A World of Ash: The Territory 3 (15 page)

The clergy-captain nodded. “I’ll have the tower and the central chamber sealed,” he said as he spun on his heels and left to confront their unknown attackers. But Squid knew who they were. He had no doubt it was the men from Reach. He would have liked to think it was for him and Nim and his mother and all the others held at Pitt they had come for, but he knew it wasn’t. The people of Reach wanted to fulfil the role they had considered theirs for hundreds of years. They would not see the vaccine fall into the hands of those responsible for the fall of civilization.

Soon after the clergy-captain had left another clergyman entered the office. “If you remain in here, Priestess, we’ll seal the doors and drop the bridges.” The clergyman’s eyes tracked to Squid, Nim, and Constance. “Would you like me to have these prisoners taken to the cells?”

Priestess Regina shook her head. “No. Just seal the tower.” She indicated the two clergymen flanking Squid, Nim, and Constance. “These two will remain in here to ensure the prisoners do me no harm.”

The clergyman left and closed the door. His departure was followed by the sound of a much heavier door sealing them inside the tower.

“This central tower was designed to be locked down in the event of rioting,” Priestess Regina said. “We are safe from the fighting in here.”

“Why exactly did you want to see us?” Squid asked. “You think your prisoners are rioting because of us, so why not just leave us in our cells?”

“Because,” Sister Constance answered for her, “she believes. She won’t admit it but she believes you really are spoken of in prophecy, Squid. Isn’t that right, Regina?”

The Warden of Pitt turned her head slowly from Sister Constance to Squid and then back. Squid thought she was considering her reply carefully. Perhaps she didn’t want to reply at all. Her silence was punctuated by yet more pounding on the main gate of the prison.

“What I believe,” Priestess Regina said, “does not matter.”

“Of course it matters,” Sister Constance said. “You are a priestess, as I am a Sister. All we have is what we believe.”

The warden said nothing.

“Look on the desk,” Sister Constance said, pointing to the silver bird the warden had dropped onto the dark wood. “That is the end of the ghouls. God has sent that to this world. High Priestess Patricia should not be allowed to stand in the way of that.”

“She is the word of God on earth!” Priestess Regina barked.

“She is a woman like you or me, and she has lost her way.”

Regina set her jaw. Squid didn’t know whether she was angry or whether his mother was managing to sway her stubborn opinion. Maybe that was what was making her angry.

A booming attack on the main gate sounded out again but this time it didn’t end there. It was followed by a splintering crack, an immense fracturing of thick wood. The main gate had broken, if not all the way then at least part of the way. It was only a matter of time until the attackers managed to fight their way inside. While Squid knew they were certainly coming for the vaccine, he wasn’t sure whether they would consider Squid, Nim, and his mother friend or foe. The next sound they heard was not the hollow boom that had echoed down into the prison so many times before but an almighty crunch and grind. Squid knew the gate had been breached.

“I know who just made it into your prison,” Squid said. “They’ve come for the vaccine. If you deliver it to them they will leave. They’re not here for you or anyone in Pitt.”

“This
vaccine
as you call it is stored in a safe place,” Priestess Regina said. “Your wastelander friends won’t be getting hold of it.”

“Why do you fight what you know is right Regina?” Constance said. “The vaccine could save us all.”

“The ghouls are getting closer to Alice all the time,” Squid pressed. “Do you really think everyone deserves to die because they were born outside the walls of Alice? Isn’t this prison built on the assumption that people can change? You tell the prisoners here that people deserve to be redeemed. Why aren’t the people in the slums around Alice given that same chance?”

The sounds of fighting could be heard creeping closer down the tunnels of Pitt. Gunshots. The crack of mechanical rifles and the burst of shotguns.

“Why?” Squid asked again. “What is it your church actually believes? Are people worth saving or not?”

Voices became clearer. Orders were being shouted. Pain and shock were being let out in screams.

“I … I’m—” Priestess Regina started, but she stumbled over her words, stopping and starting and stopping again, unsure of herself.

