‘Are you sure Fearfall won’t talk and –’
Before Noa finished his sentence, Letta heard the door to the main room open.
‘Sir!’ A woman’s voice. ‘It’s Amelia. She’s had a bad turn. She can’t breathe.’
Noa jumped to his feet. ‘Where is she?’ His voice was calm, crisp, but Letta could hear fear in it.
‘This way, sir,’ the woman said, and Letta heard feet rushing from the room.
For a moment, Letta felt as if she had forgotten how to breathe herself. Fragments of the conversation she had just heard raced about her head.
We took out all of his fingernails.
She tried to banish the images from her head. She had to get out of here. Then she could think about it. But her legs wouldn’t move.
We took out all of his fingernails.
She had to get her breathing under control or she was going to throw up.
Three deep breaths, she told herself. One, two, three.
She felt a bit steadier. She put her ear to the door. There was no sound. Could the man be there still? Sitting quietly? Slowly she turned the handle. Through the tiny crack in the door she could see the room was empty, the door open. She crept out, afraid to make any noise. She tiptoed across the room. At the far door, she stopped and looked tentatively out at the corridor.
Nothing.
She had to go back to where she had left Amelia. The woman would tell Noa she had been there. Her head started to pound. She ran along the corridor. She came to the corner and looked back towards the room door.
‘Letta!’ The word was like a gunshot. ‘Letta?’
She turned around to face John Noa. He was frowning at her, a puzzled look in his eyes.
‘What are you doing here?’
Think! Say something!
‘I … I was looking for you. I was with Amelia and … and …’
John Noa put his hand on her shoulder, his eyes full of concern.
‘You poor child,’ he said. ‘You have had a terrible shock. I can see that.’
Did he know what she had overheard?
‘You were with Amelia?’
‘She couldn’t breathe.’ Letta could barely get the words out.
‘She has a breathing disease, my poor Amelia,’ Noa said. ‘She has these attacks regularly.’
Persuade him. Let him think you know nothing.
‘I tried to find someone, to get help, but I got lost.’
‘It’s all right.’ Noa’s voice was soothing, talking to her in the way people spoke to frightened horses. ‘We have sent for the healer. Amelia will be fine. Now, why did you want to see me?’
Letta shook her head. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t pretend for another second. The man was a monster. He was so concerned about Amelia but he had allowed Benjamin to be tortured.
She had to get out.
‘It was nothing,’ she said. ‘Nothing important. I have to go. I’ll come back another time.’
Noa looked at her, his sharp eyes boring into her. ‘You’re sure?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ Letta said. Convince him! ‘I hope Amelia is better soon.’
‘Thank you,’ Noa said. ‘You can find your way out?’
Letta nodded and walked away from him. With every step, she thought he would stop her or call the gavvers. At the door, she risked a glance over her shoulder. He was gone. She grabbed the door handle and pulled. The fresh air hit her in the face and she breathed it in greedily. She ran towards the gate, opened it and started down the steps. She had to fight to keep her attention from wandering. She needed to concentrate. It wouldn’t do to fall now. She would think when she got home. For now, there were only the steps. She kept her eyes down, putting one foot after another.
She almost collided with the healer as she came to the last third of the journey. He stopped when he saw her, and stood back to let her pass.
‘Is she still alive?’ he said.
Letta nodded. ‘I think so,’ she said.
He pushed past her then, his heavy cloak brushing against the bare skin of her legs, leaving the smell of musty herbs in his wake. The wind gusted, and Letta felt rain on her face. Cold, stinging raindrops. She willed herself to walk on. She had to get home.
Benjamin! Benjamin was alive. His name flew above her like a firefly, circling, circling and then falling into oblivion.
CHAPTER 12
#192
Forest
Many trees
IMAGES of Benjamin flashed before her eyes, and in her mind, his suffering was her own. She could feel his poor hands, dry and cool, and in her head she could see the nails ripped from their cuticles. She remembered the first day she had visited Noa, when he told her Benjamin was dead. Had they been torturing him then? What did they want from him?
He could not, would not go along with your plan.
What plan? What was Noa planning that was so terrible that Benjamin would endure torture rather than agree to it?
She tried to remember everything that she had overheard at John Noa’s house. The main thing was, they were going to dump Benjamin in the forest tomorrow – if he survived that long, if he hadn’t already died from his injuries.
Noa did not actually kill people. Benjamin had explained that to her. Those who would not live in harmony were given up to nature. They were banished from Ark and had to take their chances in the forest. She hadn’t realised then that they were beaten and tortured first. When their broken and bloodied bodies were thrown in the forest they were nothing but live bait for the wild animals. She couldn’t let that happen to anyone else.
She had to contact Marlo again. She ran downstairs, already composing the note in her head.
I need you URGENTLY. Come at once. Letta
Outside, the day had dawned. Light snuck in through the high windows lighting the hard marble floor. People were moving towards Central Kitchen, going about their daily business. It all felt unreal to Letta. She wanted to open the door and scream at them to open their eyes and see Ark for what it was, a place built on treason and deceit. She swallowed the lump in her throat. She had to control her anger. Noa was a formidable enemy. She wouldn’t beat him by being hysterical.
