Monsters of Men (29 page)

“And what might those exact reasons be?” the Mayor asks him, sounding like he’s talking to a child.

“How about the avoidance of complete annihilation?” Bradley says. “How about creating a planet that has room enough for everyone, including the two of you? The convoy’s now forty days away, so how about a peaceful world for them to land in? Each of us has power. Mistress Coyle has a dedicated group behind her, though smaller and less well-equipped than your army. Our position is more easily defended than yours, but it lacks room to support a population that grows more restive by the day. Meanwhile, you’re subject to attacks you can’t combat–”

“Yes,” the Mayor interrupts, “the military wisdom of combining our forces is obvious–”

“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Bradley says, and his voice gets hotter, his Noise, too, rawer and more awkward than anyone I’ve ever seen, but buzzing with a sense of how right he is, how
sure
he is that he’s doing the right thing, and how much muscle he’s got to back it up.

I’m finding I kinda like him.

“I’m not talking about
military
combinations
at all,” he says. “I’m saying that
I’ve
got the missiles,
I’ve
got the bombs, and
I
say right now that I will happily leave you to your little conflict if you don’t agree with
me
that what we’re going to discuss here is a way to combine our strength to
end
this war, not
win
it.”

And for the slightest of seconds, the Mayor ain’t smiling.

“It should be easy,” Viola says, coughing. “We have water, you have food. We exchange what we have for what we need. We show the Spackle we’re united, that we aren’t going anywhere, and that we want peace.”

But all I’m seeing as she says it is how much she’s shivering in the cold.

“Agreed,” Mistress Coyle says, sounding pleased with how things have gone so far. “Then as a first point of negotiation, perhaps the President would be so kind as to tell us how to reverse the effects of the bands, which, as I’m sure was his intention all along, are now killing every woman who wears one.”

{VIOLA}

“WHAT?” Todd shouts.

“I have no idea what she’s talking about,” the Mayor says quickly but Todd’s face is already a storm.

“It’s only a theory,” I say. “They haven’t proved anything.”

“And you’re feeling just fine, are you?” Mistress Coyle says.

“No, but I’m not
dying
.”

“That’s because you’re young and strong,” Mistress Coyle says. “Not every woman is so lucky.”

“The bands are from a regular cattle stock you had in Haven,” the Mayor says. “If you’re saying I modified them to kill the women who were banded, then you are sorely mistaken and I take
great
offence–”

“Don’t you get high and mighty with
me,
” Mistress Coyle says. “You killed every woman in old Prentisstown–”

“The women of old Prentisstown committed suicide,” the Mayor says, “because they were losing a war
they
started.”

“What?”
Todd says again, whirling around to look at the Mayor, and I realize this is the first time he’s heard the Mayor’s version of events.

“I’m sorry, Todd,” the Mayor says. “But I did tell you what you knew was untrue–”

“Ben told us what happened!” Todd yells. “Don’t you try to worm yer way out of it now! I ain’t forgot nothing about what kinda man you are and if you hurt Viola–”

“I did not hurt Viola,”
the Mayor says strongly. “I haven’t intentionally hurt
any
woman. You’ll remember I only started the bands
after
Mistress Coyle’s terrorist attacks began,
after
she started killing innocent townsfolk,
after
we needed to keep track of those who were attacking us. If anyone’s to blame for the necessity of ID bracelets–”

“ID bracelets?”
Mistress Coyle shouts.

“–then point the finger at her. If I’d wanted to kill the women, which
I did not,
I could have done so in the first moment the army entered the town, but that is not what I wanted then and that is not what I want
now
!”

“Nevertheless,” Mistress Coyle says. “I’m the best healer on this planet, and I’m unable to heal the infection. Does that seem likely to you?”

“Fine,” the Mayor says, staring at her hard. “Our first agreement then. You have full and open access to all the information I have on the bands and on how we’re treating the women in town who are affected, though they are, I must say, not in anywhere near as perilous a state as you’ve suggested.”

I look at Todd, but he obviously doesn’t know how true any of this is. I can hear a little bit of his Noise now, mostly worry and some feeling about me, but still nothing clear, still nothing like he used to have.

It’s almost like the Todd I know isn’t here at all.

[T
ODD
]

“Are you sure yer okay?” I ask Viola, riding up close to her, ignoring the others as they keep on talking. “Are you
sure
?”

“There’s nothing to worry about,” she says and I can tell she’s lying to make me feel better, which of course only makes me feel worse.

“Viola, if something’s wrong with you, if something
happened–
”

“It’s Mistress Coyle trying to scare me into helping, that’s all–”

But I look into her eyes and I can tell that’s not the whole truth and I feel my stomach falling away cuz if something ever did happen to her, if I
lost
her, if she–

I am the Circle and the Circle is me,
I think.

And it goes, it falls away, it quiets down, and I realize I’ve closed my eyes and when I open ’em, Viola’s staring back at me, horrified.

“What did you just do?” she asks. “The little bit of your Noise I could hear just disappeared.”

“It’s something I can do now,” I say, looking away. “Make myself quiet.”

Her forehead furrows with surprise. “You
want
it to be this way?”

“It’s a good thing, Viola,” I say, my face burning a little. “I can finally keep a secret or two.”

But she’s shaking her head. “I thought you’d seen something so bad it made your Noise go quiet. I didn’t think you were doing it on purpose.”

I swallow. “I
did
see things that bad. This makes it
stop
.”

“But where did you learn?
He’s
the one who knows how to do that, isn’t he?”

“Don’t worry,” I say. “I got it under control.”

“Todd–”

“It’s just a tool. You chant these words and that focuses you and you put that together with desire and–”

“That sounds like
him
talking.” She lowers her voice. “He thinks you’re special, Todd. He always has. He could be tempting you into something you don’t want, something dangerous.”

