The Sacrifice (4 page)

‘I’m not a coward! I’ll
show you I’m not.’

But everyone could see just how scared he
was.

It had all been really heavy and it had
thrown Sam. He’d felt safe here. Something he never thought he’d feel again
in the awful hours after being taken from the Waitrose car park.
That night had been so extreme, so utterly terrifying, he’d already shut it away
in some secret part of his brain. It was a film. It hadn’t really happened. To
even touch on those memories would send him crazy.

The Tower had been a magical place. Properly
safe. It was a real castle, built to keep out armies of knights. The walls were high and
thick, there were always guards patrolling the walls, there was even the moat full of
water. Grown-ups didn’t stand a chance of getting in. The thought of living like
someone from the Middle Ages had thrilled him at first … 

But he’d read enough about the Middle
Ages to know that they were a time of violence and uncertainty.

Out there, where Brendan was going, was the
real world. The world Sam would have to go back into if he was ever going to see his
sister again.

On the other side of the open ground stood
the ticket offices. The group of kids stopped and Brendan’s hands were untied. A
girl ran up to him and threw her arms round him. Sam remembered what it was like at
primary school when all the Year Six kids left, the hugs and tears in the playground,
the weeping and wailing.

‘She loves him dearly,’ said The
Kid. The girl let go of Brendan and returned to her friends. ‘But she don’t
love him enough to go with him. Poor show.’

They watched as Brendan turned to shout
something at Jordan. One of the guards levelled his halberd at him. Brendan spat on the
ground and strode off past the ticket offices.

‘Not that way, Brendan,’ Ed
muttered to himself. ‘Not the no-go zone, you idiot.’

‘Well,’ said The Kid, ‘I
guess that’s the last we’ll see of him. Tutty-bye, old fruit.’

Ed shook his head. ‘I still think
Jordan’s gone too far. He’s going to make himself some enemies if he carries
on like this.’

They were distracted by a shout and laughter
from the kids below who were working in the moat. A girl had slipped over and was
covered from head to toe in filth, her hair over her face like strands of seaweed. When
Sam looked back over towards the ticket offices, Brendan had disappeared. It was as if
nothing had happened. Life went on as normal.

If only Ella was here
, Sam thought.
Instead of halfway across London.

‘What are they doing down there
playing silly buggers in the moat?’ The Kid asked.

‘Trying to get rid of the
water,’ Ed explained. ‘We need to drain it so that we can grow food again.
It’s a good wide strip of land and well protected. We used to grow everything we
needed there.’

‘Where did all the water come from
then?’ Sam asked.

‘The Thames.’ Ed nodded towards
the flat grey waters of the river that ran directly alongside the tower. ‘We
can’t do anything to stop it rising. There used to be a barrier, well, there still
is one, but it’s useless now.’

‘What?’ said Sam. ‘You
mean to stop the water getting in the moat?’

‘No. To stop the river flooding
everywhere.’

‘That’s the Thames
Barrier,’ said Sam. ‘I’ve heard of it, but I never knew what it
did.’

‘It was lowered whenever there was a
tidal surge from the North Sea, otherwise London would have always been flooding.
It’s not far downstream of here. There’s no one to operate it now, of
course, and no power even if there was. Every now and then we get a really high tide and
the water overflows the banks. The last one flooded the moat. It had been dry for two
hundred years before that. The
level drops a little every day and
we’re working to bail it out. It’s only a matter of time before it happens
again, though. And with the moat flooded we can’t grow so much food so the
scavenging parties have to go out more often and they have to go further each time.
It’s getting dangerous. The Pathfinders are really busy.’

‘What’s Pathfinders?’ Sam
asked.

‘When we got here, Jordan Hordern
arranged everyone into military units.’

‘Was there no one here before you came
then?’ said Sam.

‘There
were
some kids, but
they weren’t very well organized. Jordan took over from their guy – the one at the
trial yesterday, half-Japanese guy? Tomoki?’

‘Oh yeah, I remember him.’

‘It was Jordan who really got this
place together,’ Ed went on. ‘He figured there was loads to be done, but
that most kids wouldn’t want to do the crappy jobs like cooking and cleaning and
washing-up.’

