by S D Smith
He crossed to strike her, lashing out with a deft punch. But Heather ducked the blow and sent a driving kick into his middle. Vitton buckled to the ground, breathless and grimacing. Two guards grabbed Heather and held her up while Vitton swiveled up and staggered to his feet.
“Oh, I love this!” he said, eyes wild. “I love this!” He nodded at a guard. “Retrieve my claw,” he said, and the guard, saluting, retreated back through the door. “I needed that, Heather Longtreader. That was a fine gift. Now, watch!”
The guards spun Heather to where she was forced to see the city center and all the bustle of Victory Day. She watched, heartbroken, as the preparations neared completion. She gazed as sad-faced rabbits glanced at the massive banner featuring Morbin. Heather saw the divided stands where the District Six elites were kept from having to interact with their outwaller guests. The smug looks of the Sixes, mixed with their genuine pleasure at the festivities, marked them over and against their kindred from the outer districts. The visitors to the city center were uneasy, uncertain where to go. Most kept their heads down, hiding unhappy faces. For some in the galleries, it was a kind of sport to point and laugh at the poorer rabbits. Heather’s eyes filled with tears.
We have become our own worst enemies. What could we have accomplished all over Natalia if we had only worked together?
Heather watched on while the city center filled, watched with a sinking heart as an open space was roped off in the midst of the gathered rabbits and the younglings were gathered there. They were so small, and their oversized scarves and neckerchiefs marked them for what they really were. Prey. She watched frenzied parents and terrified friends be pressed back, often with brutal force, from the abandoned younglings. There were guilty glances everywhere as disgusted bucks and horrified does watched helplessly. Most did not know what was coming, but their dread steadily increased as the number of younglings multiplied.
The clamorous music wasn’t loud enough to drown out the screams.
Heather’s weeping eyes grew wider, and her heavy heart sank ever lower. A sickening helplessness overwhelmed her. She had forgotten where she was. Her heart was with the mothers and all the other helpless rabbits who watched their children be exposed to the baleful horrors that would surely come. She longed to see Flint and Fay, impossibly large, leaping from standing stone to standing stone, coming to rescue them all. Fay with light in her eyes and Flint bearing his stone sword. Rescuers. Justice. But they were not coming. No one was coming.
There are no heroes here.
“You do not enjoy our Victory Day festivities, I find,” Vitton said sickly. Heather turned slowly to find him kneeling before a small forge that had been brought up while she watched below. Orange coals, stoked by a broad rabbit pumping large bellows, heated several instruments. Smoke puffed out in twisting wisps, and mingled with the falling flakes of ash. Vitton smiled, seeing her alarm. “Are you crying. Heather Longtreader?” He cackled with glee. “You’re perfect! You still care so much. I find so often my victims have given up. But you still care, and you still believe in your hopeless cause.” He laughed louder still. “I love it!”
Heather hung her head. He was right. She did care. And she did, somehow, still believe. She looked up as Vitton was fitted with a thick metal-rimmed glove. The stout blacksmith took tongs and secured a five-bladed claw, which he then settled onto the glove, clicking it in place. Now Vitton’s eyes were lit with a fell frenzy as he rose, brandishing this orange-hot claw. His other hand was fitted with a thick glove, and he drew from the forge a heated sword, its end glowing white. Heather saw the air ripple above the claw hand and the sword. She saw Vitton’s twisted glee as he stepped forward.
“Now,” he said, his voice high and frantic, “you will feel the burning. There will be no mending, only an ending—to you, your family, and your cause!”
Chapter Forty-Six
A NEW BETRAYAL
Captain Vitton advanced, rabid in his glee. The door opened behind him, and Heather’s heart rose. Then she saw the Commandant walk out onto the roof, and her hopes died.
“Commandant,” Vitton said, his eyes still bright and his sharp teeth showing a bright, wild smile, “you’re just in time for the burning.”
