Brink (The Ruin Saga Book 2) (35 page)

Many people under the mission’s banner had made their beds, and had no illusions about lying in them. But starry-eyed youngsters like Richard, raised to believe in the unassailable
goodness
of the mission and their elders’ past deeds, they were all setting out to march to their dooms.

None of them have a clue.

Most had already volunteered for roles they thought best suited to their experience, and fractured into myriad sub-groups, each tasked with a different aspect of the fledgling expedition.

That was all there had been time for. A fledgling plan. No ironing out creases, no trimming the fuzzy edges.

If things went to hell, they would all go together.

Norman paused with a wordless cry, gritting his teeth. Cold had clamped down on his skin with sharp fangs.

It’s happening again!

He fought to keep hold of the here and now, but he felt himself slipping, as though on sheet ice. The Echoes were all around: suited men and women, tourists encumbered with shopping bags and cameras slung over their necks, even the odd sweat-covered intern scrabbling with trays of coffee. All oblivious to their eventual fate.

Was this some freakish journey behind the curtain of the End’s mystery, or had he really lost it?

What do you think, genius? If everyone weren’t so distracted, they would have carted you away already.

No, it couldn’t be real.

But then the cold intensified—painful gnawing cold that couldn’t be thawed in a thousand years. He looked down at his hands and almost gasped aloud. Trails of vapour streamed off his knuckles, the kind that rises off melting snow.

Either it’s real, or I’m in real trouble.

He concentrated on breathing until it had passed, and he felt warmth steeling into him again. He couldn’t afford this, not now. He had to be strong.

Like we have a chance, anyway, said a traitorous voice in the back of his head.

He resisted the urge to slap himself.

No! At least we’re doing
something
, now.
Anything’s better than cowering here and waiting for death.

Evelyn had banged her gavel and disbanded the council without pomp or ceremony, and everyone had drained from the chambers as one. Most of them would never be together again, that much was certain. People were going to die. A lot of people.

For the vast majority, the task now was damage control. If they could scramble enough resources, barricade any remaining dwellings, put enough guns in enough untrained, shaking hands, some of them might pull through.

Meanwhile, a small breakoff faction prepared the expedition that was blue-skies whimsy at best, and at worst a kamikaze dash of insanity. Norman was surprised just how many had volunteered to make the journey north. Radden was only a word to almost all of them—and an oft-avoided subject even to himself—and yet there was scarcely space for them all in the tower corridors. In fact, they were clamouring, desperate to get close to Alexander, Lincoln, John DeGray, and Marek Johnson, who had adopted the roles of de facto generals of a coalescing, ramshackle regiment.

Though he stood to the side, his ribs safe from the squeezing and buffeting of the crowd, Norman knew he was one of those generals. Eyes were moving over him constantly now, and he felt a magnetic, expectant tug drawing him forward.

It’s because of what I started in there
.
Now that I’ve spoken in the chambers, sat at the bench, I’ve triggered what they’ve been waiting for all this time, ever since I was a nipper. They’ve all been waiting for me to pick up a staff and march them into the desert. The Chosen One.

He shivered.

Him, a leader of men, in what could be the last, most foolish cavalry charge in all of history.

I’m a cripple. And they’re looking to me.

Despite an atmosphere so thick with imminent doom that it could be carved up and used for sandwich filling, he laughed to himself, a full-throated bawl that sent a few onlookers blinking in alarm.

Well, fine, he thought. If that’s what they need, who am I to say no? It’s all I might be good for at this point: play the role, be the bobble head they all need. Even if I’m fit to drop at the first sign of trouble, even if I’m a tongue-tied loser who couldn’t string a speech together to save his own sorry skin.

Allie was staring at him hard. Her cheeks were flushed. He knew she wasn’t thinking about any charge upon the Scottish Highlands.

He sighed. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re not going.”

“I have to.”

“No, you don’t!” She seized his forearm in a death grip to belittle that of a falcon’s talons.

