The August 5 (14 page)

Tamsin stared at the case of metal letters. Gavin asked her what stories she would tell. Right now she felt like a blank page. She could sit back and let the world stomp all over her. But Tamsin didn't want it to be like that. She didn't want to be a passive observer like her mother. She wanted to write her own story and stamp it on the world.

13

SPEAK OUT FOR THE AUGUST FIVE

A vigil will be held at eleven a.m. on Saturday in Mast Square to show support for the men arrested during the August Rising. These men should be treated fairly, allowed visits with their families, and given counsel to help them with their trials.

—
JFA Bulletin,
September 27

It was a beautiful autumn morning. Instead of studying, Tommy kept staring out of the open window at the old oak trees planted along the inside of the Seminary wall. Their leaves had changed late and they were now a picturesque band of crimson against the gray stones and the city beyond. It was unseasonably warm, and the birds were chirping as if they had forgotten that winter was coming. Tommy couldn't bring himself to focus on the schematic that he was supposed to draw by Monday.

A knock at the door startled him. Bern was usually the only one who visited his room, and he was on a walking holiday in the northern woods with some of the lads. When Tommy opened the door, Kristin and the black-haired girl, Ellie, were standing in the corridor. Kristin gave him a cheery smile. Ellie looked uncomfortable. Ellie, whose real last name was Hywel, but Tommy wasn't supposed to mention that.

“Hello,” Tommy said, realizing that he hadn't brushed his hair or changed his clothes from the night before, when he fell asleep in his armchair in front of the fire. Seminary rules prohibited him from entertaining girls in his room, so he stood in awkward silence.

“It's a beautiful Saturday,” Kristin said. “What are you doing inside?”

“Banging my head against my math homework,” Tommy said, and earned a little smile from Ellie. Bern had said she was a math genius, so she probably flew through assignments.

“We're going to see Mast Square,” Kristin said. “You have to come with us.”

Mast Square was a historical site on the south banks of the Lyone River. A large sailing ship stood at the heart of a courtyard surrounded by tenement buildings. The circumstances of its grounding were lost to history, and for years it had lolled on its side as if flung from the harbor by a giant's hand. Recently, it had been hoisted upright and turned into an open-air museum. Tommy had read about the ship's renovations, but hadn't had a chance to see it yet. That sounded like more fun than sitting in his room drawing a plan for a better icebox.

“You don't have to, if you're busy,” Ellie said.

“I've always wanted to see it,” Tommy said. “Let's go.”

As they headed toward the front gate, Tommy felt an unexpected surge of happiness. He noticed a few glances from passing lads, but didn't really care what they thought. Strolling with the girls through the campus was the first time he'd felt like a real student, not Bern's brother who was tagging along with some group that didn't want him. Ellie had a copy of
The Streets of Sevenna
, a pamphlet-size book of street maps. She kept flipping the pages as they crossed Seminary Square and through the shadow of the giant statue of the Vigilant Zunftman, a twenty-foot stone man with both fists raised above his carved shoulders.

“Why are his hands raised like that?” Kristin asked.

“I think he's giving a speech to the masses,” Tommy said.

“It must be a very dramatic speech.” Kristin laughed.

“I think it looks like he's holding an invisible rifle,” Ellie said, still not looking up from her maps.

“You're right, it does,” Kristin agreed.

“That's the last thing we need: soldiers with invisible guns,” Tommy said.

“Maybe that's just what the cottagers need,” Ellie muttered.

“Ellie!” Kristin scolded her. “You have to watch what you say.”

“I'm not inside the Seminary walls,” Ellie retorted. But then her eyes flicked to Tommy, as if she had remembered she was talking to the son of Colston Shore.

“No worries,” Tommy assured her. “Which way do we go?”

“This way,” Ellie said. They headed toward the harbor district, which was on the north side of the river, but had a large population of cottagers living near the docks. She led them into a narrow alleyway lit only by sparse shafts of sunlight. Planks had been laid between the buildings to form a makeshift floor above the alley. Shabby furniture was visible through the gaps, and people paced the rickety boards above. At the end of the alley, a flight of crumbling granite steps descended into a long tunnel that doubled as a market. The air smelled like lantern oil and oranges, and the noise of the crowd echoed off the mossy walls. Despite the narrowness of the tunnel, it was jammed with wooden carts selling cabbages, salted meats, wreaths of dried flowers, and red tulips. Each cart sported a lantern, casting shifting shadows along the length of the passage.