“Very good, Captain Vitton,” the Commandant said. “I have brought you more players for your sport. After you’ve finished with this girl and her mother, then enjoy exercising your particular skills on these.” The Commandant motioned, and five rabbits were led out onto the roof, canvas bags covering their heads. Uniformed guards shoved them forward, and they stood behind the Commandant, whose half-scarred face and callous expression made Heather shudder. These are the leaders of Akolan. A cold, heartless bureaucrat and a twisted fanatic.
“Are they rebels?” Vitton asked, waving his hot-metal talon back and forth.
“They tried to keep back their younglings from the gathering,” the Commandant said. Heather’s heart lurched. “They are traitors and deserve whatever fate you may… enjoy to give them.”
Vitton motioned them over, and the guards dragged them toward the maniacal captain. “I will get to you, bag-heads, after her!” He twisted toward Heather, his eyes wide with dark delight and his bright blades bearing down on her.
The door opened again, and a frantic guard ran through, saluting.
“You may speak, Lieutenant Anders,” the Commandant said, his face betraying a mild concern.
“Sir,” the breathless Anders said, “I’ve been interrogating all morning and have just found out the most incredible intelligence.”
“How did you obtain this intelligence, Lieutenant?” the Commandant asked.
“The outwaller volunteered it, sir,” Anders replied. “He wanted to trade the information for the life of his twin younglings. I agreed, knowing we could always do what we wanted anyway once the intel was secured.”
“You did very well. Go on,” the Commandant said, while Captain Vitton turned to listen.
“Sir,” Lieutenant Anders continued, “the rebels…they have built a tunnel into the mountain behind the Lepers’ District.”
“What?” Captain Vitton said, eyes still wide with frenzy. Heather’s heart sank, and she barely stifled a scream. It wasn’t only that she and mother, Jacks, and all the young-lings were going to be killed but that the whole project of escape was in jeopardy.
“Silence, you!” Mother cried at Anders. The Commandant spun, and Vitton nodded to her nearest guard. She was herself silenced with a crunching blow. Heather screamed as Mother fell back, unmoving.
“No!” Heather cried, and she strained at her captors. They held her tight as Vitton swung his hot blade around, pointing it at her and motioning for her to be silent.
“Say on, Lieutenant,” Vitton said, a savage hunger in his eyes.
“Yes, Captain,” Anders answered. “They have a council, a kind of government, and a leader. And they have a vast cavern back in there, and they call it District Seven. They have ships—massive ships—intended to take most of the city away in escape! They have trained soldiers called battle-bucks and a whole scheme that’s been worked on for over a hundred years!”
The guards and officers atop the roof gasped and looked at one another. Vitton whistled, then cackled and bobbed his head. The Commandant frowned.
“Stay here a moment, Anders,” the Commandant said. “I have heard similar rumors today. When Captain Vitton is finished, we will go and question this buck together. Then we will uncover all.”
Vitton smiled grotesquely, nodding thanks to the Commandant, who stood behind the five prisoners by the door. Then Vitton turned again on Heather, walking forward and raising his incandescent claw. His crazed eyes were wide as he stepped forward. “And now, the painful end to your pitiful story!”
Heather closed her eyes as the claw swept toward her. She braced for the horrifying end.
But she felt nothing.
All she heard was a clanging ring. Her eyes flashed open. She saw the claw, orange-hot, on the stone r
ooftop beside her. She looked up to see Vitton’s face overcome with confusion.
“What is this?” he demanded, turning around. Heather saw what he saw—five bags on the deck and the former prisoners rushing toward Vitton and his guards. She couldn’t take it all in at once, but she saw one of the prisoners had a bow. He had shot a guard and was nocking another arrow. Another of the freed prisoners, a familiar form, charged hard at the wicked captain. She had to look twice to be certain.
Her heart leapt. Father! He rushed at Vitton, who brought around his white-hot sword with tremendous speed and drove it down hard on Father. Father brought up his weapon, an ordinary pickaxe that looked ancient, and blocked Vitton’s stroke. Vitton stumbled back toward Heather, his maniac glee giving way to hysteria.
“Who are you?” he screamed.
“I am her father, and father to more,” he said, “and now I am a father to all.”
