by Ann Aguirre
“That’s right. And it offered us a bargain.”
“What kind?” Fade asked.
“We stay inside our town limits. We don’t hunt Muties in the wilderness. And we provide a regular tithe to show our good faith.”
Oh, I had a bad feeling about this. “What do you mean?”
Fade’s hand slipped into mine, whether as a caution or a comfort I didn’t know, but it was both. The counterman narrowed his eyes as if he could feel the weight of my judgment. “It was for the best. And things have been so much easier since the deal was struck.”
“Just finish your story,” Morrow said. “So I can tell mine.”
“The tithe is simple. We offer food to the Muties and leave it in a certain spot, once a month.”
Maybe it wasn’t as bad as I feared. In the enclave, we gave them our dead to appease them, so they took less interest in trying to breach our barricades. A similar practice in Otterburn would be smart and practical, though I imagined most Topsiders would find the idea repugnant. As I glanced around, the rest of my men looked quietly horrified, so I didn’t volunteer that information.
“Exactly what’re we talking about, here?” Tully spoke for the first time.
The man cleared his throat. “Anybody who dies naturally, they receive the bodies.”
“And if there are no deaths?” I asked.
Things were better on the surface, so I imagined that in good times, people probably didn’t pass on that often. And the Freaks wouldn’t understand failure to honor the agreed-upon terms. I was shocked to hear they had proposed any kind of deal at all, instead of mindlessly attacking. That development was … beyond worrisome.
The lout hunched his shoulders. “It wasn’t my idea,” he said, low. “But to pay the tithe, we draw lots. And the loser goes out to the meeting place.”
“That sounds an awful lot like human sacrifice,” Spence snapped.
The man flattened big hands on the counter, both angry and defensive. “We don’t kill anybody.”
Thornton leaned in. “The Muties do that for you. How long do you reckon you can maintain your population, paying in that coin?”
“It’s not a permanent solution, and you don’t understand how frightened everybody was after the attacks accelerated, how tired we were of hiding. You never knew when the Muties would strike or who would get to shelter. At least this way the deaths are predictable and you get a chance to say good-bye.”
It was horrible, but true. That didn’t mean I could see myself accepting such a deal.
The counterman went on, “And that’s why I won’t let you speak your piece in here. Nobody wants to anger the Muties by encouraging folk who mean to kill them.”
“Then I’ll honor my part of the bargain,” Morrow said. “If you’ll keep yours.”
“Certainly,” the man replied.
He was obviously relieved as we put a couple of tables together, then Morrow leapt up on one. At first the Otterburn men yelled at him to get down, stop making a clown of himself, but he played a few bars on his pipe, and they took an interest. The tale that followed was wild and improbable—about a boy wizard who lived in a cupboard, then a giant came to fetch him to a magical school, thus commencing a bunch of adventures. We were all hanging on Morrow’s words when he wrapped up:
“And that’s the end … for now.”
To my astonishment, I had cold soup and a lukewarm drink before me. If I had anything of value, I’d pay him to keep talking. Sadly I didn’t and Morrow must be parched. I ate my meal quickly, sad for the folks of Otterburn and sorry for myself. There were no warriors here, so I’d failed on our first leg of the journey. I couldn’t defeat the horde without more men.
Then I put such self-pity aside because I did have a small troop and I had to provide for them. So I signaled the counterman and asked him, “Sir, if I promise to be gone in the morning, would you consent to let us bunk on the floor by the fire? It would be nice to pass the night under a warm roof before we go back into the wild.”
He looked undecided, then Morrow pointed out, “I marked how many pitchers of beer you sold while I was sharing that tale.”
But the man wore a shrewd look. “That was part of our old arrangement, but I’ve a mind to offer you another if you’re interested.”
“Not the same sort you gave the Muties, I hope,” Thornton muttered.
I shot him a quelling glance. “I’m amenable to bargaining.”