“What?!” Squid felt a heat rising within him. “What excuse are you going to make?”

The cacophony outside continued to increase in volume, as did the tension in the room. The Warden of Pitt had suddenly shrunk in Squid’s eyes. She was staring at him but she was not so intimidating anymore, and not even as tall. Her feet shuffled on the floor like a child under a headmistress’s glare. It took him a moment to realize that it was his glare she was shrinking from.

“Where is the person in charge here?!”

The voice came from outside. Squid recognized it this time. It was Ernest, First Sergeant of the Reach Border Patrol, just as Squid had thought it would be.

“We’re just here for the vaccine,” Ernest called. “Hand it over and we leave. You cannot hide in that tower forever.”

“Tell your men to open the doors and drop the bridges,” Squid said to Priestess Regina. “Let them have the vaccine.”

A shotgun blast peppered the outside of the tower. “Final warning,” Ernest called.

Squid walked toward the door. The two Holy Order clergymen moved to block his way. “Let me pass,” he said, but the clergymen would not move. Squid spun back to the warden. “You are not the High Priestess. You can still do the right thing. Tell them to open the door and drop the bridge.”

She took a long moment, but eventually Priestess Regina nodded. “Let them across,” she said.

The clergymen moved quickly; perhaps they had already been swayed by Squid’s words. They opened the door to the office and then slid aside the heavy reinforced door that had sealed off the small room in which they had sat earlier. The wooden bridge had been raised up, pulled to vertical on this side of the great chasm of the central chamber. Across the other side Squid could see Ernest in his white uniform, which was splattered with dirt and blood, and a group of thirty or more similarly uniformed men behind him. He rested his shotgun on his shoulder and his grimy face cracked into a chuckle when he saw Squid.

“Lad,” he said. “Didn’t take you long to end up running things here, then?”

Squid looked at the clergymen standing to the side. “Get this bridge down,” he said, hoping he sounded like he really was the one suddenly in charge here. Thankfully they complied, unlatching two chains and lowering the heavy bridge until it fell into place on the wooden platform opposite. Ernest immediately began walking across to meet him. He stretched out his hand and shook Squid’s. Ernest laughed.

“We came for the vaccine, lad,” Ernest said. “But I was hoping we’d find you here. Didn’t half like the way we had to leave things back at the outpost. Not the way we like to operate in Reach.”

Squid smiled. “I’m very glad to see you too.”

“So what do you say we get the vaccine and get out of here?”

Squid spun back to Priestess Regina, who stood in the doorway behind them. “It’s over here,” he said. “You’re done. Where is the vaccine?”

The warden’s lips pinched together before she exhaled heavily in defeat. “It’s here in the tower,” she said, “one level below us.”

“And what about her?” Ernest said, looking over Squid’s shoulder at the warden.

“Leave her,” he said. “She let us go. Let her stay in her crumbling prison.” Below them Squid could still hear the prisoners fighting. With the rioting below and the men from Reach attacking from above, Squid knew it was inevitable that Pitt would soon be overthrown.

Squid led the men from Reach down to the next level of the tower. Whoever had been guarding the doors of this level had long ago fled or gone to join the fight elsewhere in the prison. Squid slid the doors open and found the bags of silver birds piled on the floor in the center of the room. The Reach Border Patrol moved in to collect them. Ernest lifted a bag, unbuckling and opening the flap to look inside. He held the bag extended for Squid to take.

“Here,” he said. “You deserve this. Central Territory or not, you’re right. It’s not up to me to decide who gets it and who doesn’t.”

“Thank you,” Squid said. “Though I think it might be too late for the people outside Alice. The ghouls have probably reached the city already.”

“There are dirigibles here,” Ernest said. “My men have already secured their hangar. One of those would make your trip back to the Central Territory much quicker, lad.”

Squid looked at Nim and his mother. “I don’t think any of us knows how to fly a dirigible.”

“I told you I’d help,” Ernest said. “I have men who know how to fly.”