She would have to go and get food. If she didn’t, Mrs Pepper would report her absence, and the gavvers would call to see where she was. She couldn’t afford to have them walk in on her. She couldn’t trust herself to behave normally. She would go now before it got too busy. After that, she would write the note and leave it with the Goddess. She walked to Central Kitchen with her head bowed, eyes cast down. She queued up, thankful that she didn’t see anyone she knew. Mrs Pepper handed her two hard-boiled eggs and her bread ration along with a bowl of stewed apples. Letta took it silently and hurried out again, past the waiting people, the gavvers at the door, past the healer’s, across the road, down the lane to her own back door.
Her hand flew to her mouth when she saw him, stifling the scream that sprang to her throat.
Marlo.
‘But how –’ she began. She hadn’t even written the note yet!
‘Sh!’ he said. ‘Inside.’
‘What are you doing here?’ she said.
‘I had a dream last night. In it, you were calling me. So I came.’
She stared at him. He was like someone from another planet. There was something so unearthly about him, so otherworldly. Who believed so strongly in dreams that they obeyed them?
‘A dream?’ she said. ‘Noa almost caught you yesterday. It isn’t safe for you to be here. It isn’t fair of me to ask you, but –’
He shrugged, the shadow of a smile playing about his lips. ‘You saved my life, Letta, and risked your own for me.’
Marlo put his arm around her, holding her to his chest. She could hear his heart beat, and for a second, it reminded her of the sparrow caught in that room in Noa’s house. She breathed in his sagey smell, feeling its comfort, its reassurance and something else as well. She felt so close to him and yet she hardly knew him.
Marlo looked down at her.
‘What’s wrong?’ he said.
She pulled away and looked into his eyes.
‘Everything,’ she said. ‘Everything.’
It took her half an hour to tell him the whole story. Marlo listened without comment for the most part, and she had no idea what he thought, or how he was going to help her. She studied his face, trying to read his expression.
‘When people are banished it can be very difficult to get information,’ Marlo said. ‘We know that the gavvers take them deep into the forest and abandon them. But there is no pattern, no routine to their actions. I need to talk to Finn. You stay here and carry on as though everything is normal.’
Marlo gripped her shoulders. She could feel his strong fingers through the thin material of her dress.
‘You have to be careful now, Letta. If Noa senses you know something … if he thinks you suspect him …’ Marlo took her face in his hands. ‘Trust me. Finn will know what to do, but for now you have to carry on. They will be watching. Give no sign that you are upset. Do you understand?’
He was right. In her heart she knew that, but it wasn’t what she had hoped for.
‘I’ll be back by noon,’ Marlo said.
She heard the door close as he left, the faint smell of sage the only sign that he had been there at all. She sat at her desk, her head in her hands.
She had to open the shop. Pretend everything was normal. Just for a few hours, she told herself. They would find Benjamin. They had to. She slipped the heavy bolts back and let the door swing open.
The rest of the morning passed in a blur. People came and went. She wrote out lists of words, prepared boxes for the builder’s apprentices and tried to pretend that everything was normal. When the bell rang twelve times, she closed the shop and sat at her desk to wait. It was only minutes later when she heard the knock. She had been waiting for it, but she still jumped. Finn and Marlo hurried in.
They sat in Benjamin’s study, Letta behind his old desk, and Marlo on the chair opposite. Finn stood beside the window, keeping one eye on the street.
‘I am sorry to hear about your master,’ Finn said.
‘Can you help me to find him?’ She couldn’t keep the desperation out of her voice.
‘We will try,’ Finn said. ‘We have heard nothing of your master. This is not something Noa wants people to know, so he will have taken precautions to ensure people don’t find out.’
‘He said it will happen tonight,’ Letta said.
‘Lately they have been using the West Gate and driving a few miles south, towards the river. There is no guarantee that they will use that route tonight, but it is probably our best chance.’
‘They change the route all the time,’ Marlo joined in. ‘There are hundreds of miles of forest but they have been known to use some sites more than others.’
‘Have you managed to rescue many people?’
There was silence for a second, then Finn spoke. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not many.’
‘And if they don’t use the West Gate?’
Finn shook his head, his eyes never leaving her face.
‘Then we will lose him,’ he said.
At that moment, she felt Marlo lean over and take her hand.
‘Can’t we follow them?’ she said, remembering the morning she had seen Daniel taken.
‘Not easily,’ Finn said. ‘They take the prisoners on a horse and cart with two gavvers positioned at the back, watching for any interference. We will post people near each gate from dusk on. That way at least we’ll know which gate they used, but even that is dangerous. If they notice men hanging around after dark …’
Four gates. If only they knew which one! If they knew for certain all their resources could be placed there.
‘Is there any way we could find out which gate they will use? I mean, for a fact. Who would know?’
‘No-one,’ Finn said. ‘Only the gavvers and Noa. We had a source for a while in Noa’s house, a man called Gorr, but he was discovered and banished about six months ago. Since then we have no-one on the inside.’
Letta’s mind was racing as Finn talked. Could she get inside? If she were in the house could she find out anything?
