Chaos Walking

by Patrick Ness

  Which it does.

  I lean down farther in the saddle, biting hard against the pain in my ankles, trying to make us go even faster.

  We get well past the cathedral, down through the rows of shuttered-up shops and bolted-in houses. The sun is completely down, everything turning to silhouette against the darkening of the sky.

  And I think about how the Answer will respond when they find out the Mayor’s fallen–

  And what they’ll think when they find out Todd did it–

  And I think of him–

  I think of him–

  I think of him–

  Todd, Acorn thinks.

  And we race down the road–

  And I nearly tumble off as a BOOM rises in the distance.

  Acorn judders to a halt, twisting round to keep me on his back. We turn and I look–

  And I see the fires burning down the road.

  I see houses on fire.

  And stores.

  And grain sheds.

  And I see people running this way through the smoke, not soldiers, just people, running past us in the dark.

  Passing us so fast they don’t even stop to look at us.

  They’re fleeing from the Answer.

  “What is she doing?” I say out loud.

  Fire, Acorn thinks, nervously clattering his hooves.

  “She’s burning everything,” I say. “She’s burning it all.”

  Why?

  Why?

  “Acorn–” I start to say.

  And a horn blows a deep, long call across the entire valley.

  Acorn whinnies sharply, no words in his Noise, just a flash of fear, of terror so sharp I feel my heart leap, echoed by the disbelieving gasps of some of the people running past me, many of them shouting out and stopping, looking behind me, back towards the city and beyond.

  I turn, even though the sky’s too dark to see much.

  There are lights in the distance, lights coming down the zigzag road by the falls–

  Not the road the army is on.

  “What is it?” I say to no one, to anyone. “What are those lights? What was that sound?”

  And then a man, stopped next to me, his Noise bright and circling with amazement, with disbelief, with fright as clear as a knife, whispers, “No.”

  He whispers, “No, it can’t be.”

  “What?” I shout. “What’s happening?”

  And the long, deep horn sounds again across the valley.

  And it’s a sound like the end of the world.

  The Mayor wakes before I even finish tying his hands.

  He moans, pure, real Noise ratcheting from him, the first I’ve ever heard outta his head, now that he’s off guard.

  Now that he’s been beaten.

  “Not beaten,” he murmurs. “Temporarily waylaid.”

  “Shut up,” I say, pulling the ropes tight.

  I come round the front of him. His eyes are still misty from my attack but he manages a smile.

  I smack him cross the face with the butt of the rifle.

  “I hear one stitch of Noise coming from you,” I warn, pointing the barrels at him.

  “I know,” says the Mayor, a grin still coming from his bloody mouth. “And you would, wouldn’t you?”

  I don’t say nothing.

  And that’s my answer.

  The Mayor sighs, leaning his head back as if to stretch his neck. He looks up into the coloured glass window, still standing, impossibly, in a wall all its own. The moons are rising behind it, lighting up their glass verzhuns just a little.

  “Here we are again, Todd,” he says. “The room where we first properly met.” He looks around himself, at how he’s the one tied to the chair now and I’m the one out here. “Things change,” he says, “but they stay the same.”

  “I don’t need to hear you talking while we wait.”

  “Wait for what?” He’s growing more alert.

  His Noise is disappearing.

  “And you’d like to be able to do that, too, wouldn’t you?” he says. “You’d like just for once to have no one know what you’re thinking.”

  “I said, shut up.”

  “Right now, you’re thinking about the army.”

  “Shut up.”

  “You’re wondering if they really will listen to you. You’re wondering if Viola’s people can really help you–”

  “I’ll hit you again with the damn rifle.”

  “You’re wondering if you’ve really won.”

  “I have really won,” I say. “And you know it.”

  We hear a BOOM in the distance, another one.

  “She’s destroying everything,” the Mayor says, looking towards the sound. “Interesting.”

  “Who is?” I ask.

  “You never met Mistress Coyle, did you?” He stretches one shoulder and then the other against his binds. “Remarkable woman, remarkable opponent. She might have beaten me, you know. She might really have done it.” He smiles wide again. “But you’ve done it first, haven’t you?”

  “What do you mean She’s destroying everything?”

  “As always,” he says, “I mean what I say.”

  “Why would she do that? Why would she just blow things up?”

  “Twofold,” he says. “One, she creates chaos so it’s harder to fight her as an orderly enemy. And two, she obliterates the safety of those who won’t fight, creating the impression that she cannot be beaten, so that everyone’s that much easier to rule when she’s done.” He shrugs. “Everything’s a war to people like her.”

  “People like you,” I say.

  “You’ll be swapping one tyrant for another, Todd. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you.”

  “I won’t be swapping nothing. And I told you to be quiet.”

  I keep the rifle pointed at him and go to Angharrad, watching us both from a cramped space in the rubble. Todd, she thinks. Thirsty.

  “Is there a trough still out front?” I ask the Mayor. “Or did it get blown up?”

  “It did,” the Mayor says. “But there’s one round the back where my own horse is tied. She can go there.”

