Free Hollow City by Ransom Riggs Page B

sighed deeply, the spark snuffed, and continued. “But our numbers are not a fraction of what they were. We have fallen into near extinction. Do any of you know what became of the peculiar animals that once roamed the world?”
    We chewed silently, ashamed that we didn’t.
    “Right, then,” he said. “Come with me and I’ll show you.” And he trotted out into the sun and looked back, waiting for us to follow.
    “Please, Addie,” said the emu-raffe. “Not now—our guests are eating!”
    “They asked, and now I’m telling them,” said Addison. “Their bread will still be here in a few minutes!”
    Reluctantly, we put down our food and followed the dog. Fiona stayed behind to watch Claire, who was still sleeping, and with Grunt and the emu-raffe loping after us, we crossed the plateau tothe little patch of woods that grew at the far edge. A gravel path wound through the trees, and we crunched along it toward a clearing. Just before we reached it, Addison said, “May I introduce you to the finest peculiar animals who ever lived!” and the trees parted to reveal a small graveyard filled with neat rows of white headstones.
    “Oh, no ,” I heard Bronwyn say.

“There are probably more peculiar animals buried here than are currently alive in all of Europe,” Addison said, moving through the graves to reach one in particular, which he leaned on with his forepaws. “This one’s name was Pompey. She was a fine dog, and could heal wounds with a few licks of her tongue. A wonder to behold! And yet this is how she was treated.” Addison clicked his tongue and Grunt scurried forward with a little book in his hands, which he thrust into mine. It was a photo album, opened to a picture of a dog that had been harnessed, like a mule or a horse, to a little wagon. “She was enslaved by carnival folk,” Addison said, “forced to pull fat, spoiled children like some common beast of burden—whipped, even, with riding crops!” His eyes burned with anger. “By the time Miss Wren rescued her, Pompey was so depressed she was nearly dead from it. She lingered on for only a few weeks after she arrived, then was interred here.”
    I passed the book around. Everyone who saw the photo sighed or shook their head or muttered bitterly to themselves.
    Addison crossed to another grave. “Grander still was Ca’ab Magda,” he said, “an eighteen-tusked wildebeest who roamed the loops of Outer Mongolia. She was terrifying! The ground thundered under her hooves when she ran! They say she even marched over the Alps with Hannibal’s army in 218 BC . Then, some years ago, a hunter shot her.”
    Grunt showed us a picture of an older woman who looked like she’d just gotten back from an African safari, seated in a bizarre chair made of horns.
    “I don’t understand,” said Emma, peering at the photo. “Where’s
    Ca’ab Magda?”
    “Being sat upon,” said Addison. “The hunter fashioned her horns into a chair.”
    Emma nearly dropped the album. “That’s disgusting!”
    “If that’s her,” said Enoch, tapping the photo, “then what’s buried here?”
    “The chair,” said Addison. “What a pitiful waste of a peculiar life.”



“This burying ground is filled with stories like Magda’s,” Addison said. “Miss Wren meant this menagerie to be an ark, but gradually it’s become a tomb.”
    “Like all our loops,” said Enoch. “Like peculiardom itself. A failed experiment.”
    “ ‘This place is dying,’ Miss Wren often said.” Addison’s voice rose in imitation of her. “ ‘And I am nothing but the overseer of its long funeral!’ ”
    Addison’s eyes glistened, remembering her, but just as quickly went hard again. “She was very theatrical.”
    “Please don’t refer to our ymbryne in the past tense,” Deirdre said.
    “Is,” he said. “Sorry. Is .”
    “They hunted you,” said Emma, her voice wavering with emotion. “Stuffed you and put you in zoos.”
    “Just like the hunters did in