MoonFall (21 page)

“I guess.” Sophie didn’t sound convinced, and Noah couldn’t say he blamed her.

“Justice is good,” he said. “But does it need to be a spectacle like this? I ain’t never seen a death that left those watching any better off than they were.”

“Sometimes justice has to be seen for it to work,” Molly said. “It reminds us what we’re fighting for. It reinforces the lessons of what we should and shouldn’t do. It pleases the gods.”

All through his two weeks in town Noah had been hearing about the gods. Fellow laborers with charms of Thor or Vishna or some other ancient deity around their necks. Folks who crossed themselves or crossed their fingers to ward off signs of the evil eye. Talk of ceremonies on a Sunday, though he’d managed to avoid public displays up until now. He wasn’t clear on what these gods stood for or what was expected when you worshiped them, but it sure wasn’t faith like his Mama had taught it.

“You really believe in all this?” he asked, looking down at Molly. “The gods and their messages and making sacrifices and all?”

She shrugged.

“I think so,” she said. “I mean, it works. It’s held us all together here, shown us how to keep the town together, to keep all these people alive. We’ve got law and order, safety in the streets, enough food to keep from starving. If it works isn’t that proof enough?”

“All that proves is that folks can work together,” Noah said. There was a slipperiness to her logic that he didn’t like, and he wasn’t convinced that she liked it much either. “I might not have seen much of that the last few years, but that don’t mean it’s a sign of some higher power.”

A bonfire roared in front of the platform, flames creeping up through dry wood and scavenged timbers, then springing from the top so that they danced in the air, twisting patches of light and shadows across the crowd. High above the stage someone was hanging a noose over a beam, tying the rope off at the back of the stage and setting a stool beneath it. The whole scene felt like something from the westerns Noah had watched as a kid – the noose, the fire, the eager lynch mob. Except that these things had seemed fitting in the westerns, or even exciting, threats for the hero to overcome. Here they seemed bleak and menacing, shadows across the mind as well as the body.

“How do y’all know what the gods want?” Noah asked, trying to take his mind off the show before him.

“The Elders bring us insight from the Oracle,” Molly said. “It’s been guiding us for as long as I’ve been here, as long as most of us have.”

“And what is this Oracle?” Noah asked “A person? A book? A movie the Elders watch on some secret projector in their basement? Bet they’ve got the Lion King down there too. I can picture them all sitting around the screen with their tubs of popcorn, pretending to hold solemn council sessions. Bet they all sing along with ‘The Circle of Life’.”

He started to sing the song himself, filling in gaps in his recollection with whatever came to mind. He hadn’t watched the film since he was ten years old, and there were a lot of gaps to fill. Then as he got going, he found he was enjoying throwing nonsense in just for the hell of it.

“It’s the ciiiiirrrrrcle,” he yodeled, “and it steals the ball, from this bonfire in the town square to the hole in the wall.”

Molly laughed.

“I used to love that tune,” she said. “Not so sure anymore.”

“Oh, I’ve got plenty more,” Noah said. “You wanna hear my ‘Sweet Child of Mine’? A bit of ‘Walk This Way’?”

“I don’t suppose you know ‘Something More Beside You’?” she asked.

“Sorry,” Noah said. “That don’t even ring a bell.”

“It was one my mom used to listen to,” she said, her mouth hitching into something that was half smile and half sadness. “A country tune.”

“Sorry, but if it ain’t got a guitar solo then it ain’t for me.”

“Even ‘The Circle of Life’?”

“Oh, that’s got a killer lick. Most folks just forget it ‘cause they get all distracted by the cartoon animals.”

“What are you two going on about?” Sophie frowned down at them with all the petulance a teenager could muster.

“Life before you and the meteors,” Noah said.

“Old folks are always going on about how much better things used to be,” Sophie said. “I don’t s’pose it could have been all that great, or you’d have found a way to keep doing that stuff.”

“That’s what we’re trying to do here,” Molly said.

“With this?” Noah pointed incredulously towards the shadow of the noose, dancing up a nearby building in the firelight.

“It’s a means to an end.” Molly folded her arms and stood watching the platform. People were moving about to one side, getting ready for the execution.

