And Shadow wanted to say that he was not theirs, was not anybody’s, but the thin blanket had slipped from the bed, and his feet stuck out at the bottom, and thin moonlight filled the attic room.

There was silence, now, in that huge house. Something howled in the hills, and Shadow shivered.

He lay in a bed that was too small for him, and imagined time as something that pooled and puddled, wondered if there were places where time hung heavy, places where it was heaped and held-cities, he thought, must be filled with time: all the places where people congregated, where they came and brought time with them. And if that were true, Shadow mused, then there could be other places, where the people were thin on the ground, and the land waited, bitter and granite, and a thousand years was an eyeblink to the hills-a scudding of clouds, a wavering of rushes and nothing more, in the places where time was as thin on the ground as the people…

“They are going to kill you,” whispered Jennie, the barmaid.

Shadow sat beside her now, on the hill, in the moonlight. “Why would they want to do that?” he asked. “I don’t matter.”

“It’s what they do to monsters,” she said. “It’s what they have to do. It’s what they’ve always done.”

He reached out to touch her, but she turned away from him. From behind, she was empty and hollow. She turned again, so she was facing him. “Come away,” she whispered.

“You can come to me,” he said.

“I can’t,” she said. “There are things in the way. The path there is hard, and it is guarded. But you can call. If you call me, I’ll come.”

Then dawn came, and with it a cloud of midges from the boggy land at the foot of the hill. Jennie flicked at them with her tail, but it was no use; they descended on Shadow like a cloud, until he was breathing midges, his nose and mouth filling with the tiny, crawling stinging things, and he was choking on the darkness…

He wrenched himself back into his bed and his body and his life, into wakefulness, his heart pounding in his chest, gulping for breath.

VII

Breakfast was kippers, grilled tomatoes, scrambled eggs, toast, two stubby, thumblike sausages, and slices of something dark and round and flat that Shadow didn’t recognize.

“What’s this?” asked Shadow.

“Black pudden’,” said the man sitting next to him. He was one of the security guards, and was reading a copy of yesterday’s Sun as he ate. “Blood and herbs. They cook the blood until it congeals into a sort of a dark, herby scab.” He forked some eggs onto his toast, ate it with his fingers. “I don’t know. What is it they say, you should never see anyone making sausages or the law? Something like that.”

Shadow ate the rest of the breakfast, but he left the black pudding alone.

There was a pot of real coffee now, and he drank a mug of it, hot and black, to wake him up and to clear his head.

Smith walked in. “Shadow-man. Can I borrow you for five minutes?”

“You’re paying,” said Shadow. They walked out into the corridor.

“It’s Mr. Alice,” said Smith. “He wants a quick word.” They crossed from the dismal whitewashed servants’ wing into the wood-paneled vastness of the old house. They walked up the huge wooden staircase and into a vast library. No one was there.

“He’ll just be a minute,” said Smith. “I’ll make sure he knows you’re waiting.”

The books in the library were protected from mice and dust and people by locked doors of glass and wire mesh. There was a painting of a stag on the wall, and Shadow walked over to look at it. The stag was haughty and superior: behind it, a valley filled with mist.

“The Monarch of the Glen,” said Mr. Alice, walking in slowly, leaning on his stick. “The most reproduced picture of Victorian times. That’s not the original, but it was done by Landseer in the late 1850s as a copy of his own painting. I love it, although I’m sure I shouldn’t. He did the lions in Trafalgar Square, Landseer. Same bloke.”

He walked over to the bay window, and Shadow walked with him. Below them in the courtyard, servants were putting out chairs and tables. By the pond in the center of the courtyard other people, party guests, were building bonfires out of logs and wood.

“Why don’t they have the servants build the fires?” asked Shadow.

“Why should they have the fun?” said Mr. Alice. “It’d be like sending your man out into the rough some afternoon to shoot pheasants for you. There’s something about building a bonfire, when you’ve hauled over the wood, and put it down in the perfect place, that’s special. Or so they tell me. I’ve not done it myself.” He turned away from the window. “Take a seat,” he said. “I’ll get a crick in my neck looking up at you.”

Shadow sat down.

“I’ve heard a lot about you,” said Mr. Alice. “Been wanting to meet you for a while. They said you were a smart young man who was going places. That’s what they said.”

“So you didn’t just hire a tourist to keep the neighbors away from your party?”

“Well, yes and no. We had a few other candidates, obviously. It’s just you were perfect for the job. And when I realized who you were. Well, a gift from the gods really, weren’t you?”

“I don’t know. Was I?”

“Absolutely. You see, this party goes back a very long way. Almost a thousand years, they’ve been having it. Never missed a single year. And every year there’s a fight, between our man and their man. And our man wins. This year, our man is you.”

“Who…” said Shadow. “Who are they? And who are you?”

“I am your host,” said Mr. Alice. “I suppose…” He stopped, for a moment, tapped his walking stick against the wooden floor. “They are the ones who lost, a long time ago. We won. We were the knights, and they were the dragons, we were the giant-killers, they were the ogres. We were the men and they were the monsters. And we won. They know their place now. And tonight is all about not letting them forget it. It’s humanity you’ll be fighting for, tonight. We can’t let them get the upper hand. Not even a little. Us versus them.”

“Doctor Gaskell said that I was a monster,” said Shadow.

“Doctor Gaskell?” said Mr. Alice. “Friend of yours?”

“No,” said Shadow. “He works for you. Or for the people who work for you. I think he kills children and takes pictures of them.”

Mr. Alice dropped his walking stick. He bent down, awkwardly, to pick it up. Then he said, “Well, I don’t think you’re a monster, Shadow. I think you’re a hero.”

No, thought Shadow. You think I’m a monster. But you think I’m your monster.

“Now, you do well tonight,” said Mr. Alice, “and I know you will-and you can name your price. You ever wondered why some people were film stars, or famous, or rich? Bet you think, He’s got no talent. What’s he got that I haven’t got? Well, sometimes the answer is, he’s got someone like me on his side.”

“Are you a god?” asked Shadow.

Mr. Alice laughed then, a deep, full-throated chuckle. “Nice one, Mister Moon. Not at all. I’m just a boy from Streatham who’s done well for himself.”

“So who do I fight?” asked Shadow.

“You’ll meet him tonight,” said Mr. Alice. “Now, there’s stuff needs to come down from the attic. Why don’t you lend Smithie a hand? Big lad like you, it’ll be a doddle.”

The audience was over and, as if on cue, Smith walked in.

“I was just saying,” said Mr. Alice, “that our boy here would help you bring the stuff down from the attic.”

“Triffic,” said Smith. “Come on, Shadow. Let’s wend our way upwards.”

They went up, through the house, up a dark wooden stairway, to a padlocked door, which Smith unlocked, into a dusty wooden attic, piled high with what looked like…

“Drums?” said Shadow.

“Drums,” said Smith. They were made of wood and of animal skins. Each drum was a different size. “Right, let’s take them down.”

They carried the drums downstairs. Smith carried one at a time, holding it as if it was precious. Shadow carried two.