The Toll (Arc of a Scythe) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,94
I mean.”
High Blade Tenkamenin sniffed at the suggestion. “Hardly,” he said. “They took simplicity to an extreme. They’re Tonists now – I haven’t spoken to them in years.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Did you hear the Tonists had a prophet?” Tenka said bitterly. “He appeared shortly after you took your deep dive. They claimed the Thunderhead still spoke to him.” Tenka gave a rueful chuckle at the thought. “Of course he got himself gleaned.”
A waiter approached with a tray of shrimp that appeared too large to be real – no doubt a product of the Thunderhead’s experimental abundance farms. As always, the Thunderhead got it right; they tasted even better than they looked.
“How are your efforts going?” Tenkamenin asked her.
“They’re going,” she told him. “But the Thunderhead links things in confusing ways. I pull up an image of the Mars colony, and it takes me to a child’s drawing of the moon. A news report from the NewHope orbital station leads to a lunch order in Istanbul from a scythe I’ve never even heard of. Dante something-or-other.”
“Alighieri?” said Tenka.
“Yes, that’s it – do you know him?”
“I know of him. From EuroScandia, I believe. He’s long gone. Must have self-gleaned maybe fifty, sixty years ago.”
“It’s like every other link I’ve found. None of them make sense.”
“Go down every rabbit hole,” Tenka advised. “Because some of them might actually have rabbits.”
“I still don’t understand why you can’t just tell me what I’m looking for.”
Tenka sighed and leaned close to whisper. “The information we have came from another scythe before she self-gleaned – a clearing of her conscience, I imagine. Other than that, we have no actual evidence, and our own digging through the backbrain has been fruitless. We’re being hindered because we know what we’re looking for. While one searches for a man in a blue hat, one totally misses the woman in a blue wig.” He gave a little flip to one of her neon curls.
Although it was counterintuitive, she had to admit it made sense. Hadn’t she seen Tenka walking toward the “tool shed” each day, but her own assumptions never allowed her to guess the reason? She recalled a mortal-age video a teacher had once shown her class. The objective was to count how many times a ball was passed between teammates shifting around the screen. She got the answer right, as did most people in class. But everyone completely missed the man in a bear suit who danced his way right through the middle of the scene. Sometimes finding the obvious means coming in with no expectations.
The next morning, she had a breakthrough and ran to Tenka’s cottage to let him know what she had uncovered.
His home was modest in a way that even Scythe Faraday would have approved of. She found Tenka in the middle of something. Directly in front of him were two other people, not looking all that happy to be there. More than unhappy, they were miserable.
“Come in, my friend,” Tenka said when he saw Anastasia. “Do you know who this is?” he asked his two other guests.
“No, Your Excellency,” they said.
“She is my florist,” he told them. “She fills the palace and my home with the most lovely arrangements.” Then he focused his attention on the more nervous of the two: a man who seemed to be nearing forty, perhaps ready to turn a corner. “Tell me your dearest dream,” said the High Blade. “What do you want to do more than anything in the world, but have not yet done?”
The man hesitated.
“Don’t hold back,” prompted Tenkamenin. “Don’t be modest. Tell me your dream in all of its garish glory!”
“I … I want a sailing yacht,” he said like a little boy on Father Holiday’s lap. “I want to sail it around the world.”
“Very well!” said the High Blade, clapping his hands once, as if that sealed the deal. “We’ll go shopping for sailing yachts tomorrow. My treat!”
“Your … Excellency?” the man said, incredulous.
“You’ll have your dream, sir. Six months of it. Then you’ll return here to tell me all about it. And then I will glean you.”
The man was ecstatic. In spite of being told that he was going to be gleaned, he was happy as could be. “Thank you, Your Excellency! Thank you!”
Once he had left, the other man – a bit younger and less frightened than he was before, turned to the High Blade. “What about me?” he asked. “Do you want to hear my dream?”