After a few minutes, she spoke again.

“That song, ‘Something More Beside You,' that’s what I think of when people ask whether I believe. I don’t know that Jesus is real, or Buddha, or Allah, or any of the other stuff people use to make sense of this. I don’t know if there are really gods, not like I know that I’ve got boots on my feet or what it feels like to go hungry. But I have to believe that there’s something more besides me, besides us. That the world isn’t just about people and the terrible things they do to each other. That someone will guide us out of this mess.”

“Nice thing to believe,” Noah said. “Reckon I’ll give it a try. Hell, you teach me the song and I’ll sing along.”

“Are you making fun of me?” she asked.

“Not me, I swear. Even a worn out wanderer needs to find meaning from time to time.”

A group of guards emerged from beside the stage, Rasmus Poulson in the lead. Buttons gleamed on his armor and the handle of his sword at his hip. He led the way onto the platform, followed by two more guards escorting someone with their hands tied behind their back and a sack over their head. The prisoner was brought to center stage where they took their place standing on a stool, noose hanging inches from their head.

“My Mama believed in Jesus,” Noah said, looking for some memory more cheerful than this spectacle. The crowd had mostly fallen silent, staring up at the stage with a terrible, mass focus. “When I was little and got scared she told me God was always watching me, looking out for me. The next couple of weeks I kept peering up at the skies, expecting to see this big bearded face looking down at me. You have any idea how hard it is to go to the can when you’re eight years old and you think–”
 

Poulson yanked the bag off the prisoner’s head and Noah abruptly fell silent.

“Are you alright?” Molly looked up at him with concern.

“I know her.” Noah stared at Jen, his companion on the chain gang, her hair hacked away and her face blotchy from crying. “She’s just some thief. Why are they hanging her?”

“She was one of the prisoners who escaped during the attack,” Molly said. “Some of them killed a guard but no-one will admit to who did it. So the Council had them draw lots for who would be punished.”

“So she’s dying for something she didn’t do?” Cold crept up his spine. He stiffened, his body readying itself for a fight or flight that wouldn’t even be his to do.

“Maybe, maybe not,” Molly said. “She was in prison for a reason, remember. And if she didn’t do it then she’s helping cover up for who did. There has to be justice, Noah. There has to be order.”

“I guess so,” Noah said. “Jesus, this is fucked up.”

He looked away, unable to watch as they placed the noose around Jen’s neck. But that was a coward’s way out. Jen hadn’t been a friend, but she was someone he’d known, someone he’d gotten along with, someone who’d suffered through many of the same things as him. The least she deserved was that he bore witness to this, whether it was justice or not.

He watched as one of the Elders stepped forward and led a prayer, inciting the crowd to join in a call for the gods to see justice done and Apollo kept safe. He watched as Poulson tightened the noose, his face showing none of the qualms that assailed Noah. But the whole time he never looked away from Jen as she stood quivering, doomed to a fate that could easily have been his. It made him sick to his stomach.

Something warm touched his hand. He looked down and saw Molly’s fingers close around his, saw her look up at him with real concern.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

He thought he should have smiled, should have felt reassured or happy at the touch. Maybe he did, he thought. Maybe this would have been even worse without her. But all he really felt was a hollow darkness and the approach of death.

“Let’s hope there is something more,” he said. “For Jen’s sake at least.”

“Hers and the dead guard,” Molly said.

She leaned closer to him and this time he did feel something, a tingling of delight, of anticipation.

Then there was a crack as Captain McCloud kicked out the stool from underneath Jen and she fell, jerking on the end of the rope. She twitched, and a dark, damp patch spread across the front of her pants. But at least she wasn’t squirming and choking. It was done.

Except that it wasn’t.

The crowd waited in expectant silence until Jen fell still. Then Poulson stepped up and cut the rope, catching the body as it fell, and the whole square went wild. Shouting, stamping, cheering, singing hymns at the top of their voices and calling out praise to whoever they believed in. At a gesture from one of the Elders more guards stepped forward and helped Poulson carry the body down from the stage, towards the edge of the fire.

“What the hell?” Noah asked, and now his hand was on Bourne, not on Molly.

