The August 5

by Jenna Helland

  “Amy! The dogs are pawing at the windows!” Hywel ranted.

  As Tommy helped Hywel onto the ladder, he thought about his father back in Sevenna, claiming victory over the cottagers now that the Cessation was over. If Colston really was responsible, then how could he justify this? How could he talk about honor and then imprison an innocent man?

  Hywel was too weak to climb the ladder, and Tommy had to lift him while Ellie dragged him up from above. Once they got to the top of the ladder, Hywel collapsed on the floor of the ruined cottage. His breath sounded raspy.

  “Let’s get him some water,” Tommy said, rummaging in the backpack for a jug.

  Ellie held the jug to Hywel’s lips, but he sputtered and called for his dead wife.

  “Should we take him to your manor?” Ellie asked. “I’m not sure he’ll make it that far.”

  “We need to get him away from here,” Tommy said. “We’ll figure something out on the way.”

  Tommy helped Hywel stand. He stood on one side, and Ellie stood on the other. Each of them put an arm around the man’s back, and they managed to shuffle down to the trail. Finally, after what seemed like hours, they reached Miller’s Road. The wind whipped through the trees, and Hywel was shivering uncontrollably. By now, they were practically dragging him and Hywel’s eyes kept rolling back in his head.

  “I’m not sure he can go any farther,” Ellie said. “Or me. My spine feels like it’s about to snap.”

  They dragged Hywel off the road and found a sheltered place at the base of a tree. Tommy covered the man with his coat and left the knapsack with Ellie.

  “If you hear a rover, don’t let the driver see you,” Tommy said. “My father has the only rovers around here.”

  “I’ll stay here no matter what,” she said to him. “Don’t forget where I am.”

  Tommy ran through the trees, oblivious to the branches scratching him through his shirtsleeves. He burst into the yard of the cottager’s house—the same one where he had left Tamsin—and banged on the door. An older man with a gray beard opened the door a crack. He looked puzzled at the unexpected intrusion.

  “Can I help you?” he asked politely.

  “Please, I need to find Mrs. Trueblood,” Tommy pleaded. “Greta Trueblood. Please, can you help me?”

  Mr. Hywel stirred on the cot near the blazing fireplace in Anna Henry’s cottage. Anna and Greta Trueblood exchanged worried glances while Ellie checked to see if he had woken up, but he was only mumbling in his sleep.

  “Will he be all right, Mrs. Henry?” Ellie asked.

  “With rest and food he should recover,” Mrs. Henry said. “But it’ll take some time for him to regain his strength.”

  Ellie sat back down at the table while Mrs. Trueblood poured her another cup of black tea. Mrs. Henry’s young daughters were asleep in the back room, so they spoke in low tones. Outside, another Aeren storm lashed the ridge, but as Tommy sat near Mrs. Trueblood in the cozy warmth of the fire, he felt a strange sense of contentment. He wished he never had to go to Sevenna again, but then his father would win, and Tommy would never forgive himself.

  “Are you sisters?” Tommy asked the two women sitting at the table. Anna looked to be in her mid 30s, while Greta was older, with graying hair and smile lines.

  “My whole life, she’s been telling me what to do,” Mrs. Henry said.

  “What would you have done without a sister like me?” Mrs. Trueblood replied.

  “I’d have been very, very lost,” Mrs. Henry said. There was a profound sadness in the woman’s eyes. When Tommy had heard that her surname name was Henry, he’d wondered if there was a family connection to the Michael Henry who had been executed for his role in the August Rising. Michael Henry had been from Aeren, but it could also be a very common name.

  “You’re lucky that you went to Mr. Fields’s house,” Mrs. Trueblood said. “He knew that I moved in with Anna after I left Shore Manor. Not many people along Miller’s Road would have been able to find me.”

  The man who had responded to Tommy’s desperate knocking did indeed know Greta Trueblood, and he’d been happy to help Tommy find her. He’d followed Tommy through the forest to retrieve Ellie and Mr. Hywel, who was now unconscious under the oak tree. Mr. Fields had driven the three of them in his wagon to a cottage a mile up Miller’s Road, where Tommy had been ecstatic to see Mrs. Trueblood again.