He bent his head low. “Look, you know what’s happening. You know what they all expect. And I know you’ve been told the same stories about me and Alexander since before you even came to New Canterbury. So don’t stand there and play innocent like it’s all some big, unfair punishment from Mummy Evelyn and Daddy Alexander. I’m a part of this now. I don’t like it, of course I don’t. So do me a favour and help me figure out how the hell I’m going to mount a horse, instead of standing there complaining!”

His voice was shuddering with the outburst, his breath stolen by an explosion of pain in his ribs. He grunted and fell against her, and she caught him with a wordless sob.

“See! See! You can’t do this. It’s madness.”

“Don’t,” he muttered, wiping his lips with the back of his hand. “Don’t.” He met her gaze, saw the tears in the corners of her eyes, and had to look away again. Strings were plucked deep in his chest. “I’m sorry,” he said, squeezing her palm.

Not long ago, her hands had been like the rest of her, wrapped in the softness of youth, pudgy and flushed and rounded. An image flashed in his memory of her naivety and fury at the famine’s harsh reality, and the speed with which she had spread gossip throughout New Canterbury.

All of that was overshadowed by the young woman before him now. Her face was pockmarked by half-healed cuts from working the fields to save the last of the harvest, and streaked with the blood of those in the infirmary. Her hands had become wiry, roughened by blossoming, cracked callouses.

It all stirred only more violet, gushing desire inside him, accentuating her femininity. Neither of them had bathed since leaving home, yet he could have stood close and breathed her in for all time.

His pulse began racing, and then he was pulling her away from the masses of people, ignoring the screaming protest from his ribcage, pulling her along in his wake. He didn’t stop until they rounded a corner, and then there was only heat and hands, and her lips on his.

They emerged from a disused storage cupboard some time later. Oblivion loomed, with only hours to prepare their last stand, and dispatch orders to the mission’s kingdom. Their last bastions of strength could have been crumbling this very moment.

Here he was, one of the only men in all the land who could make a difference, and he had chosen to spend a wad of those precious moments canoodling in a dusty old cupboard.

Bloody right I did. All these fools should be doing the very same thing.

He couldn’t help but feel sorry for them all as he led Allie by the hand back into the mayhem.

Order was forming from chaos. Norman could hear more activity outside, preparations for the myriad journeys to surviving settlements. Emergency rations were being raided and divvied up, the river assaulted with every pail and bucket. Tents, bedrolls, cooking pots and firelighters that hadn’t seen action in years were being hauled from storage and shaken out in the wind.

Norman pulled Allie still farther into the masses, passing droves who now saluted him in a manner so casual he felt invested by unseen power, as though their faith hardened his bones and buoyed him up so he floated two inches above the floor. He didn’t welcome it—didn’t want to become that, one of
those men
, but the sensations came nonetheless.

They neared the centre of the mass as Lincoln spread his arms for silence, and though he was frail and brittle as a rusted girder, a bubble of silence with a twenty-foot radius slammed down over the congregation. “It’s settled, then. Those who’ll make ready the tower and elsewhere in the capital, rally to me. Sign your names with Latif Hadad and report to my workshop for instructions. Hurry, damn it!”

A swirling vortex of bodies oozed from the body of the crowd, swarmed Latif in a whirlwind of noise and scribbling and then vanished outside.

“Those with tactical knowledge or experience, join Professor DeGray. You will be our eyes and ears and our brains. Every decision henceforth will be made by majority vote from those who step forward, with veto power invested in the remaining councillors. Step forward, now.”

Another more solemn sub-group slunk from the crowd and stood before John and Richard: wizened combat veterans, academic types, terrified bibliophiles, and those with bodies lame but minds sharp all trailed forth. After a few quiet words from DeGray, and the distribution of key materials from Richard’s bulging satchels, they too disappeared, heading for the tower’s upper levels.

The crowd was thinning. Norman dragged Allie steadily onward, receiving more attention all the while. Salutes came in an endless blur, interspersed with the occasional bow or a grabbing hand from someone who just wanted to
touch him
, feel that the Chosen One was really among them.

