Brink (The Ruin Saga Book 2)

by Harry Manners

  He had done his best to guide Norman himself, but he was away too often, and was far from an authority. Agatha and Lincoln did what they could, but to fit in, Norman had to be invested with the zeal for the mission. The only one who could have done the boy justice was the only one who successfully ignored the boy’s very existence.

  Alex was too busy for the young man, too swept up in building their network of allies and trading partners. Since James had completed his scholarly training and taken to joining him on expeditions, Alex had made but the most cursory appearances in the classroom.

  “Good,” Alex said. “Then we’ll be ready to receive them by morning. I trust you’re all comfortable pitching in with the teaching?”

  Helen leaned forward. “Just wait a second, Alex!”

  “Why would Malverston ask for this? It’s way out of character,” Lincoln said.

  Alex was impassive. “He’s not a fool. He knows that the one who rules the masses is one who learns from history. And if he can build a small army of people who know the Old World, he’ll have everything he needs to lay the foundation of his own government.”

  Lincoln grumbled. “He’s looking to stay in power … through education?”

  “He underestimates us. He sees it as just a way of shushing the naysayers.”

  “So why does he need us? Plenty of people know the Old World.” Helen held Hector’s arm via a tight bunch of sleeve, waving him to keep his tongue. He looked furious. She, meanwhile, kept her voice level, though still she looked troubled, almost hurt. “We want him out of power, not to strengthen his position. All this time, we’ve asked to have our son taught, and we’ve sat quietly while you chased old first editions and dodgy salvagers. And now we’re pulling out all the stops for him?”

  “It seems we’ve made an impression on the town.” There was no mistaking the note of pride in Alex’s voice. “He’s giving them what they want, but he’s not thinking about how it’ll change them, really wake them up to his filth. In the end, it’ll undermine him. We might not even have to take any action at all, other than teach them all we know.”

  James had the urge to hold his head in his hands. He knew Alex had been up to something bound to sit with them poorly, but this was much worse.

  None of them were convinced. That much was obvious at a glance.

  Alex leaned forward, for the first time showing a hint of concern. “Look, we were always going to start schooling others, sooner or later.”

  “Yes, but God, Alex!” Lincoln said.

  “Why them, of all people, to start? The most volatile political theatre we’ve encountered.”

  “On the contrary, they’re the ideal candidates. They’ve held on to the old ways, mostly, in any case. They’ve just forgotten the value of what they know. It won’t take long for them to remember. It’s the perfect experiment. If it doesn’t work, no harm to us; we’ll have learned what doesn’t work. If it does, Malverston’s own people will dethrone him.”

  Hector stood up sharply, tipping his chair over in a fit of rage. His face was bright red and inflamed. He seemed to be struggling for words that were out of reach. He looked around at the others, looking for help, then down at Norman. For a moment it looked as though he would reach across the table for Alex, but then Helen’s hand reached up to his shoulder and held firm. “And Norman?” he said. “He’ll be able to participate in the classes?”

  Alex’s face was blank, then creased into an easy smile. “Of course, of course. I’m sure it’ll be a great benefit to him.” It was a skilful ruse, but in that momentary blankness, James had seen the truth: Alex hadn’t given Norman a single thought. He wondered whether Hector had seen it too.

  But if Hector sensed anything untoward, he made sure not to compromise his turn of luck. “Good,” he said, his face poker-flat. He left the room in three bounding strides.

  The others looked at their hands. Helen looked hurt, her eyes flashing around at the rest of them. Then she set about packing away Norman’s things into a knapsack, deliberate and slow. Norman sat with his head hung and his face pale, eyes wary. Once she was done, she slipped the knot tight and took his arm, standing to face the table.

  “It’s not fair,” she said quietly. “You all know that.”

  Then she shepherded Norman out the door, nudging him when he turned back, his big eyes wide and confused.

  The others stayed for a while, but not long. There was little left to say. Alex explained that they should expect their first batch of students at sunrise the following morning, and that was that. They departed the room slowly, lost in their own thoughts, so that James and Alex were alone.

  James clicked his tongue. “I don’t understand why you spurn him like that.”

  “What?”

  “Norman. You’ve never given him the time of day.”

  Alex looked hurt. “I love him. I’d do anything for him, just as much as the rest of you.”

  “You know what I mean. You … you spent the first twenty years after the End preparing me for the mission. You gave up sleep and leisure, a wife, a family … You gave everything to make me what I am today because you believed that the future lay in teaching the young all we’d lost.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then why would you throw away a chance to teach another? He’s here, right under your roof. He’s a bright boy, and he wants to learn, so why haven’t you done the same with him? Hector would give anything to have you take him into the classroom. Hell, anybody would. You’re the Alexander Cain, now—”

  “Careful. All that’s for the stage, when we’re out there. I’m just Alex, remember? I want it to stay that way.”

  “My point is that you’re the biggest hope we have. You were born to lead people, so lead him. I don’t understand why you’re so keen to abandon him. Hell, you’re bringing people from hundreds of miles away to be taught, but you can’t bring yourself to sit at a table with a kid who has been right under your nose for almost ten years!”

