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Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2020 by Ship & Bird Pty Limited
Jessica Townsend has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work.
Cover and interior art copyright © 2020 by Jim Madsen
Cover design by Sasha Illingworth and Angelie Yap
Cover copyright © 2020 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
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Simultaneously published in 2020 by Hachette Children’s Group in the UK and Hachette Australia
First US Edition: October 2020
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Townsend, Jessica, 1985–author. | Madsen, Jim, 1964–illustrator.
Title: Hollowpox : the hunt for Morrigan Crow / Jessica Townsend ; illustrated by Jim Madsen.
Description: First edition. | New York : Little, Brown and Company, 2020. |
Series: Nevermoor | Audience: Ages 8–12. | Summary: “Morrigan Crow must uncover the mystery behind a new disease spreading through Nevermoor.”—Provided by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020032657 | ISBN 9780316508957 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780316495264 | ISBN 9780316508940 (ebook)
Subjects: CYAC: Magic—Fiction. | Schools—Fiction. | Diseases—Fiction. | Fantasy.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.T696 Hol 2020 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020032657
ISBNs: 978-0-316-50895-7 (hardcover), 978-0-316-50894-0 (ebook), 978-0-316-49526-4 (int’l), 978-0-7595-5694-2 (OwlCrate)
E3-20201010-JV-NF-ORI
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
CHAPTER ONE
UNIT 919
CHAPTER TWO
A CAREFULLY MANEUVERED SEQUENCE OF EVENTS
CHAPTER THREE
THE GATHERING PLACE
CHAPTER FOUR
DANGEROUS LEVELS OF CHEER
CHAPTER FIVE
SIX SWIFTS, TWO CATS
CHAPTER SIX
DE FLIMSÉ
CHAPTER SEVEN
ROOK
CHAPTER EIGHT
BASEMENT NERDS
CHAPTER NINE
THE BOOK OF GHOSTLY HOURS
CHAPTER TEN
GOLDERS NIGHT
CHAPTER ELEVEN
VISITORS
CHAPTER TWELVE
HAPPENCHANCE AND EUPHORIANA
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“WUNIMAL SHOCK AT NEVERMOOR OPERA HORSE!”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
HOLLOWPOX
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE GOSSAMER-SPUN GARDEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITY
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
EZRA, THE BOY
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
DAYLIGHT ROBBERY
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE GOBLEIAN LIBRARY
CHAPTER TWENTY
BOOK BUGS
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CONCERNED CITIZENS OF NEVERMOOR
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
THE SUNSET GALA
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
RESCUE RINGS
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
FROM BAD TO WORSE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
WE’RE ALL ON THE SAME SIDE, REALLY
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
SQUALL, THE MONSTER
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
SPARK
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
A NEW THREAT TO NEVERMOOR
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
THE HUNT FOR MORRIGAN CROW
CHAPTER THIRTY
THE KINDLING IN THE HEARTH
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CALL ME MOG
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
SQUID CROW PO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
DEAR PRIME MINISTER
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
THE EMISSARY
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
SUMMONER AND SMITH
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
COURAGE SQUARE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
BED REST
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
OPENING A WINDOW
Acknowledgments
About the Author
This book is dedicated with love to Jo Laurance and
her friend Mrs. Miller, the original cabaret duckwun.
CHAPTER ONE
UNIT 919
Winter of Two
On a glossy black door inside a well-lit wardrobe, a tiny circle of gold pulsed with light, and at its center was a small, glowing W.
Come in, it seemed to say with each gentle beat. Hurry up!
Morrigan Crow finished buttoning her starched white shirtsleeves, pulled on a black overcoat, and carefully fixed her gold W pin to the lapel. Finally, she pressed her fingertip to the shimmering circle, and just as if she’d turned a key in a lock, the door swung open onto an empty train station.
These quiet, still moments had become Morrigan’s favorite time of day. Most mornings, she was the first to arrive at Station 919. She liked to close her eyes for just a few seconds, listening to the distant rumbling of trains in the Wunderground tunnels. Like mechanical dragons waking from slumber. Ready to carry millions of people all over the city of Nevermoor on a complex tapestry of tracks.
Morrigan smiled and took a deep breath.
Last day of the autumn term.
She’d made it.
The rest of her unit began arriving, shattering the peace and quiet as the remaining eight doors were flung open up and down the platform—from Mahir Ibrahim’s ornate red door at one end, all the way to Anah Kahlo’s small, arched, unvarnished wooden one at the other—and the tiny station filled with chatter.
Hawthorne Swift, Morrigan’s best friend, arrived in his typical morning state—unbalanced by armfuls of dragonriding gear, gray shirt not quite properly buttoned, unbrushed brown curls sticking out at wild angles, blue eyes sparkling with some mischief he’d either just dreamed up or just committed (Morrigan didn’t want to know which). Archan Tate—who was always impeccably mannered and dressed—took half of Hawthorne’s teetering pile of kit for him without a word and gave the badly buttoned shirt a discreet nod.
