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Squeezing the hand of the girl next to me, I lean in to whisper in her ear.
I tell her the plan, and make her promise that if something happens to me, she will help her friends get there. “You just keep on following the shoreline. Do you understand?”
She looks at her friend, a small boy whose hand she’s holding. When she looks back at me, she nods. “I understand.” The strength in her voice makes me smile.
“Good girl.” I stroke her hair. “And when you get to the mountains, you unbind your wings. Do you hear?” I say firmly.
“You’ll be with us, though, won’t you?” she asks, pushing back her shoulders in an attempt to look brave.
“Of course, I will. This is just in case we get separated.” I gesture to her friends. “Now, pass the message along so that everyone knows.”
Smiling a little – pleased to be given some responsibility – she does as I’ve asked and passes the message amongst her friends. It spreads like autumn leaves on a cool breeze. And soon they all look a little brighter.
There is a plan.
They will live happily in the mountains with their unbound wings and the kind mountain fae who take them in.
What a wonderful dream.
I blink tears from my eyes and comb my fingers through my hair.
How did it come to this?
Someone pushes past us, shoving the children out of the way in their hurry to leave the Shadow Quarter. I yell at them, but they don’t look back.
Panic is starting to spread.
The bridge is in sight now, and the moon is shining brightly.
“There...” I smile and inhale deeply. “We’re almost out of the city.”
A ripple of excitement spreads through the children and their pace quickens. In their pairs, they scurry onto the bridge. There are a few other Shadowkind heading in this direction, but they do not stop and do not acknowledge me or the children.
No one asks if we need help.
No one questions where we are going.
We are in the middle of the bridge when it starts to shake.
The children stop. Several of them release scared squeaks that sound almost kitten-like in their pitch.
I brace my hand on the side of the bridge and turn back towards the citadel. The castle looms large against the dark sky. A shadow. Barely visible, but beating with a blackness that makes me shudder.
Matching the rhythm of my heart, the bridge shakes again.
The children hurry to the sides and grip on to steady themselves. It creaks.
I peer over the edge. The water is moving faster than it should. Far too fast. As if it can’t get back to the ocean quickly enough.
“What’s that?” the girl with the blue eyes points in the direction of the castle.
I follow her gaze.
Something is moving towards us. A wall of darkness.
My first thought is of Finn’s shadows, but then I realise it is too solid to be shadows. It is not air we are looking at; it is water.
A raging wall of water.
