The August Five Part 16

"You don't know that!" Tamsin protested. Leader ... worthy of legends. Her father had said something similar during her visit to the compound.

"Please stop this madness and leave with me," Gavin said.

"We need a leader worthy of legend," Tamsin insisted. She leaned down and slipped the knife into her boot, but for the first time since the plan took shape in her mind, the path suddenly wasn't as clear.

"Why people do things is as important as what they do," Gavin said.

"Get out of my way," Tamsin said, trying to sound tough.

"Your father told me that he was willing to sacrifice you," Gavin said. "Bury you young in the green fields of Aeren. He wanted them to sing songs about it. It was all about him, Tamsin."

Tamsin hesitated. She thought about Eliza and her other sisters. How she would feel if it had been them in the warehouse in Port Kenney. Little Iris tucked behind the workbench, holding the match, waiting to be consumed by fire. The image infuriated her. Why hadn't her father felt that same revulsion at the thought of her death? But then she remembered Michael Henry with his hands chained to a rough-hewn table. She imagined him blindfolded in front of a wall as an executioner readied his gun. Her father was powerless, but she was not.

Gavin was watching her carefully, and she could see hope in his eyes. He thought she'd changed her mind. But she pushed past him and went to retrieve Tommy Sh.o.r.e.

21.

WHEN EMILIE GOT BACK to the table, she seemed angry. She kept glancing at the kitchen door while Tommy put on his coat. Over her protests, he laid enough coin on the table to pay for two meals.

"Do you still want to go?" he asked. He really wanted to see Mrs. Trueblood, but Emilie was a strange girl. When they were talking earlier, it was more like an interview than a conversation. And now she seemed jumpy and ready to bolt.

"Yes," she said. "Definitely."

The pub was less crowded now, and as they headed to the door, Tommy could feel the eyes of the other patrons watching them. Maybe everyone here knew everyone else, so he stood out as a stranger. Whatever the reason, he'd had enough of being stared at for one night. He was happy when they left the pub and headed out into the darkened streets.

"See how the lights flicker?" Emilie asked, pointing to the gaslight at the end of the street. "It always happens at this hour. The lanterns are about to run out of fuel."

"It's creepy," Tommy said, watching the light dance along the sides of the buildings and wooden fences. It looked like the shadows of monsters skulking down the muddy road.

"Better than that horrific glare from the autolights in your section of the city," Emilie said. "How do you sleep with that harsh light coming through your window at night?"

"Curtains," he said. He didn't agree with Tamsin that the oppressive darkness of the nighttime was better. He was sure he was going to twist an ankle in a pothole as they navigated the rutted street.

"Where does Mrs. Trueblood live?" Tommy asked.

"A few blocks south," Emilie said. "I should warn you, Tommy, it's not in a nice area. And that's part of my motivation for bringing you to see her, even though it's so late."

"What do you mean?"

"She's not doing very well. She's having a hard time making ends meet. I thought maybe you could help her."

"I can if she'll let me," Tommy said.

"Let's not give her a chance to ask," Emilie said. "We'll show up at her door and surprise her."

"Will she mind us coming this late?" Tommy wondered.

"She's going to be so happy to see you," Emilie said. "I promise you-she won't mind."

"If she's in Sevenna, I guess she hasn't received my letters," Tommy said. "I've been sending them to Black Rock. Do you know why she came here? She always hated the city."

"She came for work, like the rest of us," Emilie said.

"Mrs. Trueblood was really close to my mother." Tommy continued talking, mainly to fill the silence. "She went to work for the Sh.o.r.es when my mother married into the family. She was with my mother when I was born and she was holding my mother's hand when she died."

"How did your mother die?" Emilie asked.

Tommy was surprised by her blunt question. Among the Zunft, it would have been considered rude to question someone about something that personal. Tommy wasn't sure what to say. He really didn't want to tell Emilie what had happened to his mother.

"It's a horrible story," Tommy said. "I shouldn't have brought it up."

Emilie stopped in the middle of the street. "But you did."

"It's not appropriate for me to talk about it with you," Tommy said.

"Please don't tell me that a cottager killed your mother," Emilie said.

Tommy was stunned. How had Emilie figured that out from the brief conversation? "He was a man who wasn't in his right mind. It wasn't political."

"But he was a cottager," Emilie persisted.

"Yes, he was," Tommy said. "He'd broken into the house at some point in the night and hidden behind the curtains. When my brother and I came into the room, he attacked us with a knife. He sliced me across my back-I still have the scar. My mother threw herself on him so he couldn't get at me again. He stabbed her ten times before the doorman overpowered him."

"I grew up near you," Emilie said. "How could I never have heard about this?"

