Tunnels (29 page)

"And if you've heard one catastrophe, you've heard them all." Imago nudged Will in the ribs.

"Amen," chorused Jesse Shingles and Joe
Waites
, knocking their tankards together and laughing. "Amen to that!"

"Now, now, it brings comfort to them that don't have minds of their own," Tam said.

Will looked out of the corner of his eye at
Cal
and saw that he was joining in and laughing with the rest of them. This puzzled Will; at times his brother appeared to be filled with a religious zeal, but at others he didn't stint at showing a total lack of respect, even a contempt, for it.

"So, Will, what do you miss most about life up top?" Jesse Shingles suddenly asked, jerking his thumb toward the rock roof above their heads. Will looked uncertain and was about to say something when the little man went on. "I'd miss the fish and chips, not that I've ever tasted them." He winked conspiratorially at Imago.

"That's enough of that." Tam's brow creased with concern as he cast his eyes over the people milling around them. "Not the time or the place."

Cal
had been happily sipping his drink but noticed Will was being a little reticent with his. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and turned to his brother, gesticulating toward his so-far-untouched tankard. "Go on, try it!"

Will tentatively took a mouthful of the chalky fluid and held it in his mouth for a moment before gulping it down.

"Well?"
Cal
inquired.

Will ran his tongue around his lips. "Not bad," he said. Then it bit. His eyes widened and watered as his throat began to burn. He spluttered, trying vainly to stifle the coughing fit that followed. Uncle Tam and Cal grinned. "I'm not old enough to drink this stuff," Will gasped, putting the tankard back on the table.

"Who's to stop you? Whole different set of rules down here. As long as you stay within the law, pull your weight, and attend their services, nobody minds if you let off a little steam. It's nobody's business, anyway," Tam said, slapping him gently on the back.

As if to show their agreement, the assembled group raised their tankards and clanked them together with salutations of "Up
yer
cludgy
!"

And so it went, drink after drink, until about the fourth or fifth round — Will had lost count. Tam had just finished telling a convoluted and unfathomable joke about a flatulent policeman and a blind orb-juggler's daughter that Will could make neither head nor tail of, although all the others found it hilarious.

Picking up his tankard and still chuckling, Tam suddenly peered into his drink and, with his thumb and forefinger, pulled something out of the froth. "I got the bloody slug again," he said as the others burst once more into fits of uncontrolled laughter.

"You'll be married within the month if you don't eat it!" Imago roared.

"In that case…!" Tam laughed and, to Will's amazement, placed the limp gray object on his tongue. He moved it around inside his mouth before chewing and then swallowing it, to shouts of applause form his friends.

In the lull that followed, Will felt sufficiently emboldened with Dutch courage to speak up.

"Tam — Uncle Tam — I need your help."

"Anything, lad," Tam said, resting his hand on Will's shoulder. "You only have to ask."

But where did he start? Where did he begin? He had so many concerns swirling through his befuddled mind… finding his father… and what about his sister… and his mother… but
which
mother? Through this haze, one pressing thought crystallized — one thing above all else, that he had to do.

"I have to get Chester out," Will blurted.

"
Shhh
!"
Tam hissed. He glanced nervously around. They all drew together to encircle him in a secretive huddle.

"Have you any idea what you're asking?" Tam said under his breath.

Will looked at him blankly, not sure how to respond.

"And where would you go? Back to
Highfield
? Think you'd ever be safe there again, with the Styx hunting you? You wouldn't last a week. Who'd protect you?"

"I could go to the police," Will suggested. "They'd—"

"You're not listening. They have people everywhere." Tam reiterated forcefully.

"And not just in
Highfield
," Imago interjected in a low voice. "You can't trust anyone Topsoil, not the police… not
anyone
."

Tam nodded in agreement. "You'd need to lose yourself somewhere they'll never think of looking for you. Do you know where you might go?"

Will didn't know whether it was fatigue or the effect of the alcohol, but he was finding it hard to fight back the tears. "But I can't just do
nothing
. When I needed help to find my dad," he said hoarsely, his throat tightening with emotion, "the one person I could rely on was Chester, and now he's stuck in the Hold… because of me. I owe it to him."

