Free The Sacrifice by Charlie Higson

selling old clothes and books and unwanted toys. Everyone talking away, eating and
     drinking and happy.
    Well, this was like a horrible parody of
     those days. Now the parents were eating
each other
. Thank God there were no
     kids down there tonight. It didn’t really upset Shadowman watching adults being
     killed and eaten. And that bothered him a little. Bothered him that he wasn’t
     bothered.How quickly he’d become hardened to it all. What did
     that say about him? Before things fell apart this would have been the most horrific
     sight. He’d have needed to go into therapy to cope with it. Now he was mostly
     intrigued by the organization shown by the strangers, by the planning that had seemed to
     go into the attack.
    Something did bother him, though.
    The strangers would be stronger now, better
     fed, quicker … 
    But still hungry. Always hungry.
    Shadowman prayed that they didn’t find
     any children tonight.

12
    Her name was Tish. She was fourteen years
     old. She’d grown up north of here in Islington, with her mother, a brother called
     Neil and a dog called Boris. This much Sam and The Kid had learnt about the green girl.
     Once she’d stopped crying.
    Ed had put her in with them, in their little
     house on Mint Street built into the outer wall of the castle. Mint Street was like a
     medieval street inside the Tower, with flowers growing in pots and clothes hanging out
     to dry on lines. The houses were self-contained, mostly single-storey, with two or three
     bedrooms each. They had little front doors and narrow arched windows that looked out on
     to the cobbled street, on the other side of which were the high battlements and old
     towers of the inner wall. There were some small windows at the back of the houses,
     little more than arrow slits for the most part, going back more than a metre through the
     stonework in a cross shape. You couldn’t see much through them and Sam was OK with
     that. The less he saw of the world outside, the better. The Casemates were warm and dry
     and felt utterly safe. No sickos were ever going to force their way into the castle.
    Sam and The Kid shared a room, with a bed
     each. A girlcalled Ali had another room and Tish had been given the
     third bedroom.
    Ed had told Sam and The Kid that they were
     to gently find out as much as they could about Tish. He felt he couldn’t face her
     yet, felt awful about killing her friend, who he now knew was called Louise. He was
     keeping a distance and wanted all the other older kids to do the same. Tish needed to
     settle in and feel reassured.
    ‘Anyone coming here from the outside
     world has valuable information,’ he’d told the boys. ‘When she’s
     ready, Jordan can properly quiz her, but for now find out what you can.’
    He’d been right to keep away. Tish was
     really cut up about Louise, wouldn’t stop talking about her, about what good
     friends they’d been. How she couldn’t get the picture out of her mind,
     Louise lying there dead, her hand cut off, her throat slashed, her guts … 
    It had taken her a few days to bottom out
     and now she was obviously still very sad, but she wasn’t crying all the time. She
     would either have to bury her sadness or go crazy. Like most kids she had horrible
     memories shut away and had a sort of haunted look about her. She was calm, though, and
     quiet, and seemed to like being with Sam and The Kid.
    It was nearly bedtime. They’d all four
     shared a communal meal in the café with the Tower kids – tonight it had been rice and
     beans – before returning to their house.
    Ali had gone to bed to read a book. She read
     a lot. Had been quite happy living there by herself, didn’t seem to get lonely or
     need company; nothing seemed to freak her out. She seemed OK with the three newcomers.
     Hardly seemed to notice them really. Spent most of the time with her nose in a book.
     Books were valuable, the only realentertainment most kids had, apart
     from when they