The Pack Read Free Page B

of her sight again.
    â€œTell me,” she said to Bradley. “Tell me again the story of my name.”
    â€œLater,” Bradley said. “Tonight. If I don’t start soon, we won’t be eating tomorrow—and then you won’t be smiling.”

3
    THE WAGER
    Bradley left Victor and Floris with the dogs and climbed out into the cold sunlight. The building above their basement had been an old warehouse. It had been looted and torched in the Dead Time. Its façade still stood, buttressed by crumbling walls. At its top you could read, carved in sandstone with pride, WYLIE’S ENGINEERING WORKS. Every so often, scavengers poked among its burnt offerings for something to barter with. But the Pack had left them with nothing.
    No passing stranger could have guessed that under the reinforced floor, the basement was still intact. A loose mesh of charred wood covered the entrance and Bradley, Victor and Floris always glanced around before entering or leaving. As for the dogs—well, stray dogs were everywhere.
    At the end of their alley there was only one street to Main Street. From the doorways of empty shops, eyes watched Bradley pass. Even in his hooded sweatshirt, padded against the cold, he moved lightly on his feet; you could see he had an animal awareness of what lay just beyond his vision. The eyes let him pass because he seemed at home in this world; they knew there was nothing he could give them.
    On Main Street it was still early, but the traders were about their business. They moved slowly in their shawls and heavy coats, laying out their wares on blankets, trestle tables or in the centres of old tires.
    One man laid out the contents of a small sack of potatoes. It must have passed through many hands to arrive here. He sat by them with his wife, who held one in her hands like a squirrel, rolling it beneath her nose, her eyes shut as if the smell of earth were her most powerful memory.
    Another man sat picking the insignia from a pile of old army uniforms. They shone dully from the tin plate he put them in. Uniforms were highly valued for their warmth. But the truth was, anything was of value—the old coins, rusty nails, broken-up computers, plastic Mickey Mice. You had to have something to barter with to survive. And the tricky thing was, though everything was of value, you didn’t know to whom; so you had to simply deal and trade and hope that sometime you would meet someone who had something you really wanted—food, matches, clothing—when you had something they wanted as badly—a padlock with the key still in it, a chain, a knife.
    Unless you had nothing. Unless you were a beggar.
    That was how Bradley had started out. Begging in a doorway all those years ago; before meeting the Old Woman, who had instructed him on the value of cast-off objects and quick wits. His first memories were of sitting cross-legged, his head tipped back, his hands out before him. That was how Victor and Floris would be, when he passed them later that day, though sometimes, for passersby, Floris would lean back in the doorway and Victor would tilt his head towards her and emit a little whimper.
    It was in a doorway that Hunger had found him and later brought Fearless and Shelter to him. He was much younger back then, so did well with the begging. Not well enough to fill his stomach, but well enough to share. So when Hunger poked his black nose into his doorway, his slack jaw showing his sharp white teeth, Bradley offered him a piece of bacon fat. It was enough for him to return and soon Bradley was making two piles of food scraps, one for himself and one for the dogs.
    Hunger, Fearless and Shelter. He named them not because of anything he saw in them, but because of what was on his mind at the time. Though Fearless, black as Hunger, but smaller and more compact, did seem to possess courage beyond her size. Whereas Hunger’s ears were always upright and alert, Fearless’s flopped at