Tommy shrugged. "It happened at our town house in Sevenna when I was three. But she died on Aeren. She insisted on it. The doctors said she would bleed to death on the ferry, but she didn't. They carried her to the house, she asked for Mrs. Trueblood, and less than an hour later, she was gone."

"She died for you," Emilie said. "She wanted you to live so badly that she was willing to die for you."

"I don't remember it," Tommy said. "And honestly, I don't remember her that well anymore, but Mrs. Trueblood always told me that Bern and I were the joy of her life. She loved us more than life itself."

"By the fields of Aeren, I am struck down," Emilie whispered.

Tommy glanced over at her. "I know that song," he said. "King of Grief with golden crown / By the fields of Aeren..."

"I am struck down," Emilie finished for him. "Do you know the rest of it?"

"I thought that was the end," Tommy said.

"The candle was lit / The fire dimmed but did not die / The world will never be the same," Emilie sang softly.

"You have a pretty voice," Tommy told her. Emilie stared at the ground and he couldn't tell if she was pleased with the compliment or not.

"Go on with your story," she said.

"Oh, there wasn't anything more to tell," Tommy told her. "Mrs. Trueblood didn't like my father, but my mother had asked her to raise us. That's why my mother wanted to make it back to Aeren alive. She didn't trust my father to ask Mrs. Trueblood to stay himself."

Low voices echoed down the street behind them, and Tommy glanced over his shoulder. A group of men were heading in their direction. They were keeping to the shadows along the opposite side of the street and were still a few blocks behind them. Tommy thought he counted five men but he couldn't see them clearly. Crime was rampant in the southern half of the city, and he wished he hadn't been so obvious about paying for the meal back in the pub.

Tommy realized how vulnerable they were. He was bigger than Emilie, but not by much. He wasn't going to be able to defend her from five men if they got attacked. He wouldn't even be able to defend himself. The men were gaining on them, but Emilie didn't seem to notice. They were on a deserted street with boarded-up storefronts and rubbish-filled gutters. Smokestacks rose into the sky above the decrepit buildings and there was a stench of rot in the air.

Tommy snuck another glance behind him. The men had stopped on the nearest corner under a darkened gaslight. Tommy was sure that the gaslight had been lit a moment ago, but it had either gone out or they had snuffed it. Either way, the entire street was now in shadows. The men on the street corner reminded Tommy of a wolf pack trying to decide whether they were hungry enough to run down their prey.

"Why do you keep looking over your shoulder?" Emilie asked.

"Haven't you noticed the men following us?" he said.

The men sprang forward as a group. They were running directly for Emilie and Tommy and their intentions were deadly clear. Emilie whirled around at the sound of their running feet.

"Oh, d.a.m.n," Emilie muttered. "They were following us."

She grabbed his hand and sprinted around the next corner. They ducked into a narrow alley and she made a beeline toward a large, wooden dustbin. She dragged him behind the bin and pulled him down until they were hidden from sight. The bin had been pulled away from the wall at an angle, and there was a narrow gap facing the entrance to the alley. Tommy shifted slightly so he could watch the street. There were no gaslights, but by now his eyes had adjusted to the faint light of the moon. After a tense moment, a man in a flat cap and ragged coat ambled into the entranceway as if he had all the time in the world. He stopped and took a drag on his reet. The glow of the ember at the end illuminated his hard, age-worn face. The man walked a few paces into the alley, obviously searching for something. After an agonizing moment, he turned back to the street and disappeared from view.

"Should we go back?" Tommy whispered.

"Let's hide for a little bit," Emilie said. "And make sure they're really gone."

"Hide where?" he asked as they headed deeper into the darkness of the alley. He thought they were going to wait in the shadows, but there was a rustle and then the sound of a match being struck beside him as Emilie lit a small candle. In the tiny circle of light, he could now see that they had reached the end of the alley and were standing in front of a rusty metal door. She pulled a key from around her neck and unlocked it.

"You know where we are?" Tommy asked, confused and more frightened than he'd have liked to admit.

Instead of answering, she tugged on the heavy door and firelight shone unexpectedly through the narrow opening. She opened it wider to reveal a staircase leading down into a black void. A lantern burned at the top of the steps, but its light didn't reach all the way to the bottom so Tommy wasn't sure how far down it went.

"What is this place?" Tommy asked.

"They're going to come back," Emilie warned. "Come inside, and we'll talk in there."

Tommy glanced over his shoulder at the alley. There was no sign of the men, but that didn't mean they weren't coming back. He stepped inside the narrow foyer at the top of the stairs. She yanked the door and it closed with a metallic clang. He heard a click as it latched automatically. They were locked inside.

"Do you know how much we hate your father?" Emilie said. "Do you know what kind of man he is?"

