The Whitechapel Fiend Read Free

seen Jace and George do it—they seemed to grip the tree very lightly. Simon tried this, realized it was futile, and grabbed the tree in a hug so intimate, he wondered if they were now dating. Using this awkward clutching method and some froglike leg pushes, he managed to get up the trunk, scraping his face along the way. About three-quarters of the way up, he felt his palms slick with sweat and he started to lose his grip. The falling feeling filled him with a sudden panic and he gripped harder.
    “You’re doing fine,” Jace said in a voice that suggested Simon was not doing fine, but that was the kind of thing Jace was supposed to say.
    Simon made it to the branch using a few desperate moves he knew looked very bad from below. There was almost definitely a moment or two when his butt must have been on display in a less-than-flattering manner. But he made it. Standing up was the next trick, which he accomplished with more fevered gripping of the trunk.
    “Good,” Jace said, giving a quirky little smile. “Now just walk to me.”
    Jace walked backward down the branch. Backward .
    Now that Simon was on the branch, it didn’t look like it was fifteen feet off the ground. It looked like it was in the sky. It was round and uneven and slippery as ever and it wasn’t meant to be walked on, especially not in the sneakers Simon had chosen to wear that morning.
    But he’d gotten this far and he wasn’t going to let Jace just do his magic backward walk while he clung to the trunk. He had gotten up there. Climbing down was a bad prospect, so there was really just the one option, and at least it was quick.
    Simon took his first step. His body immediately began to shake.
    “Look up,” Jace said sharply. “Look at me.”
    “I need to see—”
    “You need to look up to keep your balance. Look at me .”
    Jace had stopped smirking. Simon looked at him.
    “Now step again. Don’t look down. Your feet will find the branch. Arms out for balance. Don’t worry about down yet. Eyes on me.”
    Somehow, this worked. Simon made it six steps out onto the branch and was amazed to find himself standing there, arms rigid and out like airplane wings, the wind blowing hard. Just out on a tree branch with Jace.
    “Now turn to face the Academy. Keep looking out. Use it as a horizon. That’s how you stay balanced—you choose a fixed point to concentrate on. Keep your weight forward—you don’t want to go over backward.”
    No. Simon really didn’t want to do that. He moved one foot to meet the other, and then he was standing facing the pile of rocks that formed the Academy, and his fellow students below, all looking up. Most did not look impressed, but George gave him a thumbs-up.
    “Now,” Jace said, “bend a bit at the knees. And then I want you to just step off in one large stepping motion. Don’t jump with both feet. Just step. And as you go down, bring your legs together and keep yourself relaxed.”
    This should not have been the hardest thing he’d ever done. Simon knew he’d done more. He knew he’d fought demons and come back from the dead. Jumping out of a tree should not have felt this terrifying.
    He stepped into the air. He felt his brain react to this new information— There’s nothing there, don’t do it, there’s nothing there —but momentum had already pulled his other leg off the branch and then . . .
    The good thing that could be said about the experience was that it was quick. Points to gravity on that one. A few seconds of almost blissful fear and confusion and then a hammering feeling as his feet met the earth. His skeleton juddered, his knees buckled in submission, his aching skull lodged a formal complaint, and he fell over sideways in what would have been a roll if he had rolled and not, in fact, just remained there on the ground in a shrimp position.
    “Get up, Lewis!” Scarsbury yelled.
    Jace landed beside him, like a large killer butterfly, barely making a noise.
    “The first one is always