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The rifle gives an angry grunt. "I'm asking," it says, "what exactly gives ye permisshun to go a-burning down other people's bridges?"

I don't say nothing. Neither does the girl.

"D'ye think this is a stick I'm a-pointing at ye?" The rifle bobs up and down once.

"We were being chased," I say, for lack of nothing else.

"Chased, were ye?" says the rifle. "Who was a-chasing ye?"

And I don't know how to answer this. Would the truth be more dangerous than a lie? Is the rifle on the side of the Mayor? Would we be bounty? Or would the rifle have even heard of Prentisstown?

The world's a dangerous place when you don't know enough.

Like why is it so quiet?

"Oh, I heard of Prentisstown, all right," says the rifle, reading my Noise with unnerving clarity and cocking the gun again, making it ready to shoot. "And if that's where yer from-"

Then the girl speaks up and says that thing that suddenly makes me think of her as Viola and not the girl anymore. "He saved my life." I saved her life. Says Viola.

Funny how that works.

"Did he now?" says the rifle. "And how do you know he don't aim to just be a-saving it for himself?"

The girl, Viola, looks at me, her forehead creased. It's my turn to shrug.

"But no." The rifle's voice changes. "No, uh-uh, no, I'm

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not a-seeing that in ye, am I, boy? Cuz yer just a boy pup still, ain't ye?"

I swallow. "I'll be a man in 29 days."

"Not something to be proud of, pup. Not where yer from."

And then he lowers the gun away from his face.

And that's why it's so quiet.

He's a woman.

He's a grown woman.

He's an old woman.

"I'll thank ye kindly to call me she," the woman says, still pointing the rifle at us from chest level. "And not so old I won't still shoot ye."

She's looking at us more closely now, reading me up and down, seeing right into my Noise with a skill I've only ever felt in Ben. Her face is making all kindsa shapes, like she's considering me, like Cillian's face does when he tries to read me to see if I'm lying. Tho this woman ain't got no Noise at all so she might be singing a song in there for all I know.

She turns to Viola and pauses for another long look.

"As pups go," she says, looking back at me, "ye are as easy to read as a newborn, m'boy." She turns her face to Viola. "But ye, wee girl, yer story's not a usual one, is it?"

"I'd be happy to tell you all about it if you'd stop pointing a gun at us," Viola says.

This is so surprising even Manchee looks up. I turn to Viola with my mouth open.

We hear a chuckle from up on the rock. The old woman is laughing to herself. Her clothes seem like real dusty

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leather, worn and creased for years and years with a rimmed hat and boots for ignoring mud. Like she ain't nothing more than a farmer, really.

She's still pointing the gun at us, tho.

"Ye were a-running from Prentisstown, were ye?" she asks, looking into my Noise again. There's no point in hiding it so I go ahead and put forward what we were running from, what happened at the bridge, who was chasing us. She sees all of it, I know she does, but all I see her do is wrinkle up her lips and squint her eyes a bit.

"Well, now," she says, crooking the rifle in her arm and starting to make her way down from the rocks to where we're standing. "I can't rightly say that I'm not peeved bout ye blowing up my bridge. Heard the boom all the way back at the farm, oh, yeah." She steps off the last rock and stands a little ways away from us, the force of her grown-up quiet so large I feel myself stepping back without even knowing I decided to do it. "But the only place it led to ain't been worth a-going to for a decade nor more. Only left it up outta hope." She looks us over again. "Who's to say I weren't right?"

We still have our hands in the air cuz she ain't making much sense, is she?

"I'll ask ye this once," the woman says, lifting the rifle again. "Am I gonna need this?"

I exchange a glance with Viola.

"No," I say.

"No, mam," Viola says. Mam? I think.

"It's like sir, bonny boy." The woman slings the rifle over

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her shoulder by its strap. "For if yer a-talking to a lady." She squats down to Manchee's level. "And who might ye be, pup?"

"Manchee!" he barks.

"Oh, yeah, that's definitely who ye be, innit?" says the woman, giving him a vigorous rubbing. "And ye two pups?" she asks, not looking up. "What might yer good mothers have dubbed ye?"

Me and Viola exchange another glance. It seems like a price, giving up our names, but maybe it's a fair exchange for the gun being lowered.

"I'm Todd. That's Viola."

"As surely true as the sun a-coming up," says the woman, having succeeded in getting Manchee on his back for a tummy rub.

"Is there another way over that river?" I ask. "Another bridge? Cuz those men-"

"I'm Mathilde," the old woman interrupts, "but people who call me that don't know me, so you can call me Hildy and one day ye may even earn the right to shake my hand."

I look at Viola again. How can you tell if someone with no Noise is crazy?

The old woman cackles. "Yer a funny one there, boy." She stands up from Manchee who rolls back over and stares at her, already a worshipper. "And to answer yer asking, there's shallow crossings a couple days' traveling upstream but there ain't no bridges for a good distance more either way."

She turns her gaze back to me, steady and clear, a small smile on her lips. She's gotta be reading my Noise again but I can't feel no prodding like I do when men try it.

And the way she keeps on looking I start to realize a few

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things, put a few things together. It must be right that Prentisstown was quarantined cuz of the Noise germ, huh? Cuz here's a grown-up woman who ain't dead from it, who's looking at me friendly but keeping her distance, a woman ready to greet strangers from my direkshun with a rifle.

And if I'm contagious that means Viola's probably definitely caught it by now, could be dying as we speak, and that I'm probably definitely not gonna be welcome in the settlement, probably definitely gonna be told to keep way way out and that's probably the end of that, ain't it? My journey ended before I even found anywhere to go.

"Oh, ye won't be welcome in the settlement," the woman says. "No probably about it."- She winks at me, actually winks --"But, what ye don't know won't kill ye."

"Wanna bet?" I say.

She turns back and steps up the rocks the way she came. We just watch her go till she gets to the top and turns around again.

"Ye all a-coming?" she says, as if she's invited us along and we're keeping her waiting.

I look at Viola. She calls up to the woman, "We're meant to be heading for the settlement." Viola looks at me again. "Welcome or not."

"Oh, ye'll get there," says the woman, "but what ye two pups need first is a good sleeping and a good feeding. Any blind man could see that."

The idea of sleep and hot food is so tempting, I forget for a second that she ever pointed a gun at us. But only for a second. Cuz there's other things to think about. I make the

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decision for us. "We should keep on the road," I say to Viola quietly.

"I don't even know where we're going," she says, also quietly. "Do you? Honestly?"

"Ben said-"

"Ye two pups come to my farm, get some good eatings in ye, sleep on a bed - tho it ain't soft, I grant ye that - and in the morning, we'll go to the settlement. " And that's how she says it, opening her eyes wide on it, like a word to make fun of us for calling it that.

We still don't move.

"Look at it thusly," the old woman says. "I got me a gun." She waves it. "But I'm asking ye to come."

"Why don't we go with her?" Viola whispers. "Just to see."

My Noise rises a little in surprise. "See what?"

"I could use a bath," she says. "I could use some sleep."

"So could I," I say, "but there's men who're after us who probably ain't gonna let one fallen bridge stop them. And besides, we don't know nothing about her. She could be a killer for all we know."

"She seems okay." Viola glances up at the woman. "A little crazy, but she doesn't seem dangerous crazy."

"She don't seem anything." I feel a little vexed, if I'm honest. "People without Noise don't seem like nothing at all."

Viola looks at me, her brows suddenly creased and her jaw set a little.

"Well, not you, obviously," I say.

"Every time ..." she starts to say but then she just shakes her head.

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"Every time what?" I whisper, but Viola just scrunches her eyes and turns to the woman.

"Hold on," she says, her voice sounding annoyed. "Let me get my stuff."

"Hey!" I say. What happened to her remembering I saved her life? "Wait a minute. We gotta follow the road. We gotta get to the settlement."

"Roads is never the fastest way to get nowhere," the woman says. "Don't ye know that?"

Viola don't say nothing, just picks up her bag, frowning all over the place. She's ready to go, ready to head off with the first quiet person she sees, ready to leave me behind at the first sweet beckoning.

And she's missing the thing I don't wanna say.

"I can't go, Viola," I say, low, thru clenched teeth, hating myself a little as I say it, my face turning hot, which weirdly makes a bandage fall off. "I carry the germ. I'm dangerous."

She turns to me and there's a sting in her voice. "Then maybe you shouldn't come."

My jaw drops open. "You'd do that? You'd just leave?"

Viola looks away from my eyes but before she can answer, the old woman speaks. "Boy pup," she says, "if it's being infeckshus yer worried about, then yer girl mate can come a-walking up ahead with ol' Hildy while ye stay back a little ways with the puppup to guard ye."

"Manchee!" Manchee barks.

"Whatever," Viola says, turning and starting to climb the rocks to where the old woman stands.

"And I told ye," the woman says, "it's Hildy, not old woman."

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Viola reaches her and they walk off outta sight without another word. Just like that. "Hildy," Manchee says to me. "Shut up," I say.

And I don't got no choice but to climb the rocks after 'em, do I?

So that's how we make our way, along a much narrower path thru rocks and scrub, Viola and old Hildy keeping close together when they can, me and Manchee miles back, tripping our way toward who knows what further danger and the whole time I'm looking back over my shoulder, expecting to see the Mayor and Mr. Prentiss Jr. and Aaron all coming after us.

I don't know. How can you know? How can Ben and Cillian have expected me to be prepared for this? Sure, the idea of a bed and hot food sounds like something worth getting shot for but maybe it's a trick and we're being so stupid we deserve to get caught.

And there's people after us and we should be running.

But maybe there really ain't another way over that river.

And Hildy could have forced us and she didn't. And Viola said she seems okay and maybe one Noise-less person can read another.

You see? How can you know?

And who cares what Viola says?

"Look at 'em up there," I say to Manchee. "They fell together pretty quick. Like they're long lost family or something."

"Hildy," Manchee says again. I swat after his rump but he runs on ahead.

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Viola and Hildy are talking together but I can only hear the murmurings of words here and there. I don't know what they're saying at all. If they were normal Noisy people, it wouldn't matter how far back on the trail I was, we could all talk together and nobody'd have no automatic secrets. Everybody'd be jabbering, whether they wanted to or not.

And nobody'd be left out. Nobody'd be left on his own at the first chance you had.

We all walk on.

And I'm starting to think some more.

And I'm starting to let them get a little farther ahead, too.

And I'm thinking more.

Cuz as time passes, it's all starting to sink in.

Cuz maybe now we found Hildy, maybe she can take care of Viola. They're clearly peas in a pod, ain't they? Different from me, anyway. And so maybe Hildy could help her get back to wherever she's from cuz obviously I can't. Obviously I ain't got nowhere I can be except Prentisstown, do I? Cuz I'm carrying a germ that'll kill her, may kill her still, may kill everybody else I meet, a germ that'll forever keep me outta that settlement, that'll probably even leave me sleeping in Hildy's barn with the sheep and the russets.

"That's it, ain't it, Manchee?" I stop walking, my chest starting to feel heavy. "There ain't no Noise out here, less I'm the one who brings it." I rub some sweat off my forehead. "We got nowhere to go. We can't go forward. We can't go back."

I sit down on a rock, realizing the truth of it all. "We got nowhere," I say. "We got nothing."

"Got Todd," Manchee says, wagging his tail.

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It ain't fair. It just ain't fair.

The only place you belong is the place you can never go back to.

And so yer always alone, forever and always. Why'd you do it, Ben? What'd I do that was so bad? I wipe my eyes with my arm.

I wish Aaron and the Mayor would come and get me.

I wish it would just be over already.

"Todd?" Manchee barks, coming up to my face and trying to sniff it.

"Leave me alone," I say, pushing him away.

Hildy and Viola are getting still farther away and if I don't get up, I'll lose the trail.

I don't get up.

I can still hear them talking, tho it gets steadily quieter, no one looking back to see if I'm still following.

Hildy I hear, and girl pup and blasted leaky pipe and Hildy again and burning bridge.

And I lift my head.

Cuz it's a new voice.

And I ain't hearing it. Not with my ears.

Hildy and Viola are getting farther away, but there's someone coming toward them, someone raising a hand in greeting.

Someone whose Noise is saying Hello

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15

BROTHERS IN SUFFERING

IT'S AN OLD MAN, also carrying a rifle but way down at his side, pointing to the ground. His Noise rises as he approaches Hildy, it stays raised as he puts an arm around her and kisses her in greeting, it buzzes as he turns and is introduced to Viola who stands back a little at being greeted so friendly.

Hildy is married to a man with Noise.

A full grown man, walking around Noisy as anything.

But how-?

"Hey, boy pup!" Hildy shouts back at me. "Ye going to sit there all day picking yer nose or are ye going to join us for supper?"

"Supper, Todd!" Manchee barks and takes off running toward them.

I don't think nothing. I don't know what to think.

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"Another Noisy fella!" shouts the old man, stepping past Viola and Hildy and coming toward me. He's got Noise pouring outta him like a bright parade, all full of unwelcome welcome and pushy good feeling. Boy pup and bridges falling and leaky pipe and brother in suffering and Hildy, my Hildy He's still carrying his rifle but as he reaches me, his hand's out for me to shake.

I'm so stunned that I actually shake it.

"Tarn's my name!" the old man more or less shouts. "And who might ye be, pup?"

"Todd," I say.

"Pleasedtameetya, Todd!" He puts an arm around my shoulders and pretty much drags me forward up the path. I stumble along, barely keeping my balance as he pulls us to Hildy and Viola, talking all the way. "We haven't had guests for dinner in many a moon, so yell have to be a-scusing our humble shack. Ain't been no travelers thisaway for nigh on ten years nor more but yer welcome! Yer all welcome!"

We get to the others and I still don't know what to say and I look from Hildy to Viola to Tam and back again.

I just want the world to make sense now and then, is that so wrong?

"Not wrong at all, Todd pup," Hildy says kindly.

"How can you not have caught the Noise?" I ask, words finally making their way outta my head via my mouth. Then my heart suddenly rises, rises so high I can feel my eyes popping open and my throat starting to clench, my own Noise coming all high hopeful white.

"Do you have a cure?" I say, my voice almost breaking. "Is there a cure?"

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"Now if there were a cure," Tam says, still pretty much shouting, "d'ye honestly think I'd be subjecting ye to all this here rubbish a-floating outta my brain?"

"Heaven help ye if ye did," Hildy says, smiling.

"And heaven help ye if ye couldn't tell me what I was meant to be thinking." Tam smiles back, love fuzzing all over his Noise. "Nope, boy pup," he says to me. "No cure that I know of."

"Well, now," Hildy says, "Haven's meant to be a-working on one. So people say."

"Which people?" Tam asks, sceptical.

"Talia," Hildy says. "Susan F. My sister."

Tam makes a pssht sound with his lips. "I rest my case. Rumors of rumors of rumors. Can't trust yer sister to get her own name right much less any useful info."

"But-" I say, looking back and forth again and again, not wanting to let it go. "But how can you be alive then?" I say to Hildy. "The Noise kills women. All women."

Hildy and Tam exchange a look and I hear, no, I feel Tam squash something in his Noise.

"No, it don't, Todd pup," Hildy says, a little too gently. "Like I been telling yer girl mate Viola here. She's safe."

"Safe? How can she be safe?"

"Women are immune," Tam says. "Lucky buggers."

