The guard took some time to reply. “You? You weren’t supposed to come back.”
&n
bsp; So even he knew I would be caught. “Well, I have. So let me out.”
“I’m not sure I can. I mean… you can’t come through.”
Beast, go to him.
The door clunked, zinged, then squeaked open. The guard dropped to his knees. “I am sorry, so sorry.”
“Get up.” Mara pointed into the tunnel. “The other door.”
The guard rose and swallowed hard. He sounded like he might cry, mumbling to himself as Mara followed him along the tunnel.
“They’ll force their way in when I open it, hundreds of ’em,” the guard said, hand on the wooden beam across the door.
“They will.”
The guard turned to look at Mara. “But –”
“Open it.”
Light burst into the tunnel. Mara could see the shapes of people getting to their feet. He pushed the guard’s back. “Out.”
The guard stumbled into the stinking compound. The dirty, skinny people looked confused at first, then anger spread across their faces. Mara pushed the guard to his knees and flicked off his helmet.
“First,” Mara shouted, pointing at the guard, “you kill him. Then… you kill the rest of them. Burn this place to the ground.”
Mara quickly lost sight of the guard as the diseased crowded around to kick and punch. Many of them ran straight for the tunnel. Mara caught a boy around his own age by the shoulder, then tugged at his shirt. “Swap? You look like you could be a prince.”
Mara’s new clothes stank of piss, but he felt far more comfortable in them than he had in the velvet. He’d walked back passed the dying, through the dead and out of the compound. Bells rang from the city. He looked across the fields. Freedom. He could be alone, but not yet. He wanted to see what chaos he’d caused in the city, the looks on people’s faces as they panicked, as they suffered. He’d walk right through the front gate. People like him were never allowed through there, and if they tried to stop him, he’d kill them.
Mara stared through the front gate from a distance. It didn’t look very much like chaos. People stood along the long road toward the castle. Mara walked toward the gate. The four guards didn’t even look at him, too busy staring into the city.
“Look,” a guard said as he pointed, “that’s smoke, ain’t it?”
“What the fuck is going on up there? How about two of us go check?” another guard said.
“We stay here. We leave our post, and we’re all fucked.”
“They’re warning bells, they must need help.”
Mara walked on. Thick grey smoke poured from several windows of the castle. As he passed through the crowd, he ran his hands across other peoples’. Chaos.
People first screamed at each other, then the fighting started. Many people barged into him as they ran around. Some he let pass, others he slashed at with Silas’s blade. He made his way to the side of the street and climbed up a stack of crates beside a building, then slowed time.
The crowd pulsed as they fought. Some people looked scared, some angry, some crazy. Blood ran from the noses of many of them. Most swung fists, while others hit people with lengths of wood. They pulled the shutters off buildings and climbed through the windows.
Mara smiled. The hum of noise warmed him. He looked back toward the gate. The guards had their swords drawn and were surrounded by people. Mara let time go back to normal and watched the crowd rush toward the guards, knocking them from view.
He jumped down from the crates and headed toward the castle. He wanted to see the diseased take over. He touched anyone that came close as he walked, looking back every so often to see the buildings starting to burn.
As he reached the clock tower, a rumble of hooves came. Two lines of white horses with guards in golden armour thundered through the crowd, the two front riders blowing horns. Behind the first eight horses was a huge wooden carriage, and eight more horses chasing behind. People dived out of their way, those too slow trampled to a pulp.
“The king, the king,” people shouted in the crowd.
Where the crowd thickened the first four horses split away, the guards on their backs slashing at people with their swords. Making way for the king’s carriage to continue through to the front gate and gone.