“Peter, you are not going out there,” Apgar said.
“Amy can protect me. You can see it for yourself. They’re here to defend us.”
“I don’t care if they’re here to fix the plumbing—you’ve lost your goddamn mind. Do not make me tackle you, because I will absolutely do that.”
The soldier darted his eyes to Peter, then the general, then back again. “Sir, should I get the harness or not?”
“Private, you take one step and I’m going to pitch you over that wall,” Apgar said.
Another cry from the spotter: “We have movement! The riders are moving away!”
Peter looked up. “What do you mean away?”
A face floated over the rail. A quick conferral with someone behind him, then the man pointed due north. “Across the field, sir!”
Peter stepped back to the edge of the rampart and raised his binoculars. “Gunnar, are you seeing this?”
“What are they doing?” Apgar said. “Are they surrendering?”
With a puff of dust, Amy and Alicia brought their horses to a halt. Amy drew and raised the sword. It was not a gesture of capitulation but defiance.
They were setting themselves as bait.
—
“Fanning, do you hear me?!”
Amy’s words dwindled into the gloom.
“If you want me, come and get me!”
“Should we go further out?” Alicia asked.
“If we do, we might not make it back.” Then, raising her voice again: “Are you listening? I’m right here, you bastard!”
Alicia waited. Still nothing. Then:
You have done well, Alicia.
She pressed her hands over her ears, a pointless reflex; Fanning’s voice was inside her.
Everything I could have wished for, you have accomplished. Her army is nothing, I can whisk it away. You have given me that, and so much more.
“Shut up! Leave me alone!”
Amy was staring at her. “Lish, what is it? Is it Fanning?”
Do you feel it, Alicia? Fanning’s voice was smooth, taunting. It was like an oily liquid spreading through her brain. Of course you do. You always could. Haunting the streets, counting heads. They are a part of you as I am a part of you.
Alicia heard the sound then. No, not heard: sensed. A kind of…scratching. Where was it coming from?
She must come to me in ruins. That will be the truest test. To feel what I feel. What we feel, my Alicia. To know despair. A world without hope, without purpose, everything lost.
“Alicia, tell me what’s happening.”
I know your dreams, Alicia. The great walled city and its sounds of life within. The music and the happy cries of children. Your longing to be among them, and the door you cannot enter. Did you know even then, Alicia? Did you know what lay in store?
The sound grew more intense. The blood was throbbing in her neck; she thought she might be ill.
My Alicia, it is already done. Can you feel it? Can you feel…them?
Her mind slammed back to awareness. She turned in her saddle. Beyond the barrier of Amy’s army, the lights of the city shone.
Outside, she thought. I’m outside, just like in the dream.
“Oh, God, no.”
—
Sara was trying to make herself breathe.
A hundred and twenty souls were crammed in the basement. Candles and lanterns, spread throughout the space, cast odd, animated shadows. Sara’s pistol lay in her lap, her hand upon it, loose but ready.
Jenny and Hannah had organized a game of duck, duck, goose to distract some of the children. Others were occupying themselves with smuggled toys. A few were crying, though probably they did not know why; they were channeling the anxiety of the adults.
Sara was sitting on the floor with her back against the door. Its metal face was cool against her skin. Would it hold? Various scenes unfolded in her mind: pounding on the door, the metal bulging, everyone screaming, backing away, then the final crack and death pouring in, engulfing them all.
She was watching Jenny and Hannah. Jenny was terrified—the woman wore her emotions like a coat—but Hannah had a steady streak in her. It was she who had initiated the game. There were people, Sara knew, who were like this, the ones who could not be ruffled or else didn’t show it, who possessed great internal reservoirs of calm. Hannah was racing around the circle on her long legs, grinning with conspiracy, pursued by a little boy. Hannah was going to let him catch her, of course; she made a stagy show of her surrender that sent the boy into a fit of happy giggles, which, for a moment, put Sara at ease. She remembered such games, how much fun they were, their object so simple and pure. She had played duck, duck, goose as a girl, then, later, with Kate and her friends. But in the next instant, this thought was replaced by another. Kate, she thought, Kate, where are you, where have you gone? Your body lies in a bed far from home; your spirit has flown. I am lost without you. Lost.