  “Thank you for taking us in tonight,” Ellie said to Mrs. Henry.

  “You can stay here for a few days if you want,” Mrs. Henry said. “It’s probably best if he doesn’t move around too much at first.”

  “Thank you,” Tommy said. “But we don’t want to be a burden.”

  “What’s your plan?” Mrs. Henry asked. “Until we find out what happened, taking him back to Shore Manor isn’t a good idea.”

  “What do you want to do, Tommy?” Mrs. Trueblood asked.

  “If Father is responsible, then he has to be held accountable,” Tommy said. “He can’t get away with the lies anymore.”

  “Your father is the law,” Mrs. Henry said bitterly. “He can do whatever he wants.”

  “I’m not so sure,” Tommy said. “Two days ago, he held a gathering in Sevenna at his town house, and very few people attended. Maybe his support is waning.”

  “Dissolving the Chamber can’t have made the other Zunftmen happy,” Ellie said.

  “But he controls the army, so it doesn’t matter what they think,” Mrs. Henry said.

  “What if we reveal the truth about Hywel?” Mrs. Trueblood asked. “Publish another treatise and tell the world that Colston kidnapped him and blamed us.”

  “But what about the prisoners?” Mrs. Henry asked. “How long will they live if the truth comes out? Besides, Shore will spin it as a cottager lie.”

  “I think we should contact the cottager leaders in Sevenna,” Tommy said. “There’s a girl I know in Sevenna. She says she’s a relation of yours, Mrs. Trueblood. I think she might be able to help us.”

  “A relation of mine?” Mrs. Trueblood asked. “What’s her name?”

  “Emilie Johns, although I’m not sure that’s her real name.”

  “Why do you say that?” asked Mrs. Trueblood.

  “I’m not sure,” Tommy said. “It’s only a hunch.”

  “How do you know her?” Mrs. Henry asked.

  “She showed me a shrine with pictures of people who have disappeared since my father has been in power,” Tommy said. “Then a few days ago, she asked for my help in finding her friend Gavin Baine. That’s the last time I saw her.”

  “I told you, Anna,” Greta said. “He’s not in league with his father. If Tamsin told him about Gavin, then she must trust him.”

  “Who’s Tamsin?” Ellie asked.

  “Tamsin is my daughter,” Mrs. Henry said. “And the daughter of Michael Henry.”

  There was a moment of silence, and then Tommy spoke, “We’re sorry for your loss, Mrs. Henry.”

  Mrs. Henry gave Tommy a sad smile. “Greta has told me stories about you since you were a little boy,” she said. “You have a good heart. If Tamsin trusted you enough to ask about Gavin, then I trust you as well. And if you mean to hold your father accountable for his crimes, then I will help in any way I can.”

  “I told her I’d try,” Tommy said. “I went through my father’s papers, but I got caught. That’s why I got expelled from Seminary.”

  “Wait, I don’t understand what’s going on,” Ellie said. “Tamsin and Emilie are the same person?”

  “She took a false name to protect us,” Mrs. Henry explained. “Tamsin was the architect of the Cessation. She wrote The Right to Rule.”

  “Angry Em!” Tommy said. “I had no idea. I thought maybe she could get us in touch with the people behind the Cessation, but she was the one I needed to talk to.”

  Near the fire, Mr. Hywel stirred and propped himself up on his elbows “Amy?” he called loudly.

  Ellie went over and sat on the edge of the cot. “It’s Ellie,”
she said. “It’s your ward.”

  “Ellie?” he asked. “Where are we?”

  “At a friend’s house,” Ellie said.

  “What friends?” Hywel asked. “And damn it all, I feel like I’ve been crushed by wild horses.”

  Mrs. Trueblood stood up abruptly, and Mrs. Henry followed her lead. The women obviously wanted to give Ellie and Mr. Hywel privacy, which seemed silly to Tommy. He didn’t want Mrs. Henry to feel like she’d been chased out of her own sitting room.

  “I’m going to put some soup on,” Mrs. Trueblood said. “Come on, Tommy.”

  Mrs. Trueblood gave him a no-nonsense look that he remembered well from childhood so he followed them into the tiny kitchen at the back of the cottage. A pot of soup was already bubbling away on the woodstove. The kitchen was not really big enough for the three of them, but they stood huddled around the iron pot like witches making a brew. They could hear Ellie and Mr. Hywel talking in low voices in the other room. After about twenty minutes, Ellie came and joined them.

