In the hallway, more guards kept their weapons trained on the small group of people. As Ben watched, Matthew was dragged from the room adjacent to Ben’s, resisting as much as possible, constantly turning his head to make sure Arian was safe. One of the guards struck him hard in the back of his head, his face hitting the marble floor with a thud.
Ben managed to mumble, “Please tell the Regent I'm sorry,” as they were forcibly escorted down a set of winding stairs to the dungeons below the palace.
X
Carl was awoken by the sound of automatic gunfire somewhere outside the trailer. His back was aching from the awkward position he had slept in, sitting at the desk in the penultimate trailer, but the second burst was enough to get even his old bones moving. He had only intended to sit for a minute, go over the cargo manifest, keep himself busy. Matthew had told him to be ready, but he hadn’t really expected anything to happen and he didn’t like being proven wrong when it came to matters like these.
He picked up the pistol that he had placed on the table in front of him and checked it was loaded. Moving more stealthily than you might expect for a man of his age and bulk, he slid onto the floor and opened the closer of the two hatches that had been cut into the floor. His decision to spend the night away from his normal sleeping trailer was proving to be the correct one. He only hoped that choosing to let his friends sleep while he stayed awake hadn't put them at any more risk.
Squeezing his greater than average bulk through the hatch was no easy exercise, but with a lot of puffing and panting, and holding his waist in, he was able to get to the grassy floor beneath the trailer.
Crawling along the ground beneath the trailer, Carl had a good view of what was happening, with the luxury of not being seen. The sun was just rising above the horizon, covering the meeting area in shadows and hiding Carl in the relative darkness beneath the trailer.
As he watched, he saw maybe a hundred of the militia and the Regent’s personal guard dragging people from the trailers, indiscriminately beating or shooting them if they put up the slightest resistance. Women were holding their children close to them as husbands were viciously punched and kicked for trying to protect their families. As he watched, a fleeing mother and daughter were gunned down as they ran, their blood-splattered bodies flailing as they were propelled to the floor.
His first instincts were to attack the soldiers, but his rational mind knew it would be useless; he’d be dead before he made the slightest difference.
Turning his attention to the other side of the trailer, he could see only one guard, looking through the gap between the trailers, towards the slaughter in the centre of meeting area. Sliding stealthily from beneath the trailer, he crept up on the soldier from behind, drawing the knife from his belt and driving it deeply between the ribs on his left side until he had reached the heart, minimising the amount to which he could scream. The body slipped from his hands to the floor, dying eyes staring at Carl as he fled to the relative safety of Island City's streets and alleyways.
Chapter 4
I
“Catrina. Catrina! Talk to me. What happened to Daniel and Adam?” Matthew said, shaking her as he spoke, though she remained oblivious to his questioning. Edward had died shortly after they had been brought to the cell, but she had refused to accept it. Instead, she sat there, motionless, staring blankly into space. So far, not a tear had been shed from her eyes, but everyone else knew that it was only a matter of time. Even so, from what they knew so far, time could be a precious commodity.
The inside of the cell was as cramped and unpleasant as possible, lit only by a dim oil lantern on the wall opposite a wooden door with a small barred window. Edward’s dead body had been left with them, for all of Matthew’s shouting through the door on the subject. The single bunk was covered in a blanket that looked, and smelled, as though it had never been washed, and the constantly dripping water from the overhead pipe was enough to drive anyone insane.
Safran sat with Arian, the two of them holding each other tightly under the blanket, vainly attempting to protect their modesty. They had been dragged from their rooms in their nightclothes, not given any opportunity to dress. Ben, dressed only in his boxers and a T-shirt, held his head in his hands, massaging his painful nose.
Shaking his head in disbelief, Matthew returned to the cell door, pounding on the heavy wood. Ben moved close to his side. “What's going on, Matthew?” he asked. “Look, I can talk to the Regent. We can sort this out.”
“Don’t be a fool, Ben, this has nothing to do with you,” Matthew replied, before hitting the door for the last time and stepping over to the bunk.
“Safran, tell me exactly what they said to you before they brought you down here,” he asked. “Try not to leave anything out.”
“I. . . I’m not sure I can remember,” Safran replied, holding back tears.
“Look, just tell me anything you can remember!” Matthew shouted, grabbing hold of Safran’s shoulders.
“Get your hands off me!” Safran demanded. “How dare you speak to me in that manner! Are you forgetting who I am?” Safran was fuming as she spoke, turning her anger towards Matthew.
“For the moment, my Lady, I really don't care,” Matthew said bitterly.
Ben stepped in, gripping Matthew’s shoulder before he had opportunity to say anything else. “Come on, calm down,” Ben pleaded. “We’re all on the same side in here. Let's not forget that.”
“I’m sorry,” Matthew said, his shoulders falling as though the fight was out of him.
Safran only looked at him, not saying a word. When she did speak, there was no mention of an apology. “The soldier called me a traitorous assassin,” she informed them. “That’s all, and then they dragged me down here and threw me in with you. That’s all I know.”
Matthew stood again and returned to the door, pounding hard against the wood, but his face told everyone that he knew it was pointless. “Guard!” he yelled. “Where are the children? Guard! There’s a man dead in here. Guard!!!”