"What does this have to do with my father?" Tommy asked.

"I wanted to hate you, too," Emilie said. "I really thought I would. But Mrs. Trueblood didn't hate you. I've heard her talk about you and she wouldn't want anything to happen to you."

"Where is she?" Tommy asked.

"She isn't here," Emilie answered. "I want you to come down these steps with me and see the truth."

"What's down there?" Tommy asked.

"Nothing that will hurt you," she said. "Come and see for yourself."

"No offense, but no thanks," Tommy said.

"If I wanted to hurt you, I would have told the fellows at the pub that you were there," Emilie said.

"Yet you invited me there in the first place," Tommy said.

"There is something at the bottom of these steps that you should see," she said. "Not only as the son of Colston Sh.o.r.e, but as a human being who exists in the world."

Tommy felt a tug of curiosity. "We'll stay until those men are gone, and then we'll go see Mrs. Trueblood?"

"I lied to you about Mrs. Trueblood," Emilie said. "She's not in the city. But she would understand why I had to bring you here. She would understand why I'm doing this."

"Is there anyone else here?" Tommy asked.

"No, it's a historical record," Emilie said.

"What?" Tommy asked. He felt thoroughly confused, but not frightened anymore. The men outside were scarier than Emilie.

"If you want to know the truth about your father, you'll come with me," she said.

She took the burning torch from the wall and climbed carefully down the steep stairs. Tommy couldn't shake his growing curiosity and followed Emilie. When they reached the bottom, he was expecting a dank and miserable s.p.a.ce, but instead, the air was pleasant and smelled like flowers. Using her torch, Emilie lit a lantern near the door and the light flooded the sweet-smelling s.p.a.ce.

Emilie moved around the small room, lighting several more lanterns, until it was as bright as day in that underground room. The walls were blanketed with hand-drawn portraits of men and women of all ages. Some of the portraits were painted with exquisite care. Others were scrawled by children on ratty paper. Some were perfect representations of the human face. Others pictures were more like scribbles with vaguely human features-angry marks gashed into paper. In the middle of the room, there was a large arrangement of violets and red tulips along with personal tokens-wooden beads and letters.

"What is this place?" Tommy asked.

"It used to be a root cellar," Emilie told him. "Now it's a shrine to the missing."

"Who are the missing?" Tommy said, and Emilie made a sweeping motion with her arm around the room.

"These people are," she said. "It started with the Ancestral Homes Act. No, actually, it started when your father took power. People are disappearing from the city. Our loved ones are gone without a trace. Where are they going? And why? Are they being deported to other islands? Maybe. Most don't have the proper identification, but then why don't we ever hear from them again?"

Tommy peered closely at the faces on the walls. A young woman with long dark hair smiled out at him from one of the paintings. The artist had painted her eyes and her dress the same cornflower blue. Whoever the artist was had known every curve of her face perfectly-this was someone who was loved. Near the door, there was a long, handwritten list of names. Tommy glanced at it, registering the first few names: Aileen Teagan. Eleanor Carson. Jamie Lindsey. Meggie Stevens.

"Those are their names, never to be forgotten," Emilie said. "Someday, there'll be a reckoning for every single one of them."

Tommy remembered the name Meg Stevens from that day at Mast Square when the soldiers attacked the demonstration. She'd been speaking from the prow of the ship.

"You should know who your father is and what he's doing," Emilie said. "The August Five are going to die under his hand. He'll call it a fair trial, and then he'll kill them. Michael Henry is being blamed for the kidnapping of Hywel. I know that he isn't responsible for that, and he shouldn't die for it."

"How do you know he didn't do it?" Tommy asked. He didn't want to offend her, but he was curious how she knew such a thing.

Instead of answering, Emilie knelt and began adjusting her boot. Absurdly, Tommy felt embarra.s.sed, like he was watching something private. So he turned around and faced the wall. He heard a rustling and a metallic clink. He had the sense that Emilie was approaching him, but when he turned around she was still crouched in the middle of the floor. But now she placed a hand on the shrine and rested her head against the edge in a defeated sort of way. Her shoulders were shaking as if she were crying silently.

He felt a rush of pity for Emilie despite her lies. Whatever manipulative game she had been playing with him was obviously over. He was disappointed about not seeing Mrs. Trueblood, and the sight of these missing people made him feel shaky and confused. But instead of sprinting back up the stairs and into the night, he knelt beside her and rested his hand on her shoulder to comfort her.

"I wish that the truth was as bright as the North Star," she whispered. "That no matter where in the world I was, all I had to do was look at the sky and know my way."

"It's like truth is determined by who can yell the loudest," Tommy said. "The people you're supposed to trust tell you the wrong thing."