From every direction Lynn felt the weight of curious and interrogative stares. No matter where they walked through the organically twisting streets of the slums, eyes watched them with interest and trepidation. They watched from behind windows of dirty glass or through wooden shutters, and from gaps in doors held slightly ajar. The people who passed them by blatantly turned their whole bodies to watch them, their eyes and mouths thin. The presence of Knox Soilwork beyond the Wall was drawing a lot of attention. Lynn didn’t know whether anyone recognized him – she supposed some might – but even to those who didn’t know how close this man had come to running the Territory it was clear enough that he wasn’t from the slums, or anywhere in the Outside, which meant he wasn’t to be trusted.

Lynn squeezed the hilt of her sword, feeling the slick of sweat her palm had left on the grip. Ever since the Administrator had betrayed them, as she’d known he would, and left them locked out of the gate, her sword hadn’t left her hand. She knew how she and Knox must have looked, both with mechanical rifles slung over their shoulders and she holding the sharp, polished blade before her in readiness. She knew that at least some of those staring eyes would be evaluating them not as unexpected strangers but as potential prey. Weapons or not, they were a sixteen-year-old girl and an elderly man walking alone beyond the Wall of Alice in a slum that had increased in population by thousands over the last few weeks, a slum where everything was in such short supply that she had no doubt people were willing to fight and maybe die for whatever they could scrounge or steal.

That was what their escort of ex-Diggers had been for, protection against the inevitable violence they would face. Though perhaps, after all, that violence had not been as inevitable as they’d first thought. Lynn felt the unfiltered stares of those around her and it made her uncomfortable, but so far no one had made a move to engage them. No one had taken a chance on the two unlucky Insiders trapped beyond the Wall. There was something restraining the population here. Not something, Lynn suspected, but
someone
.

It had not been difficult to catch wind of the man they had come beyond the Wall to find. Everywhere they searched a single mention of Hank Barton’s name brought with it awe and concern in equal measure – awe at what Hank had accomplished in uniting so many people of the slums together, and concern about why these Insiders happened to be seeking him out. Hank Barton was the leader the slums needed right now, they would say, what did they want with him? Were they here because the Insiders were afraid Hank would actually succeed? Everyone assured Lynn and Knox they wouldn’t give Hank up to some Insiders who wanted to be rid of him.

Even when they’d convinced people they weren’t with the Holy Order and bore Hank no ill will, most of them could only point in the general direction of where they’d heard Hank had last been, but as they drew closer the directions became more certain. It was like the game of “Hunting the Ghoul” Lynn had sometimes played with the other kids at school. One child, blindfolded, would call out, “I’m thirsty!” to which the other children had to answer, “Over here!” and the ghoul would try to catch the others just by following the sound of their voices. That’s what searching for Hank was like: a clue here, a voice pointing them in the right direction somewhere else.

That had been a dumb children’s game, but Lynn knew now that the rush of giggling fear that had flooded her chest when the child playing the ghoul had reached out for her was all too much like the actual fear she felt as snarling, screeching ghouls grabbed at her. A child’s version of a very real thing. She felt a flutter of that fear now, knowing that even as they searched for Hank the horde was out there, following the trail of moisture toward them.

“What are we going to do when we find him?” Lynn asked as she stepped around a large pile of what was either horse manure or mud or maybe a bit of both. “We can’t get all of the Outsiders in behind the Wall now. We can’t even get ourselves back behind the Wall.”

“Our first order of business is to convince Mr. Barton not to engage in an outright attack against the gates.”

They had heard whispers of this as they walked the slums. The odd person would share some vague detail about the plan they thought was in the works. Hank was leading the way, of course, and he was readying to attack the city. He was going to lead them in a fight to claim a spot within the safety of the Wall. Lynn knew without Knox needing to explain it to her that an attack like that, without support from inside the city, was foolhardy on a massive scale. It was on par with sending all the Diggers to be slaughtered at the teeth of the horde in the first place. If the slum-dwellers attacked the city gates they would be decimated.

Knox spoke to a bent-backed lady with long gray hair matted together in thick ropes. Other hairs, whiter than those on her head, grew out from her chin in curls, and Lynn found them incredibly difficult to look away from.

