KAREN
SHOOK herself awake – literally. One cannot carry enough blankets
in a wet winter to make up for near-starvation. The fat from the pig
had been a help – though she had decided not to tell the others
that wild pigs accumulate more radionuclides than other animals. We
all have worries enough as it is.
The clouds
had broken for now, though. She could see that, beyond the edge of
the tarp and the cedar branches. Leaving Allyn nesting in his
cradleboard – a design that Errol had come up with that had but one
shoulder strap – Karen slung her revolver and knife at her hip and
crawled out to pee. At least now there were no mosquitoes.
Griff, wrapped in an animal hide she hadn't seen before, stood
up across the clearing and waggled the all-clear with his bow. His
frosted breath hung in the air.
Her morning
business finished, Karen sought him out beneath his own cedar tree.
She fondled the light gray fur. "What's that you're
wearing?"
"I dunno – dogskin? I found
it lying on a log. It's really warm."
"It's wolfskin. Where was it?" Alarm prickled
at her neck and shoulder.
"Next clearing over
– the way we're going."
"Show
me. And draw your bow." Karen unholstered the Sentinel.
Griff, wondering what he could have done wrong, led the way.
The light in the next clearing was bright enough to hurt
Karen's eyes. Snow had fallen in the night on the mountains to their
east, and these glowed with unaccustomed sunrise. Griff, arrow at the
ready, surveyed the clearing as they both listened for any non-forest
sounds, then gingerly stepped forward and stood upright, scanning
ahead. He quickly withdrew and settled beside Karen, who had thumbed
her hammer.
"There's meat on
the log now – right where I found the coat."
"Shhh."
For several minutes more, they
listened. Nothing but a winter wren disturbed the morning.
Karen whispered. "What ... what kind of meat?"
"Deer. – hind leg!"
An offering
of some kind? "Go back absolutely quietly and get everyone up
and armed. Defensive perimeter. Hop!" Her own whisper sounded
like thunder in Karen's ears. Or was it her heart beating?
Griff slipped quietly away. Water dripped from bracken down
the back of Karen's neck. She should, of course, have gone with the
boy. But the thought of venison! She hadn't tasted venison in too
many days.
Could Wilson have done this? They were
the next valley over, so far as she knew. Couldn't be Josep's group,
traveling along the Great River on the other side of Wilson. No, any
Creeker would have whistled. This was a stranger – or perhaps an
army, such as from Port Land, of whom the Roundhousers had warned. So
many ways this could be a trap or a provocation.
"Hey."
The voice – a man's – came
from the mountain alder copse across the clearing! Whoever it was had
not moved since she and Griff had come – had perhaps watched them –
might have her in his sights. Damn it! She was at a disadvantage in
all the ways she could think of.
"S'okay,"
said the voice, in a conversational tone. "I know ya got yer
hammer back, I hear pretty good. How's 'bout ya get behind better
cover, if it suits ya, and when ya're ready, I'll stand up
empty-handed?"
"Let me see hands first,
then just stand up already." She eased her indexed finger inside
the trigger guard.
A tall man, bald, bearded, and
tattooed, wearing a horsehide cloak, arose perhaps twenty meters
away, among the leafless alders. He looked familiar – where could
Karen have seen this man before?
He
was none of that sorry lot that had trooped south from Starvation
Creek half a moon ago.
"Five steps forward,
then stop," Karen barked. If there were weapons at his feet,
this would move him precious seconds away from them.
The man complied, evidently quite relaxed. Karen held her front sight
squarely in the groove of her rear sight, centered on the man's
chest. Her finger rested lightly on the trigger. She drew a long,
deep breath and exhaled, to slow the effect of her hammering heart on
the sights. "Alone?"
"Well, yeah,
but don't take my word for it."
"Wouldn't. What do you want here?" With an effort, she
scanned all around for sounds and movement. Peripheral
vision, her father had said, is almost everything.
See without looking.
Someone was moving
through brush, but she could tell who it was. Armon came heavily up
to the right of her, bow at the ready. Errol, more quietly, appeared
to her left.
The man smiled and nodded." A
little parley. Got some thoughts about yer line of travel."
"Are you armed?" Karen asked.
"Now you ask me. Well, back a ways where I can't get to 'em
quick an' you can't find 'em, there's a pistol, a carbine, a bow, a
quiver with nine arrows, and a knife. I do hope you'll regard the
haunch as a gift, but will not seek to relieve me of my toys."
"What's your parley?"
"Well,
yer three lil' tribes now, all goin' north. A while back I had a good
talk with a dyin' kid from Port Land. He indicated things was hell
here, hell there, and extra-special-hell north
of there. If yer goin' Pilgrim, I c'n tell ya, can't get to Canuck
Land from here."
"What's 'extra hell'
about north of Port Land?" asked Karen.
"There was stuff back in th' day, place called Hanford."
"Heard of it."
"Cooked off.
Bad. Ruint ever'thin from th' sea half way to Chicago. And if you
think Hanford was bad –"
"Can this guy
be on th' level?" whispered Armon.
