“FORM A LINE!” we hear Mr Hammar shouting and the soldiers immediately behind him start spreading out. “FIRST WAVE READY!” he shouts and the men stop and raise their rifles, poised to rush forward at his command as the second wave lines up behind ’em.
The Spackle have stopped too, forming an equally long line at the bottom of the hill. A horned creacher parts their line in the middle, a Spackle standing on its back behind a u-shaped white thing that looks like it’s made of bone, half-again as wide as a man and mounted on a stand on the creacher’s armour.
“What is that?” I ask the Mayor.
He grins as if to himself. “I think we’re about to find out.”
“MEN READY!” Mr Hammar shouts.
“Stay back with me, Todd,” the Mayor says. “Keep out of the fighting as much as you can.”
“Yeah, I know,” I say, heavy feeling in my Noise. “You don’t like to get your hands dirty.”
He catches my eye. “Oh, there are going to be plenty of dirty days ahead. Don’t you worry.”
And then “CHARGE!!!” Mr Hammar screams at the top of his lungs–
And the war is on.
{VIOLA}
“Wilf!” I yell, riding over to him. He’s driving an ox-cart, out in front and off to the side of the first line of the Answer, still marching down the road in the smoky gloom.
“Yer alive!” Wilf says, hopping down off the cart and scooting over to me. “Mistress Coyle tol’ us yoo were dead.”
Anger fills my stomach again over what Mistress Coyle tried to do, at the bomb she intended for the Mayor and how she didn’t seem to mind that it would take me with it. “She’s wrong about a lot of things, Wilf.”
He looks up at me and in the light of the moons, I can see the fright in his Noise, fright in the most unflappable man I’ve ever met on this whole planet, a man who risked his life to save both me and Todd more than once, fright in the one man around here who’s never afraid. “The Spackle are comin, Viola,” he says. “Ya gotta get outta here.”
“I’m riding to get help, Wilf–”
Another BOOM rips through a building across the road from us. There’s a small blast wave and Wilf has to hold on to Acorn’s reins to keep standing up. “What the hell are they doing?” I yell.
“Mistress’s orders,” Wilf says. “To save the body, ya sometimes have to cut off the leg.”
I cough from the smoke. “That sounds exactly like the kind of stupid thing she’d say. Where is she?”
“Took off when that ship done flew over. Riding fast to where it landed.”
My heart jumps. “Where did it land, Wilf? Where exactly?”
He motions back down the road. “Yonder hill, where tower used to be.”
“I knew it.”
There’s another distant blast of the horn. Every time it goes off, there’s yet more screaming from the townsfolk running everywhere. I even hear some screaming from the army of the Answer.
“Ya gotta run, Viola,” Wilf says again, touching my arm. “Spackle army is bad news. Ya gotta go. Ya gotta go now.”
I fight down a flash of worry about Todd. “You’ve got to go, too, Wilf. Mistress Coyle’s trick didn’t work. The Mayor’s army is already back in town.” Wilf sucks in air over his teeth. “We’ve got the Mayor,” I continue, “and Todd’s trying to stop the army, but if you attack head on, you’ll be slaughtered.”
He looks back at the Answer, still marching down the road, faces still set, though some of them are seeing me and Wilf, seeing me alive on horseback, and surprise is starting to dawn. I hear my name more than once.
“Mistress Coyle said to keep marching,” Wilf says, “keep bombing, no matter what we heard.”
“Who’d she leave in charge? Mistress Lawson?” There’s a silence and I look back down at Wilf. “It’s you, isn’t it?”
He nods slowly. “She said Ah was the best at follering orders.”
“Yet another mistake she made,” I say. “Wilf, you have to turn them round.”
Wilf looks back at the Answer, still coming, still marching. “Other mistresses won’t lissen to me,” he says, but I can hear him thinking.
“Yes,” I say, agreeing with his thought, “but everyone else will.”
He looks back up to me. “Ah’ll turn ’em round.”
“I have to get to the ship,” I say. “There’ll be help there.”
Wilf nods and points his thumb back over his shoulder. “Second big road up back yonder. Mistress Coyle’s got twenty minutes on ya.”
“Thank you, Wilf.”
He nods again and turns back to the Answer. “Retreat!” he yells. “Retreat!”
I urge Acorn along again and we ride past Wilf and the astonished faces of Mistresses Lawson and Nadari at the front of the Answer line. “On whose authority?” Mistress Nadari snaps.
“Mine!” I hear Wilf say, strong as I’ve ever heard him.
I’m already passing through the Answer and pushing Acorn as fast as he’ll go and so I don’t see Wilf when he says, “And hers!”
But I know he’s pointing at me.
[TODD]
Our front line sprints across the clearing like a wall falling down a hill–
Men running in a V-shape with Mr Hammar screaming on horseback at its tip–
The next line of men sets off a split second later so now there’s two rows running at breakneck speed towards the line of Spackle, guns out but–
“Why ain’t they firing?” I ask the Mayor.
