The Toll

by Neal Shusterman

  “If the Israebian scythedom had ordained me instead of denying me,” Munira quipped, “I could have opened those doors with you, because I’d have my own ring.”

  “If you had become a scythe, you wouldn’t even be here, because I would never have met you at the Alexandria Library,” Faraday pointed out. “No doubt you’d be out there gleaning like the rest of us, and trying to quell your troubled sleep. No, Munira, your purpose was not to be a scythe. It was to save the scythedom. With me.”

  “Without a second ring, we can’t make much progress, Your Honor.”

  Faraday smiled and shook his head. “All this time, and it’s still ‘Your Honor.’ I’ve only heard you call me Michael once—and that was when you thought we were about to die.”

  Ah, thought Munira. He remembers that. She was both embarrassed and pleased.

  “Familiarity might be… counterproductive,” she said.

  His grin grew wider. “You think you’ll fall for me, you mean?”

  “Maybe it’s the other way around, and I’m afraid you’ll be the one who falls for me.”

  Faraday sighed. “Well, now you’ve got me in a bind. If I say I won’t fall for you, then you’ll be insulted. But if I say I might, then we’re in an uncomfortable place.”

  She knew him well enough to know that he was just being playful. So was she.

  “Say what you like—it won’t matter,” Munira told him. “I’m not attracted to older men. Even when they’ve turned a corner and set their age down, I can always tell.”

  “Well, then,” said Scythe Faraday, the grin never leaving his face. “Let’s agree that our relationship will remain as castaway co-conspirators on a noble quest for grand answers.”

  Munira found she could live with that, if he could.

  * * *

  It was on a morning toward the end of their sixth week that things took an unexpected turn.

  Munira was in one of the wild patches that had once been a backyard, checking a tree for ripe fruit, when an alarm went off. It was the first time since they’d arrived that the island’s defensive system had come back to life. Munira dropped what she was doing and raced to the bunker. She found Faraday standing on the mound above it, peering through rusted binoculars toward the sea.

  “What is it? What’s going on?”

  “See for yourself.” He handed her the binoculars

  She adjusted the view and brought things into focus. It was clear now what had triggered the island into red alert. There were ships on the horizon. About a dozen of them.

  * * *

  “Unregistered vessel, please identify.”

  It was the first communication the Nimbus flotilla had had since passing out of the Thunderhead’s sphere of influence the previous day. It was morning, and Director Hilliard was taking tea with Loriana. The director nearly dumped what was left of hers when the message came over the bridge loudspeaker amid a burst of awful static.

  “Should I get some of the other agents?” Loriana asked.

  “Yes,” said the director. “Get Qian and Solano. But skip Sykora—I could do without his negativity right now.”

  “Unregistered vessel, please identify.”

  The director leaned toward the microphone on the communication console. “This is fishing vessel Lanikai Lady out of Honolulu, registration WDJ98584, currently under private charter.”

  The last thing that Loriana heard before the door closed behind her was the voice on the other end saying “Authorization unrecognized. Access denied.”

  Well, even with resistance from whoever it was, Loriana couldn’t help but feel that this was a positive development.

  * * *

  Munira and Faraday scrambled to do something—anything—that could take down the defense system. In all the weeks they’d been here, they had been unable to locate its control center—which probably meant it was behind the impenetrable steel door.

  All this time, the silent titanium turret had stood nestled in the shrubs of the island’s highest point, like a chess piece forgotten in the corner of the board. It was just an inert object these past weeks, but now a panel had opened, and a heavy gun barrel protruded. It was easy to forget how deadly the thing was when it was nothing but an immobile, windowless tower—and a squat one at that, barely four meters high. Now it had awakened, and the air filled with a building electronic whine as it powered up.

  The first blast came before they reached it, a white laser pulse that hit one of the ships on the horizon. Black smoke billowed silently in the distance.

  Then the turret began to charge again.