“What do you mean?” Vitton shrieked, rising with a last effort to face this envoy of death.
Father raised the ancient pickaxe and said, “I am the Tunneler and the Truth.” He struck then such a devastating blow that Vitton had no chance to deflect it. The white-hot blade snapped in half, and the ancient tool sped down, finding, and finishing, that dreaded captain of a thousand cruelties. Heather looked away.
Then Father was with her. “Are you all right, Heather?”
“Yes,” she said, hugging him. “But Mother. We need to get her somewhere safe.”
“There’s only one safe place now,” Father said, looking down at the city center. It was full now, and the ceremony was beginning. “And it’s nowhere near here.” He ran to his wife and handed the pickaxe to another of the former prisoners. Heather recognized Dote. Father took Mother in his arms and dodged through the chaos of the ongoing battle with what was left of Vitton’s band.
“The Commandant!” Heather cried, recalling his presence with a jolt of terror.
Dote pointed, and she tracked the path of his outstretched finger. She saw that the Commandant’s drawn sword was pointed at the neck of Anders, the young lieutenant who had revealed the secret of District Seven. “He’s with us,” Father said, smiling. “The Commandant has always been with us. He’s betraying the betrayers.”
She was astounded. “But all the evil he’s done! He knocked me off this roof!” she said.
“I know,” Father answered, “right onto a series of awnings that were meant to bring you to the ground unharmed. But we’ll speak of it later. Right now, we have work to do!”
“Yes, Father,” she said, leaping to action. “Where’s Jacks?”
Father swiveled toward the Commandant. “Will Jacks still be in the holding area?” he called.
“No, Father Tunneler,” he answered. “They’ll be moving them to the city center now. They will call the birds at the first alarm, so we have very little time.”
“Okay,” Father said, turning to the archer, who Heather noticed was Stitcher. “Do it!”
Stitcher nodded and then called for his fellow archers to step to the edge. They lit the soaked bundles on the ends of their arrows in the forge that held Vitton’s twisted weapons. They raised their arrows and aimed. “Fire!” Stitcher shouted.
The flaming arrows sped through the sky, arcing over the anxious crowd below. Heather watched as they found the massive banners and burst into flame. Heather shouted a defiant cry along with the others on the roof as the image of Morbin began to peel away in the flames.
At that signal, the gate filled with a horde of rabbits rushing into the city center. None wore the red preymarks at their necks. They were lepers, Heather saw with amazement, and they ran in with a tremendous shout, scattering the galleries of the shocked residents of Sixth District.
“Lepers!” the inwallers cried, knocking one another down in their efforts to avoid the diseased horde. “They’ll infect us all!”
Heather saw, with a mounting shock and wild joy, that Harmony was at the head of the leper insurrection. Harmony, her fur mottled and with apparent sores scattered through rips in her tattered rags, was leading the lepers into the city center. Soon there were gaps in the crowd, and the lepers sped in, surrounding the terrified younglings. Harmony shouted instructions, and the leper host went to work. Heather watched with rising hope as the lepers encircled and began to pick up the younglings and carry them off. Many rabbits screamed and fought off the rescue, but scores more joined in, rushing away with younglings in tow.
“The trick of a century!” Stitcher cried out in joy.
And what a deception it had been. Heather finally understood that the so-called lepers were not truly sick at all but were part of an old ploy to keep curious foes away from the ongoing project inside the mountain—in District Seven. They had sacrificed to provide cover for the great project of the ages. Heather knew they were heroes. And how heroically they acted now!
Heather smiled as she saw the burning banners fall and, though it seemed impossible to her, two new banners were revealed beneath. One bore the red and green double-diamond emblem and the other the old oath:
My place beside you,
My blood for yours.
Till the Green Ember rises,
Or the end of the world!
Stitcher stepped up beside Heather, smiling wide with tears in his eyes as others patted his back.
“Good work, Mr. Weaver!’ Dote said. “I don’t know how you did it.”
“Thank you, son,” the old rabbit said. “It’s an old trick, but I’ve never tried it on that scale before.”