Cadence Blackburn was the last to make it this morning. She ran in with seconds to spare—thick black braid whipping behind her, long brown limbs taking great strides—and arrived just as a single, slightly battered train carriage chugged into view, trailing puffs of white steam. Painted on its side was the familiar W symbol and the number 919, and hangi
ng halfway out the door was their conductor, Miss Cheery.
This was Hometrain, a mode of transport and home-away-from-home exclusively for them, the 919th unit of the Wundrous Society. Inside were beanbags, a lumpy old sofa, piles of cushions, a wood-burning stove that was always lit in winter, and a ceramic polar bear biscuit jar that was rarely empty. It was one of Morrigan’s favorite and most comfortable places in the world.
“Moooorning!” the conductor shouted, beaming from ear to ear and waving a handful of papers at them. “Happy last day of term, scholarly ones!”
Miss Cheery’s role as Unit 919’s official “conductor” was an interesting one—part transport operator, part guidance counselor. She was there to smooth a path through their first five years as members of Nevermoor’s most elite and demanding organization. The Wundrous Society was made up of extraordinary people with extraordinary talents, but most of them were too absorbed in their own extraordinary endeavors to pay much attention to the Society’s youngest inductees. Without their conductor, Unit 919 would be lost in the wilderness.
Miss Cheery was the only person Morrigan knew who utterly lived up to her name: she was pure sunshine. She was fresh linen, birdsong at twilight, perfectly cooked toast. She was all rainbow-colored clothes and impeccable posture, deep brown skin and enormous smile, and when the light shone through the edges of her cloudlike halo of curly black hair, she made Morrigan think of an angel… though of course, she would never say anything so cheesy out loud.
As their designated grown-up, the one thing she probably ought to have had was a bit more decorum. But 919 liked her exactly as she was.
“Last! Day! Last! Day! Last! Day!” she chanted, kicking her legs out from the train door in celebration, before it had even come to a halt.
Anah shouted back in a fretful voice, “Miss Cheery, that is NOT safe!”
Miss Cheery responded by contorting her face into something comically terror-stricken and flailing her arms as if she were going to fall out—and then actually falling out onto the platform when the train suddenly stopped.
“I’m okay!” she said, jumping up to take a bow.
The others laughed and applauded, but Anah turned to glare at them one by one, pink-faced, her blond curls swinging dramatically. “Oh yes, very funny. Except who’ll be expected to stop the bleeding when she falls onto the tracks and snaps her tibia in half? I bet none of you even knows how to splint a leg.”
“That’s why we have you, Anah.” Archan smiled at her, his pale cheeks dimpling, and bent down to help Miss Cheery pick up the scattered papers with his free hand.
“Yeah, Dr. Kahlo,” added the brawny Thaddea Macleod, nudging Anah in the side and nearly knocking her over. (It was a gentle nudge by Thaddea’s standards, but sometimes she forgot her own considerable strength.)
Anah made a face as she straightened up but seemed somewhat mollified by Thaddea’s use of the word Doctor.
“Miss, what’s…” Archan was staring at one of the papers, frowning in confusion. “Are these new timetables?”
“Thanks, Arch. Help me pass them out, will you?” the conductor replied, waving Unit 919 onto the train. “Come on, everyone aboard or we’ll be late. Francis, put the kettle on, please. Lam, hand round the biscuit jar.”
Hawthorne gave Miss Cheery a puzzled look as she handed him his timetable. It was the last day of term, and they usually only received new timetables once a week. “You gave us these on Monday, Miss. Remember?”
He dropped into a beanbag while Morrigan settled on the sofa between Cadence and Lambeth, scouring her own timetable. As far as she could tell, it was identical to the one she’d been given at the start of the week: there was Tuesday’s workshop in Undead Dialects, and Wednesday’s master class in Observing Planetary Movements, followed by a class in the Sub-Five espionage wing called Cultivating and Handling Informants (that had been Morrigan’s favorite lesson of the week so far—turned out she was quite good at spy stuff).
“I do remember, yeah,” said Miss Cheery. “Despite my advanced age of twenty-one, Hawthorne, my decrepit brain does still allow me to reach into its vast memory bank to the distant past of four whole days ago.” She smiled, raising an eyebrow. “These are new timetables. Please note where today has been updated.”
Morrigan skipped to Friday’s column and, spotting the difference, asked, “What’s C&D?”
“I’ve got that too,” said Hawthorne. “C&D, Level Sub-Two. Last class of the day.”
Mahir put his hand up. “Me too!”
There was a general murmuring and comparing of schedules, and the scholars found they all had the same class. Mostly their timetables were individualized—tailored by Miss Cheery to help each of them develop their unique talents and work on their weaknesses—and it had been a couple of months since Unit 919 had had any lessons together as a group.
“Miss, what does C&D stand for?” asked Francis Fitzwilliam, sounding slightly worried. His brown eyes grew large. “Does Aunt Hester know about this? She says she has to approve any changes to my timetable.”
Morrigan raised an eyebrow at Hawthorne, who made a face back at her. Francis’s family went back several generations in the Wundrous Society, on both sides—the famous Fitzwilliams and the admired Akinfenwas. His patron—the Society member who nominated him for admission and therefore had a stake in his education—was his aunt on his father’s side, Hester Fitzwilliam. She was very strict and, in Morrigan’s opinion, a bit of a cow.