‘Too true,’ said The Kid.
‘I would not want to join the royal washer-uppers. Not in any way, shape or form.
No siree. That would not suit The Kid, thank you, madam.’

‘Exactly,’ Ed laughed.
‘But Jordan figured that if he made everything like in the army people
wouldn’t mind so much. He put everybody into regiments. The idea was that each
regiment would be proud of what they did and no regiment would be any more important
than another. It works pretty well. Boys and girls are mixed up so that nothing’s
seen as being either girls’ work or boys’ work, either.’

‘Have you got officers and everything
then?’ Sam asked.

‘Sure. Each regiment has its own
captain and each captain is equal.’

‘Are you a captain?’ asked
Sam.

‘Yeah, I’m Captain of the Tower
Guard.’ Ed said this casually, but Sam could tell he liked being an officer.

‘I want to be in your regiment,’
said The Kid. ‘Don’t want to be in the kitchen rattling them pots and pans,
thanks all the same, don’t mind if I don’t. Not one time, for the money, not
two times, not three times, not any time. The Kid is not for cleaning.’

Ed shook his head and chuckled. ‘Yeah,
well, Jordan carefully chose the names of the regiments to sound more exciting than
cooking or cleaning or, I don’t know, maintenance. The kids down there –’ he
nodded towards the moat – ‘they’re Sappers. Anything that needs to be built
or demolished or repaired is down to them. Anything inside the buildings – furniture,
weapons, clothes, books, tools, firewood, whatever – is the responsibility of the
Armourers. The Engineers look after anything mechanical and the Service Corps deal with
all the food. Finding it, cooking it and growing it. The only other non-fighting unit is
the Medical Corps, who you’ve already met.

‘Then we’ve got three combat
regiments, each with its own captain. The Tower Watch, the Tower Guard and the
Pathfinders. The Tower Watch are a sort of police force; they deal with any problems
inside the castle. That’s Tomoki’s regiment. As I say, I’m Captain of
the Tower Guard. Our job is to defend the castle and patrol the nearby streets.’
Ed pointed out a boy and girl standing on the walls below, scanning the area with
binoculars.

‘We’ve got troops on look-out
duty on the walls, the towers and the gatehouses all day and night.’ As Ed was
speaking, the two look-outs waved up to him. The girl then nudged her friend and started
talking excitedly to him, throwing looks back up at Sam and The Kid. Sam
noticed a look of irritation on Ed’s face, and when he carried on speaking, he
sounded distracted.

‘We also organize all the
training,’ he said. ‘So you’ll be seeing quite a bit of me. Everyone
has to do at least an hour of military training and exercise every day.’

‘Cool.’ Sam was excited. Maybe
he’d get his own sword and armour. ‘So what do the Pathfinders do
then?’ he asked.

‘They go out on the streets, guarding
the forage parties and exploring.’ Ed rattled this off quickly, like he wanted to
be done with it. Something was annoying him and Sam wondered if it was his fault, if he
was asking too many questions. Ed glanced back to the two look-outs, who were still
looking up in their direction and discussing something, like two bystanders at the scene
of a car crash.

‘Keep your eyes looking
outwards!’ Ed suddenly shouted, and they guiltily went back to what they were
supposed to be doing. Ed muttered something under his breath.

‘Come on,’ he said, walking
across to the stairs. ‘I want to show you something.’

He led the way down to ground level and they
emerged at the bottom of the tower.

‘As you can see, we’ve got an
inner wall and an outer wall.’ Ed seemed more comfortable down here. ‘And
they both have sort of houses built into them. This road runs between them, all the way
round.’

Sam and The Kid looked down the cobbled road
that curved between high walls on either side.

‘It’s called Mint Street,’
Ed explained. ‘The buildings in the outer wall used to be where they had the Royal
Mint. You know, where they made all our money in the olden days? Afterwards they were
converted into homes called Casemates for the people who worked here. You’ve been
staying in the sick-bay, but now we’re sure you’re OK
you can move into one of the Casemates. Most of us live there. Except Jordan, who lives
in the Queen’s House on Tower Green where the governor used to live. You’ll
be OK here. If it was safe enough for the Royal Mint it’ll be safe enough for you
two shrimps.’

‘Look after the pennies and The Kid
will look after himself,’ said The Kid.

