The Twilight Circus by Di Toft

are right next door, so any loud music or loud noises …”
    â€œWe’ll know who to complain to.” Nat grinned.
    Evan glanced at his watch. “You’ve got about an hour before we eat,” he said. “Why don’t you unpack, make yourself at home, and we’ll walk across together?”
    Nat watched as Woody lit the tiny, wood-burning stove, put the kettle on it, and explained how everything worked. There were solar panels on the roof that supplied most of their electricity, which he said was stored in batteries from decommissioned submarines (another cool fact for Nat to savor). Woody lit some candles to give the gas lamp a bit more oomph, and in no time the trailer was warm and cozy. It felt like home.
    After Nat had unpacked the few things he had brought with him, the boys sat down with their drinks to talk properly without being overheard.
    Woody had been having the time of his life, by the sound of it. Nat could see that he had grown since he lastsaw him, and cleaned up his unibrow. He looked almost human in the candlelight, but Nat thought there would always be a wildness about him that would set him apart from true humans. And while Nat had been recovering from his wound in Temple Gurney, Woody had been either loping around the site in Wolven shape or, when he shifted to human shape, busy helping Evan backstage, learning French from TV commercials, and making more friends.
    Woody listened intently as Nat told him about the changes he was experiencing.
    â€œThese … things that’ve been happening, they’re not
all
bad. I don’t want my mum and dad to know what’s going on, though,” he explained. “Just after I got the Wolven blood transfusion, my sense of smell went crazy, and I’ve got, like,
infrared
vision—I can see things miles and miles away, even in the
dark
. But I get these headaches, ’cause when I’m in a crowd of people, I can’t tune stuff out: It’s like there’s always noise in my head. It’s like watching TV while you’re eating potato chips —”
    â€œWhat
you
need is an earworm,” interrupted Woody.
    Nat stared at his friend askance. He didn’t like thesound of that at all. Was this earworm some sort of parasite that lived in the ear canals of all Wolvens—or his case, half Wolvens? Did it hurt? Was it alive …?
    Woody laughed at Nat’s slightly worried expression. “An earworm isn’t alive, it’s a tune.”
    Nat still looked worried.
    â€œIt’s, like, you think of the most annoying song you can think of, and after a while it kind of lodges itself inside your head,” explained Woody. “Then you can use that to block anyone nosy enough to want to brain-jack your thoughts.”
    â€œLike you.” Nat grinned.
    â€œYup,” said Woody, nodding, “some fings are private. But what
else
has happened? Have bits of you disappeared, like when my ears don’t always go back to normal?”
    â€œNo, nothing like
that
.” Nat shivered. “It’s nothing, really; it’s stuff that’s easy to hide. I’m physically stronger; I get these premonitions when bad things are going to happen, and —”
    â€œBut you definitely haven’t shifted?” interrupted Woody again. “’cause the game will be up when that starts. Trust me, I should know.”
    â€œNo,” admitted Nat, “and I don’t think I can, either. But like I hinted in the car, something happened to me at St. Pancras, and then I met this man on the train.” He told Woody what had happened and Woody stared, his topaz eyes shimmering in the lamplight.
    â€œHe wanted
us
to join this, er … NightShift agency?” he asked, astounded.
    Nat nodded. “He reckons that there’s been an increase in supernatural activity and that the human race is in for a bit of a rough time. He said if we join them, he’d arrange a