SKYDRUM Chapter 5: Bell-Shaped

The drum shop from the canal, shutters half closed. Inside, through the door, Pell at his bench and Tam in the doorway with a bloody nose, grinning like it's nothing.

Tam says: "I'm home! Don't look at my face."

Pell looks at his face.

Pell.

Pell says: "What hit you?"

Tam says: "Me, mostly."

Pell grunts, takes a rag from the bench and throws it. It hits Tam in the face.

Sound: "FLAP"

Vela slipping in behind Tam, heading straight for the loft ladder and the dark.

Vela says: "He talked during a fight."

Pell says: "He talks during sleep."

Tam, dabbing his nose, sitting on an upturned drum.

Tam says: "Two Wardens. In the rope yard. I had one beaten, Pell. Beaten."

Pell, back at work, sanding a drum frame.

Pell says: "And then?"

Tam.

Tam says: "And then I made a joke about his helmet."

Pell, not turning round.

Pell says: "Was it a good joke?"

Tam says: "It was a great joke."

Pell sets down the sandpaper. He nods at the shelf. Tam's drum sits there with a new pale head, tight and clean.

Pell says: "Your drum."

Tam lights up, grabs it, taps it.

Sound: "tok-tok-TOK"

Tam says: "It sings! It sounds better than before."

Pell.

Pell says: "Nobody's fallen out of the sky onto it yet."

Tam cradling the drum, the grin fading. Working up to something.

Tam says: "Pell. I need to tell you something and you can't say no till I'm done."

Pell.

Pell says: "No."

Tam.

Tam says: "I didn't say it yet!"

Pell says: "I can hear you thinking it."

Tam, in a rush.

Tam says: "Vela's going home to prove her count. I want to go with her. Out of Halfsun."

The shop goes quiet. Even the canal outside seems still.

Pell turns on his stool, slow and heavy.

Pell says: "No."

Tam.

Tam says: "You didn't even think about it."

Pell.

Pell says: "I thought about it sixteen years ago. The answer was no then too."

Tam, standing up.

Tam says: "The Wardens are hunting me in my own market! Staying is more dangerous than going!"

Pell.

Pell says: "Then you stay inside. You stay quiet. You stop hearing things."

Tam.

Tam says: "I can't stop hearing things! You think I haven't tried?"

Up in the loft hatch, Vela's goggled face peeks over the edge, then pulls back out of sight.

Tam, louder now, pacing.

Tam says: "Every day since I was little. Under the floor. Under the water. THUM. And you never once asked me what it was."

Pell's jaw, tight.

Tam.

Tam says: "You never tell me anything. Where I came from. Who my parents were. Why we don't have a single drawing of them."

Pell, very low.

Pell says: "Drums don't care who hits them."

Pell.

Pell says: "People should."

Tam.

Tam says: "That's not an answer! That's a thing you say!"

Pell gets up. He's bigger than Tam remembers.

Pell says: "You want an answer? Here's one."

Pell.

Pell says: "Outside these walls, they find you. They take you. And nobody brings you back."

Tam, startled into silence.

Pell, turning away again.

Pell says: "You don't leave Halfsun. Ever."

Tam, fists clenched round his sticks.

Tam says: "How do you know that? How do you know what they do?"

Pell's back. No answer.

Tam, shouting now, voice cracking.

Tam says: "PELL!"

The bell tower in the square, seen over the rooftops. The hour bell swings.

Sound: "BONNNG"

Caption (narration): "The tower rings the half-day."

Pell's chisel slipping out of his fingers.

Sound: "KLANG"

Pell grips the edge of his bench with both hands. They are shaking.

Pell's hands, shaking hard, knuckles white.

Sound: "BONNNG"

Tam, the anger draining out of him.

Tam says: "...Pell?"

Pell, breathing through his nose, eyes shut.

Pell says: "It's nothing. Old hands."

Tam stepping closer.

Tam says: "It happens every time. Every time the tower rings. I thought it was the cold."

Pell.

Pell says: "It is the cold."

Tam.

Tam says: "It's never cold in Halfsun."

The bell rings once more, the last stroke.

Sound: "BONNNG"

Pell's hands jerk; a jar of hide glue goes over.

Sound: "KLOK"

Tam reaches out and catches Pell's wrist to steady him.

Tam's hand on Pell's wrist. Pell's sleeve has slid back.

Pell freezes. He doesn't pull away fast enough.

Tam's eyes, going wide.

Pell's wrist: an old burn scar, shiny and pale, in the clear shape of a bell.

The other wrist, the sleeve also slipped: the same bell, burned in the same place.

Pell, slowly drawing his sleeves down over both wrists. He does not look at Tam.

Pell says: "Go upstairs."

The shop. Pell's broad back at the bench, his hands still trembling. Tam standing alone in the middle of the floor. Above them, in the loft hatch, Vela's goggles catching the light.

Tam thinks: "Bells. On both wrists."