The August 5

by Jenna Helland

  “Hide where?” he asked as they headed deeper into the darkness of the alley. He thought they were going to wait in the shadows, but there was a rustle and then the sound of a match being struck beside him as Emilie lit a small candle. In the tiny circle of light, he could now see that they had reached the end of the alley and were standing in front of a rusty metal door. She pulled a key from around her neck and unlocked it.

  “You know where we are?” Tommy asked, confused and more frightened than he’d have liked to admit.

  Instead of answering, she tugged on the heavy door and firelight shone unexpectedly through the narrow opening. She opened it wider to reveal a staircase leading down into a black void. A lantern burned at the top of the steps, but its light didn’t reach all the way to the bottom so Tommy wasn’t sure how far down it went.

  “What is this place?” Tommy asked.

  “They’re going to come back,” Emilie warned. “Come inside, and we’ll talk in there.”

  Tommy glanced over his shoulder at the alley. There was no sign of the men, but that didn’t mean they weren’t coming back. He stepped inside the narrow foyer at the top of the stairs. She yanked the door and it closed with a metallic clang. He heard a click as it latched automatically. They were locked inside.

  “Do you know how much we hate your father?” Emilie said. “Do you know what kind of man he is?”

  “What does this have to do with my father?” Tommy asked.

  “I wanted to hate you, too,” Emilie said. “I really thought I would. But Mrs. Trueblood didn’t hate you. I’ve heard her talk about you and she wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

  “Where is she?” Tommy asked.

  “She isn’t here,” Emilie answered. “I want you to come down these steps with me and see the truth.”

  “What’s down there?” Tommy asked.

  “Nothing that will hurt you,” she said. “Come and see for yourself.”

  “No offense, but no thanks,” Tommy said.

  “If I wanted to hurt you, I would have told the fellows at the pub that you were there,” Emilie said.

  “Yet you invited me there in the first place,” Tommy said.

  “There is something at the bottom of these steps that you should see,” she said. “Not only as the son of Colston Shore, but as a human being who exists in the world.”

  Tommy felt a tug of curiosity. “We’ll stay until those men are gone, and then we’ll go see Mrs. Trueblood?”

  “I lied to you about Mrs. Trueblood,” Emilie said. “She’s not in the city. But she would understand why I had to bring you here. She would understand why I’m doing this.”

  “Is there anyone else here?” Tommy asked.

  “No, it’s a historical record,” Emilie said.

  “What?” Tommy asked. He felt thoroughly confused, but not frightened anymore. The men outside were scarier than Emilie.

  “If you want to know the truth about your father, you’ll come with me,” she said.

  She took the burning torch from the wall and climbed carefully down the steep stairs. Tommy couldn’t shake his growing curiosity and followed Emilie. When they reached the bottom, he was expecting a dank and miserable space, but instead, the air was pleasant and smelled like flowers. Using her torch, Emilie lit a lantern near the door and the light flooded the sweet-smelling space.

  Emilie moved around the small room, lighting several more lanterns, until it was as bright as day in that underground room. The walls were blanketed with hand-drawn portraits of men and women of all ages. Some of the portraits were painted with exquisite care. Others were scrawled by children on ratty paper. Some were perfect representations of the human face. Others pictures were more like scribbles with vaguely human features—angry marks gashed into paper. In the middle of the room, there was a large arrangement of violets and red tulips along with personal tokens—wooden beads and letters.

  “What is this place?” Tommy asked.

  “It used to be a root cellar,” Emilie told him. “Now it’s a shrine to the missing.”

  “Who are the missing?” Tommy said, and Emilie made a sweeping motion with her arm around the room.

  “These people are,” she said. “It started with the Ancestral Homes Act. No, actually, it started when your father took power. People are disappearing from the city. Our loved ones are gone without a trace. Where are they going? And why? Are they being deported to other islands? Maybe. Most don’t have the proper identification, but then why don’t we ever hear from them again?”