"No, they're not!" I say, my voice getting louder. "No, they're not! Every woman in Prentisstown caught the Noise and every single one of them died from it! My ma died from it! Maybe the version the Spackle released on us was stronger than yers but-"

"Todd pup." Tam puts a hand on my shoulder to stop me.

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I shake him off but I don't know what to say next. Viola hasn't said a word in all of this so I look at her. She don't look at me. "I know what I know," I say, even tho that's been half the trouble, ain't it?

How can this be true?

Tam and Hildy exchange another glance. I look into Tarn's Noise but he's as expert as anyone I've met at hiding stuff away when someone starts poking. What I see, tho, is all kind.

"Prentisstown's got a sad history, pup," he says. "A whole number of things went sour there."

"Yer wrong," I say, but even my voice says I ain't sure what I'm saying he's wrong about.

"This ain't the place for it, Todd," Hildy says, rubbing Viola on the shoulder, a rub that Viola don't resist. "Ye need to get some food in ye, some sleep in ye. Vi here says ye ain't slept hardly at all in many miles of traveling. Everything will be a-looking better when yer fed and rested."

"But she's safe from me?" I ask, making a point of not looking at Vi.

"Well, she's definitely safe from catching yer Noise," Hildy says, a smile breaking out. "What other safety she can get from ye is all down to a-knowing ye better."

I want her to be right but I also want to say she's wrong and so I don't say nothing at all.

"C'mon," Tam says, breaking the pause, "let's get to some feasting."

"No!" I say, remembering it all over again. "We ain't got time for feasting." I look at Viola. "There's men after us, in

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case you forgot. Men who ain't interested in our well-beings." I look up at Hildy. "Now, I'm sure yer feastings would be fine and all-"

"Todd pup-" Hildy starts.

"I ain't a pup!" I shout.

Hildy purses her lips and smiles with her eyebrows. "Todd pup," she says again, a little lower this time. "No man from any point beyond that river would ever set foot across it, do ye understand?"

"Yep," says Tam. "That's right."

I look from one to the other. "But-"

"I been guardian here of that bridge for ten plus years, pup," Hildy says, "and keeper of it for years before that. It's part of who I am to watch what comes." She looks over to Viola. "No one's coming. Ye all are safe."

"Yep," Tam says again, rocking back and forth on his heels.

"But-" I say again but Hildy don't let me finish.

"Time for feasting."

And that's that, it seems. Viola still don't look at me, still has her arms crossed and is now under the arm of Hildy as they walk on again. I'm stuck back with Tam who's waiting for me to start. I can't say as I feel much like walking anymore but everyone else goes so I go, too. We carry on up Tam and Hildy's private little path, Tam chattering away, making enough Noise for a whole town.

"Hildy says ye blew up our bridge," he says.

"My bridge," Hildy says from in front of us.

"She did build it," Tam says to me. "Not that anyone's used it in forever."

"No one?" I say, thinking for a second of all those men

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who disappeared outta Prentisstown, all the ones who vanished while I was growing up. Not one of them got this far.

"Nice bit of engineering, that bridge was," Tarn's going on, like he didn't hear me and maybe he didn't, what with how loud he's talking. "Sad to hear it's gone."

"We had no choice," I say.

"Oh, there's always choices, pup, but from what I hear, ye made the right one."

We walk on quietly for a bit. "Yer sure we're safe?" I ask.

"Well, ye can't never be sure," he says. "But Hildy's right." He grins, a little sadly, I think. "There's more than bridges being out that'll keep men that side of the river."

I try and read his Noise to see if he's telling the truth but it's almost all shiny and clean, a bright, warm place where anything you want could be true.

Nothing at all like a Prentisstown man.

"I don't understand this," I say, still gnawing on it. "It's gotta be a different kinda Noise germ."

"My Noise sound different from yers?" Tam asks, seeming genuinely curious.

I look at him and just listen for a second, Hildy and Prentisstown and russets and sheep and settlers and leaky pipe and Hildy .

"You sure think about yer wife a lot."

"She's my shining star, pup. Woulda lost myself in Noise if she hadn't put a hand out to rescue me."

"How so?" I ask, wondering what he's talking about. "Did you fight in the war?"

This stops him. His Noise goes as gray and featureless as a cloudy day and I can't read a thing off him.

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"I fought, young pup," he says. "But war's not something ye talk about in the open air when the sun is shining."

"Why not?"

"I pray to all my gods ye never find out." He puts a hand on my shoulder. I don't shake it off this time. "How do you do that?" I ask. "Do what?"

"Make yer Noise so flat I can't read it." He smiles. "Years of practice a-hiding things from the old woman."

"It's why I can read so good," Hildy calls back to us. "He gets better at hiding, I get better at finding."

They laugh together yet again. I find myself trying to send an eyeroll Viola's way about these two but Viola ain't looking at me and I stop myself from trying again.

We all come outta the rocky part of the path and around a low rise and suddenly there's a farm ahead of us, rolling up and down little hills but you can see fields of wheat, fields of cabbage, a field of grass with a few sheep on it.

"Hello, sheep!" Tam shouts.

"Sheep!" say the sheep.

First on the path is a big wooden barn, built as watertight and solid as the bridge, like it could last there forever if anyone asked it.

"Unless ye go a-blowing it up," Hildy says, laughing still.

"Like to see ye try." Tam laughs back.

I'm getting a little tired of 'em laughing about every damn thing.

Then we come around to the farmhouse, which is a totally different thing altogether. Metal, by the looks of it,

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like the gas stayshun and the Church back home but not nearly so banged up. Half of it shines and rolls on up to the sky like a sail and there's a chimney that curves up and out, folding down to a point, smoke coughing from its end. The other half of the house is wood built onto the metal, solid as the barn but cut and folded like-- "Wings," I say.

"Wings is right," Tam says. "And what kinda wings are they?"

I look again. The whole farmhouse looks like some kinda bird with the chimney as its head and neck and a shiny front and wooden wings stretching out behind, like a bird resting on the water or something.

"It's a swan, Todd pup," Tam says.

"A what?"

"A swan."

"What's a swan?" I say, still looking at the house.

His Noise is puzzled for a second, then I get a little pulse of sadness so I look at him. "What?"

"Nothing, pup," he says. "Memories of long ago."

Viola and Hildy are up ahead still, Viola's eyes wide and her mouth gulping like a fish.

"What did I tell ye?" Hildy asks.

Viola rushes up to the fence in front of the house. She stares at it, looking all over the metal part, up and down, side to side. I come up by her and look, too. It's hard for a minute to think of anything to say (shut up).

"Sposed to be a swan," I finally say. "Whatever that is."

She ignores me and turns to Hildy. "Is it an Expansion Three 500?"

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"What?"

"Older than that, Vi pup," Hildy says. "X Three 200."

"We got up to X Sevens," Viola says. "Not surprised," says Hildy.

"What the ruddy hell are you talking about?" I say. "Expanshun whatsits?"

"Sheep!" we hear Manchee bark in the distance.

"Our settler ship," Hildy says, sounding surprised that I don't know. "An Expansion Class Three, Series 200."

I look from face to face. Tarn's Noise has a spaceship flying in it, one with a front hull that matches the upturned farmhouse.

"Oh, yeah," I say, remembering, trying to say it like I knew all along. "You build yer houses with the first tools at hand."

"Quite so, pup," Tam says. "Or ye make them works of art if yer so inclined."

"If yer wife is an engineer who can get yer damn fool sculptures to stay standing up," Hildy says.

"How do you know about all this?" I say to Viola.

She looks at the ground, away from my eyes.

"You don't mean-" I start to say but I stop.

I'm getting it.

Of course I'm getting it.

Way too late, like everything else, but I'm getting it. "Yer a settler," I say. "Yer a new settler." She looks away from me but shrugs her shoulders. "But that ship you crashed in," I say, "that's way too tiny to be a settler ship."

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"That was only a scout. My home ship is an Expansion Class Seven."

She looks at Hildy and Tam, who ain't saying nothing. Tarn's Noise is bright and curious. I can't read nothing from Hildy. I get the feeling somehow, tho, that she knew and I didn't, that Viola told her and not me, and even if it's cuz I never asked, it's still as sour a feeling as it sounds.

I look up at the sky.

"It's up there, ain't it?" I say. "Yer Expanshun Class Seven."

Viola nods.

"Yer bringing more settlers in. More settlers are coming to New World."

"Everything was broken when we crashed," Viola says. "I don't have any way to contact them. Any way to warn them not to come." She looks up with a little gasp. "You must warn them."

"That can't be what he meant," I say, fast. "No way." Viola scrunches her face and eyebrows. "Why not?"

"What who meant?" Tam asks.

"How many?" I ask, still looking at Viola, feeling the world changing forever again. "How many settlers are coming?"

Viola takes a deep breath before she answers and I'll bet you she's not even told Hildy this part.

"Thousands," she says. "There's thousands."

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16

THE NIGHT OF NO APOLOGIES

THEY WON'T be a-getting here for months," Hildy says, passing me another serving of mashed russets. Viola and I are stuffing our faces so much it's been Hildy and Tam doing all the talking. All the a-talking.

"Space travel ain't like ye see it in vids," Tam says, a stream of mutton gravy tracking down his beard. "Takes years and years and years to get anywhere at all. Sixty-four to get from Old World to New World alone."

"Sixty-four years?" I say, spraying a few mashed blobs off my lips.

Tam nods. "Yer frozen for most of it, time passing you right on by, tho that's only if ye don't die on the way."

I turn to Viola. "Yer sixty-four years old?"

"Sixty-four Old World years," Tam says, tapping his fingers like he's adding something up. "Which'd be ... what? Bout fifty-eight, fifty-nine New World-"

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But Viola's shaking her head. "I was born on board. Never was asleep."

"So either yer ma or yer pa musta been a caretaker," Hildy says, snapping off a bite of a turnipy thing then giving me an explanashun. "One of the ones who stays awake and keeps track of the ship."

"Both of them were," Viola says. "And my dad's mother before him and granddad before that."

"Wait a minute," I say to her, two steps behind as ever. "So if we've been on New World twenty-odd years--"

"Twenty-three," says Tam. "Feels like longer."

"Then you left before we even got here," I say. "Or your pa or grandpa or whatever."

I look around to see if anyone's wondering what I'm wondering. "Why?" I say. "Why would you come without even knowing what's out here?"

"Why did the first settlers come?" Hildy asks me. "Why does anyone look for a new place to live?"

"Cuz the place yer a-leaving ain't worth staying for," Tam says. "Cuz the place yer a-leaving is so bad ye gotta leave."

"Old World's mucky, violent, and crowded," Hildy says, wiping her face with a napkin, "a-splitting right into bits with people a-hating each other and a-killing each other, no one happy till everyone's miserable. Least it was all those years ago."

"I wouldn't know," Viola says, "I've never seen it. My mother and father ..." She drifts off.

But I'm still thinking about being born on a spaceship, an honest to badness spaceship. Growing up while flying along the stars, able to go wherever you wanted, not stuck on some

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hateful planet which clearly don't want you. You could go anywhere. If one place didn't suit, you'd find another. Full freedom in all direkshuns. Could there possibly be anything cooler in the whole world than that?

I don't notice that there's a silence fallen at the table. Hildy's rubbing Viola's back again and I see that Viola's eyes are wet and leaking and she's started to rock a little back and forth.

"What?" I say. "What's wrong now?"

Viola's forehead just creases at me.

"What?" I say.

"I think maybe we talked enough about Vi's ma and pa for now," Hildy says softly. "I think maybe it's time for boy and girl pups to get some shut-eye."

"But it's hardly late at all." I look out a window. The sun ain't even hardly set. "We need to be getting to the settlement-"

"The settlement is called Farbranch," Hildy says, "and we'll get ye there first thing in the morning."

"But those men-"

"I been a-keeping the peace here since before you were born, pup," Hildy says, kindly but firmly. "I can handle whatever is or ain't a-coming."

I don't say nothing to this and Hildy ignores my Noise on the subject.

"Can I ask what yer business in Farbranch might be?" Tam says, picking at his corncob, making his asking sound less curious than his Noise says it is.

"We just need to get there," I say.

"Both of ye?"

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I look at Viola. She's stopped crying but her face is still puffy. I don't answer Tarn's asking.

"Well, there's plenty of work going," Hildy says, standing and taking up her plate. "If that's what yer after. They can always use more hands in the orchards."

Tam stands and they clear the table, taking the dishes into their kitchen and leaving me and Viola sitting there by ourselves. We can hear them chatting in there, lightly enough and Noise-blocked enough for us not to be able to make it out.

"Do you really think we oughta stay the whole night?" I say, keeping my voice low.

But she answers in a violent whisper, like I didn't even send out an asking. "Just because my thoughts and feelings don't spill out into the world in a shout that never stops doesn't mean I don't have them."

I turn to her, surprised. "Huh?"

She keeps whispering something fierce. "Every time you think, Oh, she's just emptiness, or, There's nothing going on inside her, or, Maybe I can dump her with these two, I hear it, okay? I hear every stupid thing you think, all right? And I understand way more than I want to."

"Oh, yeah?" I whisper back, tho my Noise ain't a whisper at all. "Every time you think something or feel something or have some stupid thought, I don't hear it, so how am I sposed to know any effing thing about you, huh? How am I sposed to know what's going on if you keep it secret?"

"I'm not keeping it secret." She's clenching her teeth now. "I'm being normal."

"Not normal for here, Vi."

"And how would you know? I can hear you being

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surprised by just about everything they say. Didn't they have a school where you're from? Didn't you learn anything?"

"History ain't so important when yer just trying to survive," I say, spitting it out under my breath.

"That's actually when it's most important," Hildy says, standing at the end of the table. "And if this silly argument twixt ye two ain't enough to prove yer tired, then yer tired beyond all sense. C'mon."

Viola and I glare at each other but we get up and follow Hildy into a large common room.

"Todd!" Manchee barks from a corner, not getting up from the mutton bone Tam gave him earlier.

"We've long since took over our guest rooms for other purposes," Hildy says. "Ye'll have to make do on the settees."

We help her put down sheets, Viola still scowling, my Noise a buzzy red.

"Now," Hildy says when we're all done. "Apologize to each other."

"What?" Viola says. "Why?"

"I don't see how this is any of yer business," I say.

"Never go to sleep on an argument," Hildy says, hands on hips, looking like she ain't never gonna budge and would be pleased to see someone try and make her. "Not if ye want to stay friends."

Viola and I don't say nothing.

"He saved yer life?" Hildy says to Viola.

Viola looks down before finally saying, "Yeah."

"That's right, I did," I say.

"And she saved yers at the bridge, didn't she?" Hildy says. Oh.

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"Yes," Hildy says. "Oh. Don't ye both think that counts for something?"

We still don't say nothing.

Hildy sighs. "Fine. Any two pups so close to adulthood could maybe be left to their own apologies, I reckon." She makes her way out without even saying good night.

I turn my back on Viola and she turns her back on me. I take off my shoes and get myself under the sheet on one of Hildy's "settees" which seems to be just a fancy word for couch. Viola does the same. Manchee leaps up on my settee and curls himself by my feet.

There's no sound except my Noise and a few crackles from a fire it's too hot for. It can't be much later than dusk but the softness of the cushions and the softness of the sheet and the too-warm of the fire and I'm already pretty much closing my eyes.

"Todd?" Viola says from her settee across the room.

I swim up from sinking down to sleep. "What?"

She don't say nothing for a second and I guess she must be thinking of her apology.

But no.

