فصل 22

A Testament of the Toll

In an ancient abbey on the northern edge of the city, the Toll did take sanctuary and sustenance. He shared bread and fellowship with the believer, the magician, and the mauler, for all were of equal timbre to the Toll. Thus, all souls, high and low, came to revere him as he sat in the cradle of the Great Fork in the springtime of his life, imparting wisdom and prophecy. He would never know winter, for the sun cast its countenance more brightly upon him than on anyone. All rejoice!

Commentary of Curate Symphonius

Here is the initial reference to what we call the first chord. Believer, Magician, and Mauler are the three archetypes that constitute humankind. Only the Toll could have united such disparate voices into a coherent sound pleasing to the Tone. This is also the first mention of the Great Fork, which has been determined to be a symbolic reference to the two paths one may choose in life: the path of harmony or the path of discord. And to this day, the Toll still stands where the paths diverge, beckoning us toward everlasting harmony.

Coda’s Analysis of Symphonius

Once again, Symphonius has made broad assumptions that stretch the facts. While it is possible that the notes of the first chord represent archetypes, it is equally possible that they represent three actual individuals. Perhaps the Magician was a court entertainer. Perhaps the Mauler was a knight who took on the fire-breathing beasts that are rumored to have existed at the time. But most egregious, in my opinion, is that Symphonius missed that the Toll sitting “in the cradle of the Great Fork in the springtime of his life” is an obvious fertility reference.

22 Just Desserts

As with most things in Greyson’s life as the Toll, Curate Mendoza had chosen his official residence—or, more accurately, given him a list of preapproved residences for him to choose from at a grand meeting of high-level curates.

“As your reputation and notoriety grow, we need a fortified and defendable location.” Then he presented what appeared to be a multiple choice test. “With our numbers of devotees ever expanding, we have received enough funds to procure any of these four sites for you to choose from,” Mendoza told him. The choices were: A) a massive stone cathedral,

B) a massive stone railroad station,

C) a massive stone concert hall, or

D) a secluded stone abbey that might have appeared massive under other circumstances, but seemed miniscule compared to the others.

Mendoza had thrown in the last choice to satisfy the curates for whom less was more. And the Toll, with a stagey, beatific gesture meant to mildly mock the entire process, raised his hand and pointed to the only wrong answer on the test: the abbey. Partially because he knew it was the one Mendoza least wanted, and partially because he kind of liked it.

The abbey, set in a park at the city’s narrow northern tip, began life as a museum designed to look like an ancient monastery. Little did the architects know that they’d be so successful, it would actually become one. The Cloisters, it was called. Greyson had no idea why it was plural; there was only one.

The ancient tapestries that once hung on the walls had been sent to some other museum of mortal-age art and replaced by new tapestries made to look old, which depicted scenes of Tonist religious significance. To look on them, one would think that Tonism had been around for thousands of years.

Greyson had been living here for more than a year now, yet coming home never felt like coming home. Perhaps because he was still the Toll, clothed in those itchy, embroidered vestments. Only when he was alone, in his private suite, could he remove them and be Greyson Tolliver once more. At least to himself. To everyone else he was always the Toll, no matter what he wore.

The staff was told repeatedly not to treat him with reverence, only common respect, but that wasn’t happening. They were all loyal Tonists handpicked for the job, and once in the Toll’s service, they treated him like a god. They would bow low when he passed, and when he told them to stop, they would revel in being chastised. It was a no-win situation. But at least they were better than the zealots—who were becoming so extreme, there was a new name for them: Sibilants. A torturous, distorted sound, unpleasant to all.

Greyson’s only respite from reverence was Sister Astrid, who, in spite of her fervent belief that he was a prophet, didn’t treat him like one. She saw it as her mission, though, to engage him in spiritual conversation and open his heartstrings to the truth of Tonism. There was only so much talk of Universal Harmonies and Sacred Arpeggios he could stand. He wanted to bring some non-Tonists into his inner circle, but Mendoza wouldn’t have it.

“You must be careful who you associate with,” Mendoza insisted. “With scythes increasingly targeting Tonists, we don’t know who we can trust.” “The Thunderhead knows who I can and can’t trust,” Greyson said, which just annoyed him.

Mendoza never stopped moving. As a monastic curate, he had been quiet and reflective, but he had changed. He had reverted to the marketing guru he had been before becoming a Tonist. “The Tone put me where I was needed, when I was needed,” he once said, then added, “All rejoice!” Although Greyson could never be sure whether he was being genuine when he said that. Even when he ran religious services, his “all rejoice” always seemed to come with a wink.

Mendoza would stay in constant communication with curates around the world by secretly piggybacking on scythedom servers. “They’re the most unregulated, least monitored systems in the world.” There was something both satisfying and troubling to know that they were using the scythedom’s own servers to carry their secret messages to Tonist curates around the world.