‘What about me?’ she said looking from Marlo’s face to Finn’s. ‘I could get in there this afternoon. What would I look for?’
Finn stood up abruptly.
‘Are you mad? If Noa even suspected –’
‘He would kill you,’ Marlo finished the sentence for him. ‘He will kill Benjamin if I don’t,’ she said. ‘Please. Help me. If I got in on wordsmith business, how could I find out?’
Finn sighed.
‘We don’t know all that much about what goes on in that house, Letta, but we did get some information from Gorr. We do know that the Captain of the Guard, Cregg Whistlestop, writes the order.’
Letta nodded, trying to take everything in.
‘We also know that all orders are signed by Noa himself,’ Finn continued.
‘So,’ Letta said trying to figure it out, ‘at some stage today the orders will cross Noa’s desk?’
‘That is almost certain,’ Finn said.
Letta stood up and started to pace. ‘So if I could get in there, into his office, I could see the order?’
‘Letta, this is foolishness! I don’t know if you could see the order or not. I don’t know where he stores such things, if he stores them. I only know that he signs them.’
‘But there is a chance …’ Marlo’s voice made Letta jump. She had nearly forgotten he was there.
‘There is always a chance,’ Finn growled. ‘There’s also a chance that she’ll be caught and killed. Why don’t you leave it to us? We will do everything we can.’
‘But you said yourself, the odds are against you. It will be like hunting for sunbeams in a river. You might get lucky, but you might not. If we knew which gate, if we knew where they were headed, then Benjamin would have a real chance.’
‘You are right, but the cost may be …’
‘My life,’ Letta said. ‘I know that, and I’m ready.’
Finn sighed again. ‘Very well then,’ he said. ‘We’d better get to work.’
CHAPTER 13
#487
Winter
Cold time of year
AS she climbed the steps to Noa’s house, Letta realised she felt no fear. She had been in awe of John Noa before, looked up to him as the man who had saved the planet. She had grown up on stories of his great valour, his clever thinking, his vision. Now she knew that none of that was real. John Noa was a bully. That thought made her brave. He might be a very clever bully, but he was still a bully.
She had gone over the plan with Finn but even as Finn was talking, her mind was working independently. She wanted to trust her instincts, and her instincts told her that she could play a part. She would pretend that she was still the girl she had been yesterday.
She had almost reached the top of the steps. She rehearsed what she would say and how she would say it. She opened the gate. From the corner of her eye, she saw movement in the downstairs window, eyes always watching no doubt. She marched up to the door and knocked firmly. A gavver opened it. He frowned but said nothing.
‘I come see John Noa,’ Letta said. ‘Tell him wordsmith here.’
The man looked her up and down, his eyes raking her from scalp to sole. Then he stood back and allowed her to pass.
‘Wait,’ he growled, before heading off down the long corridor.
She waited. A few minutes later, John Noa himself hurried up towards her. His face was creased in a frown and his eyes were full of concern.
‘Letta?’ he said. ‘Is everything all right?’
She forced a smile. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘I am so sorry to bother you again but you did say if I needed to talk to you – and I was worried about Amelia.’
‘Amelia is much better today, thank you. Now come with me and we can talk in private.’
Letta tried to k
eep her mind blank as she followed him down the corridor to where it swung right and past two closed doors, one marked Laboratory, the other wordless. Finally, he came to his own study door. He opened it and Letta could see the huge desk and the chair behind it. Another two chairs stood on the far side. On the desk itself there was very little and Letta’s heart sank when she saw how tidy the room was. She had imagined mounds of paper and files that would give her a hope of finding something useful.
‘How can I help you, Letta?’ said John Noa, sitting now behind his desk and looking at her, giving her his full attention.
She sat down opposite him.
‘I came here yesterday to ask you if you might consider adding some words to the new List.’
She watched as the dark eyes clouded over. He sat back in his chair.
‘New words?’ he repeated. ‘I’m not sure what you mean. Our aim is to curtail the use of language. As you know, throwing words about to all and sundry is quite irresponsible, considering our history. What had you in mind?’
‘Nothing too radical.’ Letta smiled at him. ‘I thought maybe we could introduce one new word. A word like “hope” perhaps?’
John Noa smiled. ‘Hope?’
‘Yes,’ Letta said. ‘I think it is a fairly harmless word, but it acknowledges that people do hope and –’
‘Harmless?’ His voice cut across her well-prepared speech. ‘You think that “hope” is a harmless word? I’m afraid I would disagree with you there, child.’
‘Would you?’ Letta said, assuming a puzzled expression. ‘May I ask why?’
Noa nodded. ‘Hope looks to the future, does it not? We hope for things that we don’t have now but wish to have some day. And that is what makes humans greedy, Letta. We are the only beings on this planet that refuse to live in the present. We are always looking for something else. A faster way to travel, a cheaper food to eat, a better song to sing. Do the deer that you live beside think like that Letta? Do the cows or the birds? No. Only man.’
‘I never thought of it like that,’ Letta said.
Noa stood up. ‘Of course you didn’t, Letta. You are too young and you have always lived in a time of peace. My experience, I’m afraid, is very different.’
The Wordsmith Page 12