"What does your book say you're supposed to do when you get to Farbranch?"

My Noise gets a bit redder. "Never you mind what my book says," I say. "That's my property, meant for me."

"You know when you showed me the map back in the woods," she says. "And you said we had to get to this settlement? You remember what was written underneath?"

"Course I do."

"What was it?"

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There ain't no poking in her voice, not that I can hear, but that's gotta be what it is, ain't it? Poking? "Just go to sleep, will ya?" I say.

"It was Farbranch," she says. "The name of the place we're meant to be heading."

"Shut up." My Noise is getting buzzy again. "There's no shame in not being able to-"

"I said, shut up!"

"I could help you--"

I get up suddenly, dumping Manchee off the settee with a thump. I grab my sheets and blanket under my arm and I stomp off to the room where we ate. I throw them on the floor and lay down, a room away from Viola and all her meaningless, evil quiet.

Manchee stays in there with her. Typical.

I close my eyes but I don't sleep for ages and ages.

Till I finally do, I guess.

Cuz I'm on a path and it's the swamp but it's also the town and it's also my farm and Ben's there and Cillian's there and Viola's there and they're all saying, "What're you doing here, Todd?" and Manchee's barking "Todd! Todd!" and Ben's grabbing me by the arm to drag me out the door and Cillian's got his arm around my shoulders pushing me up the path and Viola's setting the campfire box by the front door of our farmhouse and the Mayor's horse rides right thru our front door and smashes her flat and a croc with the face of Aaron is rearing up behind Ben's shoulders and I'm yelling "No!" and-

And I'm sitting up and I'm sweating everywhere and my heart's racing like a horse and I'm expecting to see the Mayor and Aaron standing right over me.

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But it's only Hildy and she's saying, "What the devil are ye a-doing in here?" She's standing in the doorway, morning sun flooding in behind her so bright I have to raise my hand to block it out.

"More comfortable," I mumble but my chest is thumping.

"I'll bet," she says, reading my just-waking Noise. "Breakfast is on."

The smell of the mutton-strip bacon frying wakes Viola and Manchee. I let Manchee out for his morning poo but Viola and I don't say nothing to each other. Tam comes in as we eat, having I guess been out feeding the sheep. That's what I'd be doing if I were home.

Home, I think.

Anyway.

"Buck up, pup," Tam says, plonking a cup of coffee down in front of me. I keep my face way down as I drink it.

"Anybody out there?" I say into my cup.

"Not a whisper," Tam says. "And it's a beautiful day."

I glance up at Viola but she ain't looking at me. In fact, we get all the way thru the food, thru washing our faces, thru changing our clothes and repacking our bags, all without saying nothing to each other.

"Good luck to ye both," Tam says, as we're about to leave with Hildy toward Farbranch. "It's always nice when two people who don't got no one else find each other as friends."

And we really don't say nothing to that.

"C'mon, pups," Hildy says. "Time's a-wasting."

We get back on the path, which before too long reconnects with the same road that musta gone across the bridge.

"Used to be the main road from Farbranch to

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Prentisstown," Hildy says, hoisting her own small pack. "Or New Elizabeth, as it was then."

"As what was then?" I ask.

"Prentisstown," she says. "Used to be called New Elizabeth."

"It never did," I say, raising my eyebrows.

Hildy looks at me, her own eyebrows mocking mine. "Was it never? I must be mistaken then."

"Must be," I say, watching her.

Viola makes a scoffing sound. I send her a look of death. "Will there be somewhere we can stay?" she asks Hildy, ignoring me.

"I'll take ye to my sister," Hildy says. "Deputy Mayor this year, don't ye know?"

"What'll we do then?" I say, kicking at the dirt as we walk on.

"Reckon that's up to ye two," Hildy says. "Ye've gotta be the ones in charge of yer own destinies, don't ye?"

"Not so far," I hear Viola say under her breath and it's so exactly the words I have in my Noise that we both look up and catch each other's eyes.

We almost smile. But we don't.

And that's when we start hearing the Noise.

"Ah," Hildy says, hearing it too. "Farbranch."

The road comes out on the top of a little vale.

And there it is.

The other settlement. The other settlement that wasn't sposed to be.

Where Ben wanted us to go. Where we might be safe.

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The first thing I see is where the valley road winds down thru orchards, orderly rows of well-tended trees with paths and irrigashun systems, all carrying on down a hill toward buildings and a creek at the bottom, flat and easy and snaking its way back to meet the bigger river no doubt.

And all thruout are men and women.

Most are scattered working in the orchard, wearing heavy work aprons, all the men in long sleeves, the women in long skirts, cutting down pinelike fruits with machetes or carrying away baskets or working on the irrigashun pipes and so on.

Men and women, women and men.

A coupla dozen men, maybe, is my general impression. Less than Prentisstown.

Who knows how many women.

Living in a whole other place.

The Noise (and silence) of them all floats up like a light fog.

Two, please, and The way I see it is and Weedy waste and She might say yes, she might not and if service ends at one then I can always and so on and so on, never ending, amen.

I just stop in the road and gape for a second, not ready to walk down into it yet.

Cuz it's weird.

It's more than weird, truth to tell.

It's all so, I don't know, calm. Like normal chatter you'd have with yer pals. Nothing accidental nor abusive.

And nobody's hardly longing for nothing.

No awful, awful, despairing longing nowhere I can hear or feel.

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"We sure as ruddy heck ain't in Prentisstown no more," I say to Manchee under my breath.

Not a second later, I hear Prentisstown? float in from a field right next to us.

And then I hear it in a coupla different places. Prentisstown? and Prentisstown? and then I notice that the men in the orchards nearby ain't picking fruit or whatever anymore. They're standing up. They're looking at us.

"Come on," Hildy says. "Keep on a-walking. It's just curiosity."

The word Prentisstown? multiplies along the fields like a crackling fire. Manchee brings hisself in closer to my legs. We're being stared at on all sides as we carry on. Even Viola steps in a bit so we're a tighter group.

"Not to worry," Hildy says. "There'll just be a lot of people who'll want to meet-"

She stops midsentence.

A man has stepped onto the path in front of us.

His face don't look at all like he wants to meet us.

"Prentisstown?" he says, his Noise getting uncomfortably red, uncomfortably fast.

"Morning, Matthew," Hildy says, "I was just a-bringing-"

"Prentisstown," the man says again, no longer an asking, and he's not looking at Hildy.

He's looking straight at me.

"Yer not welcome here," he says. "Not welcome at all." And he's got the biggest machete in his hand you ever seen.

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17

ENCOUNTER IN AN ORCHARD

MY HAND GOES right behind my rucksack to my own knife.

"Leave it, Todd pup," Hildy says, keeping her eyes on the man. "That's not how this is gonna go."

"What do ye think yer a-bringing into our village, Hildy?" the man says, hefting his machete in his hand, still looking at me and there's real surprise in his asking and-

And is that hurt?

"I'm a-bringing in a boy pup and a girl pup what's lost their way," Hildy says. "Stand aside, Matthew."

"I don't see a boy pup nowhere," Matthew says, his eyes starting to burn. He's massively tall, shoulders like an ox and a thickened brow with lots of bafflement but not much tenderness. He looks like a walking, talking thunderstorm. "I see me a Prentisstown man. I see me a Prentisstown man with Prentisstown filth all over his Prentisstown Noise."

"That's not what yer a-seeing," Hildy says. "Look close."

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Matthew's Noise is already lurching on me like hands pressing in, forcing its way into my own thinking, trying to ransack the room. It's angry and asking and Noisy as a fire, so uneven I can't make hide nor hair of it.

"Ye know the law, Hildy," he says.

The law?

"The law is for men," Hildy says, her voice staying calm, like we were standing there talking bout the weather. Can't she see how red this man's Noise is getting? Red ain't yer color if you wanna have a chat. "This here pup ain't a man yet."

"I've still got twenty-eight days," I say, without thinking.

"Yer numbers don't mean nothing here, boy," Matthew spits. "I don't care how many days away ye are."

"Calm yerself, Matthew," Hildy says, sterner than I'd want her to. But to my surprise, Matthew looks at her all sore and steps back a step. "He's a-fleeing Prentisstown," she says, a little softer. "He's a-running away."

Matthew looks at her suspiciously and back to me but he's lowering the machete. A little.

"Just like ye did yerself once," Hildy says to him.

What?

"Yer from Prentisstown?" I blurt out.

Up comes the machete and Matthew steps forward again, threatening enough to start Manchee barking, "Back! Back! Back!"

"I was from New Elizabeth," Matthew growls, twixt clenched teeth. "I'm never from Prentisstown, boy, not never, and don't ye forget it."

I see clearer flashes in his Noise now. Of impossible things, of crazy things, coming in a rush, like he can't help it,

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things worse than the worst of the illegal vids Mr. Hammar used to let out on the sly to the oldest and rowdiest of the boys in town, the kind where people seemed to die for real but there was no way of ever knowing for sure. Images and words and blood and screaming and-

"Stop that right this second!" Hildy shouts. "Control yerself, Matthew Lyle. Control yerself right now."

Matthew's Noise subsides, suddenlike but still roiling, without quite so much control as Tam but still more than any man in Prentisstown.

But as soon as I think it, his machete raises again. "Ye'll not say that word in our town, boy," he says. "Not if ye know what's good for ye."

"There'll be no threats to guests of mine as long as I'm alive," Hildy says, her voice strong and clear. "Is that understood?"

Matthew looks at her, he don't nod, he don't say yes, but we all understand that he understands. He ain't happy bout it, tho. His Noise still pokes and presses at me, slapping me if it could. He finally looks over to Viola.

"And who might this be then?" he says, pointing the machete at her.

And it happens before I even know I'm doing it, I swear.

One minute I'm standing there behind everyone and the next thing I know, I'm between Matthew and Viola, my knife pointing at him, my own Noise falling like an avalanche and my mouth saying, "You best take two steps away from her and you best be taking 'em real quick."

"Todd!" Hildy shouts.

And "Todd!" Manchee barks.

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And "Todd!" Viola shouts.

But there I am, knife out, my heart thumping fast like it's finally figured out what I'm doing.

But there ain't no stepping back.

Now how do you spose that happened?

"Give me a reason, Prentissboy," Matthew says, hoisting the machete. "Just give me one good reason."

"Enough!" Hildy says.

And her voice has got something in it this time, like the rule of law, so much so that Matthew flinches a little. He's still holding up his machete, still glaring at me, glaring at Hildy, his Noise throbbing like a wound.

And then his face twists a little.

And he begins, of all things, to cry.

Angrily, furiously trying not to, but standing there, big as a bull, machete in hand, crying.

Which ain't what I was expecting.

Hildy's voice pulls back a bit. "Put the knife away, Todd pup."

Matthew drops his machete to the ground and puts an arm across his eyes as he snuffles and yowls and moans. I look over at Viola. She's just staring at Matthew, probably as confused as I am.

I drop the knife to my side but I don't let it go. Not yet.

Matthew's taking deep breaths, pain Noise and grief Noise dripping everywhere, and fury, too, at losing control so publicly. "It's meant to be over," he coughs. "Long over."

"I know," Hildy says, going forward and putting a hand on his arm.

"What's going on?" I say.

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"Never you mind, Todd pup," Hildy says. "Prentisstown has a sad history."

"That's what Tam said," I say. "As if I don't know."

Matthew looks up. "Ye don't know the first bit of it, boy," he says, teeth clenched again.

"That's enough now," Hildy says. "This boy ain't yer enemy." She looks at me, eyes a bit wide. "And he's putting away his knife for that very reason."

I twist the knife in my hand a time or two but then I reach behind my rucksack and put it away. Matthew's glaring at me again but he's starting to back off for real now and I'm wondering who Hildy is that he's obeying her.

"They're both innocent as lambs, Matthew pup," Hildy says.

"Ain't nobody innocent," Matthew says bitterly, sniffing away his last bits of weepy snot and hefting up his machete again. "Nobody at all."

He turns his back and strides into the orchard, not looking back.

Everyone else is still staring at us.

"The day only ages," Hildy says to them, turning round in a circle. "There'll be time enough for a-meeting and a-greeting later on."

Me and Viola watch as the workers start returning to their trees and their baskets and their whatevers, some eyes still on us but most people getting back to work.

"Are you in charge here or something?" I ask.

"Or something, Todd pup. C'mon, ye haven't even seen the town yet."

"What law was he talking about?"

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"Long story, pup," she says. "I'll tell ye later."

The path, still wide enough for men and vehicles and horses, tho I only see men, curves its way down thru more orchards on the hillsides of the little vale.

"What kind of fruit is that?" Viola asks, as two women cross the road in front of us with full baskets, watching us as they go.

"Crested pine," Hildy says. "Sweet as sugar, loaded with vitamins."

"Never heard of it," I say.

"No," Hildy says. "Ye wouldn't have."

I look at way too many trees for a settlement that can't have more than fifty people in it. "Is that all you eat here?"

"Course not," Hildy says. "We trade with the other settlements down the road."

The surprise is so clear in my Noise that even Viola laughs a little.

"Ye didn't think it was just two settlements on all of New World, did ye?" Hildy asks.

"No," I say, feeling my face turn red, "but all the other settlements were wiped out in the war."

"Mmm," Hildy says, biting her bottom lip, nodding but not saying nothing more.

"Is that Haven?" Viola says quietly.

"Is what Haven?" I ask.

"The other settlement," Viola says, not quite looking at me. "You said there was a cure for Noise in Haven."

"Ach!" Hildy psshts. "That's just rumours and speck-alashuns."

"Is Haven a real place?" I ask.

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"It's the biggest and first of the settlements," Hildy says. "Closest New World's got to a big city. Miles away. Not for peasants like us."

"I ain't never heard of it," I say again.

No one says nothing to this and I get the feeling they're being polite. Viola hasn't really looked at me since the weirdness back there with me and Matthew and the knife. To be honest, I don't know what to make of it neither.

So everyone just keeps walking.

There's maybe seven buildings total in Farbranch, smaller than Prentisstown and just buildings after all but somehow so different, too, it feels like I've wandered right off New World into some whole other place altogether.

The first building we pass is a tiny stone church, fresh and clean and open, not at all like the darkness Aaron preached in. Farther on is a general store with a mechanic's garage by it, tho I don't see much by way of heavy machinery around. Haven't even seen a fissionbike, not even a dead one. There's a building that looks like a meeting hall, another with a doctor's snakes carved into the front, and two barnlike buidings that look like storage.

"Not much," Hildy says. "But it's home."

"Not yer home," I say. "You live way outside."

"So do most people," Hildy says. "Even when yer used to it, it's nice to only have the Noise of yer most beloved a-hanging round yer house. Town gets a bit rackety."

I listen out for rackety but it still ain't nothing like Prentisstown. Sure there's Noise in Farbranch, men doing their usual boring daily business, chattering their thoughts that don't mean nothing, C hop, chop, chop and I 'll

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only give seven for the dozen , and Listen to her sing there, just listen and That cop needs fixing tonight and He's gonna fall off that and on and on and on, so heedless and safe-sounding to me it feels like taking a bath in comparison to the black Noise I'm used to.

"Oh, it gets black, Todd pup," Hildy says. "Men still have their tempers. Women, too."

"Some people would call it impolite to always be listening to a man's Noise," I say, looking around me.

"Too true, pup." She grins. "But ye aren't a man yet. Ye said so yerself."