“What is this place?” Kristin asked as they struggled to navigate through the crowds.

“A creepy carnival,” Tommy said.

“It's short cut,” Ellie replied.

“Are you sure?” Tommy asked. “How old is that book?”

“I think this is Piper Leaf Market,” Ellie said. “My book only lists official Zunft sites so it's not in here.”

“We're in a place that doesn't officially exist?” Tommy said. “How did you know about it?”

“Hywel talked about tunnels that run under the city,” Ellie said. “Most of them are old coal tunnels, and have been sealed off. He had some idea about transforming the tunnels into a transportation system that anyone could use to get around.”

After Ellie mentioned Hywel, the conversation died away. The news that the cottagers had kidnapped the former chief administrator had broken very recently, and Tommy wasn't supposed to know Ellie's connection to Hywel anyway. They reached the end of the tunnel, climbed another set of crumbling steps, and emerged near Regent's Bridge. Built from reddish limestone, it had distinctive lion's-head carvings at both ends of the span.

“That's Mast Square,” Ellie told them, pointing south across the Lyone where masses of people were spilling out of the square and into the street. “Maybe there's some kind of gathering.”

“Let's go see,” Kristin said. Fortunately, they were wearing ordinary street clothes with nothing to identify them as Seminary students. The girls had on long wool coats over their flowered dresses. If anyone stared at their knee-high leather boots, they would see how expensive they were, but hopefully no one would be paying attention.

When they reached Mast Square on the opposite bank they pushed their way through the crowd at the entrance. Once inside the large courtyard, there were so many spectators that it was hard to move at all. Solid blocks of tenement houses formed both the eastern and western walls, and scores of onlookers leaned out of windows, waving green handkerchiefs. The curved side of a majestic ship rose above the heads of the spectators. Seeing the old-fashioned sailing vessel perched in the heart of the city was even more impressive than Tommy had imagined, and he wished he could have seen it without all the people around. He couldn't imagine what circumstances could have brought such a ship so far inland.

“What are they celebrating?” Kristin asked.

“Maybe it's some kind of street performance?” Ellie wondered.

The crowd quieted as a woman stepped forward and raised her hands. From his angle below the prow, Tommy could only see the side of her face and the black curls tumbling down her back. She looked like she was in her forties, with a starburst of lines at the corners of her eyes.

“Fellows,” she called out, her voice echoing around the silent square. “Please forgive me, I've never made a speech before. For those who don't know me, my name is Meg Stevens. My husband is Jack. My son was Christopher.”

She paused as a murmur of recognition rippled through the crowd. Her voice wavered a little, and she was gripping the edge of the prow as if she might fall over.

“They won't let our children get an education. They won't let us publish a newspaper. They won't let us own our homes. Now they threaten to send us to the estates to work as slaves and bleed us for a loaf of bread. What choice did the August Five have?”

“Who's Jack Stevens?” Kristin whispered to Ellie and Tommy.

“One of the cottager rebels,” Ellie whispered back.

“Our people are disappearing!” Meg Stevens raged. “Did you wake up one morning and find your mother, or your uncle, or your son has gone missing? Colston Shore expects us to believe that these people have trotted back to their ancestral estates like good little slaves. Well, that's a lie!”

“People are disappearing?” Kristin asked. “What is she talking about?”

“I don't think we should be here,” Tommy whispered.

“We are the Children of the Islands!” Meg Stevens shouted. Her voice wasn't shaking anymore. “The rightful heirs to all the land.
We
are the warriors of old.
They
are fattened lambs. We are stronger than they'll ever be. And we will not be silenced!”

“We need to leave—” Tommy started to say. But the onlookers roared enthusiastically and drowned out his words. Suddenly the cheers turned to shouts of warning, and people whirled toward a commotion near the entrance of the square. There was a flurry of movement, and the crowd surged, knocking Ellie to her knees. Tommy pulled her to her feet and strained to see what was happening. He couldn't see over the heads of the people, but he could hear rovers rumbling in the street in front of the square.

