In the northern slums, the white line took control of the beasts belonging to moneylenders and security firms.
People locked themselves inside their homes. Ironfang boars, fire hounds and heavy lizards roamed the streets.
The girl with the copper whistle climbed onto the roof of the dye works. She spotted the swarm before the adults did and gave the familiar signal.
The dyers opened the old steam pipes. Hot mist hid the people from the beasts, but the mosquitoes navigated by heat and scent. They found the collars inside the cloud and marked them with red light.
The workers struck the clasps, not the beasts.
Not every blow landed true. One boar took a hammer to the jaw and charged the people. The girl with the whistle did not call the swarm to attack. She gave the long, low signal used at the dye works to warn of a steam release.
The workers dropped to the ground. A valve opened above the street. A white cloud hid the people, and the boar lost its target. The mosquitoes reached its collar while it searched for their scent.
Once freed, the beast did not stay to help. It smashed through a fence and headed for the northern gates.
Its owner ran after it, calling it a traitor.
Cole stopped the man.
"It never promised you anything."
That sentence provoked more anger than the attack had. But the workers had already seen the hound that stayed and the boar that left. Both choices were possible.
One hound broke free of the seal and lay down beside the master it had just been hunting. An ironfang boar left. A lizard stayed to protect the children from creatures that were still bound.
No one had given them a common order.
Cole arrived with a small group of soldiers. Command still called him a deserter, but the residents opened their courtyards to him and showed him the underground passages.
"The old drainage pipes lead to the tower," the girl said, handing the whistle back to me. "Your turn to call now."
I blew the whistle three times.
The answer came from the roofs, the cellars and the drains. The people of the district marked safe routes towards the centre.
The first evacuation route not controlled by the Guild now ran from the slums to the centre.
Lily marked the district on the map as free of the outer circuit.
The Crown's third pulse lost part of its power supply.
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