We cross the central strip of the town. A few men and women walk to and fro, some tipping their hats to Hildy, most just staring at us.

I stare back.

If you listen close, you can hear where the women are in town almost as clear as the men. They're like rocks that the Noise washes over and once yer used to it you can feel where their silences are, dotted all about, Viola and Hildy ten times over and I'll bet if I stopped and stood here I could tell exactly how many women are in each building.

And mixed in with the sound of so many men, you know what?

The silence don't feel half so lonesome. And then I see some teeny, tiny people, watching us from behind a bush. Kids.

Kids smaller than me, younger than me. The first I ever seen.

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A woman carrying a basket spies them and makes a shooing movement with her hands. She frowns and smiles at the same time and the kids all run off giggling round the back of the church.

I watch 'em go. I feel my chest pull a little.

"Ye coming?" Hildy calls after me.

"Yeah," I say, still watching where the kids went. I turn and keep on following, my head still twisted back.

Kids. Real kids. Safe enough for kids and I find myself wondering if Viola would be able to feel at home here with all these nice-seeming men, all these women and children. I find myself wondering if she'd be safe, even if I'm obviously not.

I'll bet she would.

I look at Viola and catch her looking away.

Hildy's led us to the house farthest along the buildings of Farbranch. It's got steps that go up the front and a little flag flying from a pole out front.

I stop.

"This is a mayor's house," I say. "Ain't it?"

"Deputy Mayor," Hildy says, walking up the steps, clomping her boots loud against the wood. "My sister."

"And my sister," says a woman opening the door, a plumper, younger, frownier version of Hildy.

"Francia," Hildy says.

"Hildy," Francia says.

They nod at each other, not hug or shake hands, just nod. "What trouble d'ye think yer bringing into my town?" Francia says, eyeing us up.

"Yer town, is it now?" Hildy says, smiling, eyebrows up.

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She turns to us. "Like I told Matthew Lyle, it's just two pups a-fleeing for safety, seeking their refuge." She turns back to her sister. "And if Farbranch ain't a refuge, sister, then what is it?"

"It's not them I'm a-talking about," Francia says, looking at us, arms crossed. "It's the army that's a-following them."

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18

FARBRANCH

Army?" i say, my stomach knotting right up. Viola says it at the same time I do but there's nothing funny bout it this time.

"What army?" Hildy frowns.

"Rumors a-floating down from the far fields of an army a-gathering on the other side of the river," Francia says. "Men on horseback. Prentisstown men."

Hildy purses her lips. "Five men on horseback," she says. "Not an army. Those were just the posse sent after our young pups here."

Francia don't look too convinced. I never seen arms so crossed.

"And the river gorge crossing is down anyhow," Hildy continues, "so there ain't gonna be anyone a-coming into Farbranch any time soon." She looks back at us. "An army," she says, shaking her head. "Honestly."

"If there's a threat, sister," Francia says, "it's my duty-"

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Hildy rolls her eyes. "Don't be a-talking to me about yer duty, sister," she says, stepping past Francia and opening the front door to the house. "I invented yer duty. C'mon, pups, let's get ye inside."

Viola and I don't move. Francia don't invite us to neither. "Todd?" Manchee barks by my feet.

I take a deep breath and go up the front steps. "Howdy, mim," I say.

"Mam," Viola whispers behind me.

"Howdy, mam," I say, trying not to miss a beat. "I'm Todd. That's Viola." Francia's arms are still crossed, like there's a prize for it. "There really were only five men," I say, tho the word army is echoing round my Noise.

"And I should just trust ye?" Francia says. "A boy who's a-being chased?" She looks down to Viola, still waiting on the bottom step. "I can just imagine why ye were running."

"Oh, stuff it, Francia," Hildy says, still holding the door open for us.

Francia turns and shooshes Hildy outta the way. "I'll be in charge of entry into my own house, thank ye very much," Francia says, then to us, "Well, c'mon if yer coming."

And that's how we first see the hospitality of Farbranch. We go inside. Francia and Hildy bickering twixt themselves about whether Francia's got a place to put us in for however long we might wanna stay. Hildy wins the bickering and Francia shows me and Viola to separate small rooms next to each other one floor up.

"Yer dog has to sleep outside," Francia says.

"But he's--"

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"That wasn't an asking," Francia says, leaving the room.

I follow her out to the landing. She don't turn back as she goes downstairs. In less than a minute, I can hear her and Hildy arguing again, trying to keep their voices down. Viola comes outta her room to listen, too. We stand there for a second, wondering.

"Whaddya think?" I say.

She don't look at me. Then it's like she decides to look at me and does.

"I don't know," she says. "What do you think?"

I shrug my shoulders. "She don't seem too happy to see us," I say, "but it's still safer than I've felt in a while. Behind walls and such." I shrug again. "And Ben wanted us to get here and all."

Which is true but I still ain't sure if it feels right.

Viola's clutching her arms to herself, just like Francia but not like Francia at all. "I know what you mean."

"So I guess it'll do for now."

"Yes," Viola says. "For now."

We listen to a bit more arguing.

"What you did back there-" Viola says.

"It was stupid," I say, real fast. "I don't wanna talk about it."

My face is starting to burn so I step back in my little room. I stand there and chew my lip. The room looks like it used to belong to an old person. Kinda smells that way, too, but at least it's got a real bed.

I go to my rucksack and open it.

I look round to make sure no one's followed me in and I pull out the book. I open it to the map, to the arrows that

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point down thru the swamp, to the river on the other side. No bridge on the map but there's the settlement. With a word underneath it.

"Fayre," I say, to myself. "Fayre braw nk."

Which I guess is Farbranch.

I breathe loud thru my nose as I look at the page of writing on the back of the map. You must warn them (of course, of course, shut up) still underlined at the bottom. Like Viola said, tho, warn who? Warn Farbranch? Warn Hildy?

"About what?" I say. I thumb thru the book and there's pages of stuff, pages and pages of it, words on words on words on words, like Noise shoved down onto paper till you can't make no sense from it. How can I warn anybody about all this?

"Aw, Ben," I say under my breath. "What were you thinking?"

"Todd?" Hildy calls from downstairs. "Vi?" I close the book and look at its cover. Later. I'll ask about it later. I will. Later.

I put it away and I go downstairs. Viola's already waiting there. Hildy and Francia, arms crossed again, waiting, too.

"I've got to get back to my farm, pups," Hildy says. "Work to do for the good of all but Francia's agreed to look after ye for today and I'll come back tonight to see how yer a-getting on."

Viola and I look at each other, suddenly not wanting Hildy to leave.

"Thank ye for that," Francia says, frowning. "Despite what my sister may have told ye two about me, I'm hardly an ogre."

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"She didn't say-" I start to say before I stop myself, even tho my Noise finishes it up for me. Anything about you.

"Yeah, well, that's typical," Francia says, glaring at Hildy but not seeming too put out. "Ye can stay here for the time being. Pa and Auntie are long dead and there's not too much call for their rooms these days."

I was right. Old person's room.

"But we're a working town here in Farbranch." Francia looks from me to Viola and back again. "And ye'll be expected to earn yer keep, even if it's just for a day or two while ye make whatever plans yer going to make."

"We're still not sure," Viola says.

"Hmmph," Francia hmmphs. "And if ye two stay on past this first cresting of the orchards, there'll be a-schooling for ye to do."

"School?" I say.

"School and church," Hildy says. "That's if ye stay long enough." I'm guessing she's reading my Noise again. "Are ye going to stay long enough?"

I don't say nothing and Viola don't say nothing and Franica hmmphs again.

"Please, Mrs. Francia?" Viola says as Francia turns to talk to Hildy.

"Just Francia, child," Francia says, looking surprised. "What is it?"

"Is there somewhere I can send a message back to my ship?"

"Yer ship," Francia says. "This a-being that settler ship way out in the dark black yonder?" Her mouth draws thin. "With all them people on it?"

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Viola nods. "We were supposed to report back. Let them know what we found."

Viola's voice is so quiet and her face so hopeful, so open and wide and ready for disappointment that I feel that familiar tug of sadness again, pulling all Noise into it like grief, like being lost. I put a hand on the back of a settee to steady myself.

"Ah, girl pup," Hildy says, her voice getting suspiciously gentle again. "I'm guessing ye tried to contact us folks down here on New World when ye were a-scouting the planet?"

"Yeah," Viola says. "No one answered."

Hildy and Francia exchange nods. "Yer a-forgetting we were church settlers," Francia says, "getting away from worldly things to set up our own little Utopia, so we let that kinda machinery go to rack and ruin as we got on with the business of surviving."

Viola's eyes get a little wider. "You have no way of communicating with anyone?"

"We don't have communicators for other settlements," Francia says, "much less the beyond."

"We're farmers, pup," Hildy says. "Simple farmers, looking for a simpler way of life. That was the whole point in flying all this ridiculous way to get here. Setting down the things that caused such strife for people of old." She taps her fingers on a tabletop. "Didn't quite work out that way, tho."

"We weren't really expecting no others," Francia says. "Not the way Old World was when we left."

"So I'm stuck here?" Viola says, her voice a little shaky.

"Until yer ship arrives," Hildy says. "I'm afraid so."

"How far out are they?" Francia asks.

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"System entry in twenty-four weeks," Viola says quietly. "Perihelion four weeks later. Orbital transfer two weeks after that."

"I'm sorry, child," Francia says. "Looks like yer ours for seven months."

Viola turns away from all of us, obviously taking this news in.

A lot can happen in seven months.

"Well, now," Hildy says, making her voice bright, "I hear tell they got all kindsa things in Haven. Fissioncars and city streets and more stores than ye can shake a stick at. Ye might try there before ye really start a-worrying, yes?"

Hildy looks toward Francia and Francia says, "Todd pup? Why don't we get you a-working in the barn? Yer a farm boy, ain't ye?"

"But-" I start to say.

"All kinds of work to be done on a farm," Francia says, "as I'm sure ye know all too well-"

Chattering away like this, Francia gets me out the back door. Looking over my shoulder, I can see Hildy comforting Viola in soft words, unhearable words, things being said that I don't know yet again.

Francia closes the door behind us and leads me and Manchee across the main road to one of the big storage houses I saw when we were walking in. I can see men pulling handcarts up to the main door and another man unloading the baskets of orchard fruit.

"This is east barn," Francia says, "where we store things ready to be traded. Wait here."

I wait and she walks up to the man unloading the baskets

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from the cart. They talk for a minute and I can hear Prentisstown? clear as day in his Noise and the sudden surge of feeling behind it. It's a slightly different feeling than before but it fades before I can read it and Francia comes back.

"Ivan says ye can work in the back a-sweeping up."

"Sweeping up?" I say, kinda appalled. "I know how farms work, mim, and I-"

"I'm sure ye do but ye may have noticed that Prentisstown ain't our most popular neighbor. Best to keep ye away from everyone till we've all had a chance to get used to ye. Fair enough?"

She's still stern, still arms crossed, but actually, yeah, this seems sensible and tho her face ain't kind exactly maybe it sorta is.

"Okay," I say.

Francia nods and takes me over to Ivan, who looks about Ben's age, but short, dark-haired, and with arms like effing tree trunks.

"Ivan, this is Todd," Francia says.

I hold out my hand to shake. Ivan doesn't take it. He just eyeballs me something fierce.

"You'll work in back," he says. "And you'll keep yerself and yer dog outta my way."

Francia leaves us and Ivan takes me inside, points out a broom, and I get to work. And that's how I start my first day in Farbranch: inside a dark barn, sweeping dust from one corner to another, seeing one single stitch of blue sky out a door at the far end.

Oh, the joy.

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"Poo, Todd," Manchee says. "Not in here, you don't."

It's a pretty big barn, 200 to 250 feet from end to end, maybe, and about half full of baskets of crested pine. There's a section with big rolls of silage, too, packed up to the ceiling with thin rope, and another section with huge sheaves of wheat ready to be ground into flour.

"You sell this stuff to other settlements?" I call out to Ivan.

"Time for chatter later," he calls back from the front.

I don't say nothing to this but something kinda rude shows up in my Noise before I can stop it. I hurry and get back to sweeping.

The morning waxes on. I think about Ben and Cillian. I think about Viola. I think about Aaron and the Mayor. I think about the word army and how it's making my stomach clench.

I don't know.

It don't feel right to be stopped. Not after all that running.

Everyone's acting like it's safe here but I don't know.

Manchee wanders in and out the back doors as I sweep, sometimes chasing the pink moths I stir from faint corners. Ivan keeps his distance, I keep mine, but I can see all the people who come to his door and drop off goods taking a deep, long look to the back of the barn, sometimes squinting into the darkness to see if they can find me there, the Prentisstown boy.

So they hate Prentisstown, I get that. I hate Prentisstown but I got more cause for grief than any of them.

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I start noticing things, too, as the morning gets older. Like that tho men and women both do the heavy labor, women give more orders that more men follow. And with Francia being Deputy Mayor and Hildy being whoever she is in Farbranch, I'm beginning to think it's a town run by women. I can often hear their silences as they walk by outside and I can hear men's Noise responding to it, too, sometimes with chafing but usually in a way that just gets on with things.

Men's Noise here, too, is a lot more controlled than what I'm used to. With so many women around and from what I know of the Noise of Prentisstown, you'd think the sky would be full of Noisy women with no clothes doing the most remarkable things you could think of. And sure you hear that sometimes here, men are men after all, but more of the time the Noise is songs or it's prayers or it's directed to the work at hand.

They're calm here in Farbranch but they're a little spooky.

Once in a while, I see if I can not-hear Viola. But no.

At lunchtime, Francia comes to the back of the barn with a sandwich and a jug of water. "Where's Viola?" I ask. "Yer welcome," Francia says. "For what?"

Francia sighs and says, "Viola's in the orchards, gathering dropped fruits."

I want to ask how she is but I don't and Francia refuses to read it in my Noise.

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"How ye getting on?" she asks.

"I know how to do a lot more than ruddy sweep."

"Mind yer language, pup. There'll be time enough to get ye to real work."

She don't stay, walking back toward the front, having another word with Ivan and then she's off to do whatever Deputy Mayors fill their days with.

Can I say? It makes no sense but I sorta like her. Probably cuz she reminds me of Cillian and all the things that used to drive me crazy bout him. Memory is stupid, ain't it?

I tear into my sandwich and I'm chewing my first bite when I hear Ivan's Noise approaching. "I'll sweep up my crumbs," I say.

To my surprise, he laughs, kinda roughly. "I'm sure ye will." He takes a bite of his own sandwich. "Francia says there's a village meeting tonight," he says after a minute.

"Bout me?" I ask.

"Bout ye both. Ye and the girl. Ye and the girl what escaped Prentisstown."

His Noise is strange. It's cautious but strong, like he's checking me out. I don't read no hostility, not toward me, anyway, but something's percolating in it.

"We gonna meet everyone?" I say.

"Ye might. We'll all be a-talking bout ye first."

"If there's a vote," I say, chomping on the sandwich, "I think I lose."

"Ye've got Hildy a-speaking for yer side," he says. "That counts for more than aught in Farbranch." He swallows his

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own bite. "And the people here are kind people and good. We've taken in Prentisstown folk before. Not for a while but from way back in the bad times."

"The war?" I say.

He looks at me, his Noise sizing me up, what I know. "Yeah," he says, "the war." He turns his head round the barn, casual-like, but I get the feeling he's looking to see if we're alone. He turns back and fixes his eye on me. An eye that's really looking for something. "And then, too," he says, "not all of us feel the same."