  Tommy peered closely at the faces on the walls. A young woman with long dark hair smiled out at him from one of the paintings. The artist had painted her eyes and her dress the same cornflower blue. Whoever the artist was had known every curve of her face perfectly—this was someone who was loved. Near the door, there was a long, handwritten list of names. Tommy glanced at it, registering the first few names: Aileen Teagan. Eleanor Carson. Jamie Lindsey. Meggie Stevens.

  “Those are their names, never to be forgotten,” Emilie said. “Someday, there’ll be a reckoning for every single one of them.”

  Tommy remembered the name Meg Stevens from that day at Mast Square when the soldiers attacked the demonstration. She’d been speaking from the prow of the ship.

  “You should know who your father is and what he’s doing,” Emilie said. “The August Five are going to die under his hand. He’ll call it a fair trial, and then he’ll kill them. Michael Henry is being blamed for the kidnapping of Hywel. I know that he isn’t responsible for that, and he shouldn’t die for it.”

  “How do you know he didn’t do it?” Tommy asked. He didn’t want to offend her, but he was curious how she knew such a thing.

  Instead of answering, Emilie knelt and began adjusting her boot. Absurdly, Tommy felt embarrassed, like he was watching something private. So he turned around and faced the wall. He heard a rustling and a metallic clink. He had the sense that Emilie was approaching him, but when he turned around she was still crouched in the middle of the floor. But now she placed a hand on the shrine and rested her head against the edge in a defeated sort of way. Her shoulders were shaking as if she were crying silently.

  He felt a rush of pity for Emilie despite her lies. Whatever manipulative game she had been playing with him was obviously over. He was disappointed about not seeing Mrs. Trueblood, and the sight of these missing people made him feel shaky and confused. But instead of sprinting back up the stairs and into the night, he knelt beside her and rested his hand on her shoulder to comfort her.

  “I wish that the truth was as bright as the North Star,” she whispered. “That no matter where in the world I was, all I had to do was look at the sky and know my way.”

  “It’s like truth is determined by who can yell the loudest,” Tommy said. “The people you’re supposed to trust tell you the wrong thing.”

  “Who does that?” Emilie asked softly. Her forehead was still pressed against the rough wooden edge of the table.

  “My father does,” Tommy said. “All he talks about is honor. But what about these people? Where is the honor in this?”

  “There is none,” Emilie said. “His honor is a bloody lie.”

  “My brother says you can do whatever you want as long as you don’t get caught,” Tommy said.

  “What do you say?” Emilie asked.

  “I think honor is about what you do when nobody’s watching,” he said.

  “And what about when everybody is watching?” she asked.

  “It shouldn’t change a thing,” he said.

  Emilie turned her head and studied him for a long moment. He was acutely aware of the burn marks on her throat. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll show you the way home.”

  22

  VANISHED!

  Tilo Locke, a beloved musician from Sevenna, is missing. He was last seen leaving the Plough and the Sun in the early-morning hours of October 6 and failed to report to his factory job the next day. Locke was engaged to be ma
rried in December, and his family fears that he has been arrested. The Zunft denies that he’s being held at the compound.

  —JFA Bulletin, October 21

  When they reached the Seventh Stone Bridge, Tamsin and Tommy parted company without a word. As Tamsin watched the slim boy cross the river, the knife felt heavy in her boot. The last hope for her father was walking back into the safety of North Sevenna. She waited until he was out of sight and then she, too, stepped onto the red-stone bridge. She moved carefully, as if she were afraid that the stones would crumble beneath her boots. At the midpoint, Tamsin stopped and listened for rover engines, but there was no sound of an approaching Zunft patrol.

  Her head ached and she wished she could get out of the city. She wanted to be somewhere where the houses were far apart and the earth was unburdened by stonework. If she were on Aeren, she would seek solace in Wren Glade, the grave site where her family buried their dead. The glade was a natural clearing in the old-growth forest, and mossy cairns commemorated the lives of her kin. Every spring equinox, they would travel to Wren Glade to replace any rocks that had fallen and leave seed cookies for the birds who watched over the site. It was meant to be a day for the family to joyfully remember the lost.

