by Patrick Ness
“Quiet, Manchee,” I say.
“I’m not even sure it matters,” Viola says, her voice stretching out.
I look up.
“Cw,” Manchee says.
A creacher is walking right past us.
We’ve entered the herd.
Entered the song.
And for a little while, I forget all about any kinda lies.
I’ve never seen the sea, only in vids. No lakes where I grew up neither, just the river and the swamp. There may have been boats once but not in my lifetime.
But if I had to imagine being on the sea, this is what I’d imagine. The herd surrounds us and takes up everything, leaving just the sky and us. It cuts around us like a current, sometimes noticing us but more usually noticing only itself and the song of Here, which in the midst of it is so loud it’s like it’s taken over the running of yer body for a while, providing the energy to make yer heart beat and yer lungs breathe.
After a while, I find myself forgetting all about Wilf and the – the other things I could think about and I’m just lying back on the cart, watching it all go by, individual creachers snuffling around, feeding, bumping each other now and again with their horns, and there’s baby ones, too, and old bulls and taller ones and shorter ones and some with scars and some with scruffier fur.
Viola’s laying down next to me and Manchee’s little doggie brain is overwhelmed by it all and he’s just watching the herd go by with his tongue hanging out and for a while, for a little while, as Wilf drives us over the plain, this is all there is in the world.
This is all there is.
I look over at Viola and she looks back at me and just smiles and shakes her head and wipes away the wet from her eyes.
Here.
Here.
We’re Here and nowhere else.
Cuz there’s nowhere else but Here.
“So this . . . Aaron,” Viola says after a while in a low voice and I know exactly why it’s now that she brings him up.
It’s so safe inside the Here we can talk about any dangers we like.
“Yeah?” I say, also keeping my voice low, watching a little family of creachers waltz by the end of the cart, the ma creacher nuzzling forward a curious baby creacher who’s staring at us.
Viola turns to me from where she’s lying down. “Aaron was your holy man?”
I nod. “Our one and only.”
“What kind of things did he preach?”
“The usual,” I say. “Hellfire. Damnayshun. Judgement.”
She eyes me up. “I’m not sure that’s the usual, Todd.”
I shrug. “He believed we were living thru the end of the world,” I say. “Who’s to say he was wrong?”
She shakes her head. “That’s not what the preacher we had on the ship was like. Pastor Marc. He was kind and friendly and made everything seem like it was going to be okay.”
I snort. “No, that don’t sound like Aaron at all. He was always saying, ‘God hears’ and ‘If one of us falls, we all fall’. Like he was looking forward to it.”
“I heard him say that, too.” She crosses her arms over herself.
The Here wraps us still, flowing everywhere.
I turn to her. “Did he . . . Did he hurt you? Back in the swamp?”
She shakes her head again and lets out a sigh. “He ranted and raved at me, and I guess it might have been preaching, but if I ran, he’d run after me and rant some more and I’d cry and ask him for help but he’d ignore me and preach some more and I’d see pictures of myself in his Noise when I didn’t even know what Noise was. I’ve never been so scared in my life, not even when our ship was crashing.”
We both look up into the sun.
“If one of us falls, we all fall,” she says. “What does that even mean?”
Which, when I really think about it, I realize I don’t know and so I don’t say nothing and we just sink back into the Here and let it take us a little farther.
Here we are.
Not nowhere else.
After an hour or a week or a second, the creachers start thinning and we come out the other side of the herd. Manchee jumps down off the cart. We’re going slow enough that there’s no danger of him getting left behind so I let him. We’re not thru lying there on the cart just yet.
“That was amazing,” Viola says quietly, cuz the song is already starting to disappear. “I forgot all about how much my feet hurt.”
“Yeah,” I say.
“What were those?”
“’Em big thangs,” Wilf says, not turning round. “Jus thangs, thass all.”
Viola and I look at each other, like we forgot he was even there.
How much have we given away?
“’Em thangs got a name?” Viola asks, sitting up, acting her lie again.