  Morpeth, I think to Angharrad, the name of the Mayor’s horse, and a feeling rises in her.

  Morpeth, she thinks. Submit.

  “Attagirl,” I say, rubbing her nose. “Damn right he’ll submit.”

  She pushes me playfully once or twice then clops off outta the rubble, making her way round the back.

  There’s another BOOM. I have a little flash of worry for Viola. I wonder how far down the road she’s got by now. She must be getting near where the Answer is, she must be–

  I hear a little stirring of Noise from the Mayor.

  I cock the gun.

  “I said, don’t try it.”

  “Do you know, Todd?” he says, like we were having a nice lunch. “The attacking Noise was easy. You just wind yourself up and slam someone with it as hard as you can. I mean, yes, you have to be focused, tremendously focused, but once you’ve got it, you can pretty much do it at your will.” He spits away a little blood pooling on his lip. “As we saw with you and your Viola.”

  “Don’t you say her name.”

  “But the other thing,” he continues. “The control over another’s Noise, well, I must say, that’s a lot trickier, a lot harder. It’s like trying to raise and lower a thousand different levers at once and sure on some people, some simple people, it’s easier than others and it’s surprisingly easy on crowds, but I’ve tried for years to get it to work as a useful tool and it’s only recently I’ve had any level of success at all.”

  I think for a minute. “Mayor Ledger.”

  “No, no,” he says brightly. “Mayor Ledger was eager to help. Never trust a politician, Todd. They have no fixed centre, so you can never believe them. He came to me, you see, with your dreams and things you said. No, no control there, just ordinary weakness.”

  I sigh. “Would you just be quiet already?”

  “My point is, Todd,”
he presses on, “that it’s only today that I’ve been able to even come close to forcing you to do what I want you to do.” He looks at me, to see if I’m getting it. “Only today.”

  Another BOOM in the distance, another thing destroyed by the Answer for no good reason at all. It’s too dark to see the army but they must be marching into town by now, down the road straight to here.

  And night is falling.

  “I know what yer saying,” I say. “I know what I’ve done.”

  “It was all you, Todd.” He keeps his eyes on me. “The Spackle. The women. All your own action. No control needed.”

  “I know what I’ve done,” I say again, my voice low, my Noise getting a warning sizzle to it.

  “The offer’s still open,” the Mayor says, his voice low, too. “I’m quite serious. You have power. I could teach you how to use it. You could rule this land by my side.”

  I AM THE CIRCLE AND THE CIRCLE IS ME, I hear.

  “That’s the source,” he says. “Control your Noise and you control yourself. Control yourself,” he lowers his chin, “and you can control the world.”

  “You killed Davy,” I say, stepping up to him, gun still pointed. “Yer the one with no fixed centre. And now yer really gonna shut the hell up.”

  And then a low and powerful sound rumbles thru the sky, like some giant, deep horn.

  A sound God would make when he wanted yer attenshun.

  I hear whinnies from the horses out back. I hear a filament of shock race thru the still-hiding Noise from the people of New Prentisstown. I hear the steady marching of the army’s feet collapse into a racket of sudden confuzhun.

  I hear the Mayor’s Noise spike and pull back.

  “What the hell was that?” I say, looking up and around.

  “No,” the Mayor breathes.

  And there’s delight in it.

  “What?” I say, poking the rifle at him. “What’s going on?”

  But he’s just smiling and turning his head.

  Turning it towards the hill by the falls, by the zigzag road coming down into town.

  I look there, too.

  Lights are at the top.

  Lights are starting to come down the zigzag.

  “Oh, Todd,” the Mayor says, amazement and, yeah, it’s joy coming thru his voice. “Oh, Todd, my boy, what have you done?”

  “What is it?” I say, squinting into the dark, as if that’ll help me see it clearer. “What’s making that–”

  A second horn blast comes, so loud it’s like the sound of the sky folding in half.

  I can hear the ROAR of the town rising, so many asking marks you could drown in ’em.

  “Tell me, Todd,” the Mayor says, his voice still bright. “What exactly were you planning on doing when the army arrived?”

  “What?” I say, my forehead furrowing, my eyes still trying to see what’s coming down the zigzag road, but it’s too far and too dark to tell. Just lights, individual points of ’em, moving down the hill.

  “Were you going to offer me up for ransom?” he goes on, still sounding cheerful. “Were you going to give me to them for execution?”

  “What were those blasts?” I say, grabbing him by the shirt front. “Is that the settlers landing? Are they invading or something?”

  He just looks in my eyes, his own sparkling. “Did you think they’d elect you leader and you’d single-handedly usher in a new era of peace?”

  “I’ll lead them,” I hiss into his face. “You watch me.”

  I let him go and climb up one of the higher piles of rubble. I see people poking their heads outta their houses now, hear voices calling to one another, see people start running to and fro.

  Whatever it is, it’s enough to get the people of New Prentisstown out of hiding.

  I feel a buzz of Noise at the back of my head.

  I whip round, pointing the gun at him again, climbing back down the rubble and saying, “I told you, none of that!”

