by James Hunt
Doug remained quiet for a moment. The sunlight caught the back of him, casting his front in shadow, making it hard for Wren to see his reaction. “I didn’t realize...” He slumped low between his crutches. “I didn’t know I’d hurt you that badly.”
“You didn’t hurt me, Doug.” Wren stepped over the broken glass, the bits crunching under the soles of her boots until they stopped just before knocking into Doug. “I didn’t care about you enough for that to happen.” Wren was close enough to see his reaction that time, and the wounds across his face were all she needed to see to know the cost of her attack.
Without a word, Doug turned, his crutches thudding against the floor and his head hung low until he was out the door and out of sight. Wren uncurled her fists; she hadn’t realized how tightly she’d been clenching them. She walked back to the table, kicking the glass from her path along the way. She collapsed in a chair, but with her body still numb from the alcohol, she didn’t feel the impact. How did I get here?
Wren lay with her head on the table for only a few more moments before the needs of food and water compelled her body to seek nourishment. She headed toward the mess hall in hopes of finding some water and any leftover lunch. There were a few people walking about, but Wren kept her eyes forward, not wanting the trouble of having to explain herself to anyone. Not now. Not yet.
By the time she arrived at the mess hall, the doors were locked, and she tugged against them fruitlessly. The walk had only worsened the dryness in her mouth, and when she wiped her brow, she saw that salt had crusted on her skin. I don’t even have any water left in me.
“Mrs. Burton?”
The voice was sheepish, and for a second Wren thought she’d imagined it until it repeated, and she turned to the sight of three people huddled closely together. An older man stood in the front, someone she’d seen before but never learned his name. The two behind him were his wife and daughter. Ella and Mary, if she remembered correctly. “Yes?”
The old man fiddled with his hands nervously, rubbing the liver spots on his skin hard enough to scrub them off. “We have some leftovers in our cabin if you’re hungry. Water too.” He offered a half smile, and the girls behind him nodded in agreement.
The offer took Wren aback. Did Edric convince them to do this? But her stomach grumbled, and her tongue scratched the dry patch in her mouth. In the end, her body’s desires overrode her concern for an ambush and she followed them to their home, keeping her distance from the old man and an eye out for any of Edric’s goons. But they arrived at the old man’s door with little incident.
The inside of the cabin was even smaller than Nathan’s but more adequately furnished. The walls were decorated with pictures and a few paintings. Wren stopped to examine one as the old man offered her a glass of water. He gestured to the picture, smiling. “My little Ella did that when she was only five.” He turned back to his daughter, who blushed. “She was always so talented.”
Wren nearly drained the glass in one gulp. Even at room temperature, the water felt cool against the hot desert that was her mouth. She turned from the painting and back to the old man. “I’m sorry, I never learned your name.”
“Edison,” he answered, smiling. “But I know who you are, Mrs. Burton.” He gestured to the sofa and took her glass from her, looking to his wife to refill it. The couch was small, and the proximity both of them were forced into was cozier than Wren would have liked, but the old man did his best to keep his distance at a respectable measure. “How are you feeling?”
The past eighteen hours had left Wren jaded to the sincerity of the people around her, and if she hadn’t seen the old man’s genuine expression firsthand, she would have waved it off as a slight. She took the refilled glass of water and gave it a raise. “Better now.”
“What you did last night. It was brave.”
Mary offered her a small plate of jerky, and Wren tore at it hungrily, the water whetting her appetite. “The boy still died. It would have been braver for me to take the bullet myself.” Half the plate disappeared in two handfuls as she stuffed her mouth. After a few bites, she forced herself to slow, making sure to chew instead of swallowing the pieces whole.
“If you had taken the bullet yourself, then your children would have been left motherless.” Edison reached his hand over and gently touched her forearm. “And we wouldn’t have a chance to talk.”
Wren looked up to see both Mary and Ella standing over them on the couch. She slowly set the plate of jerky down on the coffee table, her eyes moving wearily between the three of them. “And what would you want to speak with me about?”
“Edric.” Edison said the name firmly, and the two women nodded their heads in agreement. “This isn’t the first time he’s gone beyond the laws of our community. This place is not a castle, and he is not a king. He can’t be allowed to do whatever he sees fit.”
