But it’s Mistress Coyle who answers. “Don’t you worry, Todd,” she says. “They’re going to know how strong and committed we are if we have to run this ship dry.”

I look baffled at the Mayor for a minute.

“Broadcasting for the folks on the hilltop, are we, Mistress?” he says raising his voice so the comm can hear.

“Would everyone shut up, please?” Viola says. “Or I’m going to turn this thing off.”

This sets off another chain of coughing in her and I see how pale and thin and small she looks in the projeckshun. It’s the smallness that hurts. Sizewise, she’s always been just smaller than me.

But I think of her and I feel like she’s as big as the world.

“You call me if you need anything,” I say to her. “Anything at all.”

“I will,” she says.

And then there’s a beep and we don’t hear nothing more.

The Mayor looks surprised up into the projeckshun. Bradley and Viola are talking to the Spackle leader again but we can’t hear nothing anyone’s saying. She’s cut off all sound.

“Thank you very much, Todd,” Mistress Coyle says, all annoyed thru the comm.

“She wasn’t shutting me up,” I say. “It’s you all trying to butt in.”

“Stupid little bint,” I hear Mr O’Hare mutter from the other side of the campfire.

“WHAT did you say?” I shout, getting to my feet and staring bullets at him.

Mr O’Hare stands, too, breathing heavy, looking for a fight. “Now we can’t hear what’s going on, can we? That’s what you get for sending a little girl to–”

“You shut up!” I say.

His nostrils flare and his fists clench. “And what are you gonna do about it, boy?”

And I see the Mayor move to intervene–

But, “Step forward,” I say–

And my voice is calm, my Noise is light–

I am the Circle–

And Mr O’Hare steps forward without hesitating–

Right into the campfire.

He just stands there for a second, not noticing anything. Then he gives a yelp of pain and leaps straight into the air, the cuffs of his trousers on fire, already running to find water to put ’em out and I hear the Mayor and Mr Tate laughing and laughing.

“Well, Todd,” the Mayor says, “very impressive.”

I blink. I’m shaking all over.

I coulda really hurt him.

I coulda, just by thinking it.

(and it kinda feels good–)

(shut up–)

“Now that we’ve obviously got some time to kill while the negotiations continue,” the Mayor says, still laughing, “what do you say we engage in some light reading?”

And I’m only just recovering my breath, so it takes another long minute before I realize what he means.

{VIOLA}

“No,” Bradley says, shaking his head again, his breath clouding up as the sun gets closer to setting. “We can’t start with punishment. How we start sets the tone for everything that follows.”

I close my eyes and remember him saying the exact same thing to me what seems like for ever ago. And he was right. We started with disaster and it was pretty much disaster straight on through.

I put my head in my hands. I’m so tired. I know my fever’s come up again, no matter how much medicine we might have brought, and even though the Spackle built a fire near us as the day got colder, I’m still shivering and coughing.

The day’s gone really well, though, better than we expected. We’ve agreed all kinds of things: a complete ceasefire on both sides while we talk, the setting up of a council to talk through all disputes, maybe even the beginnings to an agreement on land where the settlers can live.

But all day, there’s been one stumbling block.

Crimes, the Sky says in our language. Crimes is the word in the Clearing’s language. Crimes against the Land.

We’ve figured out that the Land is them and the Clearing is us, and that to them, even our name is a crime. But it’s more specific than that. They want us to hand over the Mayor and his top soldiers to be punished for their crimes against a part of the Spackle they call the Burden.

“But you killed men, too,” I say. “You killed hundreds of them.”

The Clearing began this war, he says.

“But the Spackle aren’t guiltless,” I say. “There’s been wrongdoing on both sides.”

And immediately images of the Mayor’s genocide reappear in the Sky’s Noise–

Including one of Todd walking through piles of bodies towards 1017–

“NO!” I shout and the Sky sits back, surprised. “He had nothing to do with that. You don’t know–”

“Okay, okay,” Bradley says, his hands up. “It’s getting late. Can we all just agree that this has been a very productive first day? Look how far we’ve come. Sitting at the same table, eating the same food, working toward the same purpose.”

The Sky’s Noise quiets down a bit, but I get that feeling again, that feeling of every eye of the Spackle on us.

“We’ll meet again tomorrow,” Bradley continues. “We’ll talk to our people, you talk to yours. We’ll all have a fresh perspective.”

The Sky remains thoughtful for a moment. The Clearing and the Sky will stay here tonight,he says. The Clearing will be our guests.

“What?” I say, alarmed. “No, we can’t–” But more Spackle have already started bringing out three tents, so clearly this was planned from the start.

Bradley puts his hand on my arm. “Maybe we should,” he says, his voice low. “Maybe it’s a show of trust.”

“But the ship–”

“The ship doesn’t have to be in the air to fire its weapons,” he says, a bit louder so the Sky can hear it, and we can tell from his Noise that he does.

I look into Bradley’s eyes, into his Noise, see the kindness and hope that have always been there, that haven’t been bashed out of him by this planet or the Noise or the war or anything that’s happened so far. It’s really more to keep that kindness in him rather than actually agreeing that I say, “Okay.”

The tents, made of what looks like closely-woven moss, are up in a matter of moments, and the Sky says a long formal good night to us before disappearing into his. Bradley and I get up and tend to the horses, who greet us with warm nickering.

“That actually went pretty okay,” I say.

“I think the attack on you might have worked in our favour,” Bradley says. “Made them more willing to show agreement.” He lowers his voice. “Did you get that feeling though? Like you were being watched by every living Spackle?”

“Yes,” I whisper back. “I’ve been thinking that all day.”

“I think their Noise is more than just communication,” Bradley says, his whisper full of marvel. “I think it’s who they are. I think they are their voice. And if we could learn to speak it the way they do, if we could really learn to join their voice . . .”

He trails off, his Noise vibrant and shimmering.

“What?” I say.

“Well,” he says, “I wonder if we wouldn’t be halfway to becoming one people.”

[TODD]

I watch Viola sleep in the projeckshun. I said no to her staying the night up there, so did Simone and Mistress Coyle. She stayed anyway, and the scout ship flew back at nightfall. She’s left the front of her tent open to the fire and I can see her in there, coughing, tossing and turning, and my heart reaches out again for her, reaches out and wants to be there.

I wonder what she’s thinking. I wonder if she’s thinking of me. I wonder how long this is all gonna take so we can start living peaceful lives and get her well and I can take care of her and hear her talk to me in person and not just over a comm and she could read my ma’s book to me again.

Or I could read it to her.

“Todd?” the Mayor says. “I’m ready if you are.”

I nod at him and go into my tent. I take my ma’s book outta my rucksack and run my hands over the cover like I always do, over where Aaron’s knife sliced into it on the night it saved my life. I open up the pages to look at the writing, the writing of my ma’s own hand, written in the days after I was born and before she was killed in the Spackle War or by the Mayor himself or by the suicide lie he’s been trying to say is true and I boil a little at him again, boil at the anthill of letters spilling cross the pages, dense and skittery, already changing my mind about having him do this and–