“Matthew, come on, leave it,” Ben suggested. “They’re not coming. We’re on our own.”
“I just don’t understand it,” Matthew replied. “If they called her an assassin, who are we supposed to have killed?”
“The Regent,” Catrina said, though when they turned to look at her, she was still staring through them into space, her dead husband’s hand held tightly in hers.
II
“Make a sound, and I’ll blow your brains out right here,” Carl hissed.
Sergeant Anderson awoke to find Carl standing over him, holding a knife at his throat and pressing the barrel of a gun hard against his temple.
“Carl, what…” the sergeant began, but Carl cocked back the hammer on the pistol, silencing the sergeant immediately.
“Move for one, and I’ll kill you with the other,” Carl said, his voice calm and steady. Sergeant Anderson stared up at him, eyes open wide with terror. “Now, I’m going to step back, okay,” Carl continued, “and I want your word that you won’t scream like a girl or nothing.” Sergeant Anderson didn’t need to give him an answer, he knew what the consequences would be if he disobeyed.
Carl moved away from the bed, gun aimed constantly at the sergeant’s head as he did so, tucking the knife back into the sheath on his belt. Carl always felt safer with his back against a wall, as opposed to the open doorway that was opposite the foot of the bed.
With his life out of immediate danger, the sergeant took a chance and spoke. “Carl,” he pleaded, “whatever I’ve done to offend you, please, let’s talk about it. There’s no need for any of this.”
“This morning,” Carl informed him, “a little after sunrise, both yours and the Regent’s men attacked and killed almost everyone I knew, without warning and, as far as I know, without provocation. I managed to get away, and I’ve come to find out what’s going on.” Again, Carl spoke with a slow, measured pace.
He had rehearsed what he was going to say in his head earlier, a
s he had watched Sergeant Anderson sleeping soundly in his bed. He couldn’t risk succumbing to the growing rage within him, taking out the anger he felt at the soldiers on this one man. Still, though, the sergeant noticed that his finger hovered dangerously close to the trigger.
“Carl, I don’t know,” Anderson pleaded. “The Regent’s men, well, I have no authority there, but the militia. You must be mistaken. I . . . I didn’t order it. No one told me. Look, Carl, I didn’t know.”
The sergeant’s voice trembled as he spoke. He had been in the Watch for over twenty years, but he had never been so scared for his life as he was at that moment. He remembered a voice from the earliest days of his basic training, telling him that there was nothing more dangerous than a cocked weapon. Now he understood that they should have said a cocked weapon in the hand of a madman.
“That’s not the answer I was looking for, Pete,” Carl continued angrily. “How long have we known each other, eh, and this is how your men repay us?”
Peter moved to sit up, saying “Carl, I…”
“Don’t you move!” Carl bellowed. “Don’t you dare move, Pete, or I’ll shoot you here and now. I’ve got nothing left to lose.” Carl was close to the edge, his rage covering his vision with a red haze.
Peter froze, mid-movement, staring down the barrel of the gun as it shook dangerously in front of his face, eyes frozen wide in terror.
The stalemate was shattered by the sounds of bells ringing out throughout the city, the noise moving from one side of the island to the other and then back again. Peter ducked sideways moments before the pistol discharged, the bullet narrowly missing his temple before burrowing through his pillow to the stone wall behind the bed. He looked Carl in the eye, his breathing quickened by the sudden shock, as he waited for the gun to fire a second time. Luckily, it didn’t.
“Sit up, Pete,” Carl said. “I . . . I didn’t mean for the gun to go off like that.” His voice had lost its confident edge, wavering almost as much as Peter's had moments before.
“Why don’t you just put the gun down, Carl,” Peter begged. “I’m not going to try anything.”
“I can’t do that. I’m sure you’ll understand if I don’t trust you for the moment,” Carl told him, but he held the gun less tightly and lowered the barrel a bit all the same. His calm voice had returned as quickly as it had left.
“Those bells, they haven’t sounded like that for years,” Peter told him. “They’re to call people to the town meeting area in times of crisis. I have to be there; they’ll miss me if I’m not and chances are they’ll come looking.” The last part of what Peter had said wasn’t strictly true, but Carl didn’t know that. Peter’s presence would be missed, of course, but chances were his men would just get on with whatever it was themselves.
Carl just continued to look at him for a while, considering what he had said. Eventually, Carl lowered the gun and tucked it back into his belt.
Peter took in a deep breath before he spoke. “That’s a good start, Carl,” he said. “I’m going to get up now, and find out what’s going on. Whatever happened, I can’t imagine any reason for the Regent to order his and my men to attack the Road Trains. Something is definitely not right here, and believe it or not, I’m on your side.”
“Wherever you’re going now, I’m coming with you,” Carl said sternly. “I still don’t trust you Pete, and as far as I’m concerned, you’re still the enemy. Make a wrong move and, so help me Pete, I’ll take you with me.”
“But you can’t; you’ll be recognised,” Peter insisted.
Carl stood there for a moment, rubbing his scar as he thought. “Maybe not,” he began. “You got a razor?”