  “That’s for political purposes. It’s a means to an end. And in any case, I don’t see you complaining about how I never had Lucian in the classroom. He’s been around since the End, but he’s never spent a single day with his head in a book.”

  “Don’t dodge. Lucian chose his path. But Norman … You’re so keen to abandon him. Why?”

  Alex said nothing for a long time. Something not quite anger, but smouldering derision, lurked somewhere amidst his expression; some shadow that set his eyes askance. Eventually, he said, “He’s blind.”

  James blinked. “Blind?”

  “He only sees the world in front of his face, sees things for what they are.”

  “So do most people.”

  “Yes, but you didn’t. You were a shining beacon in the dark, James, even before you could talk. You saw what might be, not just what you knew. I’d been grappling with the others for so long, trying to get them to act, to do something! I was alone. And then there you were, looking out at all those crumbling ruins, and you imagined, you dreamed. You had destiny! But Norman … he’s just …”

  “A boy?”

  Alex sighed. He leaned back in his chair, brooding. “The boy has no sense of wonder. No destiny. I wouldn’t know what to do with him.”

  “Teach him!” James paused, then he was speaking again before he knew what he was saying. “Or I will.”

  He hadn’t meant to say that, but now that it was out, he knew he meant it.

  How could I teach him? I never saw the Old World, either.

  But if Alex wouldn’t, he would try. He wouldn’t leave the boy to devolve into one of the witless savages that eked out a life in the North.

  Alex was looking at him strangely. “Is the reason you’re focusing so much on this because you’re afraid I’ll ask you about what happened in the stables?”

  James swallowed convulsively. He made to say something fast, desperate to curtail any opportunity to dwell on what happened. Already it was almost possible to pretend that it was all
part of the mad blur between leaving Beth in the orchards, and arriving home. “What are you talking about?”

  Alex didn’t move, and yet his entire manner shifted. He had gone from companionable partner to cold stranger in an instant. “I know you, James. You saw something.”

  “It’s all a joke!” James said. “I’m tired, he was crazy, and I had a dizzy spell. He was waxing lyrical about all kinds of insanity, and I got swept up in it for a second, that’s all.”

  “Just tell me. Please.”

  James laughed, leaning across the table. “For a moment I thought I saw moorland, and fog, and towns. Old towns. I thought it was Radden. I … I was sure it was Radden.” He paused, then shrugged. “But it’s just my imagination. I’ve never even seen the place. Anyway, it’s all nonsense. Seeing other places, having visions, it’s all bumpf.”

  Alex was quiet. Somewhere outside, some of the others were arguing. “Anything else?”

  James shrugged. “There was a man. Some pale-faced guy with this big hyena grin on his face, and dark marks under his eyes.”

  Alex’s face fell slack upon his skull, formless and drooping, like jelly thrown over a spear of rock. The colour drained from his skin until he was paler than the whitewashed wall behind him. But his eyes were the worst: haunted, sunken in his skull. “Dark marks?” he muttered.

  James frowned. “That’s right. But it was just heat madness, that’s all.”

  Alex wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Yes. Yes, just madness.”

  “It was just my imagination,” James said. “I’ve never seen anywhere north of Manchester. You know that. And so what? I saw some guy, a figment of my imagination. Somebody who looked like they’d misapplied mascara and—”

  “—and looked a little like a wolf,” Alex finished.

  James stared. “How did you know that?”

  Alex’s brow flickered. “What did he say?”

  “Alex …”

  “What did he say?”

  James sighed. “He said he was waiting.”

  Alex stood over what seemed an age, meandering his way around the room as though blind, steadying himself with chair-backs and upholstery. James’s skin came out in gooseflesh, seeing him that way. He reached the door and turned around, looking more child-like than James had ever seen him. “And the frost?” he said. “Did you feel that too?”

  James’s throat closed down to a pinhole as he remembered the ice crystals that had evaporated off his temples the moment the man’s hands had left his head. “How did you know about that?” he whispered.

  Alex hung his head. He cursed under his breath. A long silence passed between them, and then he said, “We have to go.”

  “Where?”

  “Radden.”

  James almost fell off his chair. “We can’t! We just arrived. The students from the Moon will be here by morning. The others are up in arms.” He flung his hands in the air. “And this is crazy! He was just a madman, like you said.”

  “No. He wasn’t.”

  “How can you say that?” James yelled. He was on his feet. “There’s no such thing as magic powers or psychic visions. You taught me that. Anyone with a mote of rationality knows that.”

  “James,” Alex said, “look out the window. Does anything out there look like a world that subscribes to the rational? There’s a reason the North is overrun with the Rapture sects, that the roads are overrun with zealots. It’s so easy to think all this is God’s punishment, or aliens swooped down and took everyone. It’s just that crazy.” He pulled the door open and stepped onto the threshold. “We have to go, as soon as possible.”

  “You’re serious?”

  Alex said nothing, just nodded.

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  James watched him until any doubt he was joking had dissipated, then said, “Fine, then I’m coming with you.”

  “Yes.”

  James realised he didn’t have a choice, either way.

