Monsters of Men (35 page)

Bring me a messenger
, he shows.

The Sky sends a messenger to the Clearing.

Not me, though I begged.

He sends the one who was captured and returned. We all watch through him as the Pathways follow him down the rocky face of the hill, stopping at intervals along the way so that the voice of the Land can reach into the Clearing like a tongue, speaking through the one chosen.

We watch through his eyes as he walks into the Clearing, watch the faces of the Clearing as they step back, opening up a path, not grabbing him, not cheering over him as they did last time, and in their voices, he can hear the order given by their leader to let him come to them untouched.

We should release the river
now,
I show.

But the Sky’s voice pushes mine back.

And so the Land walks through their streets, leaving the last Pathway behind him, making the final steps across their central square himself, towards their leader, a man called Prentiss in the language of the Burden, standing there waiting to receive us as if he was the Clearing’s Sky.

But there are others, too. Three of the Clearing without voices, including the Knife’s one in particular, whose face the Knife thought of so regularly I know it almost as well as my own. The Knife is by her side, silent as before but even now his useless worry is obvious.

“Greetings,” says a voice–

A voice not the leader’s.

It is one of the voiceless. Through the clicks they make with their mouths, she has stepped in front of the Clearing’s leader, her hand out, reaching for our messenger. But her arm is grabbed by the leader of the Clearing, and for a moment there is a struggle between them.

And then the Knife steps forward, steps past them.

Steps up to the messenger.

The leader and the voiceless one watch him, each held back by the other.

And the Knife says with his mouth, “Peace. We want peace. No matter what these two tell you, peace is what we want.”

And I feel the Sky beside me, feel his voice take in what the Knife has said, how he says it, and then I feel him reach out even further through the messenger, out into the Clearing itself, reaching deep into the Knife’s silent voice.

The Knife gasps.

And the Sky listens.

The Land does not hear what the Sky hears.

What are you doing?
I show.

But the Sky is already sending a response through the Pathways–

Sending the voice of the Land speaking as one down the hill and along the road and across the square and into the voice of the messenger–

So quickly the Sky can only have been planning it all along–

A single word–

A word that makes my voice rise in uncontainable rage–

Peace
, the Sky shows the Clearing.
Peace
.

The Sky offers them peace.

I storm away from the Sky, from all of the Land, walking, then running up the hillside to my private outcropping–

But there is no getting away from the Land, is there? The Land is the world and the only way to leave it is to leave the world altogether.

I look at the band on my arm, at the thing that makes me for ever separate, and I make my vow.

Killing the Knife’s Ben won’t be enough, though I will do it and make the Knife know that I did–

But I will do more.

I will block this peace, I will block it if it kills me to do so.

The Burden will be revenged.

I will be revenged.

And there will be no peace.

[T
ODD
]

“It’s obvious,” the Mayor says. “
I
will be the one who goes.”

“Over my dead body,” Mistress Coyle snaps.

The Mayor smirks. “I can accept that as a condition.”

We’ve all crammed into a little room on the scout ship. Me, the Mayor, Mistress Coyle, Simone and Bradley, with Lee, his face covered in scary-looking bandages, on one bed and Viola, looking awful, on another. This is where we’re having the most important talk in the human history of New World. In a little room that smells like sickness and sweat.

Peace,
the Spackle said to us,
Peace
coming thru loud and clear, like a beacon, like a demand, like an answer to what we’ve been asking.

Peace.

But there was something else there, too, something digging round in my head for a minute, like when the Mayor does it but faster, sleeker, and it weren’t like it was coming from the Spackle in front of us neither, it was like there was some kinda mind behind his, reaching
thru
him and reading me, reading my truth, no matter if I was quiet–

Like there was just one voice in the whole world and it was talking only to me–

And it heard that I meant it.

And then the Spackle said,
Tomorrow morning. On the hilltop. Send two.
He looked round to all of us in turn, stopping on the Mayor for a second, who stared back at him hard, and then he turned and left without even seeing if we agreed.

That’s when the arguing started.

“You know full well,
David,
” Mistress Coyle says, “that one of the scout ship people has to go. Which means there’s only room for one of us–”

“And it won’t be you,” says the Mayor.

“Maybe it’s a trap,” Lee says, his Noise rumbling. “In which case, I vote for the President.”

“Maybe Todd should go,” Bradley says. “He’s the one they spoke to.”

“No,” the Mayor says. “Todd stays.”

I spin round. “
You
don’t get a say in what I do.”