"Bout what?" I say, not liking his look, not liking his buzz.

"Bout history." He's talking low, his eyes still poring into me, leaning a little closer.

I lean back a little. "I don't know what you mean."

"Prentisstown's still got allies," he whispers, "hidden away in surprising places."

His Noise gets pictures in it, small ones, like Noise speaking just to me and I'm starting to see them clearer and clearer, bright things, wet things, fast things, the sun shining down on red-

"Puppies! Puppies!" Manchee barks in the corner. I jump and even Ivan startles and his Noise pictures fade pretty quick. Manchee keeps barking and I hear a whole raft of giggling that ain't him at all. I look.

A group of kids is kneeling down, peeking in thru a torn-away board, smiling, laughing with daring, pushing each other closer to the hole.

Pointing at me.

And all so small.

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So small.

I mean, look at 'em.

"Get outta here, ye rats!" Ivan calls but there's humor in his voice and Noise, all trace of what was before hidden. There's squeals of laughter outside the hole in the wall as the kids scatter.

And that's it, they're gone.

Like I mighta made 'em up.

"Puppies, Todd!" Manchee barks. "Puppies!"

"I know," I say, scratching his head when he comes over. "I know."

Ivan claps his hands together. "That's lunch then. Back to work." He gives me one more important look before he heads back to the front of the barn.

"What was that all about?" I say to Manchee.

"Puppies," he murmurs, digging his face into my hand.

And so there follows an afternoon pretty much exactly like my morning. Sweeping, folks stopping by, a break for water where Ivan don't say nothing to me, more sweeping.

I spend some time trying to think about what we might do next. If it's even we who's doing it. Farbranch'll have its meeting about us and they'll definitely keep Viola till her ship arrives, anyone can see that, but will they want me?

And if they do, do I stay?

And do I warn 'em?

I get a burning in my stomach every time I think about the book so I keep changing the subject.

After what seems like forever, the sun starts to set. There's no more damn sweeping I can do. I've already covered the whole barn more than once, counted the baskets,

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recounted them, made an attempt to fix the loose board in the wall even tho no one asked me to. There's only so much you can ruddy well do if no one lets you leave a barn.

"Ain't that the truth?" Hildy says, standing there suddenly.

"You shoudn't sneak up on people like that," I say. "All you quiet folk."

"There's some food over at Francia's house for ye and for Viola. Why don't ye go on there, get something to eat?"

"While you all have yer meeting?"

"While we all have our meeting, yes, pup," Hildy says. "Viola's already in the house, no doubt eating all yer dinner."

"Hungry, Todd!" Manchee barks.

"There's food for ye, too, puppup," Hildy says, leaning down to pet him. He flops right over on his back for her, no dignity whatsoever.

"What's this meeting really about?" I ask.

"Oh, the new settlers that are a-coming. That's big news." She looks up from Manchee to me. "And introducing ye around, of course. Getting the town used to the idea of a-welcoming ye."

"And are they gonna a-welcome us?"

"People are scared of what they don't know, Todd pup," she says, standing. "Once they know ye, the problem goes away."

"Will we be able to stay?"

"I reckon so," she says. "If ye want to."

I don't say nothing to that.

"Ye get on up to the house," she says. "I'll come collect ye both when the time's right."

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I only nod in response and she gives a little wave and leaves, walking back across a barn that's growing ever darker. I take the broom back to where it was hanging, my steps echoing. I can hear the Noise of men and the silence of women gathering across town in the meeting hall. The word Prentisstown filters in most heavily and my name and Viola's name and Hildy's name.

And I gotta say, tho there's fear and suspishun in it, I don't get a feeling of overwhelming nonwelcome. There's more askings than there is anger of the Matthew Lyle sort.

Which, you know, maybe. Maybe that ain't so bad after all.

"C'mon, Manchee," I say, "let's go get some food."

"Food, Todd!" he barks along at my heels.

"I wonder how Viola's day was," I say.

And as I step toward the entrance to the barn I realize one bit of Noise is separating itself from the general murmuring outside.

One bit of Noise lifting from the stream.

And heading for the barn.

Coming up right outside it.

I stop, deep in the dark of the barn.

A shadow steps into the far doorway.

Matthew Lyle.

And his Noise is saying, Ye ain't going nowhere boy.

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19

FURTHER CHOICES OF A KNIFE

BACK! BACK! BACK!" Manchee immediately starts barking.

The moons glint off Matthew Lyle's machete.

I reach behind me. I'd hidden the sheath under my shirt while I worked but the knife is definitely still there. Definitely. I take it and hold it out at my side.

"No old mama to protect ye this time," Matthew says, swinging his machete back and forth, like he's trying to cut the air into slices. "No skirts to hide ye from what ye did."

"I didn't do nothing," I say, taking a step backward, trying to keep my Noise from showing the back door behind me.

"Don't matter," Matthew says, walking forward as I step back. "We got a law here in this town."

"I don't have no quarrel with you," I say.

"But I've got one with ye, boy," he says, his Noise starting to rear up and there's anger in it, sure, but that weird grief's in it, too, that raging hurt you can almost taste on yer

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tongue. There's also nervousness swirling about him, edgy as you please, much as he's trying to cover it.

I step back again, farther in the dark.

"I ain't a bad man, you know," he says, suddenly and kinda confusingly but swinging the machete. "I have a wife. I have a daughter."

"They wouldn't be wanting you to hurt no innocent boy, I'm sure-"

"Quiet!" he shouts and I can hear him swallow.

He ain't sure of this. He ain't sure of what he's about to do.

What's going on here?

"I don't know why yer angry," I say, "but I'm sorry. Whatever it is-"

"What I want you to know before you pay," he says over me, like he's forcing himself not to listen to me. "What you need to know, boy, is that my mother's name was Jessica."

I stop stepping back. '"Scuse me?"

"My mother's name," he growls, "was Jessica."

This don't make no sense at all.

"What?" I say. "I don't know what yer-"

"Listen, boy!" he yells. "Just listen."

And then his Noise is wide open.

And I see-

And I see--

I see what he's showing.

"That's a lie," I whisper. "That's a ruddy lie."

Which is the wrong thing to say.

With a yell, Matthew leaps forward, running the length of the barn toward me.

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"Run!" I shout to Manchee, turning and making a break for the back door. (Shut up, you honestly think a knife is a match for a machete?) I hear Matthew still yelling, his Noise exploding after me, and I reach the back door and fling it open before I realize.

Manchee's not with me.

I turn round. When I said "run", Manchee'd run the other way, flinging himself with all his unconvincing viciousness toward the charging Matthew.

"Manchee!" I yell.

It's ruddy dark in the barn now and I can hear grunts and barks and clanks and then I hear Matthew cry out in pain at what must surely be a bite.

Good dog, I think, Good effing dog.

And I can't leave him, can I?

I run back into the darkness, toward where I can see Matthew hopping around and the form of Manchee dancing twixt his legs and swipes of the machete, barking his little head off.

"Todd! Todd! Todd!" he's barking.

I'm five steps away and still running when Matthew makes a two-handed strike down at the ground, embedding the tip of the machete into the wooden floor. I hear a squeal from Manchee that don't have no words, just pain, and off he flies into a dark corner.

I let out a yell and crash right into Matthew. We both go flying, toppling to the floor in a tumble of elbows and kneecaps. It hurts but mostly I'm landing on Matthew so that's okay.

We roll apart and I hear him call out in pain. I get right

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back up to my feet, knife in hand, a few feet away from him, far from the back door now and with Matthew blocking the front. I hear Manchee whimpering in the dark.

I also hear some Noise rising from across the village road in the direkshun of the meeting hall but there ain't time to think about that now.

"I'm not afraid to kill you," I say, tho I totally am but I'm hoping my Noise and his Noise are now so rackety and revved up that he won't be able to make any sense of it.

"That makes two of us then," he says, lunging for his machete. It don't come out the first tug, or the second. I take the chance to jump back into the dark, looking for Manchee.

"Manchee?" I say, frantically looking behind the sheaves and the piles of fruit baskets. I can still hear Matthew grunting to get his machete outta the floor and the ruckus from the town is growing louder.

"Todd?" I hear from deep in the darkness.

It's coming from beside the silage rolls, down a little nook that opens up next to them back to the wall. "Manchee?" I call, sticking my head down it.

I look back real quick.

With a heave, Matthew gets his machete outta the floor.

"Todd?" Manchee says, confused and scared. "Todd?"

And here comes Matthew, coming on in slow steps, like he no longer has to hurry, his Noise reaching forward in a wave that don't brook no argument.

I have no choice. I wedge myself back into the nook and hold out my knife.

"I'll leave," I say, my voice rising. "Just let me get my dog and we'll leave."

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"Too late for that," Matthew says, getting closer. "You don't wanna do this. I can tell."

"Shut yer mouth."

"Please," I say, waving the knife. "I don't wanna hurt you."

"Do I look concerned, boy?" Closer, closer, step by step.

There's a bang outside somewhere, off in the distance. People really are running and shouting now but neither of us look.

I press myself back into the little nook but it's really not wide enough for me. I glance round, seeing where escape might lie.

I don't find nothing much.

My knife's gonna have to do it. It's gonna have to act, even if it is against a machete. "Todd?" I hear behind me.

"Don't worry, Manchee," I say. "It's gonna be all right." And who knows what a dog believes? Matthew's almost on us now. I grip my knife.

Matthew stops a few feet from me, so close I can see his eyes glinting in the dark. "Jessica," he says.

He raises his machete above his head.

I flinch, knife up, steeling myself-

But he pauses-

He pauses-

In a way I reckernize-

And that's enough--

With a quick prayer that they ain't covered with the

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same stuff from the bridge, I swing my knife in an arc to my side, slicing right thru (thank you thank you) the ropes holding up the silage rolls, cutting the first lot clean away. The other ropes snap pretty quick from the sudden shift in weight and I cover my head and press myself away as the silage rolls start to tumble.

I hear thumps and clumps and an oof from Matthew and I look up and he's buried in silage rolls, his arm out to one side, the machete dropped. I step forward and kick it away, then turn to find Manchee.

He's back in a dark corner behind the now fallen rolls. I race over to him.

"Todd?" he says when I get close. "Tail, Todd?"

"Manchee?" It's dark so I have to squat down next to him to see. His tail's two thirds shorter than it used to be, blood everywhere, but, God bless him, he's still trying to wag.

"Ow, Todd?"

"It's okay, Manchee," I say, my voice and Noise near crying from relief that it's just his tail. "We'll get you fixed right up."

"Okay, Todd?"

"I'm okay," I say, rubbing his head. He nips my hand but I know he can't help it cuz he's in pain. He licks me in apology then nips me again. "Ow, Todd," he says.

"Todd Hewitt!" I hear shouted from the front of the barn.

Francia.

"I'm here!" I call, standing up. "I'm all right. Matthew went crazy-"

But I stop cuz she ain't listening to me.

"Ye gotta get yerself indoors, Todd pup," Francia says in a rush. "Ye gotta-"

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She stops when she sees Matthew under the silage.

"What happened?" she says, already starting to tug away the rolls, getting one off his face and leaning down to see if he's still breathing.

I point to the machete. "That happened."

Francia looks at it, then a long look up at me, her face saying something I can't read nor even begin to figure out. I don't know if Matthew's alive nor dead and I ain't never gonna find out.

"We're under attack, pup," she says, standing.

"Yer what?'

"Men," she says, rising. "Prentisstown men. That posse that's after ye. They're attacking the whole town."

My stomach falls right outta my shoes.

"Oh, no," I say. And then I say it again, "Oh, no."

Francia's still looking at me, her brain thinking who knows what.

"Don't give us to them," I say, backing away again. "They'll kill us."

Francia frowns at this. "What kinda woman do ye think I am?"

"I don't know," I say, "that's the whole problem."

"I'm not gonna give ye to them. Nor Viola. Honestly, now. In fact the feeling of the town meeting, as far along as it got, was how we were a-deciding to protect ye both from what was almost certainly a-coming." She looks down at Matthew. "Tho maybe that's a promise we couldn't keep."

"Where's Viola?"

"Back at my house," Francia says, suddenly all active again. "C'mon. We gotta get ye inside."

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"Wait." I squeeze back behind the silage rolls and find Manchee still in his corner, licking his tail. He looks up at me and barks, just a little bark that's not even a word. "I'm gonna pick you up now," I say to him. "Try not to bite me too hard, okay?"

"Okay, Todd," he whimpers, yelping each time he wags his stumpy tail.

I reach down, put my arms under his tummy and hoist him up to my chest. He yelps and bites hard at my wrist, then licks it.

"It's okay, buddy," I say, holding him as best I can.

Francia's waiting for me at the door to the barn and I follow her out into the main road.

There are people running about everywhere. I see men and women with rifles running up toward the orchards and other men and women scooting kids (there they are again) into houses and such. In the distance I can hear bangs and shouts and yelling.

"Where's Hildy?" I yell.

Francia don't say nothing. We reach her front steps.

"What about Hildy?" I ask again as we climb up.

"She went off to fight," Francia says, not looking at me, opening the door. "They would have reached her farm first. Tam was still there."

"Oh, no," I say again stupidly, like my oh nos will do any good.

Viola comes flying down from the upper floor as we enter.

"What took you so long?" she says, her voice kinda loud, and I don't know which one of us she's talking to. She gasps when she sees Manchee.

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"Bandages," I say. "Some of those fancy ones."

She nods and races back up the stairs.

"Ye two stay here," Francia says to me. "Don't come out, whatever ye hear."

"But we need to run!" I say, not understanding this at all. "We need to get outta here!"

"No, Todd pup," she says. "If Prentisstown wants ye, then that's reason enough for us to keep ye from them."

"But they've got guns--"

"So do we," Francia says. "No posse of Prentisstown men is going to take this town."

Viola's back down the stairs now, digging thru her bag for bandages.

"Francia--" I say.

"Stay right here," she says. "We'll protect ye. Both of ye."

She looks at both of us, hard, like seeing if we agree, then she turns and is out the door to protect her town, I guess.

We stare at the closed door for a second, then Manchee whimpers again and I have to set him down, Viola gets out a square bandage and her little scalpel.

"I don't know if these'll work on dogs," she says.

"Better than nothing," I say.

She cuts off a little strip and I have to hold Manchee's head down while she loops it around the mess of his tail. He growls and apologizes and growls and apologizes until Viola's covered the whole wound up tight. He immediately sets to licking it when I let him go.

"Stop that," I say.

"Itches," Manchee says.

"Stupid dog." I scratch his ears. "Stupid ruddy dog."

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Viola pets him, too, trying to keep him from licking off the bandage.

"Do you think we're safe?" she asks quietly, after a long minute.

"I don't know."

There's more bangs out in the distance. We both jump. More people shouting. More Noise.

"No sign of Hildy since this started," Viola says. "I know."

Another bit of silence as we overpet Manchee. More ruckus from up in the orchards above town.

It all seems so far away, as if it's not even happening.

"Francia told me that you can find Haven if you keep following the main river," Viola says.

I look at her. I wonder if I know what this means.

I think I do.

"You wanna leave," I say.

"They'll keep coming," she says. "We're putting the people around us in danger. Don't you think they'll keep coming if they've already come this far?"

I do. I do think this. I don't say it but I do.

"But they said they could protect us," I say.

"Do you believe that?"

