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"Shut your fat gob," Bronwyn replied "If you’d ever done a nice thing for another person, younice for another person," Enoch said, "and it nearly got us eaten by hollows!"

We oodbyes that went unreturned and slipped quietly into the shadows Melina took the pigeon from her shoulder and tossed it skyward It flew a short distance before a string she’d tied around its foot snapped taut and it hovered, caught in the air, like a dog straining at its lead "Miss Wren’s this way," Melina said, nodding in the direction the bird was pulling, and we followed the girl and her pigeon friend down the alley

I was about to assume holloatch, roup, when solance back at the sisters I turned in time to see Sam lift Esme into the ambulance, then bend forward to plant a kiss on each of her scraped knees I wondered ould happen to them Later, Millard would tell me that the fact that none of them had ever heard of Sam--and someone with such a unique peculiarity would’ve been well known--meant she probably had not survived the war

The whole episode had really gotten to Emma I don’t knohy it was so iood-hearted, e knew ourselves to be--but the suggestion that ere anything less than angels walking the earth, that our natures were more complexly shaded, see

Then again, I thought,depended on a pigeon Whether ould end the night in the womblike safety of an y black of a hollow’s guts; whether Miss Peregrine would be saved or ander lost through this hellscape until her clock ran out; whether I would live to see ain--it all depended on one scrawny, peculiar pigeon

I walked at the front of the group, feeling for hollows, but it was really the pigeon who led us, tugging on its leash like a bloodhound after a scent We turned left when the bird flew left, and right when it jerked right, obedient as sheep even when itbos, their jagged iron spear tips lurking di down fro, I’d reached a ne of exhaustion My head tingled strangely My feet dragged The rumble of bombs had quieted and the sirens had finally wound down, and I wondered if all that apocalyptic noise had been keeping me awake Now the s fro, hoarse voicesfor help Occasionally fellow travelers would ures escaped fro with fear and suspicion, clutching randoilt box, a funerary urn Dead bearing the dead

We ca between left and right The girl eon Show us the way"

Enoch leaned in and whispered, "If you don’t find Miss Wren, I will personally roast you on a spit"

The bird leapt into the air, urging left

Melina glowered at Enoch "You’re an ass," she said

"I get results," he replied

Eventually we arrived at an underground station The pigeon led us through its arched entry into a ticket lobby, and I was about to say We’re taking the subway--smart bird, when I realized the lobby was deserted and the ticket booth shuttered Though it didn’t look like trains would be visiting this station anytiate, along a hallway lined with peeling notices and chipped white tiles, to a deep staircase where we spiraled down and down into the city’s hu, we had to step around sleeping people wrapped in blankets: lone sleepers at first, then groups lying like scattered matchsticks, and then, as we reached bottoround platform--hundreds of people squeezed between a wall and the tracks, curled on the floor, sprawled on benches, sunk into folding chairs Those eren’t sleeping rocked babies in their arms, read paperbacks, played cards, prayed They weren’t waiting for a train; no trains were coees from the bombs, and this was their shelter