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.
“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 offence 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 torch 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 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 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 had.” 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 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?”