  Her father would need a cairn soon. She would have to stack heavy stones in memory of his life. She thought of the rubble left from the battle at the Grand Customs House, and it reminded her of a giant cairn. Since she couldn’t go to Wren Glade, she would pay her respects at the last place Michael Henry had known freedom. Tamsin continued across the bridge, and when she reached the northern side of the Lyone River, she hurried to the harbor. Being out at night without an identification card was a foolish thing to do. If she got caught by the Zunft, she would join her father in the compound or have her face plastered on the wall in the shrine to the missing.

  Tamsin felt reckless. As she ran through the sleeping city, she understood why Navid loved being a messenger. The wind whipped down the narrow streets, and the shops became a surreal blur in her watery eyes. Inspired by her young friend’s preferred mode of travel, Tamsin decided to head to the rooftops. She found an alley near the Grand Customs House and searched for a way to climb up, away from the perils of the street and closer to the night sky.

  She glimpsed a sturdy fire ladder in the shadows, and it made her smile. Navid would tell her she’d got off easy. As she scampered to the top of the three-story building, she remembered Tommy and his mother’s sacrifice. Michael Henry had done the opposite. He’d used Tamsin in search of his own glory and fame. Gavin had tried to tell her, but at the time, she couldn’t accept what he was saying.

  At the top of the ladder, she hoisted herself onto the gravel roof of a tenement building across the alley from the customs house. In the months since she’d seen it, the Zunft had completely rebuilt the building. The scars of the battle were gone. There was even a new bell tower on top of the Grand Customs House, overlooking Sevenna Harbor. She stared across the expanse. Leaping from building to building was easy for Navid, but it seemed ridiculously far to Tamsin. What do I have to lose? she thought as she backed up a few paces and got a running start. She jumped as far as she could, but didn’t make it cleanly onto the roof of the customs house. She slammed into the edge, her hands frantically grasping the edge of the stonework trim.

  With her boots scrabbling against the stones, she hauled herself up. She was scraped and bruised, but felt an odd sense of accomplishment. She inspected the bell tower and rattled the glossy black door, which was secured with a padlock. There was a brass plaque that read: In memory of the brave soldiers who lost their lives during the August Rising. If the customs house was her father’s tomb, then this was his epithet. Violence was his legacy to the world.

  “I’m not high enough,” Tamsin whispered to the bell tower. “I need to be closer to the stars.”

  The wooden bell tower was wider at its base, and become narrower toward its peaked roof, which was painted cerulean blue. In the east, the sky was getting lighter as she scaled the outside of the twenty-foot tower. She was feeling confident until she tried to navigate onto the roof. Twice, she almost lost her grip on the planks, and the jolt of fear almost made her give up this dangerous pursuit. But on her third try, she ungracefully shimmied onto the top of the bell tower, which was barely big enough for her to sit cross-legged and catch her breath.

  She was the highest thing in the city.

  The sea stretched to her west. Although Aeren was too far away to see, she imagined her mother and her little sisters sleeping in the cottage near Miller’s Road. She gazed north, where the Zunft Compound dominated the ridge overlooking the city. She couldn’t see beyond the imposing walls, but she envisioned her father outside in the prison yard breathing the crisp early-morning air. Her eyes traced the winding Lyone River, which drew a line between the two halves of the city. North Sevenna had clean lines and sharp edges compared to the raggedy, haphazard buildings of South Sevenna.

  “Am I a destroyer?” Tamsin asked the horizon, hugging her knees to her chest. “Do I want to tear all of this down, set fire to the world?”

  The eastern sky turned crimson as the sun rose over the city. She could see crowds of people taking to the streets in South Sevenna as the cottagers prepared to make their way toward their jobs for the Zunft. From this height, the people seemed to move in unity, a mass exodus from the south to the north. As soon as they crossed the river, the crowd would be separated into individual parts. A cottager woman would go do a Zunftman’s laundry. Another would clear his table. Others would bake his bread and sew his suit.

