Joseph D'Lacey - Meat

Collins put out his hand and Shanti grasped it. There were many words that passed in that silent communication, but not enough. Shanti took a hand of each girl and together they crouched and ran away from the gate and the shouting mob, away from the road where Bruno and his men would soon arrive. They crept into the long grass and down into the ditch below the hedgerow. From there they half ran, half stumbled away from town following the smell of rot.

She woke to the sounds of angry shouting, of men spoiling for affray.

It wasn’t clear how long she’d slept for. This time she’d entered such a deep sleep that it might have been a few hours of blackness or a whole day. Her first act was to vomit but nothing came except the pain of spasms contracting around the growth inside her. Crying, she stood up. Weakness of the legs and a fog of dizziness brought her straight back to her knees.

So. The rest, no matter how deep, had done little for her.

None of this was going to be easy.

With more will than physical power, she used the top of the tower wall to haul herself up. Once there, the top of the wall came to just above her waist. Its only function, she assumed was to stop stockmen from falling. She was grateful for it.

Her vision cleared and she saw it all.

To her right, the MMP plant and the burgeoning gang of workers and black-coats that thronged near the entrance. Beyond the gate, she saw – finally – Prophet John Collins. There was no mistaking who it must have been. A smooth-headed man dressed in rags and a band of two or three dozen others that looked much the same. They stood calmly whilst the men inside the plant appeared close to frenzy. She felt that Richard Shanti should be there too but there was no sign of him. She wanted him there, somehow. The idea of his presence comforted her but she knew the reality would be that Magnus had done away with him or was about to. It was a terrible pity.

In front of her, a few fields away, was the road connecting the plant and the town. Along this she could see three distinct groups. The first, nearest Collins, was another group of black-coats. Some distance behind them, far enough that the former group might easily not have been aware of them, was a huge band of Parsons led by a man she recognised even from this distance. The way he walked, the tilt of his head and the set of his shoulders; she knew the mannerisms all very well. And yet not well enough.

The final group was the largest and still quite distant. As far as she could make it out it was simply a huge crowd of townsfolk. The head of the column advanced but the tail never ended. It stretched right back into Abyrne. There was no way to calculate how many there were.

Everyone heading to the MMP plant.

Everyone ready to spill blood.

She was weary of it. Surely there had been enough blood let in this town. Enough to fill a river that stretched to eternity. Suddenly, everything she recognised and understood was wrong. Not just flawed, but so completely warped it made no sense at all.

She turned her attention back to the tiny group made up by Collins and his followers and felt a fierce protective instinct for them. They must each have known with utter certainty that they would die, and there they stood ready, steadfast. Only one other creature shared such nobility.

Perhaps they still had a chance, though.

She turned to go to the ladder and tripped over the hems of her gowns. She landed badly, not able to react quickly enough to protect herself, and hit the side of her head against the opposite wall of the tower. It stunned her. There was more pain but that was easy to ignore now. Pain was the essence of her reality from waking until sleeping. Urgency flared in her mind and she remembered Collins.

She had to move fast. Ignoring the blood trickling into her right eye, she lowered her legs to the rungs and began to climb down. Three steps from the bottom she committed to a rung that wasn’t there and didn’t have the strength to hold herself. She fell the rest of the way landing on her back in the churned mud of the field.

She rolled onto her side, grabbed at one of the tower’s supporting legs and pulled herself upright. A few paces away was a high bolted gate. One of many that kept the Chosen secure. She hobbled to it. It took all her mental effort to pull open the bolt. Then, leaning away from the gate and using only her diminishing weight, she hauled it open. Further along the dense hedgerow, there was another gate.

She staggered down to it.

The Grand Bishop led the Parsons at a fast walk but it wasn’t fast enough to stay ahead of the column of townsfolk drawing up behind.

The crowds that had set out from so many doors across Abyrne were fuelled by fear and anger. Their huge numbers lent them a shared strength and stamina. Not long after leaving the mansion, those at the front had broken into a trot and everyone else that was able had followed suit. Seeing the hurrying group of Parsons up ahead did nothing to slow them down.

The crowd sensed the power of its numbers and began to pursue the Parsons rather than merely follow. They were hungry for meat and ready for confrontation in order to get it.

The Grand Bishop heard the hurried panic in his own footsteps and realised he had to make a decision. If they tried to open the gap now, the crowd would run them down. His only option was to turn and face the townsfolk, talk to them as he had so many times before in the streets, in the squares and in the Central Cathedral. He’d give them God’s word they’d receive everything they required. He held his hands up to the Parsons behind him and stopped. He wanted time to regain his breath before the townsfolk caught up to them.

Atwell was right behind him.

‘What are you doing, Your Grace?’

‘Trying to prevent the end of the world. If we don’t turn and face the townsfolk, we’re finished. When we’re gone, the town will destroy itself.’

‘But wouldn’t it be safer to outrun them and take refuge at the plant? Then we can address them from safety.’

‘No. If they’ve chased us all that way, they’ll have no reason to listen. They’ll have lost all respect. We must face them.’

The Grand Bishop pushed his way back through the panting Parsons. Then, with his back to the fast approaching crowd he said to them, ‘Stand firm. Don’t give an inch or show any emotion. The Welfare is the highest authority in the town, God’s voice to His people. Let’s act like it.’

He turned to face the oncoming throng of townsfolk and grain workers. When they were still two hundred yards distant, he held up his hands with his palms to them. He set his expression in stone and waited.

The front ranks approached quickly. They were thinned out by their pace but they were only the vanguard. Hordes were close behind them. They saw the Grand Bishop but continued to run. Their faces were full of rebellion and disrespect, twisted by a feral mob spirit, knowing anything might happen and that nothing could stop it once it began. The Grand Bishop noticed many of them were armed with iron bars or lumps of rubble and brick. He filled his lungs in a final attempt to control his breathing.

He made eye contact deliberately with as many of the approaching men and women as he could. He kept his face stern and imperious. The crowd’s pace slowed. The front ranks thickened as more drew up behind them. They became a wall of faces.

He noticed how thin and hollow-faced so many of them looked while the Parsons were plump, robust and ruddy cheeked. He knew his voice would only reach the first few hundred, possibly a thousand townsfolk. After that, word would have to pass back on its own. He waited until he was sure the column had stopped and that enough folk had caught up to hear him.