Necropolis

both. Scarlett wondered how that would go down with Mrs. Murdoch. Somehow she knew it wasn't going to mean laughter and backslapping at bedtime.
    In fact, the accident had several consequences.
    Paul and Vanessa Adams were told what had happened when they got home that night, and as soon as they had got over the shock, the knowledge of how close they had come to losing their only child, they began to argue about whose fault it was: their own for allowing Scarlett too much freedom, Aidan's for distracting her, or Scarlett's for showing so little road sense, even at the age of thirteen. In the end, they decided that in the future, Mrs. Murdoch would take up her old position at the school gates. It would be another nine months before Scarlett was allowed to walk home on her own again.
    The identity of the man who had saved her remained a mystery. Where had he come from? How had he seen what was about to happen? Why had he been in such a hurry to get away? Mrs. Murdoch decided that he must be an illegal immigrant, that he had taken off at the sight of the approaching policeman. For her part, Scarlett was just sorry that she hadn't been able to thank him. And if he was in some sort of trouble, she would have liked to have helped him.
    That was the night she had her first dream.
    Scarlett had never been one for vivid dreams. Normally she got home, ate, did her homework, spent forty minutes on her PlayStation, and then plunged into a deep, empty sleep that would be ended all too quickly by Mrs. Murdoch shaking her awake for the start of another school day. But this dream was more than vivid. It was so realistic, so detailed, that it was almost like being inside a film. And there was something else that was strange about it. As far as she could see, it had no connection to her life or to anything that had happened during the day.
    She dreamed that she was in a gray-lit world that might be another planet…the moon perhaps. In the distance, she could see a vast ocean stretching out to the horizon and beyond — but there were no waves. The surface of the water could have been a single sheet of metal. Everything was dead. She was surrounded by sand dunes — at least, that was what she thought they were, but they were actually made of dust. They had somehow blown there and — like the dust on the moon — it would stay the same forever. She walked forward. But she left no footprints.
    There were four boys standing together, a short distance away.
    The boys were searching for her. If she listened carefully, she could actually hear them calling her name.
    She tried to call back; but although there was no wind, not even a breeze, something snatched the words away.
    The boys weren't real. They couldn't be…Scarlett had never seen them before. And yet, somehow, she was sure that she knew their names.
    Scott. Jamie. Pedro. And Matt.
    She knew them from somewhere. They had met before.
    That was the first time, but over the next two years, she had the same dream again and again. And gradually, it began to change. It seemed to her that every time she saw the boys, they were a little farther away, until finally she had to get used to the fact that she was completely on her own. Every time she went to sleep, she found herself hoping she would see them. More than that. She needed to meet them.
    She never spoke about her dreams, not even to Aidan. But somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew that finding the four boys had become the single most important thing in her life.
    TWO
    The Door

    Two years later, Scarlett had turned fifteen — and she had become an orphan for a second time.
    Paul and Vanessa Adams hadn't died, but their marriage had, one inch at a time. In a way, it was amazing they had stayed together so long. Scarlett's father had just started a new job, working for a multinational corporation based in Hong Kong. Meanwhile, her mother was spending more and more time with her own business, looking after customers who seemed to demand her attention twenty-four hours a day. They were seeing less and less of each other and suddenly realized that they preferred it that way. They didn't argue or shout at each other. They just decided they would be happier apart.
    They told Scarlett the news at the end of the summer holidays and, for her part, she wasn't quite sure what to feel. But the truth was that in the short term it would make little difference to her life. Most of the time she was on her own with Mrs. Murdoch anyway, and