Monsters of Men

“Is that why people are returning to the town in droves?” he says. “Is that why half the women are already a-taking the Mayor’s new cure?”

Mistress Coyle spins round to Mistress Lawson. “What?”

“I only gave it to the dying, Nicola,” Mistress Lawson says, slightly sheepish. “If you have to choose between certain death and possible death, it’s no choice at all.”

“It’s not just the dying now,” Ivan says. “Not when the rest saw how well it works.”

Mistress Coyle ignores him. “And you didn’t tell me?”

Mistress Lawson looks down. “I knew how upset you’d be. I’ve tried to talk the others out of it–”

“Your own mistresses are doubting your authority,” Ivan says.

“You shut your mouth, Ivan Farrow,” Mistress Lawson barks.

Ivan licks his lips, sizing us all up again, and then he leaves, heading back to the crowd outside.

Mistress Lawson immediately starts apologizing. “Nicola, I’m so sorry–”

“No,” Mistress Coyle stops her. “You were right, of course. Those worst off, those who had nothing to lose . . .” She rubs her forehead. “Are people really going back to town?”

“Not as many as he said,” Mistress Lawson says. “But some.”

Mistress Coyle shakes her head. “He’s winning.”

And we all know she means the Mayor.

“You’ve still got the council,” I say. “You’ll be better at that than he is.”

She shakes her head again. “He’s probably planning something right now.” She sighs out through her nose, and then she leaves, too, without another word.

“He won’t be the only one planning something,” Lee says.

“And we’ve seen how well her plans have worked in the past,” I say.

“You two hush up,” Mistress Lawson snaps. “A lot of people are alive today because of her.”

She tears the last bandage off Lee’s face with more vigour than is strictly necessary. Then she bites her bottom lip and glances up at me. Over the bridge of Lee’s nose, there’s just bright pink scar tissue where his eyes used to be, the sockets covered now with livid skin, the blue eyes that used to look back gone for ever.

Lee can hear our silences. “Is it that bad?”

“Lee–” I start to say, but his Noise says he isn’t ready and he changes the subject.

“Are you going to take the cure?” he asks.

And I see all the feelings he has for me right at the front of his Noise. Pictures of me, too. Way more beautiful than I ever could be.

But the way he’ll see me for ever now.

“I don’t know,” I say.

And I really don’t know. I’m not getting better, not at all, and the convoy is still weeks away, if they’ll even be able to help when they get here. Fatal, I keep thinking, and now it doesn’t just feel like Mistress Coyle trying to scare me. I wonder if I’m one of those women Mistress Lawson mentioned who have to choose between certain death and possible death.

“I don’t know,” I say again.

“Viola?” Wilf says, appearing in the doorway.

“Ah,” Lee says, his Noise reaching out to Wilf’s, almost unwillingly seeing what Wilf’s seeing–

Seeing his own scarred eyes.

“Phew,” he whistles, but you can hear the nervousness, the fake bravery. “That’s not so bad. You two made it seem like I was practically Spackle.”

“Ah brought Acorn back from town,” Wilf says to me. “Stabled him wi’ my oxes.”

“Thank you, Wilf,” I say.

He nods. “And young Lee there,” he says. “If ya ever need me to see for ya, ya just gotta say.”

There’s a flood of surprised and touched feeling in Lee’s Noise, bright enough for Wilf to see his answer.

“Hey, Wilf?” I say, getting an idea, one that feels better by the second.

“Yeh?” he says.

“How would like you be on the new council?”

[TODD]

“It’s a ruddy great idea,” I say, watching Viola’s face in my comm. “Every time they wanna do something stupid, Wilf won’t even say no, he’ll just say what we should obviously do instead.”

“That’s what I thought,” she says and doubles up coughing again.

“How are them tests coming along?” I say.

“The women who’ve taken it haven’t shown any problems so far, but Mistress Coyle wants to do more checks.”

“She ain’t never gonna approve it, is she?”

Viola don’t disagree. “What do you think about it?”

I take a long deep breath. “I don’t trust him,” I say, “no matter how much he says he’s redeemed.”

“He says that?”

I nod.

“Well, that’s exactly the kind of thing he would say.”

“Yeah.”

She waits for me to say more. “But?”

I look back into her eyes, back thru the comm to her, there, on the hilltop, on this same world as me but so far away. “He seems to need me, Viola. I don’t know why, but it’s like I’m important to him somehow.”

“He called you his son once before, when we were fighting him. Said you had power.”

I nod. “I don’t trust him to do any of this outta the goodness of the heart he ain’t got.” I swallow. “But I think he’d do it to get me on his side.”

“Is that enough reason to risk it?”

“Yer dying,” I say, and then keep talking cuz she’s already talking over me. “Yer dying and yer lying to me that yer not and if something happened to you, Viola, if something happened–”

My throat chokes up hard, like I really can’t breathe.

And I can’t say nothing more for a second.

(I am the Circle–)

“Todd?” she finally says, for the first time not denying she’s sicker than she’s said. “Todd, if you tell me to take it, I will. I won’t wait for Mistress Coyle.”

“But I don’t know,” I say, my eyes still flooded.

“We fly in tomorrow morning,” she says. “To ride up for the first council.”

“Yeah?”

“If you want me to do it,” she says, “I want you to put the bandages on me yourself.”

“Viola–”