  “He’s asleep again,” she said.

  “Did he tell you who did it?” he asked.

  “Your father,” she said grimly. “It was Colston Shore.”

  “How did he end up on Miller’s Road?” Tommy asked.

  “Your father sent him a message that a rebellion was imminent,” Ellie said. “Colston said that he had arranged a meeting with the leaders, but they would only talk to Hywel. That’s how your father got him to come to Aeren. Mr. Hywel thought he was headed to that meeting when you saw him along Miller’s Road. He was with the Zunft soldiers, but had no idea that they meant to harm him. He thought they were taking him to a rendezvous point.”

  “So that’s why he was so calm,” Tommy said. “He didn’t know it was all a lie.”

  “Once they were in the woods, they were ambushed and someone knocked him unconscious,” Ellie said. “When he woke up, he was in the cellar. For weeks, they made him think that he’d been kidnapped by cottagers. Apparently Colston was trying to pull off an elaborate ruse so Hywel wouldn’t know he had been taken by Colston and his guards.”

  “Why would he do that?” Mrs. Trueblood asked.

  “He thinks that Colston was going ‘rescue’ him from the cottagers and be a hero,” Ellie said. “If that’s true, then Colston wasn’t planning on killing him, at least not at first. He wanted him out of the way so he could take power, and use the kidnapping as an excuse to persecute the cottagers.”

  “So what happened?” Tommy asked. “Hywel obviously discovered the truth.”

  “He said that the guards got lazy, and he could hear them talking through the floorboards,” Ellie said. “Then something changed, and the guards came less and less frequently. A few days ago, the guards disappeared and never came back. Perhaps they meant him to starve to death? He had a jug of water that kept him going, but he wouldn’t have lasted much longer.”

  “Did he drink anything while you were talking to him?” Mrs. Trueblood asked.

  “I gave him some of that root tea,” Ellie said. “He drank the entire cup.”

  “Well, he won’t be awake for a while,” Mrs. Henry said. “What do we do now?”

  “Do you think he’d help us if we ask?” Tommy asked Ellie.

  “Yes, I do,” Ellie replied. “I think he’d do anything to make things right. When he heard about what happened to Michael Henry … He never wanted anything like that to happen.”

  “I’m afraid if Hywel confronts Father directly, he’ll be arrested and we’ll gain nothing.” Tommy said.

  “He’s too feeble to make a show of strength,” Mrs. Trueblood said. “I doubt he could even manage a flight of stairs at this point.”

  “So what do you suggest?” Mrs. Henry asked.

  “Can you get the three of us to Sevenna City?” Tommy asked. “I need to see Emilie—I mean, Tamsin. We need to find a way to reveal to the world what my father has done.”

  30

  “DO YOU WANT me to go in with you?” Ellie asked.

  “No, I need you to back me up out here,” Tommy said, brushing aside the leafy branches to get a better look at the house on the other side of the hedge. They were crouched outside Colston’s town house in Sevenna. It was still dark, and most of the houses along the street were dark. But the volt-lamps had flickered on inside the library. Colston was awake, and Tommy needed to enter the house while his father was still reading at his desk.

  “How am I supposed to do that?” Ellie asked crossly.

  As if in answer to her question, Tommy searched the ground at the base of the shrub. His fingers picked through the brown leaves while Ellie stared at him in confusion. Since they had left Aeren with Hywel in tow, they’d endured a whirlwind of nighttime boat rides, hiding in basements, and endless conversation with Tamsin and her network of people. There were heated discussions, particularly among Tamsin, Tommy, and Ellie over the future of the cottagers, Colston, and Hywel. Since Hywel was often too weak to speak for himself, Ellie had been a stubborn advocate for him. But Ellie was also a realist, and she knew that lives would be lost unless they came to an arrangement. Finally, both she and Hywel agreed to Tamsin’s proposal.