Greyson’s private suite was a true sanctuary. It was the only place where the Thunderhead could speak aloud and not just through his earpiece. There was a freedom to that more palpable than removing the stiff garments of the Toll. The earpiece he wore in public made the Thunderhead feel like a voice in his head. It only spoke to him aloud when it knew no one else could hear, and when it did, he felt surrounded by it. He was in it, rather than it in him.

“Talk to me,” he said to the Thunderhead as he stretched out on the comfort of his bed—a massive thing constructed specially for him by a follower who made mattresses by hand. Why did people think that just because the Toll was now larger-than-life, everything within his life had to be? The bed was big enough for a small army. Honestly, what did they expect him to do in it? Even on the rare occasions that he had “the company of a guest,” as the curates so tactfully put it, it felt like they had to drop breadcrumbs to find each other.

Mostly he was alone when he lay upon it. That left him with two choices. He could either feel insignificant and solitary, swallowed by the billowing expanse of it—or he could try to remember what it was like to be a baby laid out in the middle of his parents’ bed, safe, comfortable, and loved. Certainly his parents had done that for him at least once before they tired of parenthood.

“I’d be happy to talk, Greyson,” the Thunderhead replied. “What shall we discuss?” “Doesn’t matter,” Greyson said. “Small talk, big talk, in-between talk.” “Shall we discuss your following, and how it’s growing?”

Greyson rolled over. “You really know how to kill a mood, you know that? No, I don’t want to talk about anything having to do with the Toll.” Greyson crawled to the edge of the bed and grabbed the plate of cheesecake he had brought with him from dinner. If the Thunderhead was going to talk about his life as the Toll, he definitely needed some comfort food to help it go down.

“The growth of the Tonist movement is a good thing,” the Thunderhead said. “It means that when we need to mobilize them, they will be a force to be reckoned with.” “You sound like you’re going to war.”

“I’m hoping that won’t be necessary.”

And that’s all the Thunderhead had to say about it. From the beginning, it was cryptic about how it might use the Tonists. It made Greyson feel like a confidant who wasn’t being confided in.

“I don’t like being used without knowing your endgame,” he said, and to emphasize his disapproval, he moved to the one spot in the room he knew the Thunderhead’s cameras had trouble seeing.

“You’ve found a blind spot,” it said. “Perhaps you know more than you’re letting on.” “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

The air-conditioning blew stronger for a brief moment. The Thunderhead’s version of a sigh. “I will tell you once things congeal, but right now there are obstacles I must overcome before I can even calculate the odds that my plan for humanity will succeed.” Greyson found it absurd that the Thunderhead could say something like “my plan for humanity” in the same unconcerned way a person might say “my recipe for cheesecake.” Which, by the way, was terrible. Void of flavor, and gelatinous rather than creamy. Tonists believed that hearing was the only sense worth indulging. But someone apparently had read the look on Greyson’s face while he tried to eat a particularly miserable babka, and the staff was scrambling to find a new dessert chef. That was the thing about being the Toll. You raised an eyebrow, and mountains moved, whether you wanted them to or not.

“Are you displeased with me, Greyson?” the Thunderhead asked.

“You basically run the world—why should you care if I’m displeased?”

“Because I do,” the Thunderhead said. “I care very much.”

“You will treat the Toll with absolute reverence no matter what he tells you.” “Yes, ma’am.”

“Step far out of his way if you see him approaching.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Always cast your eyes downward in his presence, and bow low.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Sister Astrid, who now served as the Cloisters’ chief of staff, looked the new pastry chef over carefully. She squinted as if it helped her see into his soul. “From where do you hail?” “BrotherlyLove,” he told her.

“Well, I hope your head isn’t as cracked as the Liberty Bell. Clearly, you must have distinguished yourself to your curate to be recommended for service to the Toll.” “I’m the best at what I do,” he told her. “Hands down, the best.”

“A Tonist without modesty,” she said with a wry grin. “Some of the sibilant sects would cut your tongue out for that.” “The Toll is too wise for that, ma’am.”

“That he is,” she agreed. “That he is.” Then she reached out her hand unexpectedly and squeezed his right bicep. The new arrival tensed it reflexively.

“Strong. By the looks of you, I’m surprised they didn’t assign you to security detail.” “I’m a pastry chef,” he told her. “The only weapon I wield is an eggbeater.” “But you would fight for him if you were asked?”

“Whatever the Toll needs, I’m there.”

“Good,” she said, satisfied. “Well, what he needs from you now is tonight’s dessert.” Then she had someone from the culinary staff show him to the kitchen.

He grinned as he was led out. He had made it through the chief of staff’s inspection. Sister Astrid was known to throw out new arrivals she didn’t care for, no matter how highly recommended they came. But he’d measured up to her high standards. Scythe Morrison couldn’t be happier.

“I am thinking that traveling might be a good course of action at this juncture,” the Thunderhead told Greyson that evening, before he removed his vestments and could relax. “I am thinking this in the strongest of ways.” “I already told you I’m not doing a world tour,” Greyson told it. “The world comes to me one person at a time. I’m fine with it that way, and until now it’s what you’ve wanted, too.” “I’m not suggesting a world tour, but perhaps an unannounced pilgrimage to places you have not been. Shouldn’t it be known that the Toll traveled the world, as prophets have historically done?” Greyson Tolliver, however, had never suffered from wanderlust. Until his life had been derailed, his hope was to serve the Thunderhead as a Nimbus agent close to home—and if not, then in a single place that would become his home. As far as he was concerned, Lenape City was as much of the world as he needed to see.