I don't say nothing to this neither. I think of Matthew Lyle.

"I don't think we're safe here anymore," she says.

"I don't think we're safe anywhere," I say. "Not on this whole planet."

"I need to contact my ship, Todd," she says, almost pleading. "They're waiting to hear from me."

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"And you wanna run off into the unknown to do it?"

"You do, too," she says. "I can tell." She looks away. "If we went together ..."

I look up at her at this, trying to see, trying to know, to know real and true.

All she does is look back.

Which is enough.

"Let's go," I say.

We pack fast without any more words. I get my rucksack on, she gets her bag around her shoulders, Manchee's on his feet again and walking, and out the back door we go. As simple as that, we're going. Safer for Farbranch, definitely, safer for us, who knows? Who knows if this is the right thing to do? After what Hildy and Francia seemed to promise, it's hard leaving.

But we're leaving. And that's what we're doing.

Cuz at least it's us who decided it. I'd rather not have no one else tell me what they'll do for me, even when they mean well.

It's full dark night outside now, tho both moons are shining bright. Everyone in town's attenshun is behind us so there's no one to stop us from running. There's a little bridge that crosses the creek that runs thru town. "How far is this Haven?" I ask, whispering as we cross.

"Kinda far," Viola whispers back.

"How far is kinda far?"

She don't say nothing for a second.

"How far?" I say again.

"Coupla weeks' walk," she says, not looking back.

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"Coupla weeks!"

"Where else do we have?" she says.

And I don't have an answer so we keep on walking.

Across the creek, the road heads up the far hill of the valley. We decide to take it as the fastest way outta town then find our way back south to the river and follow that. Ben's map ends at Farbranch so the river's all we got for direkshuns from here on out.

There's so many askings that come with us as we run outta Farbranch, askings that we'll never know the answers to: Why would the Mayor and a few men go miles outta their way to attack a whole ruddy town on their own? Why are they still after us? Why are we so important? And what happened to Hildy?

And did I kill Matthew Lyle?

And was what he showed me in his Noise right there at the end a true thing?

Was that the real history of Prentisstown?

"Was what the real history?" Viola asks as we hurry on up the path.

"Nothing," I say. "And quit reading me."

We get to the top of the far hill of the valley just as another rattle of gunfire echoes across it. We stop and look.

And then we see.

Boy, do we see.

"Oh, my God," Viola says.

Under the light of the two moons, the whole valley kinda shines, across the Farbranch buildings and back up into the hills where the orchards are.

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We can see the men and women of Farbranch running back down that hill. In retreat.

And marching over the top, are five, ten, fifteen men on horseback.

Followed by rows of men five across, carrying guns, marching in a line behind what has to be the Mayor's horses in front.

Not a posse. Not a posse at all.

It's Prentisstown. I feel like the world's crumbling at my feet. It's every ruddy man in Prentisstown.

They have three times as many people as even live in Farbranch.

Three times as many guns.

We hear gunshots and we see the men and women of Farbranch fall as they run back to their houses.

They'll take the town easily. They'll take it before the hour is thru.

Cuz the rumors were true, the rumors that Francia heard.

The word was true. It's an army. A whole army.

There's a whole army coming after me and Viola.

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20

ARMY OF MEN

WE DUCK BEHIND SOME BUSHES, even tho it's dark, even tho the army is across the valley, even tho they don't know we're up here and there's no way they could hear my Noise amidst all the ruckus going on down there, we duck anyway.

"Can yer binocs see in the dark?" I whisper.

By way of answer Viola digs 'em outta her bag and holds 'em up to her own eyes. "What's happening?" she says, looking thru 'em, pressing more buttons. "Who are all those men?"

"It's Prentisstown," I say, holding out my hand. "It looks like every man in the whole effing town."

"How can it be the whole town?" She looks for a second or two more then hands the binocs to me. "What kind of sense does that make?"

"You got me." The night setting on the binocs turns the valley and all that's in it a bright green. I see horses galloping down the hill into the main part of town, the riders

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shooting their rifles on the way, I see the people of Far-branch shooting back but mostly running, mostly falling, mostly dying. The Prentisstown army don't seem interested in taking prisoners.

"We have to get out of here, Todd," Viola says.

"Yeah," I say, but I'm still looking thru the binocs.

With everything green, it's hard to make out faces. I press a few more buttons on the binocs till I find the ones that take me in closer.

The first person I see for sure is Mr. Prentiss Jr., in the lead, firing his rifle into the air when he don't have nothing else to shoot at. Then there's Mr. Morgan and Mr. Collins chasing some Farbranch men into the storage barns, firing their rifles after them. Mr. O'Hare's there, too, and more of the Mayor's usual suspects on horseback, Mr. Edwin, Mr. Henratty, Mr. Sullivan. And there's Mr. Hammar, the smile on his face showing up green and evil even from this distance as he fires his rifle into the backs of fleeing women hustling away small children and I have to look away or throw up the nothing I had for dinner.

The men on foot march their way into town. The first one I reckernize is, of all people, Mr. Phelps the storekeeper. Which is weird cuz he never seemed armylike at all. And there's Dr. Baldwin. And Mr. Fox. And Mr. Cardiff who was our best milker. And Mr. Tate who had the most books to burn when the Mayor outlawed them. And Mr. Kearney who milled the town's wheat and who always spoke softly and who made wooden toys for each Prentisstown boy's birthday.

What are these men doing in an army?

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"Todd," Viola says, pulling at my arm.

The men marching don't look none too happy, I spose. Grim and cold and scary in a different way from Mr. Hammar, like they're lacking all feeling.

But they're still marching. They're still shooting. They're still kicking down doors.

"That's Mr. Gillooly," I say, binocs pressed to my eyes. "He can't even butcher his own meat."

"Todd," Viola says and I feel her backing away from the bushes. "Let's go."

What's going on? Sure, Prentisstown was as awful a place as you could ever not wanna paint it but how can it suddenly be an army? There's plenty of Prentisstown men who're bad thru and thru but not all of them. Not all. And Mr. Gillooly with a rifle is a sight so wrong it almost hurts my eyes just to look at it.

And then of course I see the answer.

Mayor Prentiss, not even holding a gun, just one hand on his horse's reins, the other at his side, riding into town like he's out for an evening canter. He's watching the rout of Farbranch as if it was a vid and not a very interesting one at that, letting everyone else do the work but so obviously in charge no one would even think of asking him to break a sweat.

How can he make so many men do what he wants? And is he bulletproof that he can ride so fearlessly? "Todd," Viola says behind me. "I swear, I'll leave without you."

"No, you won't," I say. "One more second."

Cuz I'm looking from face to face now, ain't I? I'm going

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from Prentisstown man to Prentisstown man cuz even if they're marching into town and are gonna find out soon enough that neither me nor Viola is there and are gonna have to come this way after us, I gotta know. I gotta know.

Face to face to face as they march and shoot and burn. Mr. Wallace, Mr. Asbjornsen, Mr. St. James, Mr. Belgraves, Mr. Smith the Older, Mr. Smith the Younger, Mr. Smith With Nine Fingers, even Mr. Marjoribanks, wobbling and teetering but marching marching marching. Prentisstown man after Prentisstown man after Prentisstown man, my heart clenching and burning at each one I can identify.

"They ain't there," I say, almost to myself.

"Who isn't?" Viola says.

"Ain't!" Manchee barks, licking at his tail.

They ain't there.

Ben and Cillian ain't there.

Which, of course, is grand, ain't it? Of course they ain't part of an army of killers. Of course they ain't, even when every other Prentisstown man is. They wouldn't be. Not never, not no how, no matter what.

Good men, great men, both, even Cillian.

But if that's true, then that means the other is true, too, don't it?

If they ain't there, then that means once and for all. And there's yer lesson.

There ain't nothing good that don't got real bad waiting to follow it.

I hope they put up the best fight ever.

I take the binocs from my face and I look down and I

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wipe my eyes with my sleeve and I turn and I hand Viola back the binocs and I say, "Let's go."

She takes them from me, squirming a little like she's itching to leave, but then she says, "I'm sorry," so she musta seen it in my Noise.

"Nothing that ain't already happened," I say, talking to the ground and readjusting the rucksack. "C'mon, before I put us in danger any worse."

I take off up the path toward the top of the hill, keeping my head down, motoring fast, Viola after me, Manchee trying to keep himself from biting at his tail as we run.

Viola matches my speed before we get far at all. "Did you see ... him?" she says, between breaths.

"Aaron?"

She nods.

"No," I say. "Come to think of it, no, I didn't. And you'd think he'd be out in front."

We're quiet for a minute as we hurry on our way and wonder what that means.

The road on this side of the valley is wider and we're doing our best to keep to the darker side of it as it twists and turns up the hill. Our only lights are the moons but they're bright enough to cast our shadows running along the road which is too bright when yer running away. I never seen no night vision binocs in Prentisstown but I didn't see no army neither so we're both crouching as we run. Manchee's running on ahead of us, his nose to the ground, barking, "This way! This way!" as if he knows any better than us where we're going.

Then at the top of the hill, the road forks.

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Which just figures.

"You gotta be kidding," I say.

One part of the road goes left, the other goes right.

(Well, it's a fork, ain't it?)

"The creek in Farbranch was flowing to the right," Viola says, "and the main river was always to our right once we crossed the bridge, so it's got to be the right fork if we want to get back there."

"But the left looks more traveled," I say. And it does. The left fork looks smoother, flatter, like the kinda thing you should be rolling carts over. The right fork is narrower with higher bushes on each side and even tho it's night you can just tell it's dusty. "Did Francia say anything about a fork?" I look back over my shoulder at the valley still erupting behind us.

"No," Viola says, also looking back. "She just said Haven was the first settlement and new settlements sprang up down the river as people moved west. Prentisstown was the farthest out. Farbranch was second farthest."

"That one probably goes to the river," I say, pointing right, then left, "that one probably goes to Haven in a straight line."

"Which one will they think we took?"

"We need to decide," I say. "Quickly now."

"To the right," she says, then turns it into an asking. "To the right?"

We hear a BOOM that makes us jump. A mushroom of smoke is rising in the air over Farbranch. The barn where I worked all day is on fire.

Maybe our story will turn out differently if we take the

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left fork, maybe the bad things that are waiting to happen to us won't happen, maybe there's happiness at the end of the left fork and warm places with the people who love us and no Noise but no silence neither and there's plenty of food and no one dies and no one dies and no one never never dies.

Maybe.

But I doubt it.

I ain't what you call a lucky person.

"Right," I decide. "Might as well be right."

We run down the right fork, Manchee at our heels, the night and a dusty road stretching out in front of us, an army and a disaster behind us, me and Viola, running side by side.

We run till we can't run and then we walk fast till we can run again. The sounds of Farbranch disappear behind us pretty quick and all we can hear are our footsteps beating on the path and my Noise and Manchee's barking. If there are night creachers out there, we're scaring 'em away.

Which is probably good.

"What's the next settlement?" I gasp after a good half hour's run-walking. "Did Francia say?"

"Shining Beacon," Viola says, gasping herself. "Or Shining Light." She scrunches her face. "Blazing Light. Blazing Beacon?"

"That's helpful."

"Wait." She stops in the path, bending at the waist to catch her breath. I stop, too. "I need water."

I hold up my hands in a way that says And? "So do I," I say. "You got some?"

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She looks at me, her eyebrows up. "Oh."

"There was always a river."

"I guess we'd better find it then."

"I guess so." I take a deep breath to start running again.

"Todd," she says, stopping me. "I've been thinking."

"Yeah?" I say.

"Blazing Lights or whatever?"

"Yeah?"

"If you look at it one way," she lowers her voice to a sad and uncomfortable sound and says it again, "if you look at it one way, we led an army into Farbranch."

I lick the dryness of my lips. I taste dust. And I know what she's saying.

"You must warn them," she says quietly, into the dark. "I'm sorry, but-"

"We can't go into any other settlements," I say.

"I don't think we can."

"Not till Haven."

"Not until Haven," she says, "which we have to hope is big enough to handle an army."

So, that's that then. In case we needed any further reminding, we're really on our own. Really and truly. Me and Viola and Manchee and the darkness for company. No one on the road to help us till the end, if even there, which knowing our luck so far-

I close my eyes.

I am Todd Hewitt, I think. When it gets to be midnight I will be a man in twenty-seven days. I am the son of my ma and pa, may they rest in peace. I am the son of Ben and Cillian, may they-

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I am Todd Hewitt.

"I'm Viola Eade," Viola says.

I open my eyes. She has her hand out, palm down, held toward me.

"That's my surname," she says. "Eade. E-A-D-E."

I look at her for a second and then down at her outstretched hand and I reach out and I take it and press it inside my own and a second later I let go.

I shrug my shoulders to reset my rucksack. I put my hand behind my back to feel the knife and make sure it's still there. I give poor, panting, half-tail Manchee a look and then match eyes with Viola.

"Viola Eade," I say, and she nods.

And off we run into further night.

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21

THE WIDER WORLD

HOW CAN IT BE THIS FAR?" Viola asks. "It doesn't make any logical sense."

"Is there another kind of sense it does make?"

She frowns. So do I. We're tired and getting tireder and trying not to think of what we saw at Farbranch and we've walked and run what feels like half the night and still no river. I'm starting to get afraid we've taken a seriously wrong turn which we can't do nothing about cuz there ain't no turning back.

"Isn't any turning back," I hear Viola say behind me, under her breath.

I turn to her, eyes wide. "That's wrong on two counts," I say. "Number one, constantly reading people's Noise ain't gonna get you much welcome here."

She crosses her arms and sets her shoulders. "And the second?"

"The second is I talk how I please."

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"Yes," Viola says. "That you do."

My Noise starts to rise a bit and I take a deep breath but then she says Shhh, and her eyes glint in the moonlight as she looks beyond me.

The sound of running water.

"River!" Manchee barks.

We take off down the road and round a corner and down a slope and round another corner and there's the river, wider, flatter, and slower than when we saw it last but just as wet. We don't say nothing, just drop to our knees on the rocks at water's edge and drink, Manchee wading in up to his belly to start lapping.

Viola's next to me and as I slurp away, there's her silence again. It's a two-way thing, this is. However clear she can hear my Noise, well, out here alone, away from the chatter of others or the Noise of a settlement, there's her silence, loud as a roar, pulling at me like the greatest sadness ever, like I want to take it and press myself into it and just disappear forever down into nothing.

What a relief that would feel like right now. What a blessed relief.

"I can't avoid hearing you, you know," she says, standing up and opening her bag. "When it's quiet and just the two of us."

"And I can't avoid not hearing you," I say. "No matter what it's like." I whistle for Manchee. "Outta the water. There might be snakes."

He's ducking his rump under the current, swishing back and forth until the bandage comes off and floats away. Then he leaps out and immediately sets to licking his tail.

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"Let me see," I say. He barks "Todd!" in agreement but when I come near he curls his tail as far under his belly as the new length will go. I uncurl it gently, Manchee murmuring "Tail, tail" to himself all the while.

"Whaddyaknow?" I say. "Those bandages work on dogs."

Viola's fished out two discs from her bag. She presses her thumbs inside them and they expand right up into water bottles. She kneels by the river, fills both, and tosses one to me.

"Thanks," I say, not really looking at her.

She wipes some water from her bottle. We stand on the riverbank for a second and she's putting her water bottle back into her bag and she's quiet in a way that I'm learning means she's trying to say something difficult.