  Tommy had to admire Tamsin. She was gambling with the situation, but she was so confident about how her plan would play out that she swayed everyone with her conviction. Tommy had his doubts, but he kept them to himself. He wanted her to be right, he wanted his father to fall, he wanted the world to change. And that was enough to convince him to confront Colston. For Tommy, this meeting with his father was the crucial moment. If he failed, then Tamsin’s plan would crumble. With his fingers in the dirt, Tommy finally found what he was looking for. He plucked a palm-size rock from under the hedge and showed it to Ellie.

  “Tamsin arranged for the bodyguard to be detained in South Sevenna so Father’s alone in the house,” Tommy said. “But if there’s a problem, you need to go back and tell Tamsin and the others.”

  “But how am I going to know if there’s a problem?” Ellie asked.

  “I’ll throw this through the window,” Tommy said. “If you see the glass smash, there’s a problem.”

  “Usually people throw rocks from the outside,” Ellie said.

  “Well, it’s my best idea,” Tommy said.

  “A rock is your best idea.” Ellie sighed. “I think we’re in trouble.”

  “It’ll work,” Tommy assured her. “Really, it will.”

  She cuffed him gently on the arm and nodded toward the house. “Well, do it then.”

  Keeping his head lower than the windows, Tommy ran for the cellar door at the back of the house. The hinges of the door were well oiled and didn’t make a sound as he slipped inside. He climbed the stone steps to the cold kitchen and padded quietly down the corridor to his father’s library where the door was open a crack. Clutching the rock in his hand, Tommy hesitated and peered through the opening. His father sat behind his desk, writing in a thick ledger. When Tommy was a child, he had imagined Colston’s Honor Index was kept in such a ledger, and it had given him a sense of security that all the evils of the world could be tabulated and controlled. It was time to let go of such childish notions. His father couldn’t see his own transgressions. Even his worst sins were filtered through a veil of self-righteousness. In Colston Shore’s mind, his honor was pure and untarnished.

  When Tommy pushed the door open, Colston glanced up in surprise. It was unusual to see Colston in a moment of vulnerability. With his unblinking eyes and pursed lips, he reminded Tommy of an owl, which made him less intimidating. But his father’s face darkened when he recognized his son standing in the doorway.

  “What are you doing here?” Colston asked angrily. “I was told you went to Aeren.”

  “I did,” Tommy said. “But now I’m back.”

  “You’re not enrolling in Seminary again,” Colston said. “Bern told me what you’ve been doing. You’ve consorted with the enemy and alienated yourself from your peers. You’ve made your choices and n
ow you have to face the consequences.”

  “What have I been doing that’s so wrong?” Tommy asked.

  “Why did you come back?” Colston asked, ignoring his question. “You are to return home immediately. You may not return to Sevenna until I give you my permission.”

  “You’re so confident in your power,” Tommy said. “It amazes me. You expect the world to bow to your wishes.”

  “I am trying to keep chaos at bay,” Colston said. “If the cottagers got their wish, society would disintegrate and violence would destroy us.”

  “You don’t know that,” Tommy said.

  “Don’t I?” Colston said. “Do you remember what they did to your mother?”

  Tommy’s heart lurched. “That was one man. Not an entire group of people. He wasn’t representing an agenda. He was deranged.”

  “Who told you that?” Colston said. “Your cottager nanny? She has poisoned your mind against your own people. I respected Rose’s dying wish, but it has cost me my son.”

  “Mrs. Trueblood hasn’t poisoned me against you,” Tommy said. “I have my own mind. Now that I’ve witnessed the things you do, I’m horrified.”

  Tommy had never seen his father so angry. His hands were clenched on the desk and his shoulders rigid with fury.

  “I am the last thing standing against the destruction of Seahaven. Everything I do, I do to protect you and Bernard.”

  “You commit crimes in the name—” Tommy began.

  “What crimes have I committed?” Colston interrupted, rising to his feet and practically shouting.

  “I know what you did to Hywel,” Tommy said.

  The silence was powerful. Colston stared at his son, unable to keep the surprise off his face.

  “What did you say?” he asked.

  “I found Hywel in the cellar off Miller’s Road,” Tommy said. “I know it was you all along. Were you going to let him starve to death? And it’s not just Hywel, of course. It’s what you’ve done to the cottagers. How many are missing? How many have you executed? Are you keeping them locked up in the compound? Are they even still alive?”