"Have you any idea what it's like to be a fugitive?" Tam asked. "To spend the rest of your years running from every shadow, without a single friend to help you because you're a danger to anyone you're around?"

Will swallowed noisily as Tam's words sank in, aware that all eyes in their little group were on him.

"If I were you, I'd
forget
about Chester," Tam said harshly.

"I… just… can't," Will said in a strained voice, looking into his drink. "No…"

"It's the way things are down here, Will… you'll get used to it," Tam said, shaking his head emphatically.

The high spirits of only a few minutes earlier had completely evaporated, and now
Cal
's
face and those of Tam's men, gathered closely around Will, were stern and unsympathetic. He didn't know if he'd put his foot in it and said totally the wrong thing, but he couldn't just leave it at that — his feelings were too strong. He lifted his head and looked Tam straight in the eye.

"But why do you all stay down here?" he asked. "Why doesn't everyone just get out… escape?"

"Because," Tam began slowly, "all said and done, this is
home
. It might not be much, but it's all most people know."

"Our families are here," Joe
Waites
put in forcefully. "Do you think we could just take off and leave them? Have you any idea what would happen if we did?"

"Reprisals," Imago said in a voice that was barely a croak. "The Styx would slaughter the lot them."

"Rivers of blood," Tam whispered.

Joe
Waites
pressed even closer to Will. "Do you really think we'd be happy living in a strange place where everything is so completely foreign to us? Where would we go? What would we do?" he gushed, trembling with agitation as he spoke. It was obvious he was extremely upset by Will's questions, only beginning to regain his composure when Tam laid a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"We'd be out of place… out of time," Jesse Shingles said.

Will could only nod, cowed by the sheer intensity of emotion he'd aroused in the group. He sighed shakily.

"Well, whatever, I have to get Chester out. Even if I have to do it myself," he said.

Tam regarded him for a moment and then shook his head. "Stubborn as a mule. Talk about like mother, like son," he said, a grin returning to his face. "
D'you
know, it's uncanny how much you sound like her. Once Sarah set her mind on something there was no budging her." He ruffled Will's hair with his large hand. "Stubborn as a bloody mule."

Imago tapped Tam's arm. "It's him again."

Relieved that he was no longer the center of attention, Will was a little slow to catch on, but when he did he observed that across the street a Styx was talking to a hefty man who had wiry white hair and long sideburns and wore a shiny brown coat with a grimy red neckerchief coiled around his stubby neck. As he watched, the Styx nodded, turned, and walked away.

"That Styx has been dogging Tam for a long time now,"
Cal
whispered to Will.

"Who is he?" Will asked.

"Nobody knows their names, but we call him the
Crawfly
, on account he can't so easily be shaken off. He's on a personal vendetta to bring down Uncle Tam."

Will watched as the figure of the
Crawfly
dissolved into the shadows.

"He's had it
infor
your family since your ma gave the White Necks the slip and went Topsoil," Imago said to Will and Cal.

"And till my dying day I'll swear he did in my pa," Tam said, his voice flat and oddly lacking in any emotion. "He killed him, all right… that was no accident."

Imago shook his head slowly. "That was a horrible thing," he agreed. "A
horrible
thing."

"So what's he cooking up with that scum over there?" Tam said, frowning as he turned to Imago.

"Who was he talking to?" Will asked, peering at the other man, who was now crossing the road toward the crowd outside the tavern.

"Don't look at him… that's
Heraldo
Walsh. A cutthroat… nasty piece of work,"
Cal
warned.

"A burglar, lowest of the low," Tam growled.

"But what's he doing talking to a Styx, then?" Will said, totally confused.

"Wheels within wheels," Tam muttered. "The Styx are a devious bunch. A belt becomes a snake with them." He turned to Will. "Look, I may be able to help you with Chester, but you've got to promise me one thing," he whispered.

"What's that?"

"If you get caught, you'll never implicate Cal, me, or any of us. Our lives and our families are here and, like it or not, we have to stay in this place with the White Necks… the Styx. That's our lot. And I'll say it again: They'll never let it rest if you cross them… they will do
everything
they can to catch up with you—" Suddenly, Tam broke off.

