The Fallow

by Alicia Britton

  Blasphemy recognized that whistle.

  She turned around. Scanned the windows and rooftops. By a chimney in the distance, she almost missed it. The quick flutter of black revealing itself against the blue, cloudless sky.

  Gospel. Like a dark angel. Back from the dead.

  Blasphemy gave him a salute. She caught a glimpse of his nod. Then he ran off. And jumped, practically flying between buildings, his black trench coat lifting in the wind. He had a gun slung over his shoulder that was almost as big as he was.

  He ducked, he turned, he leapt, and before long . . . he vanished. But he was, no doubt, off to save Portsmith from the scourge of injustice.

  One small victory at a time.

  Chapter 13

  Herald

  “Give me your hands.”

  Herald shuffled Virtue’s red scarf around in his fist, tucking it in and squeezing it tight before offering his wrists between the bars.

  “Behind you!” the Authority Figure barked further, his gruffness now tinted with irritation.

  Herald turned around, careful to keep his fists tight as he placed them at his back.

  The Authority Figure slapped on the handcuffs with rough obliviousness. Herald had no agenda or fight left in him. He only meant to keep this one small comfort with him during his last moments alive. Such a harmless token, and yet it was one they would have rid him of had it been discovered.

  He wouldn’t exactly go ahead and call this luck. It was more like a pinprick, like a glint of light from a single star in an infinitely black sky.

  His cell door opened. It was the only time and would be the final time . . . with him as its captive at any rate. He had fought a good fight. He didn’t win this one, though, or come anywhere close to it.

  Nonetheless, there would be other battles. Other daring souls who’d use his bones as a stepping stone. A push here, a kick there, and they’d be closer to the head of the monster. Someday that monster would fall. Of that, he was certain. But this dark day was neither the time nor the place.

  At gunpoint, ten men doomed to die lined up in the corridor between cells. Herald was eighth. Law was fifth. Other than a solemn nod of acknowledgement, Law did not pay him much mind.

  They agreed to disagree about almost everything. As much as it tore them apart, it was also the glue that kept them by each other’s side through it all.

  The way things stood between them at that time, bodies weren’t the only obstruction. It was also failure. Their alliance on this was like a final wedge, impossible to reconcile in the time they had left.

  The light at the end of their tunnel was blinding. After his dark and lonely term of pain and suffering, it made his wounded eye burn and water. Through tears, he took in the cloudless sky. It was a crystalline blue. But shadows and a purplish dusk had settled across the gray stone of the Town Center courtyard.

  The sun was elsewhere. And the steady chill of autumn moved effortlessly around and through him. Upon the arrival of the damned, the angry crowd parted, revealing the gallows, the scaffold to climb upon, and the nooses swaying in the crisp breeze . . . flailing in the gusts as if eager to fulfill their purpose.

  Stepping underneath the eighth noose, Herald closed his eyes and ran the bloody scarf through his fingers. His mind gave him a small reprieve, allowing him to wander away from the horrific scene.

  He sought a place to be with Virtue.

  She was in the apple orchard with a basket over her arm. She wore a long skirt and shawl, and cradled the swell of an unborn child with her free hand. Not his, of course, but at least half hers.

  She’d make a lovely wife and mother. After a mental hemming and hawing, it was the first coherent thought he was capable of the day he had met her. It flowered to something irresistible and enchanting as she, little by little, opened up to him, mind, then heart, then body. If there was any virtue left in the world, it would still be possible.

  But it was a fool’s delusion. Captain was her only hope. He’d have his way with her and she’d get her fill of rage, spite, and deceit, and she’d have to bear that burden for a lifetime. And worse, she’d be trapped on that godforsaken island, haunted by the memories, wholly unappreciated after his lust and greed wandered to the next girl he’d coerce to say, “I do.”

  The corrective pull against his arm urged his eyes to seek, not for the dream but the reality.

  “How much blood will it take. . . ?” Herald’s fitful thoughts sharpened at the sound of Law’s voice. “Is this enough? For you to see that without truth there will never be justice!”

