Chaos Walking: The Complete Trilogy (142 page)

{V
IOLA
}

“He’s taken
all
the credit!” Mistress Coyle shouts, stomping around the healing room of the scout ship as we fly back. “He had them eating out of his
hands
!”

“You’re not even going to
try
the cure?” Bradley says.

Mistress Coyle looks at him like he’s just asked her to take off all her clothes. “You honestly think he just
discovered
it? He’s had it all along! If it’s even a cure at all and not another little time bomb.”

“But why would he do that,” Bradley says, “if curing all the women makes him even more popular?”

“He’s a genius,” Mistress Coyle says, still ranting. “Even I have to admit that. He’s a bloody, terrible, savage, brutal genius.”

“What do
you
think, Viola?” Lee asks from the next bed.

I can only cough by way of answer. Mistress Coyle stepped in front of me when the Mayor tried to give me the new bandages and refused to let him touch me with them until she and the other mistresses tested them thoroughly first.

And the crowds booed her, actually
booed
.

Especially when the Mayor brought up three women with bands. Three women with no signs of infection at all. “We haven’t figured out a way to remove the bands safely yet,” the Mayor said, “but the early results are obvious.”

Things kind of disintegrated from there and Mistress Coyle didn’t even get to give her speech, though they probably would have kept booing her anyway. After we got off the cart, Todd said he didn’t know any more than we did. “Mistress Coyle can do her tests,” he said to me, “and I’ll see what I can find out.”

But he was gripping my arms tight, whether in hope or fear, I don’t know.

Because I couldn’t hear him.

The rest of us finally went back to the scout ship, Mistress Lawson coming with us to help test the Mayor’s cure.

“I don’t know what to believe,” I say now, “only that it
would
be in his interests to save us.”

“So we have to base our decision on what suits him best?” Mistress Coyle says. “Brilliant, just brilliant.”

“
We’re coming in for a landing,
” Simone says over the comm system.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” Mistress Coyle says. “When we’re on that council together, he’ll learn that his days of out-manoeuvring me are
over
.” There’s a judder as we touch down. “And now,” she says, her voice burning with heat, “I’ve got my own speech to give.”

Before the engines are even properly off, she’s marched out of the room, down the bay door and into the crowds that wait for us, crowds I can see on the monitors.

She’s greeted by a few cheers.

But only a few.

And nothing at all like what the Mayor got back in town.

And then this crowd, led by Ivan and other voices, begins to boo her, too.

[T
ODD
]

“
Why
would I harm the women?” the Mayor says to me across the campfire, as night begins to fall on his day of glory. “Even if you still somehow believe I’m bent on killing every one of them, why would I do it
now
at my moment of biggest triumph?”

“Why didn’t you tell me, tho?” I say. “That you were so close to a cure?”

“Because I didn’t want to risk your disappointment if I failed.”

He looks at me for a long time, trying to read me, but I’m so good at it now I don’t think even
he
can hear me.

“Can I make a guess at what you believe?” he finally says. “I think you want to get that cure to Viola as soon as possible. I think you’re worried Mistress Coyle won’t move fast enough on her tests because she won’t want me to be right.”

And I do think this. I
do
.

I want the cure to be true so bad I could almost choke.

But it’s the Mayor.

But it could save Viola.

But it’s the
Mayor–

“I also think you want to believe me,” he says. “That I’d really do this for real. If not for her, then for you.”

“Me?” I say.

“I think I’ve figured out your special talent, Todd Hewitt. Something that should have been obvious from the behaviour of my son.”

My stomach tenses, with anger, with grief, like it always does when Davy’s mentioned.

“You made him better,” the Mayor continues, his voice soft. “You made him smarter and kinder and more aware of the world and his place in it.” He sets down his coffee cup. “And whether I like it or not, you’ve done the same for me.”

And there’s that faint
hum–

Connecting us–

(but I know it’s there and it ain’t affecting me–)

(it ain’t–)

“I regret what happened with David,” he says.

“You shot him,” I say. “It weren’t nothing that just
happened
.”

