Free Wormwood Gate by Katherine Farmar

mean, I still think it was a good idea to get away from those three guys, and to go on the roof rather than the ground, but as to what would happen when we were up here … I sort of hoped it would be possible to improvise.’
    â€˜Improvise what? A helicopter?’
    Aisling glared at her. ‘If you have any ideas on how to improve our situation, I’m open to suggestions.’
    â€˜Is there a fire escape?’
    â€˜Where do you think we are, New York? No, there isn’t a fire escape.’
    â€˜A drainpipe, then. Or a window ledge? We climbed up. There must be a way to climb down.’
    â€˜Stand back a bit and I’ll look.’
    Julie scuttled back crabwise, and Aisling crouched down and shifted her body back so that she could lie face-down in the valley and peer over the side of the roof. The wall was a plain gable-end, with no windows, no creeper, no drainpipes within reach, not even a bit of uneven brickwork to grab onto. She pushed herself back up into a sitting position and shook her head.
    â€˜Nothing?’ said Julie.
    â€˜Nothing.’
    Julie looked despondent, and then she started laughing.
    â€˜What?’ said Aisling.
    â€˜I just realised … even though I’m trapped on the roof of a building with no phone service and no way of getting down, this is actually the most fun I’ve had in months.’
    Aisling grinned, warmth rising in her cheeks and her belly. ‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘me too,’ and then, because that felt like giving away too much, she stood up and spread her arms. ‘Look at the view!’
    From their vantage point on the roof, Aisling could see a ribbon of river snaking through the mostly-dark city, the darkness punctuated by many small white lights and three big red ones – the fires: the three burning castles. The city grew misty beyond the areas illuminated by the fires; there was a vague suggestion of mountains in one direction, something that might have been a bay in another, a wide strip that was probably a road stretching out towards a third.
    Julie stood up beside her and looked. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘It’s amazing. Makes me wish my camera was working.’
    â€˜Yours isn’t working either?’
    â€˜Nope. What do you think that’s about?’
    â€˜I don’t know,’ said Aisling, frowning. She took out her phone and fiddled with it a little, then put it back in her pocket. ‘I mean, I have a theory.’
    â€˜Well, let’s hear it, then.’
    â€˜Well … Well, it’s totally speculative and not exactly grounded in anything other than the observations I’ve been able to make since we arrived here, and it might be complete nonsense and disproved by the next thing we see, and in any case I’m not completely –’
    â€˜Aisling!’
    â€˜Right. Yes. Em. Well, you know what I said earlier, about this being a hallucination? What if it sort of is, only –’
    There was a shriek and a cry from overhead. She broke off. There was another cry, then another, then a chorus of shrieks all at once, and a flock of seagulls descended to swoop around them in a circle. Julie ducked down into a crouch, and Aisling followed a second later, sweeping her arm around Julie to cover her with her coat and peering up at the birds. There were dozens of them, squealing and lamenting like lost souls, wheeling around and around so fast that the wind from their wings made her eyes water.
    â€˜This isn’t normal!’ Aisling said, shouting to be heard over the gulls’ cries. ‘Seagulls don’t act like this!’
    â€˜I don’t think they are seagulls,’ Julie shouted back. ‘I think they’re –’
    Whatever she thought they were, Aisling never heard it, because the gulls chose that moment to swoop in and grab hold of her by the epaulettes and belt of her coat. Aisling cried out and let go of Julie, but Julie grabbed