“Oh gods, you didn’t know did you?” she said. “Oh Noah, I’m so sorry, but the gods demand sacrifices, and when there’s an execution–”
 

He held up a hand to stop her. Didn’t say anything, just watched as the body was placed on another table by the fire. An Elder stepped up and a knife flashed in the darkness, its tip glinting as it slashed down into Jen. Then the Elder held up a handful of guts and the crowd followed him in a prayer so raucous Noah couldn’t even make out the words. It was like watching an animal being butchered, if that animal could talk and think and feel, if that animal were someone he’d shared meals with, shared conversation with, planned a half-assed escape with.

The tangle of guts was flung onto the fire. Then the guards grabbed Jen by her arms and legs, swung her back to get momentum, and flung her into the fire.

Though he’d never have thought it possible, Noah heard the crowd go even wilder.

“This,” he said. “This is what your precious Oracle is about? What your gods demand?”

“She was going to be executed anyway,” Molly said.

“Tell me you don’t think that makes this right.” Noah felt like his chest was being squeezed in a vice. How could people think this was acceptable? How could Molly?

She didn’t answer.

Noah watched Jen burn. He didn’t watch for the gods, for the Elders, for the crowd or even for Molly. It was for Jen, and for the fact that someone there shouldn’t be cheering her grisly death. He didn’t resist when Molly squeezed his hand again, but he didn’t squeeze back.

Whatever was behind this, good or bad, gods or men, he needed to know.

He needed to know what this Oracle was about.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-F
IVE

O
R
S
HOULD
I
G
O
?

“I
AM
TELLING
you my friends, this year I make it happen.”

Dimitri pounded the table with his fist for emphasis, making their chipped cups bounce and the contents splash over the sides. Noah and Mason both grabbed their drinks, looking at the spillages with expressions of alarm that were only part mocking.

“This year, football tournament,” Dimitri continued. “Like in days before Fall. Lift spirits. Make fun for everyone, yes?”

“Careful, Dimitri,” Noah said. “We ain’t got much of this to spare.”

Mason nodded and held up the half empty bottle to prove a point. He wasn’t telling where he’d gotten the beer from, but he’d made clear there wouldn’t be more for a while. So here they were, in a little-used guard hut by the east wall, getting their drink on around an old card table.

“Alright, alright.” Dimitri’s blue eyes sparkled as he took a swig from his own cup, a little of the beer dribbling down the scar on his chin. “But is good idea, yes?”

Mason shrugged.

“It was a good idea last year,” he said in his quiet Texan drawl. “And the year before that. And the year before that. But you still ain’t made it happen, and you ain’t gonna this year. I bet my next bottle of hooch on it.”

“We have football tournament.” Dimitri nodded towards Noah with towering seriousness. “You see.”

“He don’t even mean football.” Mason leaned conspiratorially towards Noah, staring out from beneath his ragged mop of dirty blond hair. “He means soccer.”

“Soccer is only football!” Dimitri exclaimed. “Is when you use your foot, not pick ball up like cheating Yankee game. How you call this football, huh? Shame on you!”

He waggled a finger at both of them, leaning forward across the table. It was all Noah could do not to burst out laughing. For such a big guy Dimitri Vostok sure couldn’t take his drink.

“Football, soccer, dodgeball, whatever.” Noah paused for a drink. Damn it felt good to get that inside him, to feel the gentle tingle around the edges of the mind. “Just give me some goddamn entertainment. I swear, I get more pleasure singing to myself than I do from any of those shitty plays they’ve been putting on in the square.”

“I bet you do.” Dimitri winked and Mason returned the gesture.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Noah asked.

“Sergeant Burns, I think she likes old songs,” Dimitri said. “I am thinking Noah Brennan knows old songs.”

“Alright, yes,” Noah said, “Molly likes it when I sing.”

“Molly, huh?” Mason chuckled as he poured another round.

“Oh, like y’all never call her by her first name.” Noah grabbed his refilled cup and hid behind his drink.

“Yes, but we never sing to her.” Dimitri leaned forward, forehead furrowing into wrinkles. “But seriously, how is going with you two?”