And why not? He was the Chosen One. It was a lie; a falsity to which everyone was at least subconsciously aware. But what of it? That didn’t make it any less real.

Lincoln continued. “Those willing to journey to the outer settlements, I ask you report to Evelyn Fisher and Alexander Cain. I will not sugar coat this. Most of you will be volunteering for certain death. But you may save lives by giving forewarning. There is no shame in refusal. I would sooner we all die than order the sacrifice a single pound of flesh.

“But you must also know this. We stand as one, or we die apart. Ladies and gentlemen, together we carry the Old World’s flame. Today, that flame is dimming. I ask you step forward, one last time, lest it go out forever.”

This time the entire crowd moved forward as one—heaving masses that numbered in the hundreds, maybe thousands. People who, on their own, might have been snivelling, crumpled wrecks, and accepted their fate without a fight, had been turned into true soldiers by words alone. The sheer volume of their echoing footsteps boggled comprehension—in all his life, Norman had never heard such a thing.

They would stand and fight for those they loved.

Norman came to stand beside the other generals not a moment too soon, for a stillness charged with appreciation that
this was it
, that
the lines had been drawn
, fell heavy over their shoulders like a smothering blanket. The dreary hopelessness had been washed out, and the air seemed almost runny, it was so light. But was this worse, the sheer finality of it all?

If we pull through, we’ll be scarred deep, a remnant of all we’ve built. And if we don’t … then that’ll be that. The Old World will be truly gone, a rosy figment in the imagination of a few outcast undesirables.

Homes would burn, the knowledge and wisdom of mankind would slip into the void of unknowing, and darkness would run free over everything. And how long would that new Dark Age last? A decade? A century? A millennium?

How long would it take for the next renaissance to revive that spark? Was there even any certainty it would
ever
happen?

Norman’s chest quivered at the thought of it.

How different all this could have been. If Mum and Dad had shacked up with somebody else, I might have accepted the world winding down, teetering on a knife-edge, in exchange for a little peace. I could have been happy living off some small patch of land way out where nobody ever bothered with. It would have been so easy to live, marry and bring up a few kids, love them and protect them, and die unaccomplished. I could have been buried in an unmarked grave, forgotten and uncelebrated. I could have done that.

Hell, right now that seemed like downright bliss.

But fate hadn’t swung that way. He had been dealt another hand.

And amongst all his doubt and misery, there rested a nugget of truth that would never yield: he loved them, and this life. He knew that now—all the times he had been lauded a hero, all the times he had shied away and swallowed that great lump of hatred and fear in his throat, he had loved them; the homes they built and memory of the Old World they kept alive by their very being.

Allison now stood in front of Alexander. During the few moments their lips had parted in the cupboard, they had come to a decision. She would return home to New Canterbury, and do all she could. It was where she held the most sway, and could conjure the most comfort. Her gift of the gab could finally be cashed in fully.

But Norman wouldn’t be going home. She had cried, even beat him on the chest in weak sobbing slaps, but she hadn’t fought his decision. In the whites of her eyes, he had seen anguish squashed by acceptance, and something else. If he had been a romantic, he would have called it love.

As things were, he was ready to call it pride. She nodded to him now, and he was sure his feet lifted yet another inch off the floor.

If only none of this had happened
.
What might we have done? What would our children have looked like?

Lincoln spoke a final time, and all thoughts of what might have been, vanished.

“Those who wish to journey north to Radden in search of aid, step towards Norman Creek.”

Only a hundred remained in the corridor. Every one of them stepped up.

Norman breathed a sigh of relief.

Good, they look strong, determined.

Most of all, he was relieved to see fear in their eyes. He had learned that was the true sign of strength: fear that threatened to tear the soul and send a person insane, overcome by sheer force of will, a refusal to give in.

He couldn’t help but feel they belonged to him now. He could almost feel the weight of their souls in his hands. He took a deep breath, not knowing what he would say, but trusting his body. “Thank you,” he said and was relieved at how strong he sounded.