  “I was just trying to keep our conversation going, Todd,” he says, false innocence everywhere. “I’m very curious to know your plan for leadership now that you’ll be head of the army and President of the planet.”

  I want to punch the smile off his face.

  “What’s going on?” I shout at him. “What’s coming down that hill?”

  There’s a third blast of the horn sound, even louder this time, so loud you can feel it humming thru yer body.

  And now people in town are really starting to scream.

  “Reach in my front shirt pocket, Todd,” the Mayor says. “I think you’ll find something that once belonged to you.”

  I stare at him, searching him out for a trick, but all that’s there is that stupid grin.

  Like he’s winning again.

  I push the rifle at him and use my free hand to dig in his pocket, my fingers hitting something metal and compact. I pull it out.

  Viola’s binos.

  “Really remarkable little things,” the Mayor says. “I do so look forward to the rest of the settlers landing, seeing what new treats they bring us.”

  I don’t say nothing to him, just climb back up the rubble and hold the binos to my eyes with my free hand, clumsily trying to get the night vision to work. It’s been a long time since I–

  I get the right button.

  Up pops the valley, in shades of green and white, cutting thru the dark to show me the town.

  I raise them up the road, up the river, to the zigzag on the hill, to the points of lights coming down it–

  And–

  And–

  And oh my God.

  I hear the Mayor laugh behind me, still tied to his chair. “Oh, yes, Todd. You’re not imagining it.”

  I can’t say nothing for a second.

  There ain’t no words.

  How?

  How can this be possible?

  An army of Spackle is marching for the town.

  Some of ’em, the ones near the front, are riding on the backs of these huge, wide creachers covered in what looks like armour and a single curving horn coming out the end of their noses. Behind ’em are troops, cuz this ain’t a friendly march, nosiree, it ain’t nothing like that at all, there are troops marching down the zigzag road, troops marching over the lip of the hill at the top of the falls.

  Troops that are coming for battle.

  And there are thousands of ’em.

  “But,” I say, gasping, hardly able to get the words out. “But they were all killed. They were all killed during the Spackle War!”

  “All of them, Todd?” the Mayor asks. “Every single one of them on this whole planet when all we live on is one little strip? Does that make sense to you?”

  The lights I’ve been seeing are torches carried by the Spackle riding on the creachers’ backs, burning torches to lead the army, burning torches that light up the spears that the troops carry, the bows and arrows, the clubs.

  All of ’em carrying weapons.

  “Oh, we beat them,” says the Mayor. “Killed them in their thousands, certainly, every one within miles of here. Though they out-numbered us by a considerable margin, we had better weapons, stronger motivation. We drove them out of this land on the understanding that they would never return, never get in our way ever again. We kept some of them as slaves, of course, to rebuild our city after that war. It was only fair.”

  The town is really ROARing now. The marching of the army has stopped and I can hear people running about and screaming to each other, stuff that don’t make no sense, stuff of disbelief, stuff of fear.

  I run back down the rubble to him, pushing the gun hard into his ribs. “Why did they come back? Why now?”

  And still he grins. “I expect they’ve had time to work on how they might get rid of us once and for all, don’t you? All these years? I expect they were only looking for a reason.”

  “What reason?!” I shout at him. “Why–”

  And I stop.

  The genocide.

  The death of ever
y slave.

  Their bodies piled up like so much rubbish.

  “Quite right, Todd,” he says, nodding like we’re talking about the weather. “I suspect that must certainly be it, don’t you?”

  I look down at him, understanding coming too late like always. “You did it,” I say. “Of course you did it. You killed every Spackle, every single one, made it look like it was the Answer.” I push the rifle into his chest. “You were hoping they’d come back.”

  He shrugs. “I was hoping I’d have the chance to beat them once and for all, yes.” He purses his lips. “But it’s you I have to thank for speeding the plan along.”

  “Me?” I say.

  “Oh, yes, definitely you, Todd. I set the stage. But you sent them the messenger.”

  “The messen–?”

  No.

  No.

  I turn and run up the rubble again, binos back on, looking and looking and looking.

  There’s too many, they’re too far away.

  But he’s there, ain’t he?

  Somewhere in that crowd.

  1017.

  Oh, no.

  “I should say, Oh, no is right, Todd,” the Mayor calls up to me. “I left him alive for you to find, but even with your special relationship, he wasn’t very fond of you, was he? No matter how much you tried to help him. You’re the face of his torturers, the face he took back to his brothers and sisters.” I hear a low laugh. “I really wouldn’t want to be you right now, Todd Hewitt.”

  I spin round, looking at the horizon on all sides. I spin round again. There’s an army to the south, one to the east, and now one marching down from the west.

  “And here we sit,” says the Mayor, still sounding calm. “Right in the middle of it all.” He scratches his nose on his shoulder. “I wonder what those poor people on the scout ship must be thinking.”

  No.

  No.

  I spin round once more, as if I could see them all coming. Coming for me.

  My mind is racing.

  What do I do?

  What do I do?

  The Mayor starts whistling, as if he had all the time in the world.