“Don’t you think I
know
how much I can’t trust him?” I say, a little sharp. “He can’t control me, Viola, I’m strong enough to fight him off–”

“Can
you
control people?” she asks, sharp right back. “If you can be silent, isn’t that the next step?”

And there’s the image in my head again, the image of James, lying dead in the square, and for a second I can’t shake it and my shame rushes up again like I’m gonna vomit and I am the Circle and the Circle is me–

“No, I can’t do that yet,” I say. “It’s bad anyway. I wouldn’t want to.”

She pushes Acorn up to me so our faces are close.

“You can’t redeem him, Todd,” she says, a little softer but I flinch a bit at the word
redeem
. “You
can’t
. Because he doesn’t want it.”

“I know,” I say, still not quite looking at her. “I know that.”

For a second we both just watch Mistress Coyle and Mayor Prentiss fighting.

“You have more than that!” Mistress Coyle’s saying. “We can see the size of your storehouse from the probes–”

“Can your probes see
inside
the storehouse, Mistress? Because that technology would amaze even me–”

Viola coughs into her hand. “Are you really okay, Todd?”

In reply, I ask, “Are you really in no danger from the band?”

And neither of us answer.

And the morning just feels colder.

{VIOLA}

The talks go on for hours, all through the morning until the sun gets high in the sky. Todd doesn’t say much and every time I try to join in, my coughing gets the better of me. It’s just Bradley and the Mayor and Mistress Coyle arguing and arguing and arguing.

A lot of things get decided, though. In addition to the exchange of medical information, transports will start twice a day, water going one way, food going the other, the Mayor providing additional vehicles along with the Answer’s carts, as well as soldiers for protection to make the exchange. It would make
way
more sense for us all to gather together in one place, but the Mayor refuses to leave the city and Mistress Coyle won’t leave the hilltop so we’re stuck dragging water ten kilometres one way and food ten kilometres the other.

It’s a start, I guess.

Bradley and Simone will make flying patrols over the city and our hilltop every day, in hopes of keeping the Spackle back by threat alone. And in the final agreement of a very long day, Mistress Coyle will provide the expertise of some of the Answer’s best women to help the Mayor fight the Spackle’s sneak attacks on the city.

“But only as a defence,” I insist. “You both have to make overtures of peace to them. Otherwise, none of this will do any good.”

“You can’t just stop fighting and call it peace, my girl,” Mistress Coyle says. “The war goes on even as you’re negotiating with the enemy.”

And she’s looking at the Mayor as she says it.

“Quite so,” says the Mayor, looking right back at her. “That’s how it was done before.”

“And how you’ll do it this time?” Bradley says. “We have your word?”

“As a bargain for peace,” says the Mayor, “it’s not a bad one.” He smiles that smile. “And when peace is achieved, who knows where we’ll all be standing?”

“Particularly if you’ve managed to make yourself peacemaker just before the convoy lands?” Mistress Coyle says. “Think how impressed they’ll be.”

“And how impressed they’ll be with you, Mistress, for skilfully bringing me to the bargaining table.”

“If they’re gonna be impressed with anybody,” Todd says, “it’ll be Viola here.”

“Or Todd,” Bradley jumps in, before I can say it. “They’re the ones who actually made this happen. But frankly, if either of you want a role in the future, you’d better start acting like it right now, because as of this moment as far as any objective observer can see, the President is a mass murderer and Mistress Coyle is a terrorist.”

“I’m a general,” the Mayor says.

“And I’m fighting for freedom,” says Mistress Coyle.

Bradley gives a rueful smile. “I think we’re finally finished here,” he says. “We’ve agreed what starts today and what happens tomorrow. If we can keep that up for forty more days, then there just might be a future for this planet after all.”

[T
ODD
]

Mistress Coyle takes up the reins and snaps them on the oxes, who say
Wilf?
in response. “You coming?” Mistress Coyle calls over to Viola.

“You go on for a second,” Viola says. “I want to talk to Todd.”

Mistress Coyle looks like she expected as much. “Good to finally meet you, Todd,” she says, giving me a long look as the cart pulls away.

The Mayor nods his goodbyes to them and says, “Whenever you’re ready, Todd,” pulling Juliet’s Joy slowly down the road to leave me alone with Viola.

“Do you think this is going to work?” she says, coughing hard into her fist.

“Six weeks till the ships get here,” I say. “Not even. Call it five and a half.”

“Five and a half weeks and it all changes again.”

“Five and a half weeks and we can be together.”

But she don’t say nothing to that.

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing with him, Todd?” she says.

“He’s different round me, Viola. Not as whacked-out crazy evil like he used to be. I think I can keep him in line just enough so he don’t kill us all.”

“Don’t let him get into your head,” she says, serious as I’ve ever heard her. “That’s where he does the most damage.”

“He ain’t in my head,” I say. “And I can take care of myself. So you take care of
yer
self.” I try to smile. I don’t succeed. “You stay alive, Viola Eade. You get better. If Mistress Coyle is able heal you, you do whatever you can to
make
her.”

“I’m not dying,” she says. “I’d tell you if I was.”

We’re quiet for a second, then she says, “You’re the thing that matters to me, Todd. Out of this whole planet, you’re the only thing that matters.”

I swallow, hard. “You, too.”

And we both know we mean it, but as we part and she rides off one way and I ride off another, I bet we’re each wondering if the other lied about important things.

“Well, well,” says the Mayor as I catch up to him on the road back into town. “What did you make of that, Todd?”

“If the infeckshun from the band takes Viola,” I say, “you’ll beg me to kill you after what I’ll do to you.”

“I believe you,” he says, as we ride along, the
ROAR
of the city rising up to greet us, “and that’s why
you
have to believe I’d never do it.”