“Apparently he can.” Wren stood up. She neither wanted nor needed a lecture. “If you wanted to stand up to him, then you should have done it last night. He wasn’t the only one that was armed. If you wanted to make a statement, then you missed your chance.” She headed for the door, her stomach irritated at the abandonment of the jerky.
“He wants to dissolve the council,” Ella blurted out.
Whether it was the desperation in the girl’s voice or the hatred Wren had for Edric, she stopped at the door. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s okay, Ella,” Edison said, encouraging her. “You can tell her.”
The woman was young, her hair a light blond. She was thin, but the wiry muscles along her arms and legs revealed a strength in her frame. Wren noticed the muscles in her hands as well, a side effect of someone who always had a pen or a brush in their hand. It was a side effect Wren was familiar with herself after spending hours at a drawing board. “How do you know that?”
“I was… talking, to one of the men in his guard unit. David,” Ella answered quietly.
Sleeping with the guard was more like it. “Go on,” Wren said.
“Edric pulled him aside when we were together, and I didn’t mean to listen, but their voices were loud. They were angry with each other over something. And when David came back, he told me that Edric had been trying to eliminate the council to streamline the decision-making process. But David told him that it was a bad idea, that the only way to keep us all together was maintaining a balance in the community.”
“Did he say how he was going to do this?” Wren asked.
Ella shook her head. “When I tried to talk to David about it more, he told me I shouldn’t probe into it. That it didn’t concern me. But after last night…”
“If Edric thinks he can kill anyone on a whim, then I think it’s obvious what he’ll do,” Edison replied.
Wren let out an exhausted sigh. “Why didn’t you bring Ben and Iris in on this? If he’s going to dissolve the council, then those two will be the first to go.”
“They did.” Iris stepped through the door first, followed closely by Ben, who shut the door behind him, locking all six of them crammed in the small living room. “Wren, we need to talk.”
Chapter 9
The effects of the alcohol wore off by evening, but Wren’s head still swam with confusion. She sat silently in Edison’s living room, the orange glow of the setting sun shading the drawn curtains a beautiful orange. Iris and Ben waited for her response, but Wren had no idea where to even start. “You realize that this idea is ludicrous, right?”
“We have to make a move, and we have to do it soon,” Iris answered. The soft, kind features Wren remembered on their first day together hardened to stone. The councilwoman had made up her mind, and Ben was with her. “Edric won’t waste any more time. He has the numbers.”
“And guns,” Wren added. “And bullets, and training, and a raging thirst for power that doesn’t seem to be satisfied in his current role.” Wren jumped from the couch, needing to move around. “You saw what happened last night, Iris. You all did. If Edric wants to take
control of this camp, he doesn’t need to do it in secret meetings. He controls the guards. He has access to the garrison. All he has to do is say the word, and the camp is his. You think going to him with a resolution telling him that he will be kicked off the council will persuade him?” She laughed. “The world beyond those walls is providing him with everything he needs to scare the people here into doing whatever he wants them to. They want security, and he’s already convinced them that he can keep them safe.”
“He’s not the only one,” Ben replied.
“The fence didn’t work.” Wren paced around, her arms flailing about in animation that she’d normally reserved for arguments with Doug. Christ. Doug, the girls, Zack. Edric will kill every single one of them the moment he thinks I’m planning something against him.
“You’re right,” Iris said, her voice low and solemn. “But what you did last night proved that you’re not afraid of him. It showed the people here that he can be stopped.” Iris moved closer, her small frame growing larger with every word. “Do you know how many people came to me after what they watched him do last night? Nearly half of the community. Half. If that isn’t cause for a call to action, then I don’t know what is.”
Wren grunted in frustration. “Then where are they now? Edric doesn’t talk. He shoots. And anyone that disagrees with him will get a bullet to the head. That’s what your people saw. And that’s what will keep them in line. Edric knows it. You know it. I know it.” She waved them all off, having reached her fill of foolishness, and headed for the door.
“You cut off the head, and the body dies,” Iris said, just as Wren’s hand was on the handle. “And we could kill him without ever having to squeeze the trigger. All we have to do is catch him off guard.”
Wren released the door handle and turned around. Everyone was standing now, all of them gathering around Iris. Wren lingered at the door, entertaining the thought. “He’s always armed. And it would be foolish to think he doesn’t keep himself protected at night. You’d never get close to him in here.”