“Then you lot clean the common room after I close up, then you can move the tables and bed down. Sound fair? I sleep upstairs, mind, and I’ll count all the jugs and bottles before I retire. If there’s even a drop missing in the morn, there will be trouble.”
“Fine.” I had no interest in more of his warm beer, which smelled like piss to me.
A few hours later, we were mopping as a unit. That wasn’t the kind of action I had in mind when I set out, but maybe the next town would bring better luck.
Of a certainty, it couldn’t get worse.
Failure
It was always a mistake to tempt fate with thoughts like that.
Tegan had explained the idea of fate, a concept passed on by her parents. She knew lots of odd things. And I shouldn’t have thought what I did, because the situation could always deteriorate. In the next month, we visited Appleton and Lorraine. The former was a village similar to Salvation, though they had more modern amenities; I could see why Longshot had enjoyed the trade runs. In both towns, I used his name to open doors, and folks were sad to hear he’d passed on, more so to learn of Salvation’s fate. Those facts were enough to get them to let me say my piece.
But I’d come to recognize the light in a man’s eyes before he laughed in derision. When it was forty or more, the sound could be demoralizing. They took one look at my ragged group, listened to my idea, then fell to uproarious chuckles. And those were the nice ones. A few men threw food.
Today, we stood on the outskirts of Gaspard. We had made a complete circuit, and now we stood on the coast. It had been so long since I saw the great water that rather than continue on toward the town I saw in the distance, I paused on the rocky beach to marvel. The men came up beside me, weary and travel stained. I had pushed them hard for little gain, but so far, nobody had complained. I had no illusion that they’d continue to follow me, however, if we kept wandering without progress.
“I’ve never seen the ocean,” Thornton said.
I gazed out over those blue-gray waters, the waves rocking toward shore. “It’s worth seeing.” I turned to Morrow. “Is this going in your story?”
“It might,” he answered.
Gaspard was built on a jut of land that reached out over the water. It seemed foolhardy. What if a great wave drowned them all? But with Freaks roaming, maybe the sea was the least of their worries. To the front, they had the ocean as a bastion and at the back, they had chipped a towering wall out of the rock and mortared it. It stood higher than any defense I’d ever seen, impressive enough to deter fire and claws, any attack the Freaks could devise. There was only a narrow pass covered by a metal gate. The town had a forbidding air, but it was a stronghold.
The world is bigger than I would’ve believed, down below.
If anyone had told me there were so many people living Topside, I would have laughed. Everyone knew the world above was ruined, uninhabitable. It was hard seeing a constant reminder of how misinformed my people had been. These towns weren’t huge like Gotham, but each held hundreds of people, all living according to different rules. Now I understood how foolish my proclamation to Colonel Park must have seemed. I’d simply go unite everyone because it needed to be done? No wonder she laughed—and people kept doing so.
“One thing I don’t understand,” Stalker said.
I turned to him. “What’s that?”
“What’s the purpose of the tithe? It’s not like one person is enough to feed a large number of Muties, so it can’t be about food.”
Ah. So he was still thinking about Ott
erburn. I had to admit, I was puzzled too.
“It’s symbolic,” Morrow said.
“Explain.” Fade looked curious.
The storyteller’s face gained a grim aspect. “It means the Muties are letting those people live on sufferance. They’re the victors, the overlords, and the battle hasn’t even been joined.”
“Do you think it could be like an experiment?” Tully asked. “On a small scale. They’re wondering how humans will react to such proposed bargains and whether we can be relied on to keep the terms.”
“If any of that’s true,” Thornton said, spitting onto the sand, “then things look bleak for us. We don’t want our enemy learning more about our ways, how to cow settlements into bending at the knee.”
There may not be anything we can do. But I didn’t speak of how disheartened I was.
