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Jace swung one leg over the monsterbike: it still looked like a Frankenstein of a thing, all rattly. "I don't want to be near people right now," she said. "People suck. Let's go to the forest."

They drove their bikes down away from the park, down the embankment, across the creaky bike-bridge across the river: down another street until they were at the forest, where the redhead swung her leg back over her bike again and wheeled it instead. The forest floor was relatively dry -- it had rained earlier, but hadn't gone through -- and was quiet and still, except for the wind rustling through the treetops, scattering the detritus on the floor here and there. It was comfortingly gloomy.

"I have some snacks in my bag," she said after a while. They were swallowed by the trees: they were much bigger than they were, much thicker, and Jace strayed off the path and into the darker woods. She'd always liked the darkness. It felt safe. "We'll find somewhere to sit, I guess. You eat jerky?"

Jace had been about to say what? Cool, really? when she realised that if Irelia was saying something like that -- fearless Irelia -- then it was probably going to creep her out, and that would be an a*****e thing to do. So she said, "Wells are dumb," and made a ninety-degree angle turn, until both of them came to the grassy bank that overlooked the river. She sat down with a thump, bike leaning against a tree, and she opened her knapsack. The river was sluggish and lazy today, not flowing too fast: everything seemed to go stiller.

"This is cool jerky," she said, "we brought it over from Africa. It's made of ostrich, it tastes real weird."

Pause. "What's it like being a goat girl?"

The redheaded girl gave her a serious what the hell are you talking about look: she pulled the jerky out of her knapsack and gave Irelia a big piece before tearing into one herself. Everyone needed some weird meat. "Your legs are cool," she said. "You have demon hooves." (This was cool to Jace.) "The key thing's weird, though. It never comes off? Not even in the shower?"

Jace peered over at the keyhole in a way that would probably embarrass and traumatise both of them when they were teenagers. Chewing avidly -- probably Jace was just eating it because it was an ostrich, and eating an ostrich was neat -- and tilted her head, swallowing thoughtfully. "We could get a hairpin and try to pick it," she said, "I saw that on TV. Maybe it opens up your chest and your lungs and s**t."

"What the ******** got Jacoba's attention: she stopped trying to peer into the keyhole and sat up a little, peering into Irelia's face to see if she had been screwing around with her, all tangerine eyes and a raised eyebrow that she had spent most of her time in Africa learning how to c**k. "Boarding school? And who beat you up? Because I'll seriously bully their asses so hard their kids' kids will be describing it to a therapist."

It was a good thing that Irelia had not: Jace would have, in fact, immediately darted off to confront Asher, which was not the best idea ever had by any preteen girl. Her fists were bunched up already in annoyance: obviously nobody was allowed to abuse Irelia other than her. "s**t, Rel," she said. "Jesus. Boarding school. My mom would so freakin' do that if she didn't think I'd bust out of there Hulk-style in five seconds. Boarding school. That's so weird."

Jace hugged her knees close to her skinny chest. Then she took another comforting mouthful of ostrich jerky. "It was okay," she said thickly, through a mouthful of dead bird. "I mean, I was sick the first half. Being stuck with M.B. and Wisp sick is no friggin' picnic. Wisp is such a retard, and M.B. is, like, seriously unsympathetic even when you're hacking up a lung. But after that it was actually kind of cool. We were out in the middle of nowhere -- there was, like, this gazelle herd you could see wandering out in the weird dry grass, and like a billion snakes, and sometimes the grass set itself on fire for no reason."