Still not
taking her eyes off her sights, Karen replied, "Yes. I remember
the maps."
"...
Chicago actually glows.
Kinda like the top of yer old mountain."
"What do you know about Ridge?"
"Well,
I'll tell ya. I'm th' one lit it off, with yer boy Mr. Avery
Murchison, may he rest in 'ternal peace."
"You were there?"
"Yes'm, had business with Old Magee, may he rest in
'ternal hell."
"How did he die?"
"Magee? Three-fifty-seven to the face, actually,
ma'am."
"That's good to know."
"Yes, ma'am, that it is."
"And
... how did Avery die?"
"Ma'am, Magee had messed him up and he chose to go down with th' ship, as it were."
"Damn it!" Karen had known this in her stomach, but
to hear it was another thing, she realized. At Roundhouse, she'd told
of the demise of the last Elders; everyone had felt this same
momentary despair.
"Sorry, ma'am."
"Wait! I know you!"
The stranger
seemed hesitant. "Where would we have met? You aren't th' ... I
mean, don't look familiar to me."
"You're
the man who ran away – after your army was defeated." She
twitched her left side toward him for emphasis. "I believe you
did this."
"Oh, were you in that fight? You're good.
Well, yeah, they was all walkin' dead by then. I saw a way to live,
so I had a go. But, uhh, yeah, it bothers me. Kinda why I'm here,
maybe."
"I don't see the connection."
"Well, that's kinda my
business. As I useta say, 'only th' livin' deserve ta live.' So,
anyways, man said, put th' ray gun on home plate an' go; I offered
t'bring him out, but he was set on stayin'. Said if I had anythin' ta
say, say it to a one-armed girl."
To
me? "You
... why would Avery even talk to you? Did he know who you are?"
The big man's rough features softened even more. "Well,
enough to guess, but he c'd see I meant to, ahh, change my ways
some."
"We'll ... we'll take that into
consideration. So, you've ..."
The man's body
relaxed.
"Stand up straight! I might just
shoot you yet."
"Why, yes, ma'am."
"Well ... so, you've, you've warned us off going Pilgrim;
do you ... do you have a recommendation?"
"Me, I'd go East. Cross over, head south. Ask around for th'
Prinevilles. I think yer man here, th' big one, has got folks
there."
"They'd be alive,
then?" asked Armon, incredulous.
"Yeah,
th' Prinevilles'r not big on eatin' captives any more, they're
gettin' better at runnin' cows. Th' chief man, Mr. Lacey, he's a man
of his word, so they are in service,
an' good service as such things go." The man spread his hands.
"Arms gettin' tired; answer y'other question holdin' onto a
coupla trees?"
Karen's arm was
getting tired, too. The sights were wobbling again. "What
other question? Umm, yes, you may."
The long
hands grasped two small alders. "Thanks. 'What's in it fer you?'
Nothin's in it fer me fer th' time bein'. Y'all've had it rough, I've
had it rough. Thought maybe I'd head East too."
"Not with us."
"Didn't ask, did I? So, I'd like go away from here fer
now. I'll move real slow. Rest of that doe is hangin' by th' creek
down behind me."
"We'll leave and count
to one hundred. Then we'll come back and clear the area. Take that
leg. We'll leave the wolfskin here, too, when we pack up."
"No, seriously, you need th'
meat; skin too. Gonna snow at altitude, an' this is altitude. Oh! Uh, inside th' mountain, didya
meet a suit?"
"What?"
"Sort of suit of old Army 'future warrior' armor, lotta Kevlar,
big old shotgun."
"The ... woman?
Yes."
"She get away?"
"She's dead."
"That so makes
my day. I thank you from th' bottom of my heart."
Karen did not know what to make of this. "We ... we're going
now."
"'K. I'll be gone when ya get
back. Try th' meat on yer puppy, then you'll know it's okay." A
disconcerting smile spread over his features.
Karen retreated, lowering the twenty-two's hammer with her thumb. Her
arm ached. Armon and Errol covered her, backing into the brown
bracken slowly.
Griff
met Karen at the edge of camp, bow drawn, watching the woods. "So,
I'm sorry about the skin and all. Wasn't thinking."
Karen holstered the revolver. What was
that sound? At camp?
One
of Griff's sisters sat under the tarp, holding little Allyn. Was
he crying?
A good sign was just what Karen needed just now. If only Billee,
Juanita, and Marleena could share in this! But they were with Wilson
and Josep, of course. Soon enough, if he proved to be up to it, she'd
have to train the child to be silent on command, perhaps. And to be
many other things: stealthy, resilient, resourceful, aware. She
started in the direction of the cry.
"So, can
I keep it?" Griff spoke behind her, still wearing the wolfskin.
She
turned. "Yes. Yes, I think that will be fine. Errol and Armon
will bring in the meat. In future, you find anything like that –
and ... and I think you will – just report it right away, all
right?"
"Right!"
The sky began to darken. They looked up.
One
snowflake, then another, and then another, drifted down from the
featureless clouds and settled, infinitesimal diamonds, on the long
green hands of the cedar.
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