III
“Catrina, what do you mean?” Matthew said. “This is insane. Even if the Regent is dead, how could they think we did it? Most of us have known him since we were kids.”
“But not all of us, though, eh?” Ben added, but he had the impression that no one was listening to him.
“There’s something wrong here. I don’t like this one bit,” Matthew continued, opening and closing his fists in frustration.
Arian spoke next, holding her hand out to her man in comfort. “You know,” she began, “they have a saying in the Wastelands. ‘Friends are only enemies who don’t have the guts to kill you.’”
“And what, you’re saying they think we’ve got ourselves some guts?” Matthew asked. “I don’t get it. It still doesn’t make any sense. We didn’t kill anybody.”
“But only we know that,” Ben said, not wishing to be left out. He was starting to get an idea about what was really going on.
“Just wait,” Safran said. “Aren’t we jumping to conclusions? We don’t know for sure if the Regent’s really dead.”
“Oh, he’s dead all right,” someone said from outside the door. Matthew and Ben turned around together, fighting for a view through the small square of window in the door.
Alexander stepped from the relative shadow into the light cast by the solitary candle, standing a short distance away on the other side of the door. As far as Ben or Matthew could see, he was alone.
“Murdered last night,” Alexander continued. “Stabbed to death by a traitorous assassin.”
“But how can you imagine we had anything to do with it?” Matthew asked.
“Oh, I don’t, but you’re going to hang for it anyway,” Alexander replied, a smile on his lips.
Matthew reached for the bars on the small window, attempting to shake the door open with all of his strength. “What's going on?” he demanded.
Alexander shouted down the hall for the guards. Within moments, four of the Regent’s personal guards were at the door, two of whom were the guards who had assisted Alexander on the previous night.
“Prepare that one for my return,” Alexander said, pointing at Ben, “and keep the others quiet. This is to be a day of mourning.”
As Alexander walked back up the dark hallway, one of the guards struck Matthew’s fingers hard with the butt of his rifle, forcing Matthew back for fear of another blow.
“Wait,” Matthew called after him. “There’s a dead man in here.”
“Good,” Alexander shouted back. “I’ll have the guards throw him in the pit with the others.”
Before Alexander had even reached the steps leading back up to the palace, Ben was being forcibly dragged down the hall to whatever fate awaited him, while his companions comforted each other within their cell. Alexander couldn’t help chuckling to himself as he made his way towards his destiny.
IV
Carl stayed close to Peter Anderson as they made their way through the back streets of the city towards the meeting area. Following the ringing of the bells, it looked as though everyone in Island City had left what they were doing and were walking along with them, with the sound of thousands of people asking each other if anyone knew what was going on.
Carl had taken five minutes to trim and shave his beard and also his head, so as to make himself look as different as possible. With only his beard gone, Carl felt that he still looked enough like himself to be easily recognised even in a large crowd of people, if those who had slaughtered his friends were still looking for him. Carl had no way of telling if the attackers had known anyone had escaped, and for all Carl knew, there may have been others who had managed to get away from the soldiers before being captured or killed.
Pete had waited for him as he had said he would, with no attempt to flee or get help. Carl had no intention of harming Pete, or anyone else unless it became absolutely necessary, but he still held the gun against Peter’s back as they made their way to the centre of town.
Of course, Carl had killed men before, as had most people who rode with the Road Trains for long enough, but hardly ever up close, and only once someone he knew. He had no desire to repeat the experience. Carl’s experience of guns was either through fun at the roadside, shooting cans or small creatures to prove his marksmanship, or during running gun battles with would-be attackers, who woul
d leave everyone on the Road Trains for dead if only they could steal some of their precious cargo. Carl had no love for the weapons, being brought up more of a fist fighter like his father before him, but he knew that when the time came, there was nothing more useful than a reliable firearm in your hand.
He had found a long coat in Peter’s wardrobe, which he had decided to wear with the collar up so as to try to hide his distinguishing scar. Even without his facial hair, it was still a marker by which most people who knew him could recognise him. The long loose sleeves of the coat also served to conceal the pistol, allowing him to hold it close to Peter’s back in a crowd full of people without anyone noticing.
The crowd around the Road Trains was already spilling back into the streets by the time Carl and Peter arrived at the town meeting area, but with some gentle nudging of the gun in Peter’s back, Carl edged him forward through the crowd towards the front. The sergeant’s uniform Peter was wearing commanded a lot of respect from the crowd. People moved aside to let him through without him even having to ask them, the civilians recognising his importance. Peter paid them no attention as they demanded he tell them what was going on, but only edged them out of his way as he moved forwards through the crowd.
“Pete, Pete! Over here!” someone shouted. “We could do with a hand!”
Both men stopped dead in their tracks, Carl pushing the barrel of the pistol harder into Peter’s back as he turned to respond to whoever was calling after him.
The man shouting was a young, fresh-faced soldier, waving his arms frantically to get the sergeant’s attention. He was stood at the front of the crowd as other similarly dressed men attempted to push the growing crowd backwards, away from the foremost Road Trains and the walls of the palace beyond.
Knightfall - Book 1 of The Chronicle of Benjamin Knight Page 11