The Toll (Arc of a Scythe #3) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,47

pointed. “And you had better be true to your word—the Amazonian scythedom will compensate them for their troubles when they are revived.”

The scythe from EuroScandia—Possuelo couldn’t remember her name—was livid. “Speaking to a scythe with such disrespect is a gleaning offense!” she said, drawing a blade, but Possuelo stood between them.

“You would glean the captain who delivered the diamonds to us?” said Possuelo. “This is not something I will do, nor will I allow you to do, either!”

“But her insolence!” shouted the EuroScandian.

“His insolence, at the moment,” said Possuelo, further flustering the angry scythe. “Captain Soberanis, keep your disrespectful tongue silent, and have your deadish crewmen brought below and prepared for transport.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Jeri said, and casually brought a flashlight beam across the open door of the vault.

The other scythes were so dazzled by the diamonds they saw twinkling in the darkness that they didn’t give a second thought to the bodies being carried away. Even when one hand flopped out from under a sheet, revealing it bore a scythe’s ring.

In the end, the diamonds were divided, the founders’ robes packed for museum shipment, and the bodies of the illustrious Scythe Anastasia and the notorious Scythe Lucifer went with Possuelo to Amazonia.

“I would very much like to meet her once she’s revived,” Jeri told Possuelo.

“As will everyone else in the world,” Possuelo pointed out.

“Well,” said Jeri with a grin that could charm a turtle from its shell, “good thing I’m a friend of a friend.”

And now Possuelo found himself sitting across from Anastasia, playing cards as if it were nothing at all. Could she read in his face how momentous this all was, he wondered, and how terrible the tightrope they’d have to walk?

* * *

Anastasia could read some of it. What was easier to read was Possuelo’s truco hand. He had a number of tells. Body language, tone of voice, the way his eyes moved across the cards. And although truco had a high element of chance, if one could exploit an opponent’s weaknesses, the odds could be turned.

It was hard, though, when he said things that seemed intentionally designed to distract her. Such as teasing her with maddening tidbits of information.

“You,” he told her, “are quite the figure out there now.”

“Exactly what’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that Scythe Anastasia has become a household name. Not just in North Merica, but everywhere.”

She discarded a five of cups, and Possuelo picked it up. She made a mental note of it.

“I’m not sure I like that,” she said.

“Whether you like it or not, this is true.”

“So what am I supposed to do with that information?”

“Get used to it,” he told her, and laid down a low-value trick.

Anastasia drew a fresh card, kept it, and discarded one that she knew was of no use to either of them.

“Why me?” she asked. “Why not any of the other scythes who went down with Endura?”

“I suppose it’s what you came to represent,” Possuelo said. “The doomed innocent.”

Anastasia found herself offended on several levels. “I am not doomed,” she told him, “and I’m not so innocent, either.”

“Yes, yes, but you have to remember people take from a situation the thing that they need. When Endura sank, people needed someone to serve as a receptacle for their grief. A symbol of lost hope.”

“Hope isn’t lost,” she insisted. “It’s just misplaced.”

“Exactly,” Possuelo agreed. “Which is why your return must be handled carefully. For you shall be the symbol of hope renewed.”

“Well, at least my hope has,” she said, throwing down the remainder of her cards in a royal trick and discarding the very one she knew Possuelo was waiting for.

“Look at this!” said Possuelo, pleased. “You’ve won!”

Then, without warning, Anastasia leaped up, flipping the table, and hurled herself at Possuelo. He dodged, but she was anticipating that and delivered a low Bokator kick meant to knock his feet out from under him. He didn’t fall, but he stumbled back against the wall… losing his balance.

He looked at her, not at all surprised, and chuckled. “Well, well, well,” he said. “There it is.”

Anastasia strode up to him.

“All right,” she said. “I’m as strong as I need to be. It’s time to tell me everything.”

“I wish to hear your thoughts.”

“Do you? Will you consider my thoughts if I share them with you?”

“Of course I will.”

“Very well. Biological life is, by its very nature, inefficient. Evolution requires a massive expenditure of time and energy. And humankind no longer evolves, it merely manipulates itself—or allows you to manipulate it—toward