  “Maybe we can cut its power…,” suggested Munira as they reached it.

  Faraday shook his head. “We don’t even know how it’s powered. Could be geothermal, could be nuclear. Whatever it is, it’s been viable for hundreds of years, which means shutting it down won’t be a simple matter.”

  “There are other ways to shut off a machine,” Munira said.

  Twenty seconds after the first blast, the turret swiveled ever so slightly. Now the barrel pointed a few degrees to the left. It fired again. Another plume of dark smoke. Another delayed report from the sea.

  There was an access ladder that ran up the back of the tower. Munira had climbed it several times over the past few weeks to get a better view of the islands of the atoll. Maybe now that its armored face was open and playing peekaboo with the incoming fleet, it could be disabled.

  A third blast. Another direct hit. Another twenty seconds to recharge.

  “We’ll wedge something in the neck of the turret!” Faraday suggested.

  Munira began climbing the turret tower while, below, Faraday dug around at the base until he came up with a pointed stone and tossed it to her.

  “Jam this in so it can’t swivel. Even if it only affects it a tenth of a degree, at this distance it will be enough for its shots to miss their mark.”

  But when Munira reached the turret, she found that it swiveled on a hairline that wouldn’t admit a grain of sand, much less a stone wedge. Munira felt a powerful surge of static as the gun fired again.

  She climbed to the very top of the turret, hoping her weight might throw the mechanism off balance, but no such luck. Blast after blast, nothing she did made a difference. Faraday shouted suggestions, but none of them helped.

  Finally, she climbed out onto the barrel itself, shimmying her way toward the muzzle, hoping that she could somehow wrestle it a few millimeters out of alignment.

  Now the muzzle was just in front of her. She reached forward to grasp it, feeling its opening, smooth and clean as the day it was manufactured. It angered her. Why had humankind put its effort into defying corrosion and the ravages of time for a device of destruction? It was obscene that this thing still functioned.

  “Munira! Watch out!”

  She pulled her hand back from the muzzle just in time. She felt the blast in the marrow of her bones and in the roots of her teeth. The barrel to which she clung got hotter with the blast.

  And then she had an idea. Perhaps this primitive war technology could be defeated with even more primitive sabotage.

  “A coconut!” said Munira. “Throw me a coconut! No—throw me a bunch of them.”

  If there was anything that there was an abundance of on this island it was coconuts. The first one Faraday threw was too big to fit into the mouth of the muzzle.

  “Smaller!” she told him. “Hurry.”

  Faraday tossed up three smaller ones. His aim was perfect, and she caught all three, just as the cannon got off another blast. The horizon was now dotted with at least a dozen pillars of smoke.

  Focusing, she began to count. She had twenty seconds. She shimmied out farther onto the barrel and pushed the first coconut into the muzzle. It slid down the smooth shaft a little too easily. The second one was harder to stuff in, though. Good! It needed to be. Finally, with the recharging whine hitting a crescendo, she rammed the last one down the gullet of the barrel, forcing it in. It was just large enoug
h to plug it completely. Then, at the last second, she jumped.

  This time there was no delay between explosion and sound. The ends of her hair singed. Shrapnel shredded the palm leaves around her. She hit the ground, and Faraday dove on top of her to protect her. Another explosion, along with heat that she thought would ignite their flesh… but then it faded, resolving into twangs of dying metal and the acrid smell of burning insulation. When they looked back, the turret was gone, and the tower was nothing but red-hot wreckage.

  “Well done,” said Faraday. “Well done.”

  But Munira knew they hadn’t been fast enough, and all they would find washing up on their shores would be the dead.

  * * *

  Loriana was in a stairwell when the blast came and ripped a hole in the ship, knocking her to the deck.

  “May I have your attention, please…,” said the ship’s automated voice, with far less conviction than the moment called for. “Please make your way to the nearest safety pod and abandon ship at your earliest possible convenience. Thank you.”