“Oh, sure,” Wilf says, giving the oxes freer rein now that we’re outta the herd. “Packy Vines or Field Baysts or Anta Fants.” We see him shrug from behind. “I just call ’em thangs, thass all.”
“Thangs,” Viola says.
“Things,” I try.
Wilf looks back over his shoulder at us. “Say what, y’all from Farbranch?” he asks.
“Yessir,” Viola says with a look at me.
Wilf nods at her. “Y’all bin seen that there army?”
My Noise spikes real loud before I can quiet it but again Wilf don’t seem to notice. Viola looks at me, worry on her forehead.
“And what army’s that, Wilf?” she says, the voice missing a little.
“That there army from cursed town,” he says, still driving along like we’re talking about vegetables. “That there army come outta swamp, come takin settlements, growin as it comes? Y’all bin seen that?”
“Where’d yoo hear bout an army, Wilf?”
“Stories,” Wilf says. “Stories a-come chatterin down the river. People talkin. Ya know. Stories. Y’all bin seen that?’’
I shake my head at Viola but she says, “Yeah, we seen it.”
Wilf looks back over his shoulder again. “Zit big?”
“Very big,” Viola says, looking at him seriously. “Ya gotta prepare yerself, Wilf. There’s danger comin. Yoo need to warn Brockley Hills.”
“Brockley Falls,” Wilf corrects her.
“Ya gotta warn ’em, Wilf.”
We hear Wilf grunt and then we realize it’s a laugh. “Ain’t nobody lissnen to Wilf, I tell ya what,” he says, almost to himself, then strikes the reins on the oxes again.
It takes most of the rest of the afternoon to get to the other side of the plain. Thru Viola’s binos we can see the herd of things still crossing in the distance, from south to north, like they’re never gonna run out. Wilf don’t say nothing more about the army. Viola and I keep our talking to a bare minimum so we don’t give any more away. Plus, it’s so hard to keep my Noise clear it’s taking mosta my concentrayshun. Manchee follows along on the road, doing his business and sniffing every flower.
When the sun is low in the sky, the cart finally creaks to a halt.
“Brockley Falls,” Wilf says, nodding his head to where we can see in the distance the river tumbling off a low cliff. There’s fifteen or twenty buildings gathered round the pond at the bottom of the falls before the river starts up again. A smaller road turns off from this one and leads down to it.
“We’re getting off here,” Viola says and we hop down, taking our bags from the cart.
“Thought ya mite,” Wilf says, looking back over his shoulder at us again.
“Thank ya, Wilf,” she says.
“Welcome,” he says, staring off into the distance. “Best take shelter ’fore too long. Gone rain.”
Both Viola and me automatically look straight up. There ain’t a cloud in the sky.
“Mmm,” Wilf says. “No one lissnen to Wilf.”
Viola looks back at him, her voice returning to itself, trying to get the point to him clearly. “You have to warn them, Wilf. Please. If you’re hearing that an army’s coming, then you’re right and
people have to be ready.”
All Wilf says is “Mmm” again before snapping the reins and turning the oxes down the split road towards Brockley Falls. He don’t even look back once.
We watch him go for a while and then turn back to our own road.
“Ow,” Viola says, stretching out her legs as she steps forward.
“I know,” I say. “Mine too.”
“You think he was right?” Viola says.
“Bout what?”
“About the army getting bigger as it marches.” She imitates his voice again. “Growin as it comes.”
“How do you do that?” I ask. “Yer not even from here.”
She shrugs. “A game I used to play with my mother,” she says. “Telling a story, using different voices for every character.”
“Can you do my voice?” I ask, kinda tentative.
She grins. “So you can have a conversayshun with yerself?”
I frown. “That don’t sound nothing like me.”
We head back down the road, Brockley Falls disappearing behind us. The time on the cart was nice but it weren’t sleep. We try to go as fast as we can but most times that ain’t much more than a walk. Plus maybe the army really is caught far behind, really will have to wait behind the creachers.