  That sounded a lot more like the man he’d be proud to die beside. Law could look failure right in the eye, swear to God the Almighty, and argue until his body was cold that it was something else.

  Somehow, the words enabled him to find Virtue’s wide eyes.

  Still . . . so beautiful. . .

  Despite the strong Authority presence, she did not abandon him . . . or the cause. She had even managed to push her way to the front and center alongside Doxy, Parody, and Blasphemy.

  And yet . . . her beautiful head of hair . . . gone. His panic and horror floundered across her gray bodysuit . . . the bruises and bloodstains. He squeezed the scarf in his hand until he could feel his own blood dripping from his knuckles.

  “You can kill me! You can kill my brothers, maim my sisters. But the blood will be on your hands! Do nothing, then die, someday, a coward.”

  At last, he found some solace. A coward was something Virtue would never be.

  The High Court’s Moral Advocate marched onto the scaffold, holding a scroll, raising his hand to attain some semblance of order. “Silence, please!”

  “I wasn’t finished!” Law spat back.

  “You are finished, you Ungodly wretch. This is the End of the Line!”

  “Judgement Day is coming for us all!”

  “The Town of Portsmith. . .” The Moral Advocate was now shouting his attempt to overpower Law and all murmurs of dissension. “The capital, and the Redeemer have sentenced you to death. . .”

  “If I were you, I’d be very afraid!”

  “Here. . .” the voice of morality boomed, “you will hang by the neck until dead. May God and the Redeemer have mercy on your soul.”

  The scroll sprung closed. He gave his official nod to the Authority Figure in charge and withdrew from the platform.

  Meanwhile, Herald was holding Virtue’s gaze, knowing it would be the last time. Don’t cry, he mouthed to her.

  She nodded. I love you, always, was her reply. Her outpouring of emotion only escalated, but so did the fire in her eyes. He had never seen anything quite like it. Not in her. Not in anyone.

  Beside her, she had friends, the four of them bound in ways a man could never truly understand.

  For a moment, all fear had lifted, even as his noose was draped over his shoulders and the sack went over his head. Virtue would never be alone. The Fallow foursome would continue to fight injustice, together, and with a new fervor . . . because they had nothing left to lose.

  Herald’s life may have come to an end—click—but the truth would never die.

  Chapter 14

  Law

  The mob was angry.

  If only Law could fan the flame, would a fire ignite?

  Did the Authorities have the power . . . the ammunition . . . the stomach to put it out before the entire courtyard went up in flames?

  One, two, three. . .

  Seven Authority Figures. Four with automatic weapons at the ready. Three government officials . . . none of them armed. All to manage a number well into the hundreds.

  Their arrogance . . . their complacency . . . it would end them . . . someday.

  Law would sell his soul to the devil himself just so he could watch them crumble.

  “How much blood will it take. . . ?” He usually accentuated every idea with his hands, but under these circumstances, it was just as well that they were cuffed at his back. They were trembling like the autumn leaves
about to succumb to the breeze. His voice, however, would be a parting gift for all to hear, because it never faltered. “Is this enough? For you to see that without truth there will never be justice!”

  He received nods and grumbles, and too many eyes to count, though he tried anyway . . . just to steady his mind. His voice may have been loud and clear, but his coherency had him worried.

  In his fight to find the words, he was slowly losing. And if he meant to escape the noose, their sharpness would have to be deadly.

  Seeking hope, inspiration, something . . . anything . . . Law paused at a face that was familiar to him.

  Blasphemy.

  His attention wandered over Parody, Doxy, and lastly, Virtue, filtering in to her right. Through standing room only, they had made their way to the front of the scaffold.

  They’d get a first-row view of the life twitching out of his body.

  Fantastic. . .

  Well, three out of the four of them, anyway. Perhaps. No guarantee, however.

  Respect, assuming he even had that, did not equal love.