The lady pointed with a gnarled finger at a structure a short distance away. “In there,” she said. “That’s Hank’s house.”

“Thank you,” Knox said. He made to walk away but evidently the lady hadn’t finished.

“Never used to live in a place that big. He used to live a bunch of streets over, near where the bio-fuel comes in. His father was a good man, fixed my dress once. I remember when Hank was much younger than he is now. Not really anybody much. Had a nice wife. I don’t know where she is now. Dead probably. Everyone here ends up dead sooner than they should, ’cept me of course, and I’m probably the only who wants to be.”

“Thank you,” Knox said awkwardly, stepping away as the old woman opened her mouth to continue. Lynn sniggered. Knox had tried to convince her he was worldly, that he knew his way around outside of Alice. It certainly didn’t seem that way. He was about as good with people as Squid. In fact, her small, wonderfully weird friend from a dirt farm on the outskirts of the Territory was probably better adjusted to all this than Knox would ever be. She couldn’t help but smile and had to suppress a giggle.

“What is it, Lynnette?” Knox asked, a sharp edge to his voice. He knew she found his interactions with the common people of the slums amusing.

“Nothing,” she said. “Nothing at all.”

Knox and Lynn walked toward the building the old woman had pointed out. It was large in comparison to the surrounding structures but it was still nothing more than a shack compared with the houses Lynn was used to. It stood much wider than it was tall. A building higher than a single story was exceedingly rare in the slums. There were places where structures had been erected on the semi-collapsed skeletons of whatever had been there before, but that was hardly the same. Like most of the dwellings in the slums, Hank Barton’s house was built from sheets of corrugated iron tacked up onto a wooden frame. It stood straight at least, avoiding the lean that many of the slum buildings had developed. There were openings for the windows cut into the front of the building. Pieces of the same corrugated iron had been cut and attached with hinges to act as shutters, which were currently closed. The door was made of thick wood and wouldn’t have looked out of place on a house inside Alice; consequently it was probably the sturdiest part of the entire house. Two men stood flanking the door. One was similarly proportioned to the house itself, his shoulders so muscled he gave the impression he was wider than he was tall. The other Lynn recognized as the man who had been wielding the club when she’d attracted so much unnecessary attention when she and Squid had first left the city. She didn’t know his name but remembered he was Hank’s son.

Hank’s son and the strong-shouldered man eyed them as they approached. Lynn saw them rock forward onto their toes, standing to attention from where they’d both been leaning against the wooden beams that supported the small eave overhanging the front door. Up to this point Knox had taken the role of speaking with the people they met, and as entertaining as that had been for Lynn, this time she jumped in before he could.

“We’re here to see your father,” Lynn said.

Knox glanced at her, and she knew he’d be confused by her sudden interjection and the fact that she knew this was Hank’s son, but he didn’t let it show. He played along, presenting the appearance of a confident, united front. This was what he’d brought her along for, after all.

Hank’s son shook his head. “Sorry, lotsa people want to get in and see Dad nowadays. We can’t just let anyone in. Especially not Insiders with weapons. We’re slum-dwellers. We ain’t stupid.”

“What’s your name?” Knox asked.

“Terry.”

“Well, Terry, we’re here because we believe we can help you and your father,” Knox said. “We want the same thing you do – to protect the Outsiders and find a way to get you all inside before the horde arrives.”

Terry stared at them with evaluating eyes. “I don’t believe you.”

“With all due respect, Terry,” Knox said, “you don’t need to believe me, your father does. Please let us speak to him.”

“Well,” Terry said, crossing his arms, “you don’t see my father unless I say so. So you better start thinking about convincing me.”

Lynn looked at Knox in annoyance. This time, when it seemed Knox was managing to annoy the very people they were searching for, his ungainly interactions weren’t all that amusing. “Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of diplomat?” she said in a low voice.

Knox turned to Lynn and leaned down until his face was close to her own. He spoke, keeping his voice equally low. “I do not conduct my negotiations with doormen.”