“It was merely a suggestion. But I believe it to be an important one,” the Thunderhead told him. It was not like the Thunderhead to be insistent when Greyson had made his feelings clear on a matter. Perhaps there would come a time when he would have to uproot himself to help bring the sibilant factions in line, but why now?

“I’ll consider it,” Greyson said, just to end the conversation. “But right now I need to take a bath and stop thinking about stressful things.” “Of course,” said the Thunderhead. “I’ll draw it for you.”

But the bath the Thunderhead drew was much too hot. Greyson endured it without saying anything, but what was the Thunderhead thinking? Was it punishing him in some passive-aggressive way for not wanting to travel? The Thunderhead wasn’t like that. What possible reason could it have for putting him in hot water?

The new pastry chef was supposed to be a culinary genius. And he was. Or at least he was until Scythe Morrison gleaned him and took his place. The truth was, three weeks ago, Scythe Morrison could barely boil water, much less bake a soufflé—but a crash course in dessert making gave him enough basics to fake his way through the short time he needed—and he even had developed a few specialties. He made a mean tiramisu and killer strawberry cheesecake.

He was nervous the first couple of days, and although his inexperienced hands bumbled quite a lot in the kitchen, it turned out to be an effective smoke screen. All new servants here were nervous when they arrived—and, thanks to the severe eye of Sister Astrid, they remained nervous for their entire tenure. Morrison’s awkwardness around the kitchen would be read as normal under the circumstances.

Eventually they’d realize that he wasn’t the chef they thought he was, but he didn’t have to keep up the charade for long. And when he was done, all these nervous little Tonists would be freed from service. Because the holy man they served was about to be gleaned.

“The Thunderhead has been behaving strangely,” Greyson told Sister Astrid, who dined with him that night. There was always someone there to dine with, because they didn’t want the Toll to ever have to dine alone. Last night it was a visiting curate from Antarctica. The night before it was a woman who created graceful tuning forks for home altars. Rarely was it someone who Greyson actually wanted to dine with, and rarely could he be Greyson. He had to be “on” as the Toll at every meal. Annoying, because his vestments stained easily and were virtually impossible to get as clean as the role demanded, so they were constantly being replaced. He would much prefer to dine in jeans and a T-shirt, but he feared he’d never have that luxury again.

“What do you mean ‘strangely’?” Sister Astrid asked.

“Repeating itself,” Greyson said. “Doing things that are… unwanted. It’s kind of hard to put my finger on. It’s just… not itself.” Astrid shrugged. “The Thunderhead’s the Thunderhead—it behaves the way it behaves.” “Spoken like a true Tonist,” Greyson said. He hadn’t meant it as mocking, but Astrid took it that way.

“What I mean is that the Thunderhead is a constant. If there’s something it’s doing that doesn’t make sense to you, then maybe you’re the problem.” Greyson grinned. “You’ll make an excellent curate one day, Astrid.”

The server put dessert before them. Strawberry cheesecake.

“You should try it,” Astrid told Greyson. “And tell me if it’s any better than the last chef’s.” Greyson took a small piece on his fork and tasted it. It was perfect.

“Wow,” he told Astrid. “We finally have a decent dessert chef!”

If nothing else, it purged the Thunderhead from his mind for the few minutes it took to devour it.

Scythe Morrison understood why the gleaning of the Toll needed to be done bloodlessly, and from the inside, rather than a frontal attack. The Tonists guarding the Toll would die for their prophet and were well armed with illegal mortal-age weaponry. They would fight back in ways that ordinary people didn’t—so even if an assassination team were successful, the world would know the resistance the Tonists put up. The world must never see that level of resistance against the scythedom. Until now, the best course of action was to just ignore the Toll’s existence. The scythedoms of the world hoped that by treating him as insignificant, he would be insignificant. But apparently he had become important enough for Goddard to desire his removal. To keep it from being some high-profile, overwrought event, a one-man infiltration was the best way to do it.

The beauty of the plan rested on the Tonists’ own self-confidence. They had vetted the new pastry chef extensively before he was approved for the job. It was so easy to alter Morrison’s ID and simply slip into the man’s shoes after the Tonists were sure it was safe.

He had to admit he was enjoying his position and liked baking much more than he thought he would. Maybe he’d make it his hobby once his business here was done. Hadn’t Scythe Curie cooked meals for the families of those she’d gleaned? Perhaps Scythe Morrison could make them dessert.

“Be sure to always bake extra,” the sous chef had advised him on his first day there. “The Toll gets the munchies during the night. And it’s usually for something sweet.” Priceless information.

“In that case,” Morrison had said, “I’ll be sure to make desserts that he can’t get enough of.”