“What is it?” Kristin cried.

Tommy grabbed the girls' hands. “The Zunft!” he shouted over the crowd. But the frightened people crushed together and there was nowhere to run. The terrified mob pushed in all directions as Zunft soldiers riding black horses galloped into the square. Tommy struggled to stay on his feet while the soldiers spurred their excited mounts into the mob, swinging heavy truncheons indiscriminately.

Holding hands and moving in a tight huddle, Tommy, Ellie, and Kristin tried to force their way through the crowd. Nearby, a man tumbled to the ground in front of a line of mounted soldiers. Several people came to his aid, but the soldiers closed ranks, trampling several more people under the hooves of the riled animals. Tommy heard the thud of a truncheon and a young man wheeled backward clutching his bloody head. As the soldiers drove the crowd against one side of the square, they became so tightly surrounded that Tommy couldn't even lift his arms. The pressure of the bodies made it feel like his ribs were crushing his heart. Around him, everything seemed to be moving abnormally slow. The quivering mob paused for breath, and Tommy felt like a cornered fox run to exhaustion by dogs.

An eerie quiet descended on the square. One of the horses danced sideways as a guard pulled hard on its reins. The soldiers advanced on the small crowd that was now trapped against the wall. Beyond the line of skittish horses, the square was empty except for the injured lying on the ground. Suddenly, a gunshot rang out and then another. A man in a flat cap crouched on the roof of a nearby tenement building. He cradled a rat gun on his shoulder. At the sound of the second bullet whizzing through the air, the mob sprang to life and rammed forward into the line of soldiers. The horses reared back as the soldiers tried to rein them under control and drive them against the crowd.

In the confusion that followed, Tommy lost his sense of direction. He heard screams and the clatter of hooves. Terrified that they were going to fall and be trampled to death, he clung on to the girls' hands with all his strength. Suddenly Ellie yanked his arm painfully, and he followed blindly, dragging Kristin behind him. Ellie's head was down and she was dodging people and darting through holes in the crowd.

Kristin's fingers were ripped from his. Tommy spun around as a mounted soldier loomed above her with a raised truncheon. He swung it down as if he meant to crush her skull. Tommy rushed toward her, but there were too many people between them. Kristin stood frozen, staring up at the soldier like she couldn't believe that he wanted to hurt her. At the last second, a young man pushed her out of the way. The truncheon cracked down on his shoulder and he fell to one knee. The soldier tugged the reins and circled his horse around.

The young man struggled to his feet. His flat cap had been knocked off, and Kristin bent down and picked it up off the cobblestones as the soldier struggled to get his horse under control. Tommy grabbed Kristin's sleeve.

“Get out of here!” the young man shouted.

Tommy dragged Kristin into the crowd in the same direction that he'd seen Ellie disappear moments before. They clawed their way to the edge of the mob and caught sight of Ellie near the entrance to the square. She had climbed onto a low window ledge and was desperately scanning the crowd. She jumped down when she saw Tommy and Kristin, and the three of them didn't stop running until they reached Regent's Bridge. Tommy's muscles were quivering and his legs unstable. When they reached the middle of the bridge, Kristin held out the man's flat cap. The cloth was covered in blood from where it had fallen on the ground. Kristin tossed the cap in the river without saying a word. They watched as it floated down the current, and Tommy thought about the anonymous cottager who had helped Kristin.
Gain five hundred honor points for saving a stranger from a crushed skull.

“Act casual,” Ellie said as they strolled back through Seminary Square. That struck Kristin as hilariously funny and she started giggling, which made Ellie and Tommy start laughing, too. For the rest of the walk back to the Seminary, one of them would start laughing nervously and the others would follow suit until Tommy felt light-headed from all the laughing. Once they reached Tauber Hall, they paused under the elm outside the entrance. Tommy marveled at how normal things looked: the lads playing Litball on the Green, the ivy-covered walls of the dormitory, and the birds chirping on the branches of the trees with crimson leaves.