  *

  Later, one of James’s pigeons fluttered onto the windowsill. He untied the scroll tied around its leg and read the fine cursive scrawled upon it. He recognised Ms McKinley’s hand at once, and breathed a sigh of relief.

  She had been the first person to ever reply to the endless messages he had sent across the land when he had been a boy, when he had been feverish with excitement, certain he could unite the world with a few handwritten greetings, and goodwill.

  Since then, the messages they exchanged were the one thing James kept to himself. It was his little secret.

  Today, however, his heart sank. The message ended with a shaking scrawl.

  Looks like Malverston’s tired of my meddling. I hear them coming. Be careful, you little shit.

  CHAPTER 11

  Canterbury cathedral hadn’t known the ravages of the End. A few short years of vacancy had elapsed before survivors had once again sought shelter and guidance under its roof. Since, various groups had come and gone, but the transept floors had stayed swept, and the myriad spires had been well cared for. Like many other ancient buildings, the decay of time had left it almost untouched, especially compared to the modern homes that had all but melted into plasterboard sludge after a few short years.

  The figures depicted in the stained glass windows, beauteous gilded things of dazzling complexity and splendour, stared out over the encroaching wild lands, untroubled and angelic.

  It was the only place left anyone felt safe. And now Robert suspected even this last bastion was crumbling in the people’s minds. A significant number of the city’s eight hundred inhabitants had taken refuge here when the attacks had started and the wind farm had been destroyed. Most hadn’t left since.

  Robert had made the mistake of bringing some food—food they couldn’t afford to waste—hoping to ease their fears and quell the worst of the rumours. With so few men and their perimeter in shambles, it was all he could do.

  Now they were upon him, hundreds of bedraggled figures, all soiled and hungry, demanding to be saved. Not long ago, these people had been his fellow citizens, his neighbours and friends. These were the people who had greeted him each morning and worked away in the fields beside him for years. He knew almost all of them by name and their everyday lives intimately.

  But these creatures he barely recognised. Their wild, bulging eyes and bared teeth took up too much of their faces, and their reaching hands had become a wall of scrabbling talons. The racket was deafening, echoing under the high roof and smearing their voices into a riotous hubbub. Before he knew it, he was backing away towards the doors, and as a single dark mass, they followed.

  Myriad questions bombarded him from every direction.

  “Where are they now? How many of them?”

  “What of our food stores?”

  “Has there been word from the ambassadors?”

  “They haven’t gotten to the last of the grain, have they?”

  “We haven’t had power in days. When will the lights be back?”

  “What are you doing to stop them? Why haven’t you killed them all?”

  “My children are hungry, you must bring us food! Where’s Alexander?”

  He backed up until his six-five frame was pressed flat against the wall, and the maddening racket closed in an unbroken half-moon around him. Time and time again he tried answering, but could scarcely manage a few words before an uproar of protest silenced him; why was that question important, and not theirs? Frozen and powerless despite all his strength and stature, Robert felt like cowering for the first time in memory.

  Then a single voice cut across them, one he knew but at the same time didn’t recognise, so full of power and fury. “Be silent! All of you, shut up!”

  It was a voice that usually carried a feminine breathiness, conveying peace and reserved consideration. It was one the city-folk were accustomed to hear subsumed into the susurrus of public socials, a dignified central component of any well-to-do congregation. Now it was rough edged and undercut
by crass aggression. One would expect its owner to be wielding a freshly smashed glass bottle.

  Sarah stood before Robert and her hair flagged out behind her in a forest of tangled ends. The blouse she had been wearing the past two days was spattered with mud and grease, and in her hand, instead of a glass bottle, were her thick-framed spectacles, almost opaque with dust. “I said shut up!” she roared.

  Hundreds of voices died with her screech’s ringing echo. The crowd shrank before her. Some fell back on their haunches, staring.

  Sarah’s form inflated and sank as she drew a single enormous breath. “How dare you?” she breathed. “How dare any of you?”

  Suddenly, the crowd was not a crowd at all, but a gathering of scared men and women dressed in the same clothes they’d worn for days, their faces puffed from weeping and sunken with fatigue. There were no bared teeth now, only quivering lips. A few children whimpered, pressing their faces into their guardians’ legs.

  Sarah and Heather, the city’s doctor, had entered through the barricaded side doors from the courtyard. Heather hung on the threshold still, her medical overalls in an unsettling state of disarray. She looked hangdog and almost grey with exhaustion. Like dandelions in a high wind, the city’s elderly folk had wilted from the stress of being under siege. She hadn’t emerged from her clinic for at least ten hours; he didn’t think she had slept since before the attack.

  Any other time, he was sure she would have been inundated with complaints of aches and ills, but right now, nobody seemed to have noticed her presence. All eyes were on Sarah.

  Robert stepped away from the wall, and placed his hands over her shoulders. She twitched violently at his touch, and he thought she would lash out and strike him, but instead, she relented after a moment of tension. Then in a curious instantaneous transformation, she was Sarah again, a mere wisp of a woman, and the monster was gone. She choked. “How could you? Robert’s trying to help us all, risking his life out there while you all cower in here, and you hound him like dogs!”