“Coward,” they’re saying. All of ’em. “Coward” over and over again.
But I wouldn’t be a Prentisstown boy if I couldn’t ignore Noise.
“Where, Manchee?” I say, getting to my feet, trying not to see how everything’s pitching and sliding.
“This way,” he barks. “Down the river.”
I follow him thru the burnt-out settlement.
He leads me past what musta been the church and I don’t look at it as we go by and he runs up a small bluff and the wind’s getting howlier and the trees are bending and I think it’s not just how I’m seeing them and Manchee has to bark louder to let me know.
“Aaron!” he barks, sticking his nose in the air. “Upwind.”
Thru the trees on the little bluff I can see downriver. I can see a thousand Violas looking frightened of me.
I can see a thousand Spackle with my knife killing them.
I can see a thousand Aarons looking back at me and calling me “Coward” with the worst smile you ever seen.
And beyond them, in a camp by the side of the river, I see an Aaron who ain’t looking back at me at all.
I see an Aaron kneeling down in prayer.
And I see Viola on the ground in front of him.
“Aaron,” Manchee barks.
“Aaron,” I say.
Coward.
“What are we gonna do?” says the boy, creeping up to my shoulder.
I raise my head from the cold river water and let it splash down my back. I stumbled back down from the bluff, elbowing my way thru crowds all calling me coward, and I got to the riverbank and I plunged my head straight in and now the cold is making me shake violently but it’s also calming the world down. I know it won’t last, I know the fever and spack blood infection will win in the end, but for now, I’m gonna need to see as clearly as possible.
“How are we gonna get to them?” the boy asks, moving round to my other side. “He’ll hear our Noise.”
The shivering makes me cough, everything makes me cough, and I spit out handfuls of green goo from my lungs, but then I hold my breath and plunge in my head again.
The cold of the water feels like a vice but I hold it there, hearing the bubbling of the water rushing by and the wordless barks of a worried Manchee hopping around my feet. I can feel the bandage on my head detach and wash away in the current. I think of Manchee wriggling the bandage off his tail in a different part of the river and I forget and I laugh underwater.
I lift my head up, choking and gasping and coughing more.
I open my eyes. The world shines like it shouldn’t and there are all kindsa stars out even tho the sun is still up but at least the ground has stopped floating and all the excess Aarons and Violas and Spackles are gone.
“Can we really do it alone?” asks the boy.
“Ain’t no choice,” I say to myself.
And I turn to look at him.
He’s got a brown shirt like mine, no scars on his head, a rucksack on his back, a book in one hand and a knife in the other. I’m shaking from the cold still and it’s all I can do to stand but I breathe and cough and shake and look at him.
“C’mon, Manchee,” I say and I head back across the burnt-out settlement, back to the bluff. Just walking is tough, like the ground could cave away at any minute, cuz I weigh more than a mountain but less than a feather, but I’m walking, I’m keeping walking, I’m keeping the bluff in sight, I’m reaching it, I’m taking the first steps up it, I’m taking the next steps, I’m grabbing on to branches to pull myself along, I’m reaching the top, I’m leaning against a tree at the top, and I’m looking out.
“Is it really him?” says the boy behind my ear.
I squint out across the trees, tracing my eye down the river.
And there’s still a campsite, still at the river’s edge, so far away they’re just specks against other specks. I still have Viola’s bag around my shoulders and I reach for her binos, holding ’em up to my eyes but shaking so much it’s hard to get a clear image. They’re far enough away that the wind’s covering up his Noise but I’m sure I feel her silence out there.
I’m sure of it.
“Aaron,” Manchee says. “Viola.”
So I know it’s not a shimmer and in the shakiness I can just about catch him still kneeling, praying some prayer, and Viola laid out on the ground in front of him.
I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know what he’s doing.
But it’s really them.
All this walking and stumbling and coughing and dying and it’s really really them, by God it’s really them.
I may not be too late and it’s only how my chest rises and my throat grips that I realize all along I’ve thought I was too late.
But I’m not.
I lean down again and (shut up) I cry, I cry, I’m crying but it has to pass cuz I have to figure it out, I have to figure it out, it’s down to me, there’s only me, I have to find a way, I have to save her, I have to save–
“What are we gonna do?” the boy asks again, standing a little way away, book still in one hand, knife in the other.
I put my palms into my eyes and rub hard, trying to think straight, trying to concentrate, trying not to listen–
“What if this is the sacrifice?” says the boy.
I look up. “What sacrifice?”
“The sacrifice you saw in his Noise,” he says. “The sacrifice of–”
“Why would he do it here?” I say. “Why would he come all this way and stop in the middle of a stupid forest and do it here?”
The boy’s expression doesn’t change. “Maybe he has to,” he says, “before she dies.”
I step forward and have to catch my balance. “Dies of what?” I say, my voice snappy, my head aching and buzzy again.
“Fear,” says the boy, taking a step backwards. “Disappointment.”
I turn away. “I ain’t listening to this.”
“Listening, Todd?” Manchee barks. “Viola, Todd. This way.”
I lean back again against the tree. I’ve got to think. I’ve got to ruddy think.