  The ship began to keel to starboard as Loriana raced back up to the wheelhouse, hoping she’d be able to grasp the situation more clearly from up there.

  Director Hilliard was standing before the navigation console. Shrapnel had shattered a window, and there was a cut on her forehead. She had a vague look about her, as if she were wandering the wheelhouse of a dream.

  “Director Hilliard, we have to go!”

  There was a second blast as another ship was hit. The vessel exploded midship, the bow and stern rising like a twig snapped in half.

  Hilliard stared in stunned disbelief. “Was this the Thunderhead’s plan all along?” she muttered. “We’re useless to the world now. The Thunderhead couldn’t kill us, so did it sent us to a place where it knew we would be killed?”

  “The Thunderhead wouldn’t do that!” Loriana said.

  “How do you know, Loriana? How do you know?”

  She didn’t—but clearly the Thunderhead had no eyes on this place, which meant it didn’t know what to expect any more than they did.

  Another blast. Another ship hit. Their own vessel was foundering, and it wouldn’t be long before the sea swallowed it.

  “Come with me, Director,” said Loriana. “We have to get to the safety pods before it’s too late.”

  When Loriana arrived at the pods with Hilliard in tow, the main deck was flooding. Several pods had already ejected; others were too damaged to use. Agent Qian lay deadish and badly burned in the corner. Not deadish, but dead. There’d be no way to revive him out here.

  There was one pod left, overstuffed with maybe a dozen agents who were unable to close the door because of a damaged hinge. It would have to be closed manually from the outside.

  “Make room for the director!” Loriana said.

  “There’s no room left,” someone inside shouted.

  “Too bad.” Loriana shoved the director in, forcing her into the crush of bodies.

  “Loriana—now you,” said Hilliard. But clearly there was no space left for her. Seawater was pooling around her ankles now. Before the pod could flood, Loriana grabbed the door and, struggling against the bent hinge, closed it. Then she waded to the manual-launch mechanism; slammed down the release button, which launched the pod into the sea; and then dove in after it.

  It was hard to keep her head above surface so close to the sinking vessel, but she gasped what air she could and swam for all she was worth to put some distance between her and the dying vessel. Meanwhile, the pod’s engine kicked in, and it began to power its way to shore, leaving her behind.

  The blasts from the island had stopped, but all around Loriana were burning ships in various stages of death. There were more agents in the water screaming for help. And bodies. So many bodies.

  Loriana was a strong swimmer, but the shore was so far away. And what if there were sharks? Was she destined to go the way of the Grandslayers?

  No, she couldn’t think about that now. She had managed to save the director. Now she had to put all her attention into saving herself. She had been a distance swimmer on the Nimbus Academy’s swim team, although she was not in the shape she had been in a year ago. Distance swimming, she knew, was about pacing yourself so that you had enough energy to finish the race. So she began a slow and measured crawl toward shore. Loriana resolved not to stop until she either reached the island or drowned.

  An open response to Her Excellency, High Blade Barbara Jordan of Texas

  You requested to be left alone, and your wish is granted. I have consulted with the High Blades of East- and WestMerica, as well as NorthernReach and Mexiteca. As of this day, no other North Merican scythedom will engage with your region. Furthermore, all shipments of goods and resources to and from the LoneStar region shall be confiscated by scythes just beyond your borders. You will no longer benefit from the good will of your neighbors, nor will you be seen as a part of the North Merican continent. Yours shall be a pariah region until you see the error of your ways.

  I would also like to say, High Blade Jordan, that it is my sincerest hope that you self-glean in the not-too-distant future, so that your region can benefit from more reasonable, and rational, leadership.

  Respectfully,

  Honorable Robert Goddard, High Blade of MidMerica

  7 Dancing in the Deep

  Salvage was a painstakingly slow process. It took three months of digging through the submerged debris until they found the outer vault.