  Virtue, for example, had her entire aura fixed on Herald and he wholeheartedly returned the sentiment. It would undoubtedly remain that way . . . forever. Herald was about to die too, but he was still the lucky one. There was someone out there who would actually miss him.

  The fact that Virtue was tearful had Law’s throat collapsing, his true last breath suddenly hard to predict or define. His Fallow colleagues hadn’t hatched a plan. They were there to be supportive . . . to say goodbye.

  And yet Blasphemy was demanding more from him. When their eyes met, they locked, and hers flared with unprecedented frustration as if to say, “It’s about goddamn time!”

  Then, she exaggerated a blink while slowly nodding.

  That was Gospel’s expression. He’s back?

  It was his way of agreeing to something. He’d dole it out judiciously, but if he did, one could be sure he’d follow through.

  Blasphemy’s eyes flashed up and to her left.

  Careful not to draw attention to the location she pointed out, Law swept his gaze casually over the entire skyline.

  There was no sign of anyone higher up than those about to fall to their doom. He was about to give up—and convey his confusion—when he spotted the subtle flutter of a black coattail by the chimney of a rooftop. And then, from that location, his eyes traced the wires running down the side of the building. He couldn’t see where they went from there, but glancing right and left, wires reappeared at the corners of the scaffold.

  Back to Blasphemy, he was biting down on his lower lip hard, just so that he wouldn’t smile. And she made a hand gesture by her mouth, encouraging him to keep talking.

  He gave her a Gospel-esque blink and nod. And then they broke the connection.

  After a deep, restorative breath, Law felt like himself again—an unapologetic, uncompromising thorn in Portsmith’s big, fat, ugly side. “You can kill me! You can kill my brothers, maim my sisters. But the blood will be on your hands! Do nothing, then die, someday, a coward.”

  He was making a difference, galvanizing everyone to take a clear position . . . for or against. And the good news? By his estimation, his side was winning.

  He would call that planning ahead. No matter what, he and his conspirators were a long way from freedom. The angry spectators would be a barrier as much as they were a shield.

  All he was being given was a chance.

  “Here you will hang by the neck until dead. May God and the Redeemer have mercy on your soul!”

  Ready? Blasphemy asked him, mouthing the word.

  Law nodded once. Herald? He inquired by flicking his head in that direction.

  She shook her head, eyes to heaven. Hasn’t a clue.

  No surprise there.

  You?

  With her finger, she drew a quick line from him to Herald.

  He winked. I’ll handle it.

  And at that moment, the sack went over Law’s head.

  I hope Gospel knows what he’s doing. . . .

  Law heard . . . and felt the click. The trapdoor fell out from beneath his feet.

  He was plummeting . . . to what felt like his demise. All the while, he was waiting, waiting, waiting—for the longest split-second of his life—for something to intervene.

  At the exact moment he was bracing himself for the tug, the pain, the end . . . the boom startled him. It was that loud.

  His feet somehow found the ground anyway.

  One explosion was followed by another, and another, the deafening sound pierced by screams and rapid gunfire. The weapons blasting, a call and answer. The Authorities weren’t the only ones shooting.

  Bending at the waist, it took one flick of his chin to get the sack off his head. He skipped past the onslaught of bullets breaking through the wood.

  He hurtled over two of the fallen bodies. Time was of the essence. “Run,” he shouted. The other ill-fated men were on their own, otherwise. But at least they weren’t dead . . . yet.

  Herald was flat on his stomach, the sack still in place over his head, doing little to alleviate any of his confusion. He was just beginning to stir.

  With Law’s foot on the sack and the other nudging him into motion at the shoulder, Herald sluggishly got a knee beneath himself. Then a foot. Then both. He slipped out of his visual barrier. And with Law leading the way, they found a splintered gap in the wood to escape through.

  Ducking and scurrying, like mice about to be picked off by hawks, Law and Herald made their way into the scrambling crowd. Since they emerged from the back of the gallows, the platform shielded them from the worst of the gunfire, but everyone else had a similar idea. Streams of people were fleeing in the same direction, though not in an orderly fashion. They were bumping, trampling, practically clawing their way to the relative safety of the walls and buildings, turns and passages the streets ahead would provide.