On the map, this settlement had a slash mark by it. I could interpret most of Longshot’s symbols but this one defeated me. But if Gaspard was dangerous, surely he would’ve noted it in a more obvious way. There was nothing for it but to push on. Turning from the ocean, I led the way up the shore and over the uncertain ground until we came to the metal lattice that sealed the town. A man in a helmet stepped into sight; his armor was crafted of reinforced leather, so it lent him a martial air. The sight gave me hope. Maybe there were warriors here, and some might be interested in taking the fight to the Freaks.
His hard glance swept our group, then the guard snapped, “We don’t open the gate for beggars and thieves. Go plead for charity elsewhere.”
Indignant, I replied, “We have skins to trade.”
After two impressive failures, I knew better than to share our true purpose with a man who worked the gate. While he might pretend to be important, if he were truly a policy maker, he wouldn’t be stationed here. Behind me, Fade held up the string of pelts he carried. We had hunted as we traveled and Stalker prepared the furs, so they would survive long enough to lend plausible credence to our reason for visiting Gaspard.
“You’re an awful big group of fur traders,” the man said doubtfully. “The ones I’ve known traveled in ones and twos, better to avoid the Muties.”
Morrow cocked his head, his manner quizzical. “There won’t be any new armor for you with that attitude, my man.”
The gate guard swore. “Fine. You can come in and trade, but if I hear of any problems from the lot of you, I’ll have you in the stocks before nightfall.”
From Salvation, I was familiar with that punishment. And it was definitely to be avoided. The only positive thing about all the traveling was that we’d gotten good at eluding detection by the Freaks, as they roved in great bands. It was as if they were taking some kind of measure of our defenses, and I wondered if they meant to offer similar deals to other settlements, like the quiet conquering of Otterburn.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, I thought, if they just let us live.
But my stomach turned at the idea of offering our dead, now that I knew it was wrong, and I couldn’t sit idly by while someone I loved sacrificed for the greater good. Even the old Deuce, the one who desperately wanted to be pure Huntress, would’ve caviled at that tithe. Freaks couldn’t be permitted to win the war that way.
The gate clanged as they hauled it up. I strode forward before the guard changed his mind. Inside, I saw that it had taken six men to get the thing open, which meant it was incredibly heavy. That offered safety, but I also had the sense of stepping into a trap when it banged shut behind us. All the guards were dirty and unshaven with a hard look in their eyes. When she noticed it, Tegan stepped closer to me while Tully instinctively reached for her weapon, checking the motion when she realized it would be unwise to seem hostile.
Unlike other towns we had visited farther inland, all the houses were made of stone. This added to the cold, forbidding air when I was used to homey timber structures. Of course, sometimes, like Winterville, the town had been expanded using salvage from the old world, but even that looked more welcoming than endless rows of squat stone buildings. Most of the windows were shuttered at this hour of the day, which struck me as unusual. If I lived in a house like that, I’d want all the warmth I could muster.
“Where’s the market?” Morrow asked.
Wordless, the guard pointed. Apparently he wasn’t wasting more time with a bunch of eccentric trappers. We had met such traders—and the surly man was right—they tended to travel in groups no larger than two. It was common to see a man alone, covered in furs and skins, with a beard all the way down his chest. Dressing in that fashion—so many parts of other animals—probably made tracking difficult for the Freaks.
Once we moved deeper into town, I didn’t send Stalker to scout. I couldn’t explain the instinct, only that I felt it best for us to stick together. Fade stayed close at my back, too, and I could tell by Tegan’s expression that she felt the sensation of countless watchers, like the entire town had their eyes pressed up against their shutters. A chill went through me that had nothing to do with the weather.
At first I feared the guard had directed us wrong out of spite, but eventually the narrow lane between buildings widened into a public square. Vendors sold their wares out of baskets and wooden carts; there was food, clothing, piles of kitchen items, and used goods. Beckoning to Fade, I beelined for the man who was running a knife across some damp skins, preparing to turn them into leather.
“I’d like to trade,” I said.
