The August 5 Read Online Free

and they should have dragged the carriage pumps into the street by now.
    â€œMaybe they were all in the warehouse,” Bern said.
    â€œThe entire village wouldn’t have been in the warehouse,” Tommy said. He imagined bodies inside the warehouse and his stomach turned over.
    â€œDo you think a rover exploded?” Bern wondered. Rovers were mechanized wagons powered by the volt-cell, a new energy source invented by the Zunft. Leather seats were mounted on the chassis in front of the earthenware vat where the cell was suspended in a chemical bath. They tended to explode if they ran into anything, even at slow speeds. Tommy had overheard cottagers refer to them as boomers, which he found amusing. But cottagers had to be careful because any language that disparaged the Zunft could earn them a fine or even jail time.
    â€œDoes anyone have rovers here?” Tommy asked. As far as he knew, Colston Shore was the only man on Aeren Island who owned a rover. The army probably had a few rovers in the larger port town of Black Rock, but there were not likely to be any in this Oceanside village.
    â€œA rover wouldn’t have made such a big fire anyway,” Bern said. There was a harsh chemical smell on the wind that made Tommy’s eyes water.
    â€œWhat if someone did it on purpose?” Tommy said, suddenly afraid. Colston Shore had raised his sons to believe that the cottagers could rebel at any moment and the Zunftmen would be slaughtered in their beds and their property stolen. For most of his childhood, Tommy’s nightmares featured the thud of cottager boots invading the corridor outside his bedroom door. But then he had realized that the Zunft had the gunpowder, the technological innovations, and control of the islands. The Zunft had the power. Why should they be scared of the cottagers? Recently, Tommy had stopped believing his father’s warnings. None of the cottagers he knew seemed very angry.
    â€œLet’s go in the customs house,” Bern said, pointing down the road at the two-story brick building with a black-and-silver Zunft flag flying from the roof. “The soldiers must be there.”
    â€œWait, something’s wrong,” Tommy warned. He tried to grab Bern’s arm, but his brother shrugged him off. A gust of warm wind blew down the street, sending a shower of embers in their direction.
    â€œDon’t be such a girl, Tommy,” Bern said.
    Tommy reluctantly followed Bern along the muddy road toward the customs house. Every port had an official Zunft office, which monitored shipping between the four main islands of Seahaven. In small villages like this, it was the locus of Zunft control. Soldiers were often stationed at customs houses, where they acted as the constabulary as much as the military.
    â€œDo you know where Kate lives?” Tommy asked. “Maybe we should—”
    They had reached the corner of High Street and Bern stopped abruptly, so that Tommy bumped into him, forgetting the rest of his sentence. They could see the steps of the customs house where two men waited, staring aggressively as the boys approached.
    In Sevenna City, Zunftmen always wore tailcoats and bowlers, so it was obvious who belonged to the elite and who didn’t. But here on Aeren, it wasn’t always easy to tell Zunft from cottager as both groups often wore plain wool jackets and trousers. Then Tommy noticed that the two men wore flat caps and wool vests without coats. A Zunftman wouldn’t deign to wear a vest without a coat, and flat caps were a badge of pride for cottagers.
    â€œCottagers?” Tommy whispered.
    â€œYep, bloody thieving bastards,” Bern whispered back.
    The taller man said something to his companion, who unsheathed a knife. The taller one reached for a metal bludgeon attached to his belt.
    â€œBern!” Tommy warned. The men looked like fighters—mean and angry. Bern liked to tussle with the lads, maybe bloody a friend’s