  Herald kept looking back, slowing them down. “Where’s Virtue? And . . . the others?” he added as an afterthought.

  Law was focusing on what was in front of him. And cursed out loud when another cuffed escapee had gotten to a fallen Authority Figure first, taking both his handgun and keys mere seconds before Law could find a way to grab them.

  The Authority Figure was dead from a bullet wound right between the eyes. He had to hand it to Gospel. He was a master planner and excellent marksman. “They’re together. They’ll be fine.”

  Gospel will see to it.

  Herald, unconvinced, earned a rough elbow to the shoulder blade, nudging him over the obstacle. In handcuffs, they still stood out as “guilty.” It’d be foolish to linger.

  Law’s pace was never quite matched by Herald’s. And yet somehow, they made it to Mercy Way.

  God did, indeed, have a sense of humor.

  About three blocks further away from the epicenter of the annihilation, Law swerved behind a brick stairway. Herald did the same. They could finally spare a moment to look back.

  Almost immediately, a low to high whistle whisked their attention to the rooftop of the brownstone beside them. Blasphemy and Doxy were nearing the same location. The whistle acquired their regard as well.

  As soon as they spotted Gospel on top of the building, their gazes drifted down to Law and Herald.

  Five down. Two to go. They were no longer a group of ten—they lost Hearsay, Corollary, and obviously, the Captain—but if all went well, they’d be reunited as completely as possible.

  Gospel pointed to a manhole a short distance down the cobblestone, conspicuously situated behind a tree and underneath a dusting of autumn leaves. Blasphemy gave him the A-OK signal while Doxy readied the keys she had for Law and Herald’s handcuffs.

  “Thank you,” Law said as his cuffs snapped open.

  Doxy acknowledged him with a curt nod, as if saving his life was just another dirty job to be done.

  “Where are the others?” Herald rubbed his sore wrists once they were free.

  Blas
phemy’s was already squinting back through the steady stream of disorder. “They were right behind us.”

  They all did their part searching . . . through faces, shadows, and gaps, and yet their efforts were being wasted in the wrong direction. They had to disappear. Because going back, even looking back for too long, would get them killed.

  Doxy was the first to turn away, emitting an exasperated sigh. “Gospel knows where we’ll be.”

  With surprising strength for someone so spindly, she set aside the manhole cover. Blasphemy gave Herald a guilty-looking shrug and followed her over there. Doxy had already descended below street level. Blasphemy went down after her.

  Law, however, remained by Herald’s side. For far too long. The cold sweat accumulating on his back was growing more frigid than ever.

  There was an Authority Figure not too far off, beating the bloody pulp out of someone with a baton. A few other Authorities had streamed by them already. They were fortunately too distracted by the brutality they were inflicting to notice or recognize two “fugitives” in what would inadequately qualify as a “hiding spot.”

  “Herald. . .” Law said, shifting toward safety. Herald didn’t look away from the direction they came from. “Nearly everyone in Portsmith has seen your face. They’ll find you. Believe it or not, you’re important. And it won’t do her or anyone else much good if you’re dead.”

  At Law’s tug, Herald remained planted in the dangerous locale. “She’s never been on her own before,” he said with an airy, maniacal calmness.

  He was at wits’ end, and yet through the despondency, he was speaking the truth. Parody could take care of herself. She could defend herself if need be. She could manage through the very worst, assuming she was still alive, but if Virtue happened to lose her. . .

  She’d get eaten alive out there.

  But there was no reason to jump to that conclusion just yet.

  “She has a fighting spirit,” Law tried to assure him, but something about the situation made the words feel hollow. “And Gospel knows what he’s doing. He won’t come back without them.”

  Herald clutched a hand over his face, his fingers leaving visible marks. And blindly—the hand seemed a permanent fixture—he no longer wanted to see or be seen—he let Law lead him into a dampness so foul and a darkness so deep.