He nods. “I regret it more with every passing day. With every day that I’m with
you,
Todd. Every day, you make me better. Knowing that I’ve got you to watch what I do.” He lets out a sigh. “Even today, in what is arguably the greatest victory I’ve ever had, my first thought was,
What will Todd think?
”

He gestures to the darkening sky above us. “This world, Todd,” he says. “This world and how it
talks,
how loud its voice is.” He drifts a little, his eyes unfocused. “Sometimes it’s all you can hear, as it tries to make you disappear into it, to make you
nothing
.” He’s almost whispering now. “But then I hear
your
voice, Todd, and it brings me back.”

I don’t know what he’s talking about, so I just ask, “Have you had the cure for the bands all this time? Have you just been holding it back?”

“No,” he says. “I’ve been having my men work round the clock so I could save Viola for
you,
Todd. To show you how much you’ve come to mean to me.” His voice is forceful now, almost emoshunal. “You’ve
redeemed
me, Todd Hewitt. Redeemed me when no one else would have thought it possible.” He smiles again. “Or even desirable.”

I still don’t say nothing. Cuz he ain’t redeemable. Viola even said so.

But–

“They’ll test it,” he says. “They’ll find it’s a cure, and then you’ll see that I tell you the truth. It’s so important, I won’t even ask you to trust me.”

He waits again for me to say something. I still don’t.

“And now,” he says, slapping his hands on his thighs, “it’s time to start preparing for our first council meeting.”

He gives me a final look, then heads back into his tent. I get up after a minute and go over to Angharrad, tethered with Juliet’s Joy by my own tent, eating her heart’s delight of hay and apples.

She saved Viola’s life up on that hill. I ain’t never forgetting that.

And now the Mayor’s offering to do it down here.

And I wish I could believe him. I
want
to.

(
redeemed–)

(but how far–?)

Boy colt
, Angharrad says, nuzzling my chest.

Submit!
Juliet’s Joy snaps, her eyes wide.

And before I can say anything, Angharrad snaps back
SUBMIT!
even louder.

And Juliet’s Joy lowers her head.

“Girl!”
I say, with amazement. “
That’s
my girl.”

Boy colt
, she says, and I hold onto her, feeling her warmth, her fuggy horse smell tickling my nose.

I hold onto her and I think about redempshun.

{V
IOLA
}

“You are
not
going to be on the council with the Spackle, Ivan,” Mistress Coyle says, Ivan clomping in behind her into the scout ship. “And you are
not
allowed in here.”

It’s the day after we came back from town, and I’m
still
on my bed, feeling worse than ever, the fever not responding at all to Mistress Lawson’s newest combination of antibiotics.

Ivan stands there a moment, looking defiantly at Mistress Coyle, at me, at Lee on the other bed, at Mistress Lawson where she’s removing Lee’s final bandages. “You’re still acting like you’re in charge here, Mistress,” Ivan says.

“I
am
in charge here,
Mr
Farrow,” Mistress Coyle seethes back at him. “As far as I know, no one’s appointed you their new Mistress.”

“Is that why people are returning to the town in droves?” he says. “Is that why half the women are already a-taking the Mayor’s new cure?”

Mistress Coyle spins round to Mistress Lawson. “
What?
”

“I only gave it to the dying, Nicola,” Mistress Lawson says, slightly sheepish. “If you have to choose between certain death and possible death, it’s no choice at all.”

“It’s not just the dying now,” Ivan says. “Not when the rest saw how well it works.”

Mistress Coyle ignores him. “And you didn’t
tell
me?”

Mistress Lawson looks down. “I knew how upset you’d be. I’ve tried to talk the others out of it–”

“Your own mistresses are doubting your authority,” Ivan says.

“You shut your mouth, Ivan Farrow,” Mistress Lawson barks.

Ivan licks his lips, sizing us all up again, and then he leaves, heading back to the crowd outside.