Ed didn’t take them down Mint Street,
however; instead he started walking along the road that joined it, Water Lane, which
took them past the riverside wall of the castle.

‘That’s the Bloody Tower to your
left and Traitor’s Gate to your right,’ he said. ‘But we’re
going to the old pub.’

They soon arrived at one of the buildings
set into the outer wall where a petrol-driven generator was set up outside a window.

Ed gave it a friendly slap. ‘When we
found this, it was the Engineers’ job to get it up and running. They scrounge
petrol from abandoned cars. They’re also collecting any usable cars they find and
we’re starting to clear the nearby roads. The plan is that we might one day be
able to drive around here.’

Ed unlocked a large wooden door using a key
from the ring that hung at his belt. He pushed the door open and the kids followed him
inside.

On all the walls there were old regimental
badges, flags and photographs of previous occupants of the Tower. At one end was a bar,
still well stocked with drinks.

‘This used to be for all the people
who lived and worked here,’ Ed explained. ‘We use it as
our
social
centre now. Once a week they fire up the generator and we get to chill out with electric
lights, music and DVDs. What do you think of that?’

There was a big flat-screen TV on one side of
the room, with chairs lined up in front of it. Sam and The Kid grinned like greedy
idiots in a sweet shop. They’d thought they’d never get to watch movies
again.

‘Sit down.’

Ed got a couple of cans of Coke from behind
the bar and gave them to the little kids. Even though the Coke was warm they drank
greedily. It tasted unbelievably sweet.

Ed sat next to them. He looked serious.

‘There’s something I need to
talk to you about,’ he said.

‘What?’ Sam’s heart was
racing, whether it was because of the Coke or because Ed was making him nervous, he
couldn’t tell.

‘I wasn’t sure whether to say
anything about it.’ Ed’s voice was quiet and calm, like an adult giving bad
news. ‘But, well, people are talking, word’s got around and I’d rather
you heard it from me than someone else.’

Ed stared at his trainers. ‘I used to
go to a boarding school down in Kent called Rowhurst,’ he said. ‘When it all
kicked off, we were stuck there. One of us, a boy called Matt, was hiding out in the
school chapel and got carbon-monoxide poisoning from burning a load of stuff to keep
warm. He went weird. Started seeing visions and got God in a big way, a big weird way.
He made up his own sort of crazy religion. Got obsessed by this kind of god he invented
called the Lamb, said the Lamb was going to save us all, and he made this ridiculous
banner, with two boys on it. The Lamb and the Goat, he called them. One was fair-haired,
the other kinda dark. It was some sort of yin and yang thing, if you know what I mean,
which you probably don’t. Good and evil. Something like that. I never could make
much sense of it. Nobody could except Mad Matt. And the thing is, when you two first
appeared here, strolling down the road in the rain, the thing is … well, you
looked exactly like the picture on Matt’s banner. And people have been joking that
you’re the Lamb and the Goat.’

‘Baaaaa,’ said Sam, copying
Kyle.

‘Yeah. Baa is right. I mean, you must
have noticed kids talking, like those two up on the wall?’

‘Yeah,’ said Sam. ‘I thought
it was just because we were new.’

‘No. It’s freaking some kids
out, some of the ones who knew Matt. We all headed into town together, met up with
Jordan Hordern and his crew at the Imperial War Museum. Then a load of us came
here.’

‘So you’re saying some people
actually think we might be this lamb and goat?’ said Sam.

‘Baby goat,’ said The Kid.

‘What?’ Ed looked confused.

‘I’m The Kid, ain’t I? The
baby goat.’

‘Yeah,’ said Sam, ‘but
admit it, Kid, we’re not gods, are we?’

‘Speak for yourself,
maggot.’

‘Well, I’m not gonna start
worshipping you, you worm!’

‘OK, OK.’ Ed held up his hands.
‘I just thought I ought to let you know, all right? Because someone’s bound
to say something. Like Kyle did. So come on then, we’ll carry on with the
tour.’

They left the bar. Ed locked up and they
went through the inner wall and up towards the White Tower. There were kids busy tending
to the makeshift raised beds with wooden sides that covered much of the paved areas. The
famous Tower of London ravens were pecking about between them. Big and black and
mangy.