Monsters of Men (42 page)

I lift my comm again, which is squawking all over the place with voices, including Viola’s, trying to figure out what’s happened–

“It’s the Mayor,” I say into it.

“Where’s he firing?”
she says.
“That’s not where the lights were coming from–”

And then the comm is nicked right outta my hand by the Mayor, triumph all over his face, just glowing in the firelight–

“Yes, but that’s where the Spackle actually
are,
dear girl,” he says, spinning to keep me from taking the comm back. “Just ask your friend the Sky, why don’t you? He’ll tell you.”

And I do get it back from him but the smile on his face is so unnerving I can barely look at it.

It’s a smile like he’s won something. Like he’s won the biggest thing of all.

{VIOLA}

“What does he mean?”
Mistress Coyle says over the comm in a panic.
“Viola, what does he mean?!”

The Sky is turning to us now, his Noise swirling so fast with images and feelings it’s impossible to read anything.

But he doesn’t look happy.

“I’ve got the probes where the President fired,”
Simone’s voice says.
“Oh, my God.”

“Here,” Bradley says, taking the comm from me. He presses a few things and suddenly the comm is flashing up a smaller three-dimensional picture like the larger remote projectors we have down below and there, hovering in the night air, lit up by my small little comm–

Bodies.

Spackle bodies. Carrying all the weapons Bradley saw in the glimpse of Noise. Dozens of them, enough to wreak all kinds of havoc on the town–

Enough to take Todd and the Mayor,
kill
them both if they couldn’t be taken–

And no lights to be seen anywhere.

“If those bodies are in the northern hills,” I ask, “what are the lights to the south?”

[T
ODD
]

“Nothing!” Mr O’Hare shouts, running back into camp. “There’s nothing there! A few torches left burning in the ground but nothing!”

“Yes, Captain,” says the Mayor. “I know.”

Mr O’Hare pulls up short. “You
knew
?”

“Of course I did.” The Mayor turns to me. “May I please use the comm again, Todd?”

He holds out his hand. I don’t give it to him.

“I promised to save Viola, didn’t I?” he says. “What do you think would have happened to her if the Spackle had been allowed to win their little victory tonight? What do you think would have happened to
us
?”

“How did you know they’d attack?” I ask. “How did you know it was a trick?”

“How did I save us all, you mean?” He’s still holding out his hand. “I’ll ask you one more time, Todd. Do you trust me?”

I look at his face, his completely untrustworthy, unredeemable face.

(and I hear the
hum,
just a little bit–)

(and okay, I
know
–)

(I know he’s in my head–)

(I ain’t no fool–)

(but he did save us–)

(and he gave me my ma’s words–)

I hand him the comm.

{VIOLA}

The Sky’s Noise whirls like a storm. We’ve all seen what’s happened in the projection. We can all hear the cheering of the soldiers down in the town. We can all feel the distant rumble of the scout ship as it rises and recrosses the valley.

I wonder what’s going to happen to me and Bradley. I wonder if it’ll be quick.

Bradley’s still arguing, though. “You attacked us,” he says. “We came here in good faith and you–”

The comm beeps, much louder than usual.

“I think it’s time my voice was heard, Bradley.”

It’s the Mayor again, and somehow his face, too, big and gloating and smiling in the hovering picture projected from it. He’s even turned as if he’s facing the Sky.

As if he’s looking him right in the eye.

“You thought you’d learned something, didn’t you?”
he asks.
“You thought your captured soldier had looked into me and saw that I could read Noise as deeply as you, isn’t that right? So you thought to yourself, here’s something I can use.”

“How’s he doing this?”
we hear Mistress Coyle on a voice-only line.
“He’s broadcasting out to the hilltop–”

“So you sent him back to us as a peace envoy,”
the Mayor goes on, like he didn’t hear her,
“and had him show me just enough to make me think I discovered your plan to attack us from the south. But there was another plan below, wasn’t there? Buried far too deep for any . . .”
he pauses for effect “. . . Clearing
to read.

The Sky’s Noise flares.

“Get that comm away from him!”
Mistress Coyle’s voice shouts.
“Cut him off!”

“But you didn’t count on
my
abilities,”
the Mayor says.
“You didn’t count that I can read deeper perhaps than even any Spackle, deep enough to see the
real
plan.”

The Sky’s face is expressionless but his Noise is loud and open and stirring with anger.

Stirring with the knowledge that the Mayor’s words are all true.

“I looked into the eyes of your peace envoy,”
the Mayor says,
“into
your
eyes and I read everything. I heard the voice
speak
and I saw you coming.”
He brings the comm forward so his face looms larger in the projection.
“So know this, and know it well,”
he says.
“If it comes to battle between us, the victory will be
mine.
”

Then he’s gone. His face and the image blink out so that the Sky is only staring back at us. We hear the scout ship’s engines, but they’re still half the valley away. The Spackle here are heavily armed, but that hardly matters because the Sky himself could take out me and Bradley on his own if he needed to.