“If you’re not here, Todd,” the Mayor says, “what’s to stop our good mistresses from planting a bomb in my tent?”

“What a splendid idea,” Mistress Coyle smiles.

“Enough bickering,” Simone says. “Mistress Coyle and I would make a perfectly good–”

“I’ll go,” Viola says, in a quiet voice that stops all of us.

We all look at her. “No way,” I start to say, but she’s already shaking her head.

“They only want two of us,” she says from the bed, coughing heavy. “And we all know that can’t be the Mayor or Mistress Coyle.”

The Mayor sighs. “Why do you two still
insist
on calling me–?”

“And it can’t be you either, Todd,” she says. “Someone has to keep him and her from killing us all.”

“But yer sick–” I say.

“I’m the one who fired the missile into the hillside,” she says, quiet. “I’ve got to fix it.”

I swallow. But I can see on her face how much she means it.

“I can actually agree with that,” Mistress Coyle says. “Viola will be a good symbol of the future we’re fighting for. And Simone can go with her to lead the talks.”

Simone stands up a little straighter but Viola says, “No,” coughing some more. “Bradley.”

Bradley’s Noise sparks with surprise. Simone’s would, too, if she had any. “The choice isn’t yours, Viola,” she says. “I’m Mission Commander here and I’m the one–”

“They’ll read him,” Viola says.

“Exactly.”

“If we send two people without Noise,” she says, “how’s that going to look? They’ll read Bradley and they’ll see peace,
for real
. Todd can stay here with the Mayor. Simone and Mistress Coyle can keep the scout ship in the air above the talks at all times to keep us safe, and me and Bradley will go up that hill.”

She coughs again. “And now you all need to leave so I can rest up for tomorrow morning.”

There’s a silence as we all think about this idea.

I hate it.

But even I can see the sense of it.

“Well,” Bradley says. “I suppose that settles that.”

“All right then,” the Mayor says. “Let’s find a place to have a few words about terms, shall we?”

“Yes,” Mistress Coyle says, “let’s do that.”

They all start filing out, the Mayor taking one last look round before he leaves. “A mighty fine ship,” he says as he disappears out the door. Lee goes, too, using Bradley’s Noise. Viola starts to say he can stay but I think he’s leaving us alone on purpose.

“You sure about this?” I ask her, when they’re all gone. “You don’t know what could be up there.”

“I don’t like it much either,” she says, “but it’s how it has to be.”

And she says it a bit hard and she’s looking at me and not saying nothing.

“What?” I say. “What’s wrong?”

She starts shaking her head.

“What?”
I say.

“Your Noise, Todd,” she says. “I hate it. I’m sorry. I
hate
it.”

{VIOLA}

He looks back at me, puzzled.

But he doesn’t
sound
puzzled. He doesn’t sound like
anything
.

“It’s a
good
thing that I’m quiet, Viola,” he says. “It’s gonna help us, help
me,
cuz if I can . . .”

He trails off because he’s still seeing the look on my face.

I have to turn away from him.

“I’m still me,” he says quietly. “I’m still Todd.”

But he isn’t. He isn’t the same Todd whose thoughts spilled out all over the place in a big, colourful mess, the one who couldn’t tell a lie if his life depended on it, who
didn’t
tell a lie when his life
did
depend on it, the Todd that saved my life more than once, in more than one way,
that
Todd who I could hear every uncomfortable thought of, who I could count on, who I knew–

Who I–

“I ain’t changed,” he says. “I’m just more like you, more like all the men you grew up knowing, more like
Bradley
used to be.”

I keep looking away from him, hoping he can’t see how weary I feel, how my arm throbs with every breath, how bad the fever is gouging me out. “I’m really tired, Todd,” I say. “It’s only tomorrow morning. I have to rest.”

“Viola–”

“You need to be out there with them anyway,” I say. “Make sure the Mayor and Mistress Coyle don’t set themselves up as interim leaders.”

He stares at me. “I don’t know what
interim
means.”

And that’s close enough to the Todd I know that I smile, a little. “I’ll be fine. I just need some sleep.”

He still stares. “Are you dying, Viola?”

“What?” I say. “No. No, I’m not–”

“Are you dying and yer just not telling me?” His eyes are boring into me now, filled with concern.

But I still can’t hear him.

“I’m not getting better,” I say, “but that doesn’t mean I’m going to die any time soon. Mistress Coyle’s bound to find something, and if she can’t, the convoy has all kinds more advanced medical stuff than the scout ship has. I can hang on ’til then.”