  Possuelo had resigned himself to the pace of the process. He found that it was actually beneficial, because the other scythes had short attention spans. Nearly a third of them had sailed off, vowing to return the second the vault was found. Those who remained bided their time and kept a close watch on the Spence—albeit from a distance. Tarsila, the Amazonian High Blade, was a formidable woman, and no one wanted to raise her ire by challenging Possuelo’s authority and autonomy over the salvage.

  As for Goddard, he had finally sent a delegation under Nietzsche—his first underscythe—who then proceeded to glean several of the salvage crews that were not under the direct protection of a scythe.

  “It is not only our right, but our duty to glean civilians whose greed leads to their violating the Perimeter of Reverence,” Nietzsche claimed. Some scythedoms were angered, others supportive, and others strategically indifferent.

  While Possuelo negotiated the convoluted politics of the fractured scythedom, Jerico spent each day in a pair of VR goggles, immersed in the world of the dive. Joining Jerico in that virtual journey was a conservator to catalogue every find, as well as a structural engineer to help weave their way through the ever-shifting wreckage.

  They used a remotely operated vehicle—or ROV—for the job. Jeri controlled the submersible with hand gestures and turns of the head—to the point that it looked like some exotic dance. Possuelo only took the virtual trip when there was something of particular interest to see—such as the ruins of the Endura Opera House, where eels weaved in and out of dangling chandeliers, and the set of Aida lay in pieces on the sideways stage, like a glimpse of some apocalyptic ancient Egypt, the Nile having swallowed everything in its rising waters.

  When they finally reached the outer vault, Possuelo was ecstatic, but Jeri’s response was measured. This was only the first stage of the battle.

  They breached it with a steel-cutting laser; then the hole they were cutting gave way before they had completed cutting it—the water pressure having caved it in—and the robotic sub plunged through the air pocket, shattering on the vault’s floor.

  “Well, at least now we know that the outer vault remained watertight,” Jeri said, taking off the goggles.

  That was the fifth ROV lost.

  At first, each time a new robotic sub had to be brought in, it added another week to the operation. After the second one was lost, they requisitioned two at a time, so there’d always be a backup.

  The escaping air created a telltale bubbling of white water o
n the surface that alerted everyone they had breached the outer vault. By the time the crew prepped the standby sub later that day, every scythe that had left the area was either back or on their way.

  The following morning, the new robotic sub was negotiating the dark void of the flooded chamber. While the outer vault was covered with residue and slime from its tenure in the sea, the Vault of Relics and Futures was just as pristine as the day it sank.

  “The best thing to do would be to cut a hole in this vault as well,” suggested Jeri, “then vacuum the diamonds out.”

  It was the most efficient plan, but Possuelo had his orders.

  “The robes of the founding scythes are also inside,” he explained. “And since the inner vault is still intact, my High Blade wishes to preserve them as well. Which means we have to bring up the entire vault.”

  To which Jeri raised an eyebrow and said, “We’re going to need a bigger boat.”

  * * *

  When it comes to scythes, money is no object, and quite literally so, because scythes pay for nothing and can have everything. Jeri told Possuelo precisely the kind of ship they needed; Possuelo found the nearest one and claimed it for the Amazonian scythedom.

  Four days later a fully equipped crane vessel that could deposit the vault right onto the Spence’s deck arrived in the dive zone. Its crew was put entirely at Captain Soberanis’s disposal. Even so, the crane had to wait, because it took more than a week to cut a hole large enough in the outer vault for the extraction, and to secure the inner vault with a cable sling strong enough to raise it.

  “Once we start the winch, it will take about twenty-four hours to raise the vault to the surface,” Jeri informed Possuelo and the elegy of scythes that had gathered for a briefing, a veritable rainbow of robes from dozens of regions.

  “We have a record of how many scythe gems are in there,” Possuelo told the others. “We’ll keep a strict accounting and divide them evenly between every region.”