“I’ve been running from the army,” Ben says, hands still in the air. “Look at me. Do I look like a well-tended soldier? I haven’t told them anything. I’ve been on the run, looking for my . . .” He pauses and I know the reason. “For my son,” he says.
“You did this knowing the law?” Doctor Snow asks.
“I know the law,” Ben says. “How could I possibly not know the law?”
“What ruddy LAW?” I yell. “What the hell is everyone talking about?”
“Todd is innocent,” Ben says. “You can search his Noise for as long as you like and you won’t find anything to say I’m lying.”
“You can’t trust them,” says the beard, still looking down his gun. “You know you can’t.”
“We don’t know anything,” Doctor Snow says. “Not for ten years or more.”
“We know they’ve raised themselves into an army,” says the birthmark.
“Yes, but I don’t see any crime in this boy,” Doctor Snow says. “Do you?”
A dozen different Noises come poking at me like sticks.
He turns to Viola. “And all the girl is guilty of is a lie that saved her friend’s life.”
Viola looks away from me, face still red with anger.
“And we’ve got bigger problems,” Doctor Snow continues. “An army coming that may or may not know all about how we’re preparing to meet them.”
“We ain’t SPIES!” I shout.
But Doctor Snow is turning to the other men. “Take the boy and the girl back into town. The girl can go with the women and the boy is well enough to fight alongside us.”
“Wait a minute!” I yell.
Doctor Snow turns to Ben. “And though I do believe you’re just a man out looking for his son, the law’s the law.”
“Is that your final ruling?” the beard says.
“If the eldermen agree,” Doctor Snow says. There’s a general but reluctant nodding of heads, all serious and curt. Doctor Snow looks at me. “I’m sorry, Todd.”
“Hold on!” I say, but the birthmark’s is already stepping forward and grabbing my arm. “Let go of me!”
Another man’s grabbing on to Viola and she’s resisting just as much as I am.
“Ben!” I call, looking back at him. “Ben!”
“Go, Todd,” he says.
“No, Ben!”
“Remember I love you.”
“What’re they gonna do?” I say, still pulling away from the birthmark’s hand. I turn to Doctor Snow. “What’re you gonna do?”
He don’t say nothing but I can see it in his Noise.
What the law demands.
“The HELL you are!” I yell and with my free arm I’m already reaching for my knife and bringing it round towards the birthmark’s hand, slicing it across the top. He yelps and lets go.
“Run!” I say to Ben. “Run, already!”
I see Viola biting the hand of the man who’s grabbing her. He calls out and she stumbles back.
“You, too!” I say to her. “Get outta here!”
“I wouldn’t,” says the beard and there are rifles cocking all over the place.
The birthmark is cursing and he raises his arm to strike but I’ve got my knife out in front of me. “Try it,” I say thru my teeth. “Come on!”
“ENOUGH!” Doctor Snow yells.
And in the sudden silence that follows, we hear the hoofbeats.
Thump budda-thump budda-thump.
Horses. Five of ’em. Ten. Maybe even fifteen.
Roaring down the road like the devil hisself is on their tail.
“Scouts?” I say to Ben tho I know they ain’t.
He shakes his head. “Advance party.”
“They’ll be armed,” I say to Doctor Snow and the men, thinking fast. “They’ll have as many guns as you.”
Doctor Snow’s thinking, too. I can see his Noise whirring, see him thinking how much time they’ve got before the horses get here, how much trouble me and Ben and Viola are going to cause, how much time we’ll waste.
I see him decide.
“Let them go.”
“What?” says the beard, his Noise itching to shoot something. “He’s a traitor and a murderer.”
“And we’ve got a town to protect,” Doctor Snow says firmly. “I’ve got a son to keep safe. So do you, Fergal.”
The beard frowns but says nothing more.
Thump budda-thump budda-thump comes the sound from the road.
Doctor Snow turns to us. “Go,” he says. “I can only hope you haven’t sealed our fate.”
“We haven’t,” I say, “and that’s the truth.”
Doctor Snow purses his lips. “I’d like to believe you.” He turns to the men. “Come on!” he shouts. “Get to your posts! Hurry!”
The group of men breaks up, scurrying back to Carbonel Downs, the beard and the birthmark still seething at us as they go, looking for a reason to use their guns, but we don’t give ’em one. We just watch ’em go.
I find I’m shaking a little.
“Holy crap,” Viola says, bending at the waist.
“We gotta get outta here,” I say. “The army’s gonna be more interested in us than it is in them.”
I still have Viola’s bag with me, tho all it’s got in it any more are a few clothes, the water bottles, the binos and my ma’s book, still in its plastic bag.
All the things we got in the world.
Which means we’re ready to go.
“This is only gonna keep happening,” Ben says. “I can’t come with you.”
“Yes, you can,” I say. “You can leave later but we’re going now and yer coming with us. We ain’t leaving you to be caught by no army.” I look over to Viola. “Right?”
She puts her shoulders back and looks decisive. “Right,” she says.
“That’s settled then,” I say.
Ben looks back and forth twixt the two of us. He furrows his brow. “Only till I know yer safe.”
“Too much talking,” I say. “Not enough running.”
We stay off the river road for obvious reasons and tear thru the trees, heading, as always, towards Haven, snapping thru twigs and branches, getting away from Carbonel Downs as fast as our legs can carry us.
It’s not ten minutes before we hear the first gunshots.