Wild Boy and the Black Terror Read Free

framed for murder. Everyone had turned against them: the showmen, the police, even Clarissa’s mother. Their quest to catch the real killer had led them to the Gentlemen. Since then, they’d barely been apart.
    Clarissa landed beside Wild Boy. Her hair hung wild around her face. “You had that dream again, didn’t you?”
    “Just a dream,” Wild Boy said.
    He almost laughed.
Just a dream
.
    “You ever think about it?” he asked. “What happened at the fairground, with the killer, and then your mum?”
    Clarissa looked away. Her frozen breaths quickened and her hands curled into fists. Then she sprang back and continued to flip around the rooftop obstacle course. But now the movements were fiercer, the landings harder. Her boots sank deeper into the snow. “Let’s do something fun,” she said. “Something dangerous.”
    Wild Boy knew he shouldn’t think about the past. They’d been through so much. They were branded monsters, hunted for a reward. Most of London still thought they
were
monsters, at large somewhere in the city. But they were safe here, under the protection of the Gentlemen. Now they could have a little fun.
    A smile rose across his face as he watched the Gentlemen in the courtyard. They were unloading a wooden crate from their carriage. Judging from the tremble in their arms, whatever was inside was either very heavy or very dangerous.
    “They’re up to something secret,” he said.
    Clarissa landed beside him. Now she was grinning too. “Definitely looks secret. Sort of thing they don’t want to get seen.”
    “Or spied on.”
    “Well then,” Clarissa said, dusting snow from her hands, “they shouldn’t have been so bloomin’ obvious about it. Let’s go!”

2
    T he floorboards creaked under Wild Boy’s feet, sounding like a moaning ghost.
    Clarissa glanced back and scowled. “Can’t you be a tiny bit sneaky? This is a spying mission.”
    “I
am
being sneaky. See, I’m on tiptoes.”
    “I’ve heard sneakier railway trains.”
    “Shut your head. You’re being loud an’ all.”
    He was lying and they both knew it. Wild Boy was certain he’d traced her steps down the stairs. How did she move so silently, even in boots? It was as if she was floating.
    He raised a foot, determined his next step would be silent. Just as he set it down, footsteps thundered along the corridor below.
    Wild Boy and Clarissa pressed against the wall. The men from the courtyard marched past the stairs, carrying their wooden crate. A lantern rested on top, rocking light around the corridor below.
    “Quick,” Wild Boy whispered.
    They leaped down the last few steps and ran along a hallway. The windows were leaded and frosted, letting in only murky moonlight. Woollen tapestries sagged from the weight of their own dust.
    Wild Boy remembered how surprised he’d been the first time he saw the inside of the palace. Everything was so shabby. After the Gentlemen’s last headquarters, the Tower of London, were partly destroyed by fire, Queen Victoria granted them this palace as a new base. They had kept only a few of the most trusted staff, and barely a handful of its dozens of rooms remained in a condition that anyone might call palatial. Stucco decorations on the ceilings were black from lamp smoke, and peeling paper revealed walls that glistened with damp.
    “Come on,” Clarissa said.
    They ran faster, turning a corner in time to see a door slam and hear the
clunk-thunk
of a lock turning on the other side.
    “Can you open this?” Wild Boy said.
    “Course I can.”
    Clarissa pulled a slim leather pouch from her boot and flipped it open. Inside were several thin metal picks. She’d learned another skill at the circus, from her father. He’d been a star there too –
an escape artist
.
    She studied the lock, selected two picks and slid them into the keyhole. A twist. A turn. The door creaked open.
    No light shone through. The only sounds were their own heavy breathing and thumping hearts.
    Wild Boy