“We can’t approach,” I say, my voice thick. “He’ll hear us coming.”
“He’ll kill her if he hears us,” says the boy.
“Ain’t talking to you.” I cough up more gunk, which makes my head spin, which makes me cough more. “Talking to my dog,” I finally choke out.
“Manchee,” Manchee says, licking my hand.
“And I can’t kill him,” I say.
“You can’t kill him,” says the boy.
“Even if I want to.”
“Even if he deserves it.”
“And so there has to be another way.”
“If she’s not too scared to see you.”
I look at him again. Still there, still book and knife and rucksack.
“You need to leave,” I say. “You need to go away from me and never come back.”
“Yer probably too late to save her.”
“Yer of no use to me at all,” I say, raising my voice.
“But I’m a killer,” he says and the knife has blood on it.
I close my eyes and grit my teeth. “You stay behind,” I say. “You stay behind.”
“Manchee?” Manchee barks.
I open my eyes. The boy isn’t there. “Not you, Manchee,” I say, reaching out and rubbing his ears.
Then I regard him, Manchee. “Not you,” I say again.
And I’m thinking. In the clouds and the swirls and the shimmers and the lights and the ache and the buzz and the shaking and the coughing, I’m thinking.
And I’m thinking.
I rub the ears of my dog, my stupid goddam ruddy great dog that I never wanted but who hung around anyway and who followed me thru the swamp and who bit Aaron when he was trying to choke me and who found Viola when she was lost and who’s licking my hand with his little pink tongue and whose eye is still mostly squinted shut from where Mr Prentiss Jr kicked him and whose tail is way way sho
rter from when Matthew Lyle cut it off when my dog – my dog – went after a man with a machete to save me and who’s right there when I need pulling back from the darkness I fall into and who tells me who I am whenever I forget.
“Todd,” he murmurs, rubbing his face into my hand and thumping his back leg against the ground.
“I got an idea,” I say.
“What if it don’t work?” says the boy from behind the tree.
I ignore him and I pick up the binos again. Shaking still, I find Aaron’s campsite one more time and look at the area around it. They’re near the river’s edge and there’s a forked tree just this side of them along the riverbank, bleached and leafless, like it maybe once got struck by lightning.
It’ll do.
I put down the binos and take Manchee’s head in both hands. “We’re gonna save her,” I say, right to my dog. “Both of us.”
“Save her, Todd,” he barks, wagging his little stump.
“It won’t work,” says the boy, still outta sight.
“Then you should stay behind,” I say to the air, riding thru a cough while I send pictures of Noise to my dog to tell him what he needs to do. “It’s simple, Manchee. Run and run.”
“Run and run!” he barks.
“Good boy.” I rub his ears again. “Good boy.”
I pull myself to my feet and half-walk, half-slide, half-stumble my way back down the little bluff into the burnt-out settlement. There’s a thump in my head now, like I can hear my poisoned blood pumping, and everything in the world throbs with it. If I squeeze my eyes nearly shut, the swirling lights ain’t so bad and everything sort of stays in its place.
The first thing I need is a stick. Manchee and I tear thru the burnt-out buildings, looking for one the right size. Pretty much everything is black and crumbly but that suits me fine.
“Thith one, Thawd?” Manchee says, using his mouth to pull one about half the length of himself out from under what looks like a burnt-up pile of stacked chairs. What happened in this place?
“Perfect.” I take it from him.
“This won’t work,” the boy says, hiding in a dark corner. I can see the glint of the knife in one of his hands. “You won’t save her.”
“I will.” I break off some larger splinters from the stick. Only one end is blackened charcoal but that’s exactly what I want. “Can you carry this?” I say to Manchee, holding it out.
He takes it in his mouth, tosses it a little to get it comfortable, but then it rests just fine. “Yeth!” he barks.
“Great.” I stand up straight and nearly fall over. “Now we need a fire.”
“You can’t make a fire,” the boy says, already outside waiting for us. “Her fire-making box is broken.”
“You don’t know nothing,” I say, not looking at him. “Ben taught me.”
“Ben’s dead,” says the boy.
“Early one mor-r-ning,” I sing, loud and clear, making the whirly shapes of the world go spangly and weird, but I keep on singing. “Just as the sun was ri-i-sing.”
“Yer not strong enough to make a fire.”
“I heard a maiden call from the val-l-ley below.” I find a long, flat piece of wood and use the knife to carve a little hollow in it. “Oh, don’t dece-e-ive me.” I carve a rounded end to another smaller stick. “Oh, never le-e-ave me.”
“How could you use a poor maiden so?” the boy finishes.
I ignore him. I put the rounded end of the stick into the little hollow and start spinning it twixt my hands, pressing hard into the wood. The rhythm of it matches the thumping in my head and I start to see me in the woods with Ben, him and me racing to see who could get the first smoke. He always won and half the time I could never get any sorta fire at all. But those were times.
Those were times.
“C’mon,” I say to myself. I’m sweating and coughing and woozy but I’m making my hands keep on spinning. Manchee’s barking at the wood to try and help it along.
And then a little finger of smoke rises from the hollow.
