Only silence greets her question.
She clicks her tongue. “Maybe the voices you heard robbed you of your own?” She laughs. “Very well. You!” She singles out a villager with her staff. A beam of faint blue light shines on him from the end. “Come forward. What is your name?”
“M-Melvin,” he stutters.
A ring of space clears all around him.
“You know who I am?” Morgan asks.
“Of course.” The man sounds positively terrified to be speaking to the Queen.
“And if I ask you a question, you would never dream of lying to me in response. Would you, Melvin?”
“N-no.”
“Good.” I can hear the Queen’s smile in her words. “Then tell me all you can about these voices. But know—” she adds before he starts to speak, “—that I have a very low tolerance for liars. You may begin.”
Melvin dry washes his hands a few times. He clears his throat. “It…” he tries. “The Voice… it…”
“Get on with it, man!” Morgan exclaims.
He shies back as if physically hit. “It…”
“The Voice told us that he’s going to make the caves collapse!” Somebody shouts from the midst of humans. “He said we would all die, that we’d all be crushed under the rock!”
“Who speaks now?” Morgan shines her beam into the crowd. “Step forth!”
A young boy, maybe a year or two younger than me, emerges.
“And what’s your name, boy?”
The boy bristles. “It’s Brayson,” he says defiantly. “And I don’t have a last name because it was stolen from me! Just like my life here in your Haven!”
“My Haven?” The Queen takes a gratuitous step back. “My dear child, this sanctuary belongs to all of us. Surely you understand that?”
“The sanctuary,” he spits, “belongs to the vampires. You keep us hostage here. We are your prey!”
“My, my,” Morgan mutters. “You’ve got quite the spirit. Tell me, did this ‘voice’ also give you such dangerous thoughts?”
“The thoughts are my own,” he tells her boldly. “And they’re not dangerous. They’re true!”
Morgan looks at him… and then laughs in response.
“Is that so?” she asks. “Look around you, Brayson. See how many supporters you’ve got.”
She shines her light on the other humans, all of whom are quick to step out of the way.
“You see?” she asks. “They understand what you do not. Maybe you are still young. Maybe you are a dreamer. But understanding will come in time. I promise you.”
“Oh?” he challenges her. “And what understanding is that?”
“That your place in The Haven is part of a divine equilibrium that keeps us safe. We provide you food, water, shelter. We ask for nothing in return.”
“You ask for our lives!”
Morgan waves the accusation aside easily. “We take your blood, yes, but it is for the good of the whole. Without it, society here would collapse. Look upon your elders! They know.”
Again she breaks her light through the other humans. They either keep their heads down or mumble in agreement.
“Enough of this,” Morgan announces. “I came here to stem the discord running rampant amongst you. Brayson—I charge you with an attempt at high treason. The voice was a figment of your imagination and, charismatic as you are, you got the other humans around you to agree. You are the troublemaker here. And, as they say—” she gives a vicious grin, “—cut the head off the snake, and the body will follow.”
Chapter Nineteen
PHILLIP
On Mother’s proclamation, the entire assembly before us explodes into a riot of confusion.
“The boy is innocent!” somebody yells.
“We all heard it! We all heard the Voice!”
“It’s true! It spoke to all of us!”
“Brayson’s done nothing wrong!”
Mother lets the protests go on and on for a long time. She turns to me and Raul. “You see what you must do to free their tongues?” she asks with a knowing smile.
She turns back to free the villagers below her.
“Very well!” she proclaims. “Now that more of you have owned up to hearing this voice, the real questions can begin. Did Brayson speak the truth? Did the Voice tell you that these caves would collapse?”
“Yes!” a thousand voices scream in unison.
“And you all claim to have heard it?” Mother asks. “Each of you can vouch for what it said?”
More cries of agreement rain up from the crowd.
Leonardo looks up. “My Queen, if I may offer an opinion?”