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All Wilf says is “Mmm” again before snapping the reins and turning the oxes down the split road towards Brockley Falls. He don’t even look back once.
We watch him go for a while and then turn back to our own road.
“Ow,” Viola says, stretching out her legs as she steps forward.
“I know,” I say. “Mine too.”
“You think he was right?” Viola says.
“Bout what?”
“About the army getting bigger as it marches.” She imitates his voice again. “Growin as it comes.”
“How do you do that?” I ask. “Yer not even from here.”
She shrugs. “A game I used to play with my mother,” she says. “Telling a story, using different voices for every character.”
“Can you do my voice?” I ask, kinda tentative.
She grins. “So you can have a conversayshun with yerself?”
I frown. “That don’t sound nothing like me.”
We head back down the road, Brockley Falls disappearing behind us. The time on the cart was nice but it weren’t sleep. We try to go as fast as we can but most times that ain’t much more than a walk. Plus maybe the army really is caught far behind, really will have to wait behind the creachers.
Maybe. Maybe not. But within the half hour, you know what?
It’s raining.
“People should listen to Wilf,” Viola says, looking up.
The road’s found its way back down near the river and we find a reasonably sheltered spot twixt the two. We’ll eat our di
“What’s a mac?” Viola asks as we sit down against different trees.
“A raincoat,” I say, looking thru my rucksack. Nope, no mac. Great. “And what did I say bout listening too close?”
I still feel a little calm, if you wa
I look over at Viola, eating outta one of her packets of fruit.
I think about my ma’s book, still in my rucksack.
Stories in voices, I think.
Could I stand to hear my ma’s voice spoken?
Viola crinkles the fruit packet she’s just finished. “That’s the last of them.”
“I got some of this cheese left,” I say, “and some dried mutton, but we’re go
“You mean like stealing?” she asks, her eyebrows up.
“I mean like hunting,” I say. “But maybe stealing, too, if we have to. And there’s wild fruit and I know some roots we can eat if you boil ’em first.”
“Mmm.” Viola frowns. “There’s not much call for hunting on a spaceship.”
“I could show you.”
“Okay,” she says, trying to sound cheerful. “Don’t you need a gun?”
“Not if yer a good hunter. Rabbits are easy with snares. Fish with lines. You can catch squirrels with yer knife but there ain’t much meat.”
“Horse, Todd,” Manchee barks, quietly.
I laugh, for the first time in what seems like forever. Viola laughs, too. “We ain’t hunting horses, Manchee.” I reach out to pet him. “Stupid dog.”
“Horse,” he barks again, standing up and looking down the road from the direkshun we just came.
We stop laughing.
There’s hoofbeats on the road, distant but approaching at full gallop.
“Someone from Brockley Hills?” Viola says, hope and doubt both in her voice.
“Brockley Falls,” I say, standing. “We need to hide.”
We repack our bags in a hurry. It’s a narrow strip of trees we’ve managed to get ourselves stuck in twixt the road and the river. We daren’t cross the road and with the river at our backs, a fallen log is the best we’re go
I take out my knife.
The hoofbeats keep coming, louder and louder.
“Only one horse,” Viola whispers. “It’s not the army.”
“Yeah,” I say, “but listen how fast he’s riding.”
Thump budda-thump budda-thump we hear. Thru the trees we can see the dot of him approaching. He’s coming full out down the road, even tho it’s raining and night’s falling. No one’d ride like that with good news, would they?
Viola looks behind us at the river. “Can you swim?”
“Yeah.”
“Good,” she says. “Because I can’t.”
Thump budda-thump budda-thump.
I can hear the buzz of the rider’s Noise starting but for a time the galloping is louder and I can’t hear it clearly.
“Horse,” Manchee says from down below.
It’s there. Static twixt the hoofbeats. Flashes of it. Parts of words caught. Rid– and Pa– and Dark– and Stup– and more and more.
I clench the knife harder. Viola’s not saying nothing now.
Thump budda-thump budda-thump budda–
Faster and Nightfall and Shot and Whatever it–
And he’s coming down the road, round a little curve we took just a hundred metres back, leaning forward–
Thump budda–
The knife turns in my hand cuz–
Shot ’em all and She was tasty and Dark here–
Thump BUDDA–
I think I reckernize–
THUMP BUDDA-THUMP BUDDA–
And he’s nearer and nearer till he’s almost–
And then Todd Hewitt? rings out as clear as day thru the rain and the galloping and the river.
Viola gasps.
And I can see who it is.
“Junior,” Manchee barks.
It’s Mr Prentiss Jr.
We try to duck down farther below the log but it ain’t no use cuz we already see him pulling back hard on the reins to stop his horse, causing it to rear up and nearly throw him.
But only nearly.
And not enough to make him drop the rifle he’s got under one arm.
Todd BLOODY HEWITT! screams his Noise.
“Oh, shit,” I hear Viola say and I know what she means.
“Well, HOOO-EEE!” Mr Prentiss Jr yells and we’re close enough to see the smile on his face and hear amazement in his voice. “Yer taking the ROAD?! You ain’t even going OFF TRAIL?!”
My eyes meet Viola’s. What choice did we have?
“I been hearing yer Noise for almost yer whole stupid life, boy!” He turns his horse this way and that, trying to find where exactly we are in our little strip of woods. “You think I’m not go
There’s joy in his Noise. Real joy, like he can’t believe his luck.
“And wait a minute,” he says and we can hear him edging his horse off the road and into the woods. “Wait just a minute. What’s that beside you? That empty space of nothing.”
He says it so nasty Viola flinches. I got the knife in my hand but he’s on horseback and we know he’s got a gun.
“Too effing right I’ve got a gun, Todd boy,” he calls, no longer searching round but coming straight for us, getting his horse to step over bushes and round trees. “And I got another gun, too, another one special, just for yer little lady there, Todd.”
I look at Viola. I know she sees what he’s thinking, what’s in his Noise, the pictures that ooze out of it. I know she does cuz I can see her face closing right up. I bump her arm and I flash my eyes over to our right, just about the only possibility we have for an escape.
“Oh, please run, boy,” Mr Prentiss Jr calls. “Please give me a reason to hurt you.”
The horse is so close we can hear its Noise, too, jittery and crazy.