Maybe. Maybe not. But within the half hour, you know what?
It’s raining.
“People should listen to Wilf,” Viola says, looking up.
The road’s found its way back down near the river and we find a reasonably sheltered spot twixt the two. We’ll eat our dinner, see if the rain stops. If it don’t we got no choice but to walk in it anyway. I haven’t even checked to see if Ben packed me a mac.
“What’s a mac?” Viola asks as we sit down against different trees.
“A raincoat,” I say, looking thru my rucksack. Nope, no mac. Great. “And what did I say bout listening too close?”
I still feel a little calm, if you wanna know the truth, tho I probably shouldn’t. The song of Here still feels like it’s being sung, even if I can’t hear it, even if it’s miles away back on the plain. I find myself humming it, even tho it don’t have a tune, trying to get that feeling of connectedness, of belonging, of having someone there to say that you’re Here.
I look over at Viola, eating outta one of her packets of fruit.
I think about my ma’s book, still in my rucksack.
Stories in voices, I think.
Could I stand to hear my ma’s voice spoken?
Viola crinkles the fruit packet she’s just finished. “That’s the last of them.”
“I got some of this cheese left,” I say, “and some dried mutton, but we’re gonna have to start finding some of our own on the way.”
“You mean like stealing?” she asks, her eyebrows up.
“I mean like hunting,” I say. “But maybe stealing, too, if we have to. And there’s wild fruit and I know some roots we can eat if you boil ’em first.”
“Mmm.” Viola frowns. “There’s not much call for hunting on a spaceship.”
“I could show you.”
“Okay,” she says, trying to sound cheerful. “Don’t you need a gun?”
“Not if yer a good hunter. Rabbits are easy with snares. Fish with lines. You can catch squirrels with yer knife but there ain’t much meat.”
“Horse, Todd,” Manchee barks, quietly.
I laugh, for the first time in what seems like forever. Viola laughs, too. “We ain’t hunting horses, Manchee.” I reach out to pet him. “Stupid dog.”
“Horse,” he barks again, standing up and looking down the road from the direkshun we just came.
We stop laughing.
There’s hoofbeats on the road, distant but approaching at full gallop.
“Someone from Brockley Hills?” Viola says, hope and doubt both in her voice.
“Brockley Falls,” I say, standing. “We need to hide.”
We repack our bags in a hurry. It’s a narrow strip of trees we’ve managed to get ourselves stuck in twixt the road and the river. We daren’t cross the road and with the river at our backs, a fallen log is the best we’re gonna get. We gather the last of our things and crouch down behind it, Manchee held twixt my knees, rain splashing everywhere.
I take out my knife.
The hoofbeats keep coming, louder and louder.
“Only one horse,” Viola whispers. “It’s not the army.”
“Yeah,” I say, “but listen how fast he’s riding.”
Thump budda-thump budda-thump we hear. Thru the trees we can see the dot of him approaching. He’s coming full out down the road, even tho it’s raining and night’s falling. No one’d ride like that with good news, would they?
Viola looks behind us at the river. “Can you swim?”
“Yeah.”
“Good,” she says. “Because I can’t.”
Thump budda-thump budda-thump.
I can hear the buzz of the rider’s Noise starting but for a time the galloping is louder and I can’t hear it clearly.
“Horse,” Manchee says from down below.
It’s there. Static twixt the hoofbeats. Flashes of it. Parts of words caught. Rid– and Pa– and Dark– and Stup– and more and more.
I clench the knife harder. Viola’s not saying nothing now.
Thump budda-thump budda-thump budda–
Faster and Nightfall and Shot and Whatever it–
And he’s coming down the road, round a little curve we took just a hundred metres back, leaning forward–
Thump budda–
The knife turns in my hand cuz–
Shot ’em all and She was tasty and Dark here–
Thump BUDDA–
I think I reckernize–
THUMP BUDDA-THUMP BUDDA–
And he’s nearer and nearer till he’s almost–
And then Todd Hewitt? rings out as clear as day thru the rain and the galloping and the river.