Will saw the alarm in
Cal
's
eyes. He spun around.
Heraldo
Walsh was standing not five feet away. And behind him a throng of drunkards had parted fearfully to allow a phalanx of brutish-looking Colonists through. They were clearly Walsh's gang — Will saw the fiery hatred in their faces. His blood ran cold. Tam immediately stepped to Will's side.

"What do you want, Walsh?" Tam said, his eyes narrowed and his fists clenched.

"Ah, my old friend,
Tamfoolery
,"
Heraldo
Walsh said with a vile,
gappy
grin. "I just wanted to see this
Topsoiler
for myself."

Will wished the ground would open up and swallow him.

"So you're the type of scum that chokes our air channels and pollutes our houses with your foul sewage. My daughter died because of your kind." He took a step closer to Will, raising his hand threateningly, as if he was going to grab at the
pertrified
boy. "Come 'ere, you stinking filth!"

Will cowered. His first impulse was to run, but he knew his uncle wasn't about to let anything happen to him.

"That's far enough, Walsh." Tam took a step toward the man to block his approach.

"You're fraternizing with the godless, Macaulay," Walsh yelled, his eyes never leaving Will's face.

"And what do you know of God?" Tam retorted, stepping fully in front of Will to shield him. "Now, you drop it! He's family!"

But
Heraldo
was like a dog with a bone — he wasn't about to let go. Behind him, his supporters were egging him on and cursing.

"You call
that
family?" He thrust a dirt-stained finger at Will. "Sarah Jerome's mongrel?"

At this, several of his men let out wild howls and whoops.

"He's the filthy offspring of that traitorous woman who ran for the sun,"
Heraldo
snapped.

"That's it," Tam hissed through his clenched teeth. He slung the dregs of his beer at the man, hitting him square in the face, dousing his hair and sideburns with the watery gray fluid.

"Nobody insults my family, Walsh. Step up to the scratch," Tam scowled.

Heraldo
Walsh's coterie began to chant, "Milling, milling, milling!" and very soon cheers filled the air as everyone out on the sidewalk joined in. Others came rushing out of the tavern door to see what all the commotion was about.

"What's going on?" Will asked
Cal
, terrified out of his wits as the huge crowd hemmed them in. Right in the center of the closely packed, overexcited rabble, Tam stood resolutely in front of the dripping
Heraldo
Walsh, locked in an angry staring match.

"A fistfight,"
Cal
said.

The pub owner, a stocky man in a blue apron, with a sweaty red face, pushed through the tavern doors and threaded his way through the mob until he reached the two men. He barged in between Tam and
Heraldo
Walsh and kneeled down to fix shackles to their ankles. As they both took a step back, Will saw that the shackles were connected by a length of rusty chain, so that the two fighters were bound together.

Then the owner reached into his apron pocket and brought out a piece of chalk. He drew a line on the pavement halfway between them.

"You know the rules." His voice boomed melodramatically, as much for the benefit of the crowd as for the two men. "Above the belt, no weapons, biting, or gouging. It stops on a KO or death.

"Death?"
Will whispered shakily to Cal, who nodded grimly.

Then the pub owner ushered everyone back until a human boxing ring had been squared off. This wasn't an easy task, because people were jostling against one another as they vied for a view of the two men.

"Step up to the mark," the man said loudly. Tam and
Heraldo
Walsh positioned themselves on either side of the chalk line. The pub owner held their arms to steady them. Then he released them with the shouted order: "Commence!" and quickly retreated.

In an attempt to knock his opponent off balance, Walsh immediately swung his foot back and the length of chain — six feet or so long — snapped taut, yanking Tam's leg forward.

But Tam was ready for the maneuver and used the forward momentum to his advantage. He leaped toward Walsh, a huge right fist flying at the shorter man's face. The blow glanced off Walsh's chin, drawing a gasp from the crowd. Tam continued with a fast combination of blows, but his opponent avoided them with apparent ease, ducking and diving like a demented rabbit, as the chain between them rattled noisily on the pavement amid the shouts and cries.