But the Sky remains still, his Noise spinning and swirling darkly, again as if every eye of the Spackle is in him, watching us and considering what’s happened–

And deciding his next move.

And then he takes a step forward.

I step back without meaning to, bumping into Bradley, who puts a hand on my shoulder.

So be it,
the Sky says.

And then he says,
Peace.

[T
ODD
]

Peace,
we hear, from the leader of the Spackle’s own Noise, boomed across the square, just like the Mayor’s voice did, his face filling the projeckshun–

And the cheering around us is as loud as the world.

“How did you do that?” I say, looking down at my comm.

“You do have to sleep sometimes, Todd,” he says. “Can you blame me if I’m curious about new technologies?”

“Congratulations, sir,” Mr Tate says, shaking the Mayor’s hand. “That showed ’em.”

“Thank you, Captain,” the Mayor says. He turns to Mr O’Hare, who’s looking way more grudging about being sent running for nothing.

“You did fine work,” the Mayor says. “We had to look convincing. That’s why I couldn’t tell you.”

“Of course, sir,” says Mr O’Hare, not sounding like it’s very fine at all.

And then the soldiers crowd in, each wanting to shake the Mayor’s hand, too, each one telling him how he outsmarted the Spackle, each one saying that the Mayor’s the one who won the peace, that he did it without the help of the scout ship, that he really showed ’em, didn’t he?

And the Mayor just takes it all in, accepting every word of it.

Every word of praise for his victory.

And for a second, just for a second–

I feel a little bit proud.

I Raise My Knife

(THE RETURN)

I raise my knife, the one I stole from the cooking huts on my way here, a knife used for the butchery of game, long and heavy, sharp and brutal.

I raise it over the Source.

I could have made peace impossible, I could have made this war unending, I could have torn the life and heart out of the Knife–

But I did not.

I saw her band.

Saw the pain obvious even in one of the voiceless Clearing.

She had been marked, too, just as they marked the Burden, with what seemed to be the same effect.

And I remembered the pain of the banding, the pain not only in my arm but in the way the band encircled my
self
as well, took what was me and made it smaller, so that all the Clearing ever saw was the band on my arm, not me, not my face, not my voice which was also taken–

Taken to make us like the Clearing’s own voiceless ones.

And I could not kill her.

She was like me. She was banded like me.

And then the beast reared up its hind legs and kicked me across the ground, probably breaking more than one bone in my chest, bones that ache even now, which did not stop the Sky from grabbing me up and flinging me into the arms of the Land, showing,
If you do not speak with the Land, then it is because
you
have chosen it.

And I understood. I was being properly exiled. The Return would not return.

The Land took me from the peace grounds and deep into the camp, where they roughly sent me on my way.

But I was not going to leave without the Sky’s final promise.

I stole a knife and came here–

Where I stand ready to kill the Source.

I look up as the news of the Sky’s attempts to secretly attack the Clearing flashes through the Pathways’ End. So that was his plan, one that would show the Clearing just how effective an enemy we are, how we could walk into their stronghold during peace talks, take the specific enemies we wanted and give them the justice they deserve. The peace that would flow from that, if peace it was, would be one that we dictated.

That was why he asked me to trust him.

But he has failed. He has admitted defeat. He has called for peace. And the Land will cower under the Clearing and the peace will not be a peace of strength for the Land, it will be a peace of weakness–

And I stand over the Source with my knife. I stand ready to take the revenge long since denied me.

I stand ready to kill him.

I knew this is where you would go,
the Sky shows, entering the Pathways’ End behind me.

Have you not a peace to be making?
I show back, not moving from where I stand.
Have you not a Land to betray?

Have you not a man to be killing?
he shows.

You promised me this,
I show.
You promised he would be mine to do with as I pleased. And so I will do this thing and then I will go.

And then the Return will be lost to us,
the Sky shows.
Will be lost to himself.

I look back at him, pointing at the band with my knife.
I was lost to myself when they put this on me. I was lost to myself when they killed every other member of the Burden. I was lost when
the Sky
refused to take revenge for my life.

So take it now,
the Sky shows.
I will not stop you.

I stare into him, into his voice, into his failure.

And I see, here in the Pathways’ End where secrets live, I see that it is a bigger failure than even that.

You were going to give me the Knife,
I marvel.
That was your surprise. You would have given me
the Knife.

My voice begins to burn at the realization. That I could have had the Knife, I could have had the Knife himself–

But you failed at even that,
I show, furious.

And so you will have your revenge on the Source,
he shows.
Again, I will not stop you.