"I don't mean any offense by it," she says, looking up to me, "but I think maybe it's time I read the note on the map."

I can feel myself redden, even in the dark, and I can also feel myself get ready to argue.

But then I just sigh. I'm tired and it's late and we're running again and she's right, ain't she? There's nothing but spitefulness that'll argue she's wrong.

I drop my rucksack and take out the book, unfolding the map from inside the front cover. I hand it to her without looking at her. She takes out her flashlight and shines it on the paper, turning it over to Ben's message. To my surprise, she starts reading it out loud and all of sudden, even with her own voice, it's like Ben's is ringing down the river, echoing from Prentisstown and hitting my chest like a punch.

"Go to the settlement down the river and across the

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bridge," she reads. "It's called Farbranch and the people there should welcome you."

"And they did," I say. "Some of them."

Viola continues, "There are things you don't know about our history, Todd, and I'm sorry for that but if you knew them you would be in great danger. The only chance you have of a welcome is yer innocence."

I feel myself redden even more but fortunately it's too dark to see.

"Yer ma's book will tell you more but in the meantime, the wider world has to be warned, Todd. Prentisstown is on the move. The plan has been in the works for years, only waiting for the last boy in Prentisstown to become a man." She looks up. "Is that you?"

"That's me," I say, "I was the youngest boy. I turn thirteen in twenty-seven days and officially become a man according to Prentisstown law."

And I can't help but think for a minute about what Ben showed me-

About how a boy becomes-

I cover it up and say quickly, "But I got no idea what he means about them waiting for me."

"The Mayor plans to take Farbranch and who knows what else beyond. Sillian and I--"

"Cillian," I correct her. "With a K sound."

"Cillian and I will try to delay it as long as we can but we won't be able to stop it. Farbranch will be in danger and you have to warn them. Always, always, always remember that we love you like our own son and sending you away is the hardest

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thing we'll ever have to do. If it's at all possible, we'll see you again, but first you must get to Farbranch as fast as you can and when you get there, you must warn them. Ben." Viola looks up. "That last part's underlined."

"I know."

And then we don't say nothing for a minute. There's blame in the air but maybe it's all coming from me.

Who can tell with a silent girl?

"My fault," I say. "It's all my fault."

Viola rereads the note to herself. "They should have told you," she says. "Not expected you to read it if you can't--"

"If they'd told me, Prentisstown would've heard it in my Noise and known that I knew. We wouldn't've even got the head start we got." I glance at her eyes and look away. "I shoulda given it to someone to read and that's all there is to it. Ben's a good man." I lower my voice. "Was."

She refolds the map and hands it back to me. It's useless to us now but I put it back carefully inside the front cover of the book.

"I could read that for you," Viola says. "Your mother's book. If you wanted."

I keep my back to her and put the book in my rucksack. "We need to go," I say. "We've wasted too much time here."

"Todd-"

"There's an army after us," I say. "No more time for reading."

So we set off again and do our best to run for as much and as long as we can but as the sun rises, all slow and lazy and cold, we've had no sleep and that's no sleep after a full

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day's work and so even with that army on our tails, we're barely able to even keep up a fast walk.

But we do, thru that next morning. The road keeps following the river as we hoped and the land starts to flatten out around us, great natural plains of grass stretching out to low hills and to higher hills beyond and, to the north at least, mountains beyond that.

It's all wild, tho. No fences, no fields of crops, and no signs of any kind of settlement or people except for the dusty road itself. Which is good in one way but weird in another.

If New World isn't sposed to have been wiped out, where is everybody?

"You think this is right?" I say, as we come round yet another dusty corner of the road with nothing beyond it but more dusty corners. "You think we're going the right way?"

Viola blows out thoughtful air. "My dad used to say, 'There's only forward, Vi, only outward and up.'"

"There's only forward," I repeat.

"Outward and up," she says.

"What was he like?" I ask. "Yer pa?"

She looks down at the road and from the side I can see half a smile on her face. "He smelled like fresh bread," she says and then she moves on ahead and don't say nothing more.

Morning turns to afternoon with more of the same. We hurry when we can, walk fast when we can't hurry, and only rest when we can't help it. The river remains flat and steady, like the brown and green land around it. I can see bluehawks

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way up high, hovering and scouting for prey, but that's about it for signs of life.

"This is one empty planet," Viola says as we stop for a quick lunch, leaning on some rocks overlooking a natural weir.

"Oh, it's full enough," I say, munching on some cheese. "Believe me."

"I do believe you. I just meant I can see why people would want to settle here. Lots of fertile farmland, lots of potential for people to make new lives."

I chew. "People would be mistaken."

She rubs her neck and looks at Manchee, sniffing round the edges of the weir, probably smelling the wood weavers who made it living underneath.

"Why do you become a man here at thirteen?" she asks.

I look over at her, surprised. "What?"

"That note," she says. "The town waiting for the last boy to become a man." She looks at me. "Why wait?"

"That's how New World's always done it. It's sposed to be scriptural. Aaron always went on about it symbolizing the day you eat from the Tree of Knowledge and go from innocence into sin."

She gives me a funny look. "That sounds pretty heavy."

I shrug. "Ben said that the real reason was cuz a small group of people on an isolated planet need all the adults they can get so thirteen is the day you start getting real responsibilities." I throw a stray stone into the river. "Don't ask me. All I know is it's thirteen years. Thirteen cycles of thirteen months."

"Thirteen months?" she asks, her eyebrows up.

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I nod.

"There are only twelve months in a year," she says.

"No, there ain't. There's thirteen."

"Maybe not here," she says, "but where I come from there's twelve."

I blink. "Thirteen months in a New World year," I say, feeling dumb for some reason.

She looks up like she's figuring something out. "I mean, depending on how long a day or a month is on this planet, you might be ... fourteen years old already."

"That's not how it works here," I say, kinda stern, not really liking this much. "I turn thirteen in twenty-seven days."

"Fourteen and a month, actually," she says, still figuring it out. "Which makes you wonder how you tell how old anybody-"

"It's twenty-seven days till my birthday," I say firmly. I stand and put the rucksack back on. "Come on. We've wasted too much time talking."

It ain't till the sun's finally started to dip below the tops of the trees that we see our first sign of civilizayshun: an abandoned water mill at the river's edge, its roof burned off who knows how many years ago. We've been walking so long we don't even talk, don't even look around much for danger, just go inside, throw our bags down against the walls and flop to the ground like it's the softest bed ever. Manchee, who don't seem to ever get tired, is busy running around, lifting his leg on all the plants that have grown up thru the cracked floorboards.

"My feet," I say, peeling off my shoes, counting five, no, six different blisters.

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Viola lets out a weary sigh from the opposite wall. "We have to sleep," she says. "Even if."

"I know."

She looks at me. "You'll hear them coming," she says, "if they comer'"

"Oh, I'll hear them," I say. "I'll definitely hear them."

We decide to take turns sleeping. I say I'll wait up first and Viola can barely say good night before she's out. I watch her sleep as the light fades. The little bit of clean we got at Hildy's house is already long gone. She looks like I must, face smudged with dust, dark circles under her eyes, dirt under her nails.

And I start to think.

I've only known her for three days, you know? Three effing days outta my whole entire life but it's like nothing that happened before really happened, like that was all a big lie just waiting for me to find out. No, not like, it was a big lie waiting for me to find out and this is the real life now, running without safety or answer, only moving, only ever moving.

I take a sip of water and I listen to the crickets chirping sex sex sex and I wonder what her life was like before these last three days. Like, what's it like growing up on a spaceship? A place where there's never any new people, a place you can never get beyond the borders of.

A place like Prentisstown, come to think of it, where if you disappeared, you ain't never coming back.

I look back over to her. But she did get out, didn't she? She got seven months out with her ma and her pa on the little ship that crashed.

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How's that work, I wonder?

"You need to send scout ships out ahead to make local field surveys and find the best landing sites," she says, without sitting up or even moving her head. "How does anyone ever sleep in a world with Noise?"

"You get used to it," I say. "But why so long? Why seven months?"

"That's how long it takes to set up first camp." She covers her eyes with her hand in an exhausted way. "My mother and father and I were supposed to find the best place for the ships to land and build the first encampment and then we'd start building the first things that would be needed for settlers just landing. A control tower, a food store, a clinic." She looks at me twixt her fingers. "It's standard procedure."

"I never seen no control tower on New World," I say.

This makes her sit up. "I know. I can't believe you guys don't even have communicators between settlements."

"So yer not church settlers then," I say, sounding wise.

"What does that have to do with anything?" she says. "Why would any reasonable church want to be cut off from itself?"

"Ben said that they came to this world for the simpler life, said that there was even a fight in the early days whether to destroy the fission generators."

Viola looks horrified. "You would have all died."

"That's why they weren't destroyed," I shrug. "Not even after Mayor Prentiss decided to get rid of most everything else."

Viola rubs her shins and looks up into the stars coming out thru the hole that was the roof. "My mother and father

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were so excited," she says. "A whole new world, a whole new beginning, all these plans of peace and happiness." She stops.

"I'm sorry it ain't that way," I say.

She looks down at her feet. "Would you mind waiting outside for a little while until I fall asleep?"

"Yeah," I say, "no problem."

I take my rucksack and go out the opening where the front door used to be. Manchee gets up from where he's curled and follows me. When I sit down, he recurls by my legs and falls asleep, farting happily and giving a doggy sigh. Simple to be a dog.

I watch the moons rise, the stars following 'em, the same moons and the same stars as were in Prentisstown, still out here past the end of the world. I take out the book again, the oil in the cover shining from the moonlight. I flip thru the pages.

I wonder if my ma was excited to land here, if her head was full of peace and good hope and joy everlasting.

I wonder if she found any before she died.

This makes my chest heavy so I put the book back in the rucksack and lean my head against the boards of the mill. I listen to the river flow past and the leaves shushing to themselves in the few trees around us and I look at the shadows of far distant hills on the horizon and the rustling forests on them.

I'll wait for a few minutes, then go back inside and make sure Viola's okay.

The next thing I know she's waking me up and it's hours

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later and my head is completely confused till I hear her saying, "Noise, Todd, I can hear Noise."

I'm on my feet before I'm fully awake, quieting Viola and a groggy Manchee barking his complaints. They get quiet and I put my ear into the night.

Whisper whisper whisper there, like a breeze whisper whisper whisper no words and far away but hovering, a storm cloud behind a mountain whisper whisper whisper .

"We gotta go," I say, already reaching for my rucksack.

"Is it the army?" Viola calls, running thru the door of the mill as she grabs her own bag.

"Army!" Manchee barks.

"Don't know," I say. "Probably."

"Could it be the next settlement?" Viola comes back, bag around her shoulders. "We can't be too far from it."

"Then why didn't we hear it when we got here?" She bites her lip. "Damn."

"Yeah," I say. "Damn."

And so the second night after Farbranch passes like the first, running in darkness, using flashlights when we need em, trying not to think. Just before the sun comes up, the river moves outta the flats and into another small valley like the one by Farbranch and sure enough, there's Blazing Beacons or whatever so maybe there really are people living out this way.

They've got orchards, too, and fields of wheat, tho nothing looks near as well tended as Farbranch. Lucky for us, the main part of town is on top of the hill with what looks like a bigger road going thru it, the left fork, maybe, and five

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or six buildings, most of which could use a coat of paint. Down on our dirt road by the river there are just boats and wormy-looking docks and dock houses and whatever else you build on a flowing river.

We can't ask anyone for help. Even if we got it, the army's coming, ain't it? We should warn them but what if they're Matthew Lyles rather than Hildys? And what if by warning them we draw the army right to them cuz then we're in everyone's Noise? And what if the settlement knows we're the reason the army's coming and they decide to turn us over to them?

But they deserve to be warned, don't they?

But what if that endangers ms?

You see? What's the right answer?

And so we sneak thru the settlement like thieves, running from dock house to dock house, hiding from sight of the town up the hill, waiting as quiet as we can when we see a skinny woman taking a basket into a henhouse up by some trees. It's small enough that we get thru it before the sun even fully rises and we're out the other side and back on the road like it never existed, like it never happened, even to us.

"So that's that settlement then," Viola whispers as we take a look behind us and watch it disappear behind a bend. "We'll never even know what it was actually called."

"And now we really don't know what's ahead of us," I whisper back.

"We keep going until we get to Haven."

"And then what?"

She don't say nothing to that.

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"That's a lotta faith we're putting in a word," I say.

"There's got to be something, Todd," she says, her face kinda grim. "There has to be something there."

I don't say nothing for a second and then I say, "I guess we'll see."

And so starts another morning. Twice on the road we see men with horse-drawn carts. Both times we hie off into the woods, Viola with her hand round Manchee's snout and me trying to keep my Noise as Prentisstown-free as possible till they pass.

Nothing much changes as the hours go by. We don't hear no more whispers from the army, if that's what it even was, but there ain't no point in finding out for sure, is there? Morning's turned into afternoon again when we see a settlement high up on a far hill. We're coming up a little hill ourselves, the river dropping down a bit, tho we can see it spreading out in the distance, what looks like the start of a plain we're gonna have to cross.

Viola points her binocs at the settlement for a minute, then hands them to me. It's ten or fifteen buildings this time but even from a distance it looks scrubby and run-down.

"I don't get it," Viola says. "Going by a regular schedule of settlement, subsistence farming should be years over by now. And there's obviously trade, so why is there still this much struggle?"

"You don't really know nothing about settlers' lives, do you?" I say, chafing just a little.

She purses her lips. "It was required in school. I've been learning about how to set up a successful colony since I was five."

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"Schooling ain't life."

"Ain't it?" she says, her eyebrows raising in mock surprise. "What did I say before?" I snap back. "Some of us were busy surviving and couldn't learn about subdivided farming."

"Subsistence."

"Don't care." I get myself moving again on the road.

Viola stomps after me. "We're going to be teaching you all a thing or two when my ship arrives," she says. "You can be sure of that."

"Well, won't we dumb hicks be lining up to kiss yer behinds in thankfulness?" I say, my Noise buzzing and not saying "behinds."

"Yes, you will be." She's raising her voice. "Trying to turn back the clock to the dark ages has really worked out for you, hasn't it? When we get here, you'll see how people are supposed to settle."

"That's seven months from now," I seethe at her. "You'll have plenty of time to see how the other half live."

"Todd!" Manchee barks, making us jump again, and suddenly he takes off down the road ahead of us.

"Manchee!" I yell after him. "Get back here!"

And then we both hear it.

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22

WILF AND THE SEA OF THINGS

IT'S WEIRD, Noise, but almost wordless, cresting the hill in front of us and rolling down, single-minded but talking in legions, like a thousand voices singing the same thing.

Yeah.

Singing.

"What is it?" Viola asks, spooked as I am. "It's not the army, is it? How could they be in front of us?"

"Todd!" Manchee barks from the top of the small hill. "Cows, Todd! Giant cows!"

Viola's mouth twists. "Giant cows?"

"No idea," I say and I'm already heading up the little hill.

Cuz the sound-

How can I describe it?

Like how stars might sound. Or moons. But not mountains. Too floaty for mountains. It's a sound like one planet singing to another, high and stretched and full of different voices starting at different notes and sloping down to other

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different notes but all weaving together in a rope of sound that's sad but not sad and slow but not slow and all singing one word. One word.

We reach the top of the hill and another plain unrolls below us, the river tumbling down to meet it and then running thru it like a vein of silver thru a rock and all over the plain, walking their way from one side of the river to the other, are creachers.