The tanner pawed through our bundle, examining each fur with a critical stare. Then he nodded. “I can use these.” He counted out fifty bits of metal, then handed them to me.
They jingled in my palm. “What’s this?”
His look turned scornful. “Haven’t you spent any time in a real town? That’s money, you idiot. You buy things with it. Food and lodging, goods and services.”
I already didn’t like Gaspard. “Other towns use different items, like wood tokens.”
The tanner became less critical. “I didn’t know that. Interesting.”
Most likely, I was better traveled than he was, especially after the past month, but I didn’t comment further. This seemed a likely place to speak my piece, but I had misgivings. I told myself I was just hungry; and it made sense to buy some supplies since we had local chits. Once we finished our business, then I’d make my speech.
I hate this. So much.
I gave four to each person in the group with two left over and we split into pairs to shop. Fade came with me. He slipped his hand into mine without thinking about it; and the casual nature of the gesture made my heart sing. We stopped first to look at a basket full of brightly painted wooden squares.
“What are these?” I asked the vendor.
Delighted, he broke the thing into pieces. “It’s a puzzle box. It goes together like this.”
I watched him do it, and it seemed easy, but when I tried it, I found it impossible to assemble into a neat cube. Instead I had a jumble of components going every which way. Smiling, Fade took it from me and put it back together.
“But what does it do?”
The seller seemed puzzled. “It’s a toy. Children play with it.”
There hadn’t been any fun down below. Even the brats trained in basic knowledge necessary for survival and when they weren’t training, they performed minor maintenance and sanitary tasks that the older enclave citizens didn’t have time to handle. I remembered running all the time with few moments to myself. As a Huntress, I’d had more leisure because my job was more dangerous.
“Thanks for your time,” Fade said, replacing the box in the basket.
He knew my thoughts too well. Since we had eight bits of metal between us, we had to buy things the group needed, not a funny little box. In the end, I bought dried meat and herbs and a lightweight pot so that we could have stew as we traveled. Later, we met the others in the middle of the market, their packs bulging with whatever they’d spent their money on.
I could delay no longer.
Taking a deep breat
h, I hopped up onto an overturned crate. But the reaction wasn’t usual. No laughter. No derision. The silence was worse somehow, but I pushed on, until I’d finished. It was the same speech I had used in Soldier’s Pond; I wasn’t one for talking. And maybe that was why I kept failing.
Then a vendor shouted, “Call the watch! They’re disturbing the peace!”
“Did you hear what she said? Coming out of the earth from where she lived down below … she’s either a madwoman or a witch!”
I had no idea what a witch was, but I recognized fear and anger when I heard it. This wouldn’t end well for any of us. I bit out a curse. If we ended up in the stocks, the few men I had would probably leave me once they cut us free. I ran toward the gate, hoping to outpace the commotion in the market. No such luck. Armed men surrounded us, their blades similar to Morrow’s, only not as light and graceful. These were weapons made for brutality and strength; they could hack off a head or a limb with equal facility.
“What did I tell you about causing trouble?” the guard demanded.
“You were against it, as I recall,” Tegan said.
It was awful, but I wanted to laugh; she looked so small and innocent, the least likely of our group to give anyone lip, but appearances could be deceiving. In an instant, however, circumstances changed. My men drew their weapons and stepped in to protect me. They put their bodies between the guards and me. I didn’t move, didn’t protest.
I had no idea how to resolve this standoff.
Change
“Did you hear what she said, Sarge?” a guard asked.
The commander snapped back, “No, I was on duty, like you were supposed to be.”
His cheeks colored. “I only popped down to the market for a drink, and there she was, bold as brass, declaiming like a loon. She wants to steal our soldiers!”
“Steal” was a strong word. I drew my knives, calculating the odds. We could kill these men, but it would do our cause no good to be hunted by the Gaspard townsfolk. With the Freaks massing, that was a complication we didn’t need, so a peaceful resolution would be best.