“And she says I’m not to do anything that could put my olfactory instrument at risk,” Francis went on.
“What about your old factory?” asked Thaddea.
“My nose,” he clarified. “What? Don’t laugh—a chef’s sense of smell is his greatest asset.” He nervously pressed on the end of his light brown, gently freckled olfactory instrument.
“No need to worry about your schnoz, Francis,” said Miss Cheery, with a mysterious sort of half-smile. “But I can’t tell you.”
Nine eager faces shot up to look at her, their interest immediately piqued.
Hawthorne sat up straighter. “Is it… Climbing and, um… Doing… something?”
“Nope. Solid guess, though.”
“Camouflage and Disguise!” said Thaddea. She twisted her long red hair into a topknot and rolled up her gray shirtsleeves, as if keen to get started immediately. “We’re going to learn evasive combat techniques, aren’t we? Finally.”
“Costumes and Drama?” was Mahir’s guess.
“Ooh! Cats and Dogs!” Anah clapped her hands, bouncing up and down on her cushion. “Are we going to play with cats and dogs?”
Miss Cheery laughed at that. “Lovely thought, Anah, but not quite.” She held up her hands for quiet. “Now everyone stop guessing, please. My lips are sealed. I am a vault.”
Anah’s shoulders slumped in disappointment, and she passed the biscuit jar on to Mahir.
“Lef’selah,” he said, which meant “thank you” in Jahalan, one of the thirty-eight languages he could speak with native fluency. Lately he’d been teaching the rest of the unit what he considered the “important bits” of his favorite languages—mostly how to ask for directions, pleases and thank yous, insults and rude words. (More rude words than anything else, Morrigan had noticed, though that might have been because Hawthorne kept making requests.)
“Hish fa rahlim” was Anah’s glum response as she bit into her biscuit.
Mahir looked up at her in mixed shock and amusement, and Morrigan’s mouth fell open.
“What?” Anah said through a mouthful of custard cream.
“That’s not ‘you’re welcome,’ if that’s what you meant to say,” said Mahir, trying and failing not to laugh.
“Oh, you know I’m no good at languages.” Anah made a petulant little huffing sound. “What did I say?”
Mahir, Hawthorne, and Thaddea shouted the vulgar translation in gleeful unison. Anah’s face turned bright red, Miss Cheery looked scandalized, and the rest of the unit didn’t
stop giggling for the remainder of the journey to the Wundrous Society.
It was a wrench to leave the cozy warmth of Hometrain when they arrived at Proudfoot Station. Huddling close against the wind, Unit 919 waved goodbye to Miss Cheery and dashed for the dubious shelter of the Whingeing Woods.
Wunsoc—the Wundrous Society’s one-hundred-acre campus, in the heart of Nevermoor—had plummeted into winter earlier than the city outside its walls. It was now several weeks deep into a cold snap that could freeze the snot from a runny nose. The mysterious “Wunsoc weather” phenomenon meant that Nevermoor’s days of drizzle were more like days of pouring rain and sleet inside Society grounds.
In fact, whatever the weather outside Wunsoc, inside was always just a little bit more. If Nevermoor was having a mild thunderstorm, the sky over Wunsoc was black and electrified, flashing like a disco, and to walk across the grounds was to risk becoming a lightning rod.
Today they felt the cold bone-deep, but it was made more bearable by a weak showing of winter sunlight and the knowledge that as soon as their last lesson was over, they’d be leaving Wunsoc behind for two weeks of festivities. Morrigan couldn’t wait. There was no place like her home, the Hotel Deucalion, at Christmas. She’d been dreaming of eggnog, roast goose, and spiced chocolate rum balls all winter long.
To take their minds off the chill, Unit 919 spent the long walk up to Proudfoot House making increasingly outlandish guesses about what C&D might be.
“Ooh—what about Creation and Destruction?” Hawthorne’s face lit up as he thought of it. “Maybe they’re going to turn us into ALL-POWERFUL GODS.”
“Or Chanting and Dancing,” said Lam.
“Or Chips and Dip?” said Francis.
They all lost the plot at this last, hopeful suggestion, but even through the shrieks of laughter, Morrigan didn’t miss the sound of someone hissing “Wundersmith” as a group of older scholars overtook them on the woodland path.
She was used to it now, but it still made her flinch. Almost two months had passed since her secret had been revealed to the entire Wundrous Society. Sometimes when Morrigan needed courage, she thought of Elder Quinn’s words: She may be a Wundersmith, but truly from today onward, she is our Wundersmith.
Most people at Wunsoc had the kindness and common sense to heed the High Council of Elders and accept Morrigan as one of their own, even if they weren’t thrilled to have such a “dangerous entity” among them. There were some who still took every opportunity to make her feel unwelcome, but it didn’t matter much. Morrigan was getting better at ignoring the whispers and glares, and knowing her unit had her back helped a lot. Over the last year Unit 919’s loyalty had been tested to its limit. There had been a time when Morrigan felt she would always be an outsider, but now she knew she belonged.