Lynn shook her head at the stubborn old man. Not everything was as well structured as the politics of Alice. Here, in the real world, you actually needed to deal with real people.

“Do you remember me, Terry?” Lynn asked.

Terry’s eyes squinted and his brow furrowed for a moment and then lifted when he gave a slight nod of his head. He clicked his fingers and then pointed at her, bouncing his finger up and down. “You’re that girl,” he said. “You’re that girl who pulled a bloody sword on my old man. You expect we’re just going to let you of all people waltz in there? With another sword to boot!”

Lynn dropped her sword to the ground in front of her and then slipped her rifle off and let that fall with a clatter to the hard, dry ground too. Knox did the same. Lynn raised her hands in a submissive gesture. “No weapons,” she said. “And I did pull my sword on your father, but I was wrong to, it was an accident, a case of mistaken identity. Don’t you remember what I said to you?”

“I remember,” Terry said, “you and that boy, that Diggers Apprentice, weren’t he? You said you were looking for a weapon against the ghouls. You said you were gonna save us.”

Lynn nodded. “That’s right. We said we were going to save you. That’s why I’m here. We’re here to help.”

“Where’s this weapon then?” Terry asked. “I don’t see anything but a sword and a couple of rifles and that ain’t gonna do much, not against the number of ghouls we’re facing.”

“I don’t have a weapon against the ghouls,” she said. “But that boy I was with, Squid, he’s still out there somewhere and I believe he’s going to find it and he’s going to bring it back here.”

“That’s a lot of belief,” Terry said. “A lot of ifs and maybes if you ask me.”

From behind Terry the door to the house swung open. Hank Barton stood in the doorway. When they’d been wandering the slums searching for him, Lynn hadn’t really been able to remember what he looked like. Now, though, she immediately recognized the face she had held her sword to. Her mind had been a blur of anger then, an uncontrolled opening to the chasm of her rage. She knew she’d changed since that moment in the slums. All that she’d been through had taught her how to control her anger, and why it was worth doing so. Now that she was face to face with Hank again she felt ashamed of the way she had attacked him. She had leaped to a ridiculous conclusion about what he might have known about her father’s murder. Now she knew it was High Priestess Patricia who had orchestrated her father’s death. That had helped focus her anger too. She knew who needed to pay.

As Hank looked out at them he didn’t look like the helpless old man Lynn remembered. In fact, the expression on his face, the sense of control in his eyes, reminded her a lot of Knox Soilwork, and the Administrator and the High Priestess, even Squid when she had last seen him. All those in positions of authority shared that look, those who felt a compelling drive to fulfil their duty and a single-minded dedication to the achievement of a goal.

“Why don’t you come inside, Miss …?”

“Hermannsburg, Lynn Hermannsburg.”

“Lynn,” Hank said. “I’d say it’s good to see you again but that would require our last meeting to have been a little more enjoyable for me.”

Lynn’s face grew hot. “I’m sorry about that,” she said. “I was … I was out of line.”

“You were angry,” Hank said. “Don’t worry. This sunburned world makes us all angry.” Hank turned to look at Knox. “And I know who you are, Chief Minister Soilwork. You make an interesting sight outside the Wall.”

“These are interesting times,” Knox replied.

“You could call them that. I call them terrifying times. Come in, both of you.”

“Dad,” Terry said, “I’m not sure—”

“It’s fine, Terry,” Hank said. “They’ve dropped their weapons. They’re just here to talk.”

Terry and the much larger man stepped aside and let Lynn and Knox follow Hank into the house. They entered directly into a living space where several wooden chairs in various styles and colors surrounded a low-standing table.

“Please,” Hank indicated with his palm open, “sit.”

The three of them sat on the chairs in a small circle.

“I’d offer you something but I’m afraid I’ve never seen the food shortages this bad before.”

“That’s fine,” Lynn said.

“Sorry about my boy out there, but as you can imagine I’ve become something of a target for the Holy Order – not that there are many of them left out here now, and even fewer that give a ghoul’s arse about whatever mission they had before the city was sealed.”