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SILENCE AND FURY

WREN

“ A full half of the Council is gone. Gone !” Raek is wild with anger; all his tight control died with his brother, and he’s incendiary on the stage, incandescent with rage and fury.

Rather than scaring the people in the square, it ignites them, spilling like Everfire from one to the next, a madness passing from villager to villager.

“We are being punished by the Gods for forgetting the ways of our people! Empty silos, early Storms, absent Justice, and now—” His voice catches, and the barbs in it rock the listening audience forward on their toes, “— now, an errant BoneKeeper, refusing to Guide souls because she cannot paint her face in pretty patterns. When will it be enough?” For all the darkened crevices of his soul, he speaks with a golden tongue, and it draws people to him.

“When will it be enough ? My brother…my brother…” The heartbreak in his words is clear, pulling sympathy from those around him like a fish on a hook from a pond.

Turning, he points to me with a shaking hand.

“Will you condemn our people further? Waiting for your missing Crown—” Disdain and suspicion drip from him like poisoned rain.

“Waiting for your simple sigils? You’ve Guided enough souls without them — we’ve all seen you Keeper.

It is too much! Too much! Do you not want to see our people safe through the Storms?

Offerings must be made, and you will be the one sending them to Silence if you refuse to Guide them.

No one else. Their souls will die in your hands.

It is as it has ever been — if the bones refuse to speak, the Council must take the task.

” He raises his voice again, as though it were not loud before, as though it was not already echoing from the stone walls in the keep square, so crowded with people that too deep of an inhale would brush your chest against another’s back.

“We will not let you drive us starving and helpless into the depths of the coming Storms! The Offerings have been named, and will be Reaped and Rendered with or without you, Keeper. We cannot fail all because you choose to fail some .”

Silas steps forward, face dark, hands raised. “Brother Raek?—”

But Raek turns to him, sneering, three of the remaining Council standing behind him, a black, cloaked wall of support.

Rexus, old and weary, is bent like a weak willow in the middle, and only Rannoch stands beside the Father.

“You were named very early, Father. Very early. By a BoneKeeper who knew, perhaps what grew in his wife’s belly.

Who is to say? But you are so often gone from our village, choosing to leave with the Hunters, choosing to stay outside our walls — there are those who question if you even want to take care of our people, or if you’d rather walk into the winter Storms like the Father before you.

” He leans forward, the crowd leaning with him, faux concern on his face.

“ Can you lead us, Silas?” The crowd draws in a breath as one; to address the Father so…

but Raek pushes forward. “ Can you make the hard decisions? The ones that steal sleep from you at night with their weight? The ones that crease your face with their memory? That is what it takes to lead this village. And if you do not have the mettle in you to draw from, well — this is already a path we have not walked in the history of our people. What is one more thing?”

Silas opens his mouth to speak, but Raek has turned from him, despair and grief wrapped around him like a cloak, worn on his face like a masque, but the people are too desperate now to care.

When the Council Bell called us to the square this morning, it was to announce that a further measure of grain had fallen prey to rot, that we had even less than thought, that starvation was not a threat this winter, but a promise, that the coming famine of the coldest months will send more to the Silence than ever heard of in bone memory.

The hollow faces of the children will cave into sharp, gaunt slices of bone beneath flesh and then further.

No toddler or infant will survive; there is just no way to keep their bellies full enough, and even if a parent gave all they had, how would someone in their milk teeth care for themselves when their mother or father lay empty on the floor, unable to continue through the Storms.

“If the Trade had happened…” Raek lets his voice trail off, glancing at me, the implication clear, and the weight of thousands of eyes follow his, pushing me into the wall of the Council House behind me.

I’m not on stage with the Council, but low behind them, beneath the pillars and the massive overhang, having been told curtly that my presence on the raised platform with the Council was not required today.

“If the Trade had happened,” he repeats, trying to be heard over the growing discord in the square, “perhaps we would not have to make this choice. Perhaps we would not have to beg the Gods for forgiveness.” Eyes white-ringed with fanatic energy, he turns his face to the yellow-grey sky above.

It’s a strange, sick color, like a fading bruise, the late light of our weak sun flicking in and out of churning clouds.

On the stage, Raek falls to his knees, hands stretched up in dramatic supplication, fingers grasping at the air as though he could pull the Sun God down from the injured heavens.

“But I will beg, if that’s what it takes!

V is for Vengeance, the payment still grows !

Well, we will pay, and pay, and pay! We will do it with willing hearts and hands, until the streets are red enough for the Gods to give us grace to make it through the storm season!

If it takes ten, or ten sets of ten, is that not better than a thousand?

Two thousand? We will pay !” he screams to the chaos above him; the sky roils in response as though it hears him, the grey clouds racing, winds whipping through the square.

And the people…the people kneel.

Rannoch is desperately trying to hide his panic; Silas, beside him, is whispering fervently in his ear, eyes darting between Raek, the Council, the villagers, and me. Control has been torn from his hands in a single moment, and even those he trusted, other than Rannoch, are nowhere to be found.

Lorcan is abnormally silent on my back; he trembles on my skin as though he is trying to speak, but is unable to. He is almost vibrating with strangled effort, and sickness rises in my throat.

“Bring the first Sacrifice!” Raek calls, and from the crowd, Grace is dragged by two Protectors.

This is nothing like we have ever seen; Offerings are not treated like criminals, gripped tightly in inflexible, bruising hands.

They are not thrown before the Council as though they have committed some crime and are now facing punishment.

They are walked with care and gratitude, given honied breads and sweet mead, made comfortable and given the blessing of their people.

They are honored, and thanked, and sent to the Gods with love and heart-deep appreciation.

None of that is here, none exists in the furious lines of Raek’s face, the desperate hunger of the rocking crowd, the set acceptance of the approaching Render and Reaper, each ready to do their job.

“To the Reaping, for the Gods!” he screams, and the kneeling crowd echoes him.

“To the Reaping, to the Reaping!”

Grace is panicked on the stage, eyes wide and wild, looking around her in confusion and terror.

Silas steps forward again, no hesitancy this time, towering over her.

His presence is just enough to push Raek back a step, to settle the crowd enough to make himself heard.

He is our mountain in human form, massive and threatening, carved stone, glinting obsidian, and grim determination is written in every line of his body.

Reaching down, he extends a steadying hand to Grace, who takes it in her own trembling one and lets him pull her gently to her feet.

“Who are we becoming?” he asks, low, troubled voice a startling counterpoint to Raek’s higher, screaming one, the juxtaposition enough to drain some of the hysteria from the undulating crowd.

“ Who are we becoming? ” There is so much sadness in his voice it is cavernous.

“With calls for Sacrifice ?” The word is bitter on his tongue, and flavors the ears of those listening.

It is true; we don’t speak of Sacrifice, only Offerings, and the difference is night from day.

Slow realization breaks on the faces of those closest to the stage.

“When have we ever treated the gift of someone’s life with such disdain, with such callous hands, with such cold hearts?

” Looking down at Grace, he studies her, giving the people a moment to take in her tear-stained face, her straining chest, shuddering from hitching breath.

“You know this woman. She is a seamstress in the Second Ring, not a Sacrifice . She has made clothes for the births of your children, dresses for your weddings, blankets for your hearths, taught at sewing circles. Does she not deserve your appreciation? The comfort of your gratitude, the weight of your arms around her as she fulfills, for each of us in our stead, the price we must pay?”