over backwards. The last of the three was a mother. She was holding her hands up to protect herself, fingers like claws. Scarface easily darted round her, and stabbed twice at her side. She squealed, holding her stomach, and ran around in circles. Finally Scarface did something to her that Ella couldn’t see and she went down with a thump.
    It was very quiet and still now. Scarface waited there, as if listening, raised his face, sniffing the air, then moved among the three dead bodies. Finally he came back over and looked at Monkey-Boy. His shoulders dropped. He touched Monkey-Boy’s face. Knelt there in silence, andthen came over to Ella. He gave her back her torch then jerked his head as if to say, ‘Come along.’
    ‘What about my friend?’ said Ella, nodding towards Monkey-Boy. Scarface shook his head.
    Ella felt a great weight of sadness crash down on her, forcing tears out of her eyes and down her cheeks.
    It wasn’t fair
. Monkey-Boy had never wanted to