Wayward Son (Simon Snow, #2)(6)

“I’ll be fine, Snow. It’s only eight hours. I get through every day without slaughtering people.” I’ve got through fifteen years, as a matter of fact. Not a single (vampire-related) casualty.

“What about when we get there?”

“No worries, I’ve heard that America is overrun with rats. And other animals. Grizzly bears, show dogs.”

He smiles at that, and it’s so good to see that I sling my arm around his shoulders and think about hugging him. There’s a woman standing in line near us, giving us her most aggrieved “don’t be gay” face, but I don’t care—easy moments with Simon are miserably few and far between.

Simon cares. He notices the woman, then leans over to mess with his bag—the same duffel he used to carry back at Watford. When he stands up, he’s pulled away from me.

He pats his thigh, nervously checking his tail.

I’m still not sure why Snow gave himself a tail.…

The wings, I understand. They were a necessity, he needed to escape. But why the tail? It’s long and red and ropey, with a black spade at the tip. If the tail has a use, I haven’t figured it out. He isn’t putting it to one, anyway.

Bunce thinks that in the moment, Simon was actually turning into a dragon, not just wishing for wings.

Which doesn’t explain why he still has them, more than a year later. Snow gave up his magic—all of it—to defeat the Insidious Humdrum. So it’s not like he’s using magic to maintain his dragon parts, and most spells would have worn off by now.

“But it wasn’t a spell,” Bunce said the last time we talked about this. “He transformed himself.”

Simon’s still touching his thigh, smoothing down the back of his jeans. I try to reassure him. “No one can see it,” I say.

“I’m just nervous. I’ve never flown before.”

I laugh. (I mean, he does have wings.)

“In a plane,” he says.

“It’ll be fine. And if it isn’t—say, if the engines die—will you save me? Will you fly me out the nearest exit?”

His face falls. “Do the engines do that? Just die?”

I bump my shoulder against his. “Promise you’ll save me first even if there are women and children.”

“If the engines die,” he says, “you and Penny better fix them. Have you been practising the spells?”

“I don’t know any plane-engine-preserving spells, do you, Bunce?”

Bunce has walked up with our boarding passes. “Plane-engine-preserving?” she repeats.

“You know, in case of critical engine failure.”

“Simon can save me,” she says.

“He’s already saving me.”

“I’m saving the women and children!” Snow says.

“Technically,” I say, “you won’t have wings.”





6





SIMON


I half expect to get stopped when I go through the security scanner. “Sir, we just need to pat down your tail.” But it’s all fine, just like Baz and Penny said it would be. I wouldn’t be surprised if Penelope jammed the machine. As soon as we’re through security, Penny buys me a bag of jelly babies and a Coke. (I’m skint; she and Baz are covering the whole trip.)

I’ve never been in an airport before. I spend an hour pacing and rolling my shoulders; they feel too light. There’s really nothing back there. I keep leaning back against walls to check. I go to the men’s room and pull up my shirt, looking over my shoulder at the mirror. Nothing but freckles.

When I come out, Baz and Penny are queued up to get on the plane, and Penelope is motioning for me to hurry up. I squeeze behind her, jostling no one with my wings. I’m thinking of everything I could do like this. Get on the Tube. See a film. Stand next to someone at a urinal without knocking him over.

I would never have fit on the plane with my wings. I couldn’t have got down the aisle without clipping everyone who was already sitting.

Baz moans when we get to our seats—in the middle of a row, in the back of the plane. “For snake’s sake, Bunce, you couldn’t spring for first class when you were stealing our tickets?”

“We’re keeping a low profile,” she says.

“I could keep a low profile in first class.”

I pull him down. It’s a tight fit between me and the lady on the other side. (She’s wearing a cross. That’s handy—Baz won’t be tempted to bite her.)

It feels good to sit back and push my shoulders directly against the seat. My spine pops. It feels good to sit this close to Baz. And the lady with the cross can’t get mad at us because we have to sit this close. It’s sitting in economy that’s making us gay.

Not that she will get mad at us necessarily.… You just never know when someone’s going to make you feel bad about what you are. The last time Baz and I held hands in public, some girl with a nose ring took offence. If you can’t trust people with nose rings to be open-minded, who’s left?

Baz said the girl wasn’t looking at us funny—he said her face just looked like that. “That woman has a miserable aspect. She put that hoop through her septum to distract from it.” He also says I can’t assume that everyone who frowns at me is frowning because I’m with a boy. “Some people just won’t like you, Simon. I didn’t like you for years.”