“Mr. Weaver?” she asked, mouth gaping open. “Mr. Edward Weaver? Maggie Weaver’s husband?”
“Yes, Heather. You have seen my wife?” he asked, his brimming eyes eager.
“Oh, dear Mr. Weaver!” she cried, plunging into his arms. “Your wife is the dearest, most wonderful rabbit! She was very well the last I saw her. Very well, indeed. She’s the wisest counselor the heirs have had and the heart of our cause. She has looked for you, Mr. Weaver, every day from her porch at Cloud Mountain. She has never forgotten you.”
They embraced for a long moment, and Mr. Weaver wept. “My dear Maggie! Oh, my Maggie,” he said.
They broke apart and stood staring, first at one another, then up at the magnificent banners Mr. Weaver had fashioned for this incredible occasion. “How?” she asked, pointing at them. “The top layer burned, but these don’t. How?”
“The bottom banners are sealed with flame-retardant ointment,” he answered, his arm around her as if she were his own granddaughter, “and the tops were highly flammable. It’s not too complicated, just daring.”
She gazed with wonder at the banners. She thought of Emma and of her beloved Smalls and then looked down at the scene unfolding below.
It was chaotic still but beginning to turn toward order as the lepers’ gamble paid off. Most of the younglings were on their way to District Seven while the inwallers fled in a panic. The Longtreader guards couldn’t manage the bedlam, and they regrouped on the edge of their headquarters. Heather reveled in their retreat.
Then she spotted Jacks. He was running against the retreating tide of lepers carrying younglings. He fought off any attempt to carry him away, even sidestepping Harmony and ducking under an upturned booth. Harmony lost sight of him and was pressed by other, urgent, dangers. But Heather tracked his movements. She saw his face plainly, and it showed a panicked confusion. He looked as if he believed his world were coming apart.
“Jacks!” she cried, though he was far too far away to hear her.
“Where?” Father asked, rushing up to the edge of the roof.
“There!” She pointed, then spun to take in the scene on the roof. The Commandant, who Heather could hardly believe was really their ally, had subdued the remainder of Vitton’s force and now held the rooftop. Mother was lying still, and Heather longed to help her, but she saw how delicate Jacks’ situation stood.
“The Lords of Prey will be coming soon, Master Tunneler,” the Commandant c
alled. “I’m late to setting the cover fires.”
“Will they believe that the younglings, and many more,” Father asked, “were maddened by the rush of the lepers and are now infected?”
“I hope so,” the Commandant said. “I have my script prepared. It only remains to be seen if your brother will believe it or acknowledge the fiction.”
“Our hopes rest on that!” Father said. “Now, go!”
The Commandant hurried through the door along with Dote, Mr. Weaver, and their other remaining allies. Vitton’s band was tied up and gagged, with the bags over their heads now.
“Heather,” Father asked, “can you carry your mother to District Seven? I have to get to Jacks!”
They both knew the answer to that question. Heather wasn’t strong enough to carry Mother that far.
“Take her, Father,” she said. “And lead these rabbits to freedom.”
“But, Heather,” Father began, tears starting in his eyes. “I can’t lose you again.”
“You’ll always have me, Father,” she said, crossing to kiss him. “You’re strong enough to carry Mother and to set the grand project in motion.”
“And you?”
“I’m strong enough to carry Jacks,” she said, and she leapt from the rooftop.
Chapter Forty-Seven
HEATHER’S DEPARTURE
Heather struck the canvas awning, careful to keep her balance as best as she could, rolled again to the next level, and so down before spilling onto the ground. But this time, knowing what to expect, she kept her feet and landed firmly on the ground. Then she dug into a sprint.
All around her, chaos reigned. The inwallers were fleeing in every direction, running inside whatever buildings would let them in. The last of the lepers were hurrying their comrades off in the direction of the Fifth District—the Lepers’ District—and then into the Seventh.
Heather sped on, dodging through the raucous rabbits. She kept her eyes on where Jacks had been and ran there with all the speed she could manage. She was still fast, and still, even in this mad moment, she felt a thrill at the speed she could achieve when she didn’t hold back.