“Ha!” I cry out. I protect it from the wind with my hand and blow on it to make it catch. I use some dried moss as kindling and when the first little flame shoots out it’s as near as I’ve come to joy since I don’t know when. I throw some small sticks on it, wait for them to catch, too, then some larger ones, and pretty soon there’s a real fire burning in front of me. A real one.
I leave it to burn for a minute. I’m counting on us being downwind to keep the smoke from Aaron.
And I’m counting on that wind for other reasons, too.
I lurch my way towards the riverbank, using tree trunks to keep me upright, till I make it to the dock. “C’mon, c’mon,” I say under my breath as I steady myself to walk down it. It creaks under my feet and once I nearly pitch over into the river but I do finally make it to the boat still tied there.
“It’ll sink,” says the boy, standing knee-high in the river.
I hop in the little boat and after a lot of wobbling and coughing, I stand up in it. It’s rickety and narrow and warping.
But it floats.
“You don’t know how to steer a boat.”
I get out and cross the dock and make my way back to the settlement and search round till I find a flat enough piece of wood to use as an oar.
And that’s all I need.
We’re ready.
The boy’s standing there, holding the things of mine in each hand, rucksack on his back, no real nothing on his face, no Noise that I can hear.
I stare him down. He don’t say nothing.
“Manchee?” I call but he’s already at my feet.
“Here, Todd!”
“Good boy.” We go to the fire. I take the stick he found and put the already burnt end into it. After a minute, the end is red hot and smoky, with flames catching on the new wood. “You sure you can hold this?” I say.
He takes the non-burning end into his maul and there he is, best ruddy dog in the universe, ready to carry fire to the enemy.
“Ready, friend?” I say.
“Weddy, Thawd!” he says, mouth full, tail wagging so fast I see it as a blur.
“He’ll kill Manchee,” the boy says.
I stand, world spinning and shining, my body barely my own, my lungs coughing up bits of themselves, my head thumping, my legs shaking, my blood boiling, but I stand.
I ruddy well stand.
“I am Todd Hewitt,” I say to the boy. “And I am leaving you here.”
“You can’t never do that,” he says, but I’m already turning to Manchee and saying “Go on, boy,” and he takes off back up the bluff and down the other side, burning stick in his mouth, and I count to a hundred, loud, so’s I can’t hear no one say nothing and then I make myself count to a hundred again and that’s enough and I lurch as fast as I can back to the dock and the boat and I get myself in and I take the oar onto my lap and I use the knife to cut away the last of the raggedy rope tying the little boat in place.
“You can’t never leave me behind,” the boy says, standing on the dock, book in one hand, knife in the other.
“Watch me,” I say and he gets smaller and smaller in the shimmering and fading light as the boat pulls away from the dock and starts making its way downstream.
Towards Aaron.
Towards Viola.
Towards whatever waits for me down the river.
There’s boats in Prentisstown but no one’s used ’em since I can remember. We got the river, sure, this same one that’s sloshing me back and forth, but our stretch is rocky and fast and when it does slow down and spread out, the only peaceful area is a marsh full of crocs. After that, it’s all wooded swamp. So I ain’t never been on a boat and even tho it looks like it should be easy to steer one down a river, it ain’t.
The one bit of luck I got is that the river here is pretty calm, despite some splashing from the wind. The boat drifts out into the current and is taken and moves its way downriver whether I do anything or not so I can put all my cou
ghing energy into trying to keep the boat from spinning around as it goes.
It takes a minute or two before I’m successful.
“Dammit,” I say under my breath. “Effing thing.”
But after some splashing with the oar (and one or two full spins, shut up) I’m figuring out how to keep it more or less pointed the right way and when I look up, I realize I’m probably already halfway there.
I swallow and shake and cough.
This is the plan. It’s probably not a very good one but it’s all that my shimmering, flickering brain’s gonna let me have.
Manchee’ll take the burning stick upwind of Aaron and drop it somewhere to catch fire and make Aaron think I’ve lit up my own campsite. Then Manchee’ll run back to Aaron’s campsite, barking up a storm, pretending he’s trying to tell me he’s found Aaron. This is simple since all he has to do is bark my name, which is what he does all the time anyway.
Aaron’ll chase him. Aaron’ll try to kill him. Manchee’ll be faster (Run and run, Manchee, run and run). Aaron’ll see the smoke. Aaron, who fears me not one tiny little bit, will go off into the woods towards the smoke to finish me off once and for all.
I’ll float downstream, come upon his campsite from the riverside while he’s out in the woods looking for me, and I’ll rescue Viola. I’ll pick up Manchee there, too, when he circles back round ahead of a chasing Aaron (run and run).
Yeah, okay, that’s the plan.
I know.
I know, but if it don’t work, then I’ll have to kill him.
And if it comes to that, it can’t matter what I become and it can’t matter what Viola thinks.
It can’t.
It’ll have to be done and so I’ll have to do it.
I take out the knife.
The blade still has dried blood smeared on it here and there, my blood, Spackle blood, but the rest of it still shines, shimmering and flickering, flickering and shimmering. The tip of it juts out and up like an ugly thumb and the serrashuns along one side spring up like gnashing teeth and the blade edge pulses like a vein full of blood.