Reaper's Legacy: Book Two (Toxic City) by Tim Lebbon Read Free Book Online Page A

sight.
    “What is this?” Lucy-Anne asked.
    “She can scent information,” Rook said.
    “So she can sniff out Andrew?”
    “I think she already did.”
    Lucy-Anne stood and started up the stairs, ignoring Rook's half-hearted attempt to call her back. He fell he was down the hole he wouldn't listen when I called . On the top deck she paused and looked around in surprise.
    Every seat was taken by a shop mannequin. They were all dressed, some extravagantly, others in jeans and tee shirts. She couldn't help feeling every eye upon her.
    “You met Nomad,” Sara said. She was sitting three seats along the bus, a plastic man beside her sporting a running top and waterproof coat.
    “No,” Lucy-Anne said.
    “Sounds like you did. Smells like you did.”
    “Only in my dreams.”
    “Hmph.” Sara looked her up and down. “You're an odd one. That hair, those clothes. And from outside. I didn't think…didn't let myself believe that outside existed anymore. There's just London, and death, and sometimes one becomes the other. Interchangeable. It's not a nice place.”
    “Tell me about it,” Lucy-Anne said. And when Sara seemed to take that as a cue to talk, she did not interrupt.
    “He is to the north. Hampstead Heath, or whatever it's called now. But, girl…that's a dead place. You think London's bad, that's somewhere else. Removed by what it's become.” She nodded at the stairs. “Even those so-called Superiors don't venture there. It's a no-go place, and if you go there, you'll die.”
    “What's there?”
    “Bad people, hungry and cruel.”
    “I'm going anyway.”
    Sara watched her, suddenly growing immensely sad. “I had a daughter, few years older than you. She'd moved away a couple of years before Doomsday, we'd had a row, hadn't talked in over a year. I wonder…” She stared into space, then turned to look at the mannequin beside her. Perhaps she talked to them. Maybe they were her family now.
    Unable to think of anything comforting to say, Lucy-Anne descended the stairs to find Rook still sitting where she'd left him.
    “Hampstead Heath,” she said, and his dark expression only echoed what Sara had said. Lucy-Anne didn't care. She was going, and she knew that Rook was intrigued enough to accompany her.
    She tried to forget seeing him fall. Not all dreams come true .

As soon as Jenna could not open the door, Jack knew that they were in trouble.
    “Now what?” Sparky said. He stood and rattled at the handle, as if his own strength could undo it when Jenna's could not.
    “It's locked, Dumbo,” Jenna said.
    “Yeah? Watch this.” Sparky took two steps back and braced himself, ready to shoulder-bash the door and probably break a bone in the process.
    “Sparky!” Jack said. His friend paused, then relaxed.
    “They've probably got a guard out there,” Jenna said.
    “So what the hell's going on?” Sparky asked.
    “Me,” Jack said. “Breezer wants to see what's happening to me.”
    “And what is?” Jenna asked softly.
    “A change,” Jack said. He searched for something else to say, to explain, but he could not. Tears threatened. “I'm really scared, guys.”
    “Still a pussy,” Sparky said. But he clapped Jack on the shoulder, then ruffled his hair like a parent comforting a kid.
    “So how do we get out of this one?” Jenna asked.
    “Yeah,” Sparky said. “Can't you, like, magic the door open, or something?” Jenna nudged him in the ribs, and he feigned hurt. He pinched her rump, she slapped his face.
    Jack turned away, pursed his lips, thinking. He felt a flush of anger at Breezer—he'd taken them in to protect them, now he held them prisoner—but the man was only doing what he thought was best. That didn't mean he could be reasoned with.
    And there was no guarantee he would not use physical force to keep them there.
    “This is an office block, not a prison,” Jack said. “Thin walls. Plasterboard. We know there's probably someone watching the door out there.” He turned around and