With a gunshot wound bleeding from a hole in his chest–
“Nice shot,” the Mayor says.
“You did it,” I say, turning to him. “I told you to stay the hell outta my head!”
“Not even to save your life, Todd?” he says, firing his gun again and another Spackle falls.
I turn, gun raised–
They’re still coming–
I aim at a Spackle raising his bow at a soldier–
I fire–
But I pull it to the side on purpose at the last second, missing altogether (shut up)–
The Spackle jumps away, tho, so it worked–
“That’s not how you win wars, Todd!” the Mayor yells, firing his gun at the Spackle I missed, catching it in the chin and sending it sprawling–
“You have to choose,” the Mayor says, ranging his gun round, looking for the next thing to shoot. “You said you’d kill for her. Did you mean it?”
Then there’s another whisk sound–
And the worst squeal imaginable from Angharrad–
I turn round in the saddle–
She’s been hit in the back right flank with an arrow–
Boy colt! she yells. Boy COLT!
And I’m immediately reaching back to try and grab the arrow and not fall off from her leaping about at the pain of it and it snaps in two in my hand and I leave a broken bit stuck into her back leg and Boy colt! Boy colt! Todd! and I’m trying to calm her so she doesn’t throw me down into the heaving mass of soldiers all round us–
And that’s when it happens again–
WHOOMP!
A huge flash of light and I turn to look–
The Spackle have another fire weapon at the bottom of the hill.
The flames spill out from the top of the horned creacher and cut right thru the middle of the soldiers and men are screaming and burning and screaming and burning and soldiers are turning back and running and the line is breaking and Angharrad is bucking and bleeding and squealing and we’re slammed by a wave of men retreating and she bucks again and–
And I drop my gun–
And the fire expands out and up–
And men are running–
And smoke is everywhere–
And suddenly Angharrad spins free and we’re somehow in a place where no man stands, where the army is behind us and the Spackle are in front of us and I don’t got my gun and I don’t know where the Mayor is–
And the Spackle on the back of the horned creacher with the fire-making thing has seen us–
And he starts coming right towards us–
{VIOLA}
Bradley presses the screen on the remote device. The probe lifts lightly off the ground, straight up with almost no sound except a little zip. It hovers for a second, extends its wings, and then takes off for the city so fast you almost don’t see it go.
“Wow,” Mistress Coyle says under her breath. She looks back to Bradley. “And we’ll be able to see what’s happening?”
“And hear,” he says, “to a limited degree.”
He presses the remote again, dialling the screen with his thumb until a light flashes out the end of the remote device, projecting a three-dimensional picture that hangs in mid-air, lit up in bright greens because of night vision. Trees rush by, a flash of the road, a few blurs of tiny people running–
“How far is the city from here?” Bradley asks.
“Ten kilometres, maybe?” I say.
“Then it should almost be–”
And then the probe’s there, at the edge of the city, rushing over buildings burning where the Answer set them alight, rushing on over the ruins of the cathedral, rushing over crowds of townsfolk running in panic from the square–
“My God,” Simone whispers, turning to me. “Viola–”
“It’s still going,” Mistress Coyle says, watching.
It is still going, flying past the town square and down the main road.
“Brightest light source–” Bradley starts to say–
And then we see just exactly what the brightest light source is.
[TODD]
Men burning–
Everywhere–
The screaming–
And the terrible smell of cooked meat–
I gag in my throat–
And the Spackle’s riding right towards me–
He’s standing on the back of a horned creacher, his feet and lower legs strapped into boot-type things on either side of the saddle, letting him stand there without needing to balance–
And he’s got a burning torch in each hand and the u-shaped fire-making thing in front of him–
And I see his Noise–
I see me in his Noise–
I see me and Angharrad alone in the middle of an emptiness–
Her screaming and twisting with the broken arrow in her flank–
Me staring back at the Spackle–
Me without a gun–
And behind me is the weakest part of our line–
And I see the Spackle shooting the fire in his Noise and taking out me and the men behind me–
Leaving the Spackle an opening to come pouring into the city–
Their war won before it’s barely even started–
I grab Angharrad’s reins and try to move her but I can see the pain and fright shooting thru her Noise as she keeps calling out Boy colt! Todd! and it’s ripping my heart as she calls it and I wheel round trying to find the Mayor, trying to find anyone who’ll shoot the Spackle on the horned creacher–
But the Mayor ain’t nowhere I can see–
Hidden by smoke and panicking men–
And no one is lifting a gun–
And the Spackle is raising his torches to fire the weapon–
And I think, No–
I think, It can’t end this way–
I think, Viola–
I think, Viola–
And then I think, “Viola”?
Would it work on a Spackle?
And I sit up as high in the saddle as I can–
And I think about her riding away from me on Davy’s horse–
I think of her broken ankles–
I think of us saying we’d never part, not even in our heads–
I think of her fingers twirling round mine–
(I don’t think about what she’d say if she knew I let the Mayor go–)
I just think Viola–
I think Viola–
Right at the Spackle on the horned creacher–
I think–
VIOLA!
And the Spackle’s head jerks back, dropping both torches and falling backwards over the horned creacher, slipping outta the boots and onto the ground, and the horned creacher turns from the sudden shift in weight, stumbling back into the line of advancing Spackle, knocking ’em this way and that–