The Toll (Arc of a Scythe #3) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,60

workers toiling like drones to turn the atoll into something it was not. What was the Thunderhead up to in this place?

Kwajalein was his find. His triumphant discovery. The Thunderhead had brazenly jumped his claim. Although Faraday was curious, he didn’t give in to that curiosity. He was a scythe, and he flatly refused to have anything to do with a work of the Thunderhead.

He could have banished it from the atoll if he’d chosen to—after all, as a scythe, and above the law, he could demand anything, and the Thunderhead would have to abide by it. He could have proclaimed that it was not allowed within a hundred nautical miles of Kwajalein, and it would have had no choice but to retreat to the precise distance he had ordered it to, taking all its construction equipment and workers with it.

But Faraday didn’t assert his claim. He didn’t banish the Thunderhead.

Because ultimately, he trusted its instincts more than he trusted his own. So Faraday banished himself instead.

There were ninety-seven islands in the Kwajalein Atoll, making up the broken, dotted rim of a submerged volcanic crater. Surely he could claim one as his own. He set aside his mission in those early days and appropriated a small raft that had arrived with the first supply ships. Then he took it to one of the islands on the far rim of the atoll. The Thunderhead respected his choice and left him alone. It kept his tiny little island out of its plans.

But not the other islands.

Some of the islets were barely large enough for a person to stand upon, but on every one that could withstand construction, something was being built.

Faraday did his best to ignore it. He cobbled himself together a shack with tools he had taken from construction crews before he left. It wasn’t much, but he didn’t need much. It was a quiet place to live out his eternity. And eternity it would be—or at least a fair slice of it—because he decided he would not self-glean, though he was greatly tempted. He vowed to live at least as long as Goddard lived, if only to secretly spite him.

As a scythe, he had a responsibility to the world, but he was done with all that. He felt no guilt in defying that first all-important scythe commandment of Thou shalt kill. He had. It was sufficient. Knowing Goddard, he was sure there was plenty of that going on without him.

Was it wrong to be separate and apart from a world he’d come to despise? He had tried this once before—in Playa Pintada on the serene northern coast of Amazonia. He was only jaded then. He didn’t yet loathe the world, just mildly disliked it. It was Citra who had rousted him out of his complacency. Yes, Citra—and look what became of all her boldness and bright intentions. Now Faraday had gone beyond jaded to being downright misanthropic. What purpose could there be for a scythe who detested the world and everyone in it? No, this time he would not be pulled back into the fray. Munira might try to drag him in, but she would fail, and she would eventually give up.

She didn’t give up, of course, but he still held on to the hope that she would. Munira would come to see him once a week, bringing food and water and seeds to grow, although his patch of the world was too small and the soil too rocky to grow much of anything. She would bring fruit and other treats that he secretly enjoyed—but he never thanked her. Not for any of it. He hoped his ungrateful nature would finally put her off, and she’d return to Israebia, and the Library of Alexandria. That’s where she belonged. He should never have pulled her off her path. Another life ruined by his meddling.

On one particular visit, Munira brought him, of all things, a bag of artichokes.

“They don’t grow here, but I suppose the Thunderhead sensed a need, and they arrived on the last supply ship,” she told him.

This, although it might not appear like it to Munira, was a substantial development. A moment worthy of note. Because artichokes were Faraday’s favorite, which meant their delivery to the island was no accident. Although the Thunderhead did not interact with scythes, it clearly knew them. It knew him. And it was, in an indirect way, reaching out to him. Well, if this was some sort of sideways gesture of goodwill from the