He breathes out a little. “Overconfidence, I should say.”
“What?”
“We’ve always fought the Spackle at close quarters, you see. It was most effective. But . . .” His eyes play over the front line of Spackle–
Which ain’t moving.
“I think we may want to be back a bit farther, Todd,” he says, turning Morpeth down the road before I can even say anything.
I look back to the men running–
And the Spackle line that ain’t moving–
And the men getting closer–
“But why–?”
“Todd,” the Mayor calls, now a good twenty metres behind me–
There’s a flash of Noise thru the Spackle–
A signal of some kind–
Every Spackle on the front line raises his bow and arrow–
Or his white stick–
And the Spackle on the horned creacher takes a lighted torch in each hand–
“READY!” Mr Hammar calls, thundering forward on his horse, heading right for the horned creacher–
The men raise their rifles–
“I really would get back if I were you,” the Mayor calls to me–
I pull a little on Angharrad’s reins–
But my eyes are still on the battle and the men running cross the clearing in front of me and the men behind ’em ready to do the same and more men behind them–
And me and the Mayor waiting at the back of the pack–
“AIM!” screams Mr Hammar with his voice and his Noise–
I turn Angharrad and ride back to the Mayor–
“Why ain’t they firing?” I say as I get close–
“Who?” the Mayor says, still studying the Spackle. “The men or the enemy?”
I look back–
Mr Hammar’s not fifteen metres from the horned creacher–
Ten–
“Either one,” I say–
Five–
“Now, this,” says the Mayor, “should be interesting.”
And we see the Spackle on the horned creacher bring the two torches together behind the u-shaped thing–
And WHOOMP!
An exploding, spilling, tumbling, churning flood of fire looking for all the world like the rushing river beside it comes whooshing out of the u-shaped thing, way bigger than looks possible, expanding and growing and eating the world like a nightmare–
Coming right for Mr Hammar–
Who pulls his horse hard to the right–
br />
Leaping outta the way–
But too late–
The fire swoops round him–
Sticking to Mr Hammar and his horse like a coating–
And they’re burning burning burning as they try to ride away from it–
Riding straight for the river–
But Mr Hammar don’t make it–
He falls from the burning saddle of his burning horse–
Hitting the ground in a jerking pile of flame–
Then lying still as his horse disappears into the water–
Screaming and screaming–
I turn my eyes back to the army–
And see that the men on the front line don’t got horses that’ll carry ’em outta the way–
And the fire–
Thicker than normal fire–
Thicker and heavier–
Cuts thru ’em like a rockslide–
Eating the first ten men it touches–
Burning ’em up so fast you can barely hear ’em scream–
And they’re the lucky ones–
Cuz the fire spreads out–
Sticking to the uniforms and the hair–
And the skin–
And my God the skin of the frontline soldiers off to each side–
And they fall–
And they burn–
And they scream like Mr Hammar’s horse–
And they keep on screaming–
Their Noise rocketing up and out over the Noise of everything else–
And as the blast of fire finally dissipates and Mr Morgan is yelling “FALL BACK!” to the front lines of soldiers and as those soldiers are already turning and running but firing their rifles as they go and as the first arrows from the Spackle bows start arcing thru the air and as the other Spackle raise their white sticks and flashes come outta the ends and the men hit by the arrows in the back and in the stomach and in the face start to fall and as the men hit by the flashes from the white sticks start losing bits of their arms and their shoulders and their heads and falling to the ground dead dead dead–
And as I grip Angharrad’s mane hard enough to pull out hair–
And she’s so terrified she don’t even complain–
All I can hear is the Mayor next to me–
Saying, “At last, Todd–”
And he turns to me and he says–
“A worthy enemy.”
{VIOLA}
Me and Acorn are barely a minute away from the army of the Answer when we pass the first road and I recognize where we are. It’s the road down to the house of healing where I spent my first weeks in New Prentisstown, the house of healing where Maddy and I snuck out one night.
The house of healing where we took Maddy’s body to prepare it for burial after Sergeant Hammar shot her for no reason at all.
“Keep going, Acorn,” I say, pushing the thought away. “The road up to the tower has to be around–”
The dusky sky suddenly lights up behind me. I turn and Acorn does, too, and though the city is far away and behind trees, we can see a huge flash of light, silent from this distance, no rumble of an explosion, just a bright, bright glow that grows and grows before dying away, lighting up the few people on the road who’ve reached this far out of town, and I wonder what could possibly have happened back in the city to make a light like that.
And I wonder whether Todd is in the middle of it.
[TODD]
The next blast of fire comes before anyone’s ready for it–
WHOOMP!
Shooting across the open ground and catching the retreating soldiers, melting their guns, burning up their bodies, laying ’em to the ground in the worst sorta heap–
“We gotta get outta here!” I shout at the Mayor, who’s watching the battle like he’s hypnotized, his body still but his eyes moving this way and that, taking in everything.
“Those white sticks,” he says quietly. “Obviously a ballistic of some sort but do you see how destructive they are?”
