The Ask and the Answer (Page 99)

I have no idea how far into town the Answer’s managed to march, no idea if they’ll wait to see who I am before they blow me off the road.

No idea what her reaction will be if she sees me–

When she sees me–

When I tell her and everyone else the things I’ve got to tell them–

“Faster if you can!” I shout and there’s a jolt like an engine firing and Acorn goes even faster.

She’ll head for the ship. No doubt about that. She’ll have seen it land and gone straight for it. And if she gets there first, she’ll tell them how sorry she is that I died so tragically, how I fell so cruelly at the hands of the tyrant the Answer are trying to overthrow, how if the scout ship has any weapons that can be used from the air–

Which it does.

I lean down farther in the saddle, biting hard against the pain in my ankles, trying to make us go even faster.

We get well past the cathedral, down through the rows of shuttered-up shops and bolted-in houses. The sun is completely down, everything turning to silhouette against the darkening of the sky.

And I think about how the Answer will respond when they find out the Mayor’s fallen–

And what they’ll think when they find out Todd did it–

And I think of him–

I think of him–

I think of him–

Todd, Acorn thinks.

And we race down the road–

And I nearly tumble off as a BOOM rises in the distance.

Acorn judders to a halt, twisting round to keep me on his back. We turn and I look–

And I see the fires burning down the road.

I see houses on fire.

And stores.

And grain sheds.

And I see people running this way through the smoke, not soldiers, just people, running past us in the dark.

Passing us so fast they don’t even stop to look at us.

They’re fleeing from the Answer.

“What is she doing?” I say out loud.

Fire, Acorn thinks, nervously clattering his hooves.

“She’s burning everything,” I say. “She’s burning it all.”

Why?

Why?

“Acorn–” I start to say.

And a horn blows a deep, long call across the entire valley.

Acorn whinnies sharply, no words in his Noise, just a flash of fear, of terror so sharp I feel my heart leap, echoed by the disbelieving gasps of some of the people running past me, many of them shouting out and stopping, looking behind me, back towards the city and beyond.

I turn, even though the sky’s too dark to see much.

There are lights in the distance, lights coming down the zigzag road by the falls–

Not the road the army is on.

“What is it?” I say to no one, to anyone. “What are those lights? What was that sound?”

And then a man, stopped next to me, his Noise bright and circling with amazement, with disbelief, with fright as clear as a knife, whispers, “No.”

He whispers, “No, it can’t be.”

“What?” I shout. “What’s happening?”

And the long, deep horn sounds again across the valley.

And it’s a sound like the end of the world.

The Mayor wakes before I even finish tying his hands.

He moans, pure, real Noise ratcheting from him, the first I’ve ever heard outta his head, now that he’s off guard.

Now that he’s been beaten.

“Not beaten,” he murmurs. “Temporarily waylaid.”

“Shut up,” I say, pulling the ropes tight.

I come round the front of him. His eyes are still misty from my attack but he manages a smile.

I smack him cross the face with the butt of the rifle.

“I hear one stitch of Noise coming from you,” I warn, pointing the barrels at him.

“I know,” says the Mayor, a grin still coming from his bloody mouth. “And you would, wouldn’t you?”

I don’t say nothing.

And that’s my answer.

The Mayor sighs, leaning his head back as if to stretch his neck. He looks up into the coloured glass window, still standing, impossibly, in a wall all its own. The moons are rising behind it, lighting up their glass verzhuns just a little.

“Here we are again, Todd,” he says. “The room where we first properly met.” He looks around himself, at how he’s the one tied to the chair now and I’m the one out here. “Things change,” he says, “but they stay the same.”

“I don’t need to hear you talking while we wait.”

“Wait for what?” He’s growing more alert.

His Noise is disappearing.

“And you’d like to be able to do that, too, wouldn’t you?” he says. “You’d like just for once to have no one know what you’re thinking.”

“I said, shut up.”

“Right now, you’re thinking about the army.”

“Shut up.”

“You’re wondering if they really will listen to you. You’re wondering if Viola’s people can really help you–”

“I’ll hit you again with the damn rifle.”

“You’re wondering if you’ve really won.”

“I have really won,” I say. “And you know it.”

We hear a BOOM in the distance, another one.

“She’s destroying everything,” the Mayor says, looking towards the sound. “Interesting.”

“Who is?” I ask.

“You never met Mistress Coyle, did you?” He stretches one shoulder and then the other against his binds. “Remarkable woman, remarkable opponent. She might have beaten me, you know. She might really have done it.” He smiles wide again. “But you’ve done it first, haven’t you?”

“What do you mean She’s destroying everything?”

“As always,” he says, “I mean what I say.”

“Why would she do that? Why would she just blow things up?”

“Twofold,” he says. “One, she creates chaos so it’s harder to fight her as an orderly enemy. And two, she obliterates the safety of those who won’t fight, creating the impression that she cannot be beaten, so that everyone’s that much easier to rule when she’s done.” He shrugs. “Everything’s a war to people like her.”

“People like you,” I say.

“You’ll be swapping one tyrant for another, Todd. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you.”

“I won’t be swapping nothing. And I told you to be quiet.”

I keep the rifle pointed at him and go to Angharrad, watching us both from a cramped space in the rubble. Todd, she thinks. Thirsty.