Viola gasps.
And I can see who it is.
“Junior,” Manchee barks.
It’s Mr Prentiss Jr.
We try to duck down farther below the log but it ain’t no use cuz we already see him pulling back hard on the reins to stop his horse, causing it to rear up and nearly throw him.
But only nearly.
And not enough to make him drop the rifle he’s got under one arm.
Todd BLOODY HEWITT! screams his Noise.
“Oh, shit,” I hear Viola say and I know what she means.
“Well, HOOO-EEE!” Mr Prentiss Jr yells and we’re close enough to see the smile on his face and hear amazement in his voice. “Yer taking the ROAD?! You ain’t even going OFF TRAIL?!”
My eyes meet Viola’s. What choice did we have?
“I been hearing yer Noise for almost yer whole stupid life, boy!” He turns his horse this way and that, trying to find where exactly we are in our little strip of woods. “You think I’m not gonna hear it if ya just HIDE?”
There’s joy in his Noise. Real joy, like he can’t believe his luck.
“And wait a minute,” he says and we can hear him edging his horse off the road and into the woods. “Wait just a minute. What’s that beside you? That empty space of nothing.”
He says it so nasty Viola flinches. I got the knife in my hand but he’s on horseback and we know he’s got a gun.
“Too effing right I’ve got a gun, Todd boy,” he calls, no longer searching round but coming straight for us, getting his horse to step over bushes and round trees. “And I got another gun, too, another one special, just for yer little lady there, Todd.”
I look at Viola. I know she sees what he’s thinking, what’s in his Noise, the pictures that ooze out of it. I know she does cuz I can see her face closing right up. I bump her arm and I flash my eyes over to our right, just about the only possibility we have for an escape.
“Oh, please run, boy,” Mr Prentiss Jr calls. “Please give me a reason to hurt you.”
The horse is so close we c
an hear its Noise, too, jittery and crazy.
There’s no farther down we can crouch.
He’s nearly on top of us.
I grip the knife and squeeze Viola’s hand once, hard, for luck.
It’s now or never.
And–
“NOW!” I yell.
We jump up and a gun blast rings out, splintering the branches over our heads, but we run anyway.
“GET!” Mr Prentiss Jr shouts to his horse and here they come.
In two bounds, his horse turns and jumps back to the road, following along it as we run. The strip twixt the road and the river ain’t getting any thicker and we can see each other as we go. Branches snap and puddles splash and feet slip and he pounds along the road matching our every step.
We ain’t gonna get away from him. We just ain’t.
But we try, each of us taking a twisty path up and over logs and thru bushes and Manchee’s panting and barking at our heels and the rain’s splashing down on us and the road’s getting closer and then it suddenly veers sharply towards the river and we got no choice but to cross it in front of him to get to the deeper woods on the other side and I can see Viola leaping over the boundary and onto the road with her arms pumping and Mr Prentiss Jr rounding the bend and he’s twirling something in his hand and we make a dash for the other side but the horse is roaring down on us and suddenly I feel something grab my legs, binding ’em so fast and so tight I fall right off my feet.
“Aaagh!” I yell and I hit my face into muck and fallen leaves and the rucksack goes over my head and nearly rips my arms off as it flies off my back and Viola sees me fall and she’s nearly cross the road but I see mud curling up from where her feet are digging in to stop herself and I shout, “NO! RUN! RUN!” and she locks my eyes and I see something change on her face but who knows what it means and as the horse bears down she turns and disappears into the woods and Manchee runs back to me and barks “Todd! Todd!” and I’m caught I’m caught I’m caught.
Cuz Mr Prentiss Jr is standing over me, breathing hard, high on his white horse, rifle cocked and pointed. I know what’s happened. He’s thrown a rope with weights at either end right at my legs and they’ve twisted round and caught me, expert, just like a hunter after swamp deer. I’m stuck down here in the mud on my belly, caught like an animal.