Mistress Lawson immediately starts apologizing. “Nicola, I’m so sorry–”

“No,” Mistress Coyle stops her. “You were right, of course. Those worst off, those who had nothing to lose . . .” She rubs her forehead. “Are people really going back to town?”

“Not as many as he said,” Mistress Lawson says. “But some.”

Mistress Coyle shakes her head. “He’s winning.”

And we all know she means the Mayor.

“You’ve still got the council,” I say. “You’ll be better at that than he is.”

She shakes her head again. “He’s probably planning something right now.” She sighs out through her nose, and then she leaves, too, without another word.

“He won’t be the only one planning something,” Lee says.

“And we’ve seen how well her plans have worked in the past,” I say.

“You two hush up,” Mistress Lawson snaps. “A lot of people are alive today because of her.”

She tears the last bandage off Lee’s face with more vigour than is strictly necessary. Then she bites her bottom lip and glances up at me. Over the bridge of Lee’s nose, there’s just bright pink scar tissue where his eyes used to be, the sockets covered now with livid skin, the blue eyes that used to look back gone for ever.

Lee can hear our silences. “Is it that bad?”

“Lee–” I start to say, but his Noise says he isn’t ready and he changes the subject.

“Are you going to take the cure?” he asks.

And I see all the feelings he has for me right at the front of his Noise. Pictures of me, too. Way more beautiful than I ever could be.

But the way he’ll see me for ever now.

“I don’t know,” I say.

And I really
don’t
know. I’m not getting better, not at all, and the convoy is still weeks away, if they’ll even be able to help when they get here.
Fatal,
I keep thinking, and now it doesn’t just feel like Mistress Coyle trying to scare me. I wonder if I’m one of those women Mistress Lawson mentioned who have to choose between certain death and possible death.

“I don’t know,” I say again.

“Viola?” Wilf says, appearing in the doorway.

“Ah,”
Lee says, his Noise reaching out to Wilf’s, almost unwillingly seeing what Wilf’s seeing–

Seeing his own scarred eyes.

“Phew,”
he whistles, but you can hear the nervousness, the fake bravery. “That’s not so bad. You two made it seem like I was practically Spackle.”

“Ah brought Acorn back from town,” Wilf says to me. “Stabled him wi’ my oxes.”

“Thank you, Wilf,” I say.

He nods. “And young Lee there,” he says. “If ya ever need me to see for ya, ya just gotta say.”

There’s a flood of surprised and touched feeling in Lee’s Noise, bright enough for Wilf to see his answer.

“Hey, Wilf?” I say, getting an idea, one that feels better by the second.

“Yeh?” he says.

“How would like you be on the new council?”

[T
ODD
]

“It’s a ruddy
great
idea,” I say, watching Viola’s face in my comm. “Every time they wanna do something stupid, Wilf won’t even say no, he’ll just say what we should obviously do instead.”

“That’s what I thought,”
she says and doubles up coughing again.

“How are them tests coming along?” I say.

“The women who’ve taken it haven’t shown any problems so far, but Mistress Coyle wants to do more checks.”

“She ain’t never gonna approve it, is she?”

Viola don’t disagree.
“What do
you
think about it?”

I take a long deep breath. “I don’t trust him,” I say, “no matter how much he says he’s redeemed.”

“He says that?”

I nod.

“Well, that’s exactly the kind of thing he
would
say.”

“Yeah.”

She waits for me to say more.
“But?”

I look back into her eyes, back thru the comm to her, there, on the hilltop, on this same world as me but so far away. “He seems to
need
me, Viola. I don’t know why, but it’s like I’m important to him somehow.”

“He called you his son once before, when we were fighting him. Said you had power.”

I nod. “I don’t trust him to do any of this outta the goodness of the heart he ain’t got.” I swallow. “But I think he’d do it to get me on his side.”

“Is that enough reason to risk it?”

“Yer dying,” I say, and then keep talking cuz she’s already talking over me. “Yer dying and yer lying to me that yer not and if something happened to you, Viola, if something
happened–
”

My throat chokes up hard, like I really can’t breathe.

And I can’t say nothing more for a second.