I stare at him wide-eyed. “DO SOMETHING!” I shout. “They’re getting slaughtered!”
He raises one eyebrow. “What exactly do you think war is, Todd?”
“But the Spackle’ve got better weapons now! We won’t be able to stop ’em!”
“Won’t we?” he says, nodding at the battle. I look, too. The Spackle on the horned creacher readies his torches for another blast but one of the Mayor’s men has risen from where he’s fallen, burns all over him, and he raises his gun and fires–
And the Spackle on the horned creacher drops one torch and slaps a hand to his neck where the bullet hit him, then falls sideways off the creacher to the ground–
A cheer goes up from the Mayor’s men as they see what’s happened–
“All weapons have their weaknesses,” the Mayor says.
And quick as that, they’re regrouping and Mr Morgan is riding his horse forward, leading all the men now, and more rifles are getting fired and tho more arrows and white flashes are coming from the Spackle and more soldiers are falling, Spackle are falling, too, their clay armour cracking and exploding, falling under the feet of other Spackle marching behind ’em–
But they keep coming–
“We’re outnumbered,” I say to the Mayor.
“Oh, ten to one easily,” he says.
I point up the hill. “And they’ve got more of those fire things!”
“But not ready yet, Todd,” he says and he’s right, the creachers are backed up behind Spackle soldiers on the zigzag road, not ready to blast unless they want to take out half their own army.
But the Spackle line is really crashing into the line of men now and I see the Mayor do a counting moshun with his hands and then look back down the empty road behind us.
“You know, Todd,” he says, taking Morpeth’s reins. “I think we’re going to need every man.”
He turns to me.
“It’s time for us to fight.”
And I know with a stab in my heart that if the Mayor himself is gonna fight–
Then we’re really in trouble.
{VIOLA}
“There!” I shout, pointing at what has to be the road up the hill to the tower. Acorn flies straight up the incline, bits of foamy sweat flying from his shoulders and neck. “I know,” I say between his ears. “Almost there.”
Girl colt, he thinks and for a second I think he might even be laughing at my sympathy. Or maybe he’s just trying to comfort me.
The road is incredibly dark as it curves around the back of the hill. For a minute, I’m cut off from absolutely everything, all sound from the city, all light from what’s happening, all Noise that might tell me what’s going on. It’s like Acorn and I are racing through the black beyond itself, that weird quiet of being a small ship in the hugeness of space, where your light is so feeble against the surrounding dark, you might as well not have a light at all–
And then I hear a sound coming from the top of the hill–
A sound I recognize–
Steam escaping from a vent–
“Coolant systems!” I shout to Acorn, like they’re the happiest words in the whole world.
The steam sound gets louder as we near the crest of the hill and I picture it in my mind: two huge vents at the back of the scout ship, just above the engines, cooling them down after entry into the atmosphere–
The same vents that didn’t open on my own scout ship when the engines caught fire.
The same vents that caused us to crash and killed my mother and father.
Acorn reaches the top of the hill and for a second, all I see is the vast empty space where the communications tower used to be, the tower Mistress Coyle blew up rather than have the Mayor use it to contact my ships first. Most of the metal wreckage has been cleared away in huge scrap heaps and when Acorn races across the open ground, at first I only see the heaps in the moons-light, three big ones, covered in the dust and dullness of the months since the tower fell–
Three gr
oupings of metal–
And behind them a fourth–
Shaped like a huge hawk, wings outstretched–
“There!”
Acorn puts on a burst of energy and we race towards the back of the scout ship, steam and heat pouring out of the vents into the sky, and we get nearer and I see a shaft of light on the left that must be the bay door open under a wing of the ship–
“Yes,” I say to myself. “They’re really here–”
Because they really are here. I almost believed they’d never come and I can feel myself getting lighter and my breath start rushing faster because they’re here, they’re actually here–
I see three figures standing on the ground at the bottom of the bay doors, silhouetted against the shaft of light, their shadows turning as they hear Acorn’s hoofbeats–
Just to the side, I see a cart parked in the darkness, its oxes nibbling on grass–
And we get closer–
And closer–
And the figures’ faces suddenly loom up as Acorn and I enter the shaft of light, too, juddering to a stop–
And it is, it’s exactly who I thought it would be and my heart does a skip of happiness and homesickness, and in spite of all that’s happening, I feel my eyes get wet and my throat start to choke–
Because it’s Bradley Tench from the Beta and Simone Watkin from the Gamma and I know they came looking for me, they came all this way looking for my mother and my father and me–
And they step back, startled at my sudden appearance, and then take a second to see past all the dirt and the grime and the longer hair–
And I’m bigger, too–
Taller–
Almost grown–
And their eyes get wider as they realize who I am–
And Simone opens her mouth–
But it’s not her voice that speaks.
It’s the third figure, the one whose eyes – now that I finally look at them – open even wider, and she says my name, says it with a look of shock that I have to say gives me a surprising flash of pleasure.