The Toll (Arc of a Scythe #3) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,102

the pyre was not Scythe Lucifer—for over the past three years the world had come to know Rowan Damisch’s face. Yet this was the face being broadcast and streamed. It filled the expansive screens all around Goddard as if to mock him.

His grand moment was not just robbed from him—it was subverted. Twisted upon itself like something obscene. The rumbles from the audience sounded different than they had only a second ago. Was that laughter he heard? Were they laughing at him? Whether they were, or not, was of little consequence. All that mattered was what he heard. What he felt. And he felt the derision of thirty thousand souls. It could not stand. This monstrous moment could not be suffered to live.

Constantine whispered in his ear. “I’ve ordered the gates locked, and the entire BladeGuard has been alerted. We’ll find him.”

But that didn’t matter. It was ruined. They could drag Rowan back and hurl him onto the pyre, but it would make no difference. Goddard’s shining moment would be the greatest casualty of the day. Unless. Unless…

* * *

Ayn knew things were heading to a very bad place the moment she saw that imbecile atop the pyre.

Goddard would have to be handled.

For when his anger took control, all bets were off. It was bad enough before, but ever since acquiring Tyger’s body, those youthful impulses—the sudden endocrine surges—gave Goddard a terrible new dimension. Adrenaline and testosterone might have been charming when managed by a harmless blank slate like Tyger Salazar; they were merely winds beneath a kite. But under Goddard, those same winds were a tornado. Which meant he would have to be handled. Like a beast that had broken out of its cage.

She let Constantine be the one to run out to him and deliver the bad news—because Goddard loved to blame the messenger, so better Constantine than her. Only after Goddard had turned to look at the hapless tech did Ayn go to him.

“The feeds have been cut,” Ayn told him. “It’s no longer streaming. We’re on damage control now. You can turn this around, Robert,” she said, cajoling him as best she could. “Make them think this is intentional. That it’s part of the show.”

The look on his face terrified her. She wasn’t even sure he’d heard her until he said, “Intentional. Yes, Ayn, that’s exactly what I’ll do.”

He raised the mic, and Ayn stepped back. Perhaps Constantine had been right. It was always in these moments of dismay that she could corral him. Control him. Fix what was broken before it became irreparable. She took a deep breath and waited, along with everyone else, to hear what he was going to say.

* * *

“Today was meant to be a day of reckoning,” Goddard began, spitting the words into the microphone as he spoke. “You! All of you who came here today nurturing a thirst for blood. You! Whose hearts quicken at the prospect of a man being burned alive before your very eyes.

“YOU! Did you think I would indulge you? Did you believe we scythes were so base as to pander to your morbid curiosity? Offering you a circus of carnage for your entertainment?” Now he screamed at them through gritted teeth. “How DARE you! ONLY SCYTHES may take pleasure in the ending of life, or have you forgotten?” He paused letting that sink in. Letting them feel the depth of their transgression. Had Rowan not vanished, he would have been happy to give them their show. But they must never know that.

“No, Scythe Lucifer is not here today,” he continued, “but YOU, who were so eager to witness the spectacle, are now the object of my eye. This was not a judgment on him; it was a judgment on YOU, who have, on this day, damned yourselves! The only way back from perdition is penance. Penance and sacrifice. Therefore, I have selected YOU on this day to be an example for the world.”

Then he looked to the thousand scythes dotting the audience of the stadium.

“Glean them,” he ordered with contempt for the crowd so great that he bit his own lip. “Glean them all.”

* * *

The panic was slow to build. Stupefied people looked to one another. Did the Overblade actually say that? He couldn’t have said it. He couldn’t have meant it. Even the scythes were unsure at first… but an order could not be refused if one didn’t want their loyalty questioned. Bit by bit weapons were pulled out, and the scythes