  What would the Zunft do if they woke up to dark houses with no one to do their work? What if the masses never came to light their fires, cook their breakfasts, or start their rovers? Tamsin stared out at the sea and said a prayer for her father, hoping the winds would whip her words across the waves to the green fields of Aeren. Then she laid down her knife and went to pick up a pen.

  23

  ILLEGAL TRIAL CONTINUES!

  The mass trial against the August Five is nearing its conclusion. The proceedings are closed to the public, but the Zunft Chronicle reported that the prosecution presented fourteen witnesses who testified that they saw the defendants exiting the Grand Customs House during the battle. The defending barrister, who was appointed by the state, presented no witnesses and finished his arguments in less than an hour. The evidence will now be judged by a panel of Zunftmen appointed by the chief administrator. The names of those on the panel have not been released. A verdict is expected within days.

  —JFA Bulletin, October 28

  Gavin tapped lightly on the Leahys’ blue door, and Katherine Leahy opened it. She smiled brightly at him. “Come in!”

  “Thank you,” Gavin said, wiping his feet on the straw mat. There was a light snow falling outside, and Gavin brushed the flakes off his cap.

  “We’re about to eat. Will you join us?”

  It was late Sunday afternoon and the family would be sitting down to supper soon. Sunday night was usually the biggest meal of the week for cottagers, and often the only one where meat was served. The Leahys’ row house smelled of stew and fresh bread. Gavin hadn’t eaten anything that day and now he felt his hunger acutely.

  “Thank you, but I can’t,” Gavin said politely, keeping his coat on. If he stayed for dinner, that would mean less for everyone else. “Navid stopped by the Bulletin and said that Mr. Leahy wanted to see me.”

  “Yes, thank you for coming,” she said. “We’d love for you to stay. I already set another place for you.”

  It had been a week since Gavin had seen Tamsin at the Plough and Sun. Whatever she’d been planning to do with the young Mr. Shore hadn’t happened, of that much he was certain. The world would have exploded if she’d kidnapped him, but there had been nothing in the news except the closed trial of the rebel leaders. Midweek, Gavin had stopped by the pub after Tamsin’s shift, but she was already gone. He didn’t want to try to talk to her in front of other
people at dinner. It would be better to catch her alone some other time.

  “I need to get back to the Bulletin as soon as possible,” Gavin said.

  “I understand,” Katherine said. “Any news about the verdict?”

  “I don’t know why they’re delaying,” Gavin said. “Maybe it’s a show of legitimacy, but everyone knows what the final result is going to be.”

  Katherine nodded. It wasn’t a question of whether or not the August Five would be found guilty. The question was how long before they were shot.

  “Brian’s in the back by the woodshed,” Mrs. Leahy told him. “Gavin, can I ask you a question?”

  “Of course,” Gavin said.

  “Did something happen to Tamsin?”

  “Why? Is something wrong?” Gavin asked worriedly.

  “I think something bad happened last weekend,” Katherine said. “At first I thought it was the stress of the trial, but now I’m not sure. She’s working constantly. First at the pub, then at the Estoria, and she even comes home and works. She closes herself in that room. I can see the candle burning at all hours.”

  “Is she here?” Gavin asked. “I can speak to her.”

  “No, she’s not,” Katherine said. “I hoped she’d be here for dinner, but she said she had something else she had to do.”

  “I’ll talk to her when I can,” Gavin promised.

  “Good,” Mrs. Leahy said. “I know she respects you.”

  Gavin wasn’t so sure about that, but he thanked Katherine and found Brian in the backyard chopping up a log. It was snowing harder now. Even though he was nearly eighteen years old, he still felt a childish excitement during a snowfall. He resisted the urge to bend down and scoop up a handful.

  “How are you, sir?” Gavin asked. “Do you need any help?”

  Brian took one more swing and left the ax buried deep in the wet wood. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a folded stack of papers.

  “I’m not an educated man,” Brian said. “But I know when I read something … exceptional. Tamsin wrote it. It’s a treatise from Angry Em.”