Creachers I never seen the like of in my life.

Massive, they are, twelve feet tall if they're an inch, covered in a shaggy, silvery fur with a thick, fluffed tail at one end and a pair of curved white horns at the other reaching right outta their brows and long necks that stretch down from wide shoulders to the grass of the plain below and these wide lips that mow it up as they trudge on dry ground and drink water as they cross the river and there's thousands of 'em, thousands stretching from the horizon on our right to the horizon on our left and the Noise of 'em all is singing one word, at different times in different notes, but one word binding 'em all together, knitting 'em as a group as they cross the plain.

"Here," Viola says from somewhere off to my side. "They're singing here."

They're singing Here . Calling it from one to another in their Noise.

Here I am. Here we are. Here we go. Here is all that matters.

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Here .

It's-

Can I say?

It's like the song of a family where everything's always all right, it's a song of belonging that makes you belong just by hearing it, it's a song that'll always take care of you and never leave you. If you have a heart, it breaks, if you have a heart that's broken, it fixes. Its-Wow.

I look at Viola and she has her hand over her mouth and her eyes are wet but I can see a smile thru her fingers and I open my mouth to speak.

"Ya won't get ver far on foot," says a completely other voice to our left.

We spin round to look, my hand going right to my knife. A man driving an empty cart pulled by a pair of oxen regards us from a little side path, his mouth left hanging open like he forgot to close it.

There's a shotgun on the seat next to him, like he just put it there.

From a distance, Manchee barks "Cow!"

"They's all go round carts," says the man, "but not safe on foot, no. They's squish ya right up."

And again leaves his mouth open. His Noise, buried under all the Here s from the herd, seems to pretty

much be saying exactly what his mouth is. I'm trying so hard not to think of certain words I'm already getting a headache.

"Ah kin give y'all a ride thrus," he says. "If ya want."

He raises an arm and points down the road, which

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disappears under the feet of the herd crossing it. I hadn't even thought about how the creachers'd be blocking our way but you can see how you wouldn't wanna try walking thru 'em.

I turn and I start to say something, anything, that'll be the fastest way to get away.

But instead the most amazing thing happens.

Viola looks at the man and says, "Ah'm Hildy." She points at me. "At's Ben."

"What?" I say, barking it almost like Manchee.

"Wilf," says the man to Viola and it takes a second to realize he's saying his name.

"Hiya, Wilf," Viola says and her voice ain't her own, ain't her own at all, there's a whole new voice coming outta her mouth, stretching and shortening itself, twisting and unraveling and the more she talks the more different she sounds.

The more she sounds like Wilf.

"We're all fra Farbranch. Where yoo from?"

Wilf hangs his thumb back over his shoulder. "Bar Vista," he says. "I'm gone Brockley Falls, pick up s'plies."

"Well, at's lucky," Viola says. "We're gone Brockley Falls, too."

This is making my headache worse. I put my hands up to my temples, like I'm trying to keep my Noise inside, trying to keep all the wrong things from spilling out into the world. Luckily, the song of Here has made it like we're already swimming in sound.

"Hop on," Wilf says with a shrug.

"C'mon, Ben," Viola says, walking to the back of the cart and hoisting her bag on top. "Wilf's gone give us a ride." She jumps on the cart and Wilf snaps the reins on his

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oxes. They take off slowly and Wilf don't even look at me as he passes. I'm still standing there in amazement when Viola goes by, waving her hand frantically to me to get on beside her. I don't got no choice, do I? I catch up and pull myself up into the cart.

I sit down next to her and stare at her with my jaw down around my ankles. "What are you doing?" I finally hiss in what's sposed to be a whisper.

"Shh!" she shushes, looking back over her shoulder at Wilf, but he could've already forgotten he picked us up for all that's going on in his Noise. "I don't know," she whispers by my ear, "just play along."

"Play along with what?"

"If we can get to the other side of the herd, then it's between us and the army, isn't it?"

I hadn't thought about that. "But what are you doing? What do Ben and Hildy gotta do with it?"

"He has a gun," she whispers, checking on Wilf again. "And you said yourself how people might react about you being from a certain place. So, it just sort of popped out."

"But you were talking in his voice."

"Not very well."

"Good enough!" I say, my voice going a little loud with amazement.

"Shh," she says a second time but with the combo of the herd of creachers getting closer by the second and Wilf's obvious not-too-brightness, we might as well be having a normal conversayshun.

"How do you do it?" I say, still pouring surprise out all over her.

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"It's just lying, Todd," she says, trying to shush me again with her hands. "Don't you have lying here?"

Well of course we have lying here. New World and the town where I'm from (avoiding saying the name, avoiding thinking the name) seem to be nothing but lies. But that's different. I said it before, men lie all the time, to theirselves, to other men, to the world at large, but who can tell when the lie's a strand in all the other lies and truths floating round outta yer head? Everyone knows yer lying but everyone else is lying, too, so how can it matter? What does it change? It's just part of the river of a man, part of his Noise, and sometimes you can pick it out, sometimes you can't.

But he never stops being himself when he does it.

Cuz all I know about Viola is what she says. The only truth I got is what comes outta her mouth and so for a second back there, when she said she was Hildy and I was Ben and we were from Farbranch and she spoke just like Wilf (even tho he ain't from Farbranch) it was like all those things became true, just for an instant the world changed, just for a second it became made of Viola's voice and it wasn't describing a thing, it was making a thing, it was making us different just by saying it.

Oh, my head.

"Todd! Todd!" Manchee barks, popping up at the end of the cart, looking up thru our feet. "Todd!"

"Crap," Viola says.

I hop off the cart and sweep him up in my arms, putting one hand round his muzzle and using the to other to get back on the cart. "Td?" he puffs thru closed lips.

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"Quiet, Manchee," I say.

"I'm not even sure it matters," Viola says, her voice stretching out. I look up.

"Cw," Manchee says. A creacher is walking right past us. We've entered the herd. Entered the song.

And for a little while, I forget all about any kinda lies.

I've never seen the sea, only in vids. No lakes where I grew up neither, just the river and the swamp. There may have been boats once but not in my lifetime.

But if I had to imagine being on the sea, this is what I'd imagine. The herd surrounds us and takes up everything, leaving just the sky and us. It cuts around us like a current, sometimes noticing us but more usually noticing only itself and the song of Here , which in the midst of it is so loud it's like it's taken over the running of yer body for a while, providing the energy to make yer heart beat and yer lungs breathe.

After a while, I find myself forgetting all about Wilf and the - the other things I could think about and I'm just lying back on the cart, watching it all go by, individual creachers snuffling around, feeding, bumping each other now and again with their horns, and there's baby ones, too, and old bulls and taller ones and shorter ones and some with scars and some with scruffier fur.

Viola's laying down next to me and Manchee's little doggie brain is overwhelmed by it all and he's just watching the

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herd go by with his tongue hanging out and for a while, for a little while, as Wilf drives us over the plain, this is all there is in the world.

This is all there is.

I look over at Viola and she looks back at me and just smiles and shakes her head and wipes away the wet from her eyes.

Here .

We're Here and nowhere else.

Cuz there's nowhere else but Here .

"So this ... Aaron," Viola says after a while in a low voice and I know exactly why it's now that she brings him up.

It's so safe inside the Here we can talk about any dangers we like.

"Yeah?" I say, also keeping my voice low, watching a little family of creachers waltz by the end of the cart, the ma creacher nuzzling forward a curious baby creacher who's staring at us.

Viola turns to me from where she's laying down. "Aaron was your holy man?"

I nod. "Our one and only."

"What kind of things did he preach?"

"The usual," I say. "Hellfire. Damnayshun. Judgment."

She eyes me up. "I'm not sure that's the usual, Todd."

I shrug. "He believed we were living thru the end of the world," I say. "Who's to say he was wrong?"

She shakes her head. "That's not what the preacher we had on the ship was like. Pastor Marc. He was kind and

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friendly and made everything seem like it was going to be okay."

I snort. "No, that don't sound like Aaron at all. He was always saying, 'God hears' and 'If one of us falls, we all fall.' Like he was looking forward to it."

"I heard him say that, too." She crosses her arms over herself.

The Here wraps us still, flowing everywhere. I turn to her. "Did he ... Did he hurt you? Back in the swamp?"

She shakes her head again and lets out a sigh. "He ranted and raved at me, and I guess it might have been preaching, but if I ran, he'd run after me and rant some more and I'd cry and ask him for help but he'd ignore me and preach some more and I'd see pictures of myself in his Noise when I didn't even know what Noise was. I've never been so scared in my life, not even when our ship was crashing."

We both look up into the sun.

"If one of us falls, we all fall," she says. "What does that even mean?"

Which, when I really think about it, I realize I don't know and so I don't say nothing and we just sink back into the Here and let it take us a little further.

Here we are.

Not nowhere else.

After an hour or a week or a second, the creachers start thinning and we come out the other side of the herd. Manchee jumps down off the cart. We're going slow enough

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that there's no danger of him getting left behind so I let him. We're not thru laying there on the cart just yet.

"That was amazing," Viola says quietly, cuz the song is already starting to disappear. "I forgot all about how much my feet hurt."

"Yeah," I say.

"What were those?"

'"Em big thangs," Wilf says, not turning round. "Jus thangs, thass all."

Viola and I look at each other, like we forgot he was even there.

How much have we given away?

"'Em thangs got a name?" Viola asks, sitting up, acting her lie again.

"Oh, sure," Wilf says, giving the oxen freer rein now that we're outta the herd. "Packy Vines or Field Baysts or Anta Fants." We see him shrug from behind. "I just call 'em thangs, thass all."

"Thangs," Viola says.

"Things," I try.

Wilf looks back over his shoulder at us. "Say what, y'all from Farbranch?" he asks.

"Yessir," Viola says with a look at me.

Wilf nods at her. "Y'all bin seen that there army?"

My Noise spikes real loud before I can quiet it but again Wilf don't seem to notice. Viola looks at me, worry on her forehead.

"And what army's that, Wilf?" she says, the voice missing a little.

"That there army from cursed town," he says, still driving

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along like we're talking about vegetables. "That there army come outta swamp, come takin settlements, growin as it comes? Y'all bin seen that?"

"Where'd yoo hear bout an army, Wilf?"

"Stories," Wilf says. "Stories a-come chatterin down the river. People talkin. Ya know. Stories. Y'all bin seen that?"

I shake my head at Viola but she says, "Yeah, we seen it."

Wilf looks back over his shoulder again. "Zit big?"

"Very big," Viola says, looking at him seriously. "Ya gotta prepare yerself, Wilf. There's danger comin. Yoo need to warn Brockley Hills."

"Brockley Falls," Wilf corrects her.

"Ya gotta warn 'em, Wilf."

We hear Wilf grunt and then we realize it's a laugh. "Ain't nobody lissnen to Wilf, I tell ya what," he says, almost to himself, then strikes the reins on the oxen again.

It takes most of the rest of the afternoon to get to the other side of the plain. Thru Viola's binocs we can see the herd of things still crossing in the distance, from south to north, like they're never gonna run out. Wilf don't say nothing more about the army. Viola and I keep our talking to a bare minimum so we don't give any more away. Plus, it's so hard to keep my Noise clear it's taking mosta my concentrayshun. Manchee follows along on the road, doing his business and sniffing every flower.

When the sun is low in the sky, the cart finally creaks to a halt.

"Brockley Falls," Wilf says, nodding his head to where we can see in the distance the river tumbling off a low cliff. There's fifteen or twenty buildings gathered round the pond

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at the bottom of the falls before the river starts up again. A smaller road turns off from this one and leads down to it.

"We're getting off here," Viola says and we hop down, taking our bags from the cart.

"Thought ya mite," Wilf says, looking back over his shoulder at us again.

"Thank ya, Wilf," she says.

"Welcome," he says, staring off into the distance. "Best take shelter 'fore too long. Gone rain."

Both Viola and me automatically look straight up. There ain't a cloud in the sky.

"Mmm," Wilf says. "No one lissnen to Wilf."

Viola looks back at him, her voice returning to itself, trying to get the point to him clearly. "You have to warn them, Wilf. Please. If you're hearing that an army's coming, then you're right and people have to be ready."

All Wilf says is "Mmm" again before snapping the reins and turning the oxen down the split road toward 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,"

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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 dinner, see if the rain stops. If it don't we got no choice but to walk in it anyway. I haven't even checked to see if Ben packed me a slicker.

"What's a slicker?" Viola asks as we sit down against different trees.

"A raincoat," I say, looking thru my rucksack. Nope, no slicker. Great. "And what did I say bout listening too close?"

I still feel a little calm, if you wanna know the truth, tho I probably shouldn't. The song of Here e still feels like it's being sung, even if I can't hear it, even if it's miles away back on the plain. I find myself humming it, even tho it don't have a tune, trying to get that feeling of connectedness, of belonging, of having someone there to say that you're Here.

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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 gonna have to start finding some of our own on the way."

"You mean like stealing?" she asks.

"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.

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23

A KNIFE IS ONLY AS GOOD AS THE ONE WHO WIELDS IT

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 don't dare cross the road and with the river at our backs, a fallen log is the best we're gonna get. We gather the last of our things and crouch down behind it, Manchee held twixt my knees, rain splashing everywhere.

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

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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 Hewit t? rings out as clear as day thru the rain and the galloping and the river. Viola gasps.

And I can see who it is.

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"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 Effing 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 gonna hear it if ya just HIDE?"

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

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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.

There's no farther down we can crouch. He's nearly on top of us.

I grip the knife and squeeze Viola's hand once, hard, for luck.

It's now or never. And-

"NOW!" I yell.

We jump up and a gun blast rings out, splintering the branches over our heads, but we run anyway.

"GET!" Mr. Prentiss Jr. shouts to his horse and here they come.

In two bounds, his horse turns and jumps back to the road, following along it as we run. The strip twixt the road and the river ain't getting any thicker and we can see each other as we go. Branches snap and puddles splash and feet slip and he pounds along the road matching our every step.

We ain't gonna get away from him. We just ain't.

But we try, each of us taking a twisty path up and over logs and thru bushes and Manchee's panting and barking at

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our heels and the rain's splashing down on us and the road's getting closer and then it suddenly veers sharply toward the river and we got no choice but to cross it in front of him to get to the deeper woods on the other side and I can see Viola leaping over the boundary and onto the road with her arms pumping and Mr. Prentiss Jr. rounding the bend and he's twirling something in his hand and we make a dash for the other side but the horse is roaring down on us and suddenly I feel something grab my legs, binding 'em so fast and so tight I fall right off my feet.

"Aaagh!" I yell and I hit my face into muck and fallen leaves and the rucksack goes over my head and nearly rips my arms off as it flies off my back and Viola sees me fall and she's nearly across the road but I see mud curling up from where her feet are digging in to stop herself and I shout, "NO! RUN! RUN!" and she locks my eyes and I see something change on her face but who knows what it means and as the horse bears down she turns and disappears into the woods and Manchee runs back to me and barks "Todd! Todd!" and I'm caught I'm caught I'm caught.

Cuz Mr. Prentiss Jr. is standing over me, breathing hard, high on his white horse, rifle cocked and pointed. I know what's happened. He's thrown a rope with weights at either end right at my legs and they've twisted round and caught me, expert, just like a hunter after swamp deer. I'm stuck down here in the mud on my belly, caught like an animal.