“That’s why we’re not going to do it in here.” Iris pointed south, to where the explosion the night before had destroyed a large section of the wall. “You go to him and tell him that you want to take a team out to scavenge for more material. Tell him you need to make the wall stronger, and that the only way is to get better material. Steel, iron, concrete, whatever you have to do to convince him that we can’t get the materials from the forest.”
“I’ve been saying that since day one,” Wren answered.
“Exactly. Despite his looks and brute force, he’s smart. Anything out of the ordinary, and he’ll smell it. But you coming to him, wanting to try and make amends for the failed wall…” Iris raised her eyebrows. “Now that’s something he’ll believe.”
“But he’d have no reason to go,” Wren replied.
Iris looked to Ella, who quickly turned her head down. “It’s all right, Ella. Tell her what you told me.”
The girl stepped forward, and though she must have been twenty, the way she twiddled her hands and twisted her ankles made her look no older than Addison. “Edric said… He told David that…” But the girl stuttered, unable to spit out her knowledge.
“Edric wants to kill you, Wren,” Iris said, finishing the girl’s words. “That’s why he’ll go with you.”
And suddenly Wren realized why they’d chosen her in the first place. Why Iris was betting all her chips. “You want to use me as bait. Draw him away from his protection, away from any prying eyes.”
“A lot of things can happen on a supply run these days.” Iris shrugged. “With all the attacks that have happened over the past few weeks on our camp, what’s to say we don’t run into trouble?”
It was amazing to Wren how innocently the words left Iris’s mouth. She’d heard the same strategies and talk at board meetings at her company, though the end goals were building acquisitions, not murder. “It’s some sort of game for you, isn’t it?”
“This is no game, Wren,” Ben said, stepping around Iris. “This could be our only shot at successfully getting rid of this man. Iris said before it’s only a matter of time before he finally makes his move, and with the events of last night, he has more reason than ever to finally take control. This has to be done quickly.”
There was no denying that having Edric gone would be a burden lifted from her shoulders and a reason for her to stop looking behind her everywhere she walked. “When are you planning on having this… run?”
The mood in the room shifted from anxious to relieved, and Iris walked her through the plan. “Ben and I have a meeting with him tonight. It’s a regular affair, so he won’t suspect anything. I’ll bring up the proposal for the run, saying it was your suggestion. Edric already knows how close we are, so it would be natural for you to come to me about it. Once he agrees, I’ll make sure to stack enough of our people on the run to give us a chance. Then… we’ll kill him.”
“And the men he brings with him?” Wren asked. “You know he’ll be sure to take his own people.”
“He’s the head,” Iris reminded her. “I don’t think they’ll put up much of a fight once he’s gone.”
“Right.” It was dark now, and Wren knew that her girls would be worried about her. As for Zack and Doug, they probably wouldn’t mind Edric getting away with whatever he had planned to kill her. “Let me know how it goes.”
Once outside, Wren suddenly felt tired. Her legs, arms, and body were sore. She couldn’t figure out why, until she remembered her alcoholic adventures from the night before. After wasting away the day still reeking of whiskey, she was surprised she’d forgotten. But she forgave herself due to the casual conversation regarding her planned murder by a cold-blooded lunatic.
Wren kept on a path to Nate’s away from most of the buildings. The fewer people she ran into at that moment, the better off she’d be. Compared to the night before, the forest surrounding them was disturbingly peaceful.
With Nate’s house only a few dozen yards from the thick of the trees behind the main buildings, Wren turned back toward the main portion of the camp. Her foot snapped a twig, and a rustle in the bushes to her left caused her to freeze. She squinted in the darkness, trying to make out any further movement or shapes, but the dense trees made it difficult. Maybe another member of the raiders? They could have easily snuck through now, with the majority of the guards focused on the massive gap in their defenses.
The rustles grew louder, and Wren coiled her body, reaching for a rock on the ground to defend herself with, but the body that stumbled out from behind the bushes walked on three legs. She dropped the rock in her hand and let out a sigh. “Christ, Zack, what are you doing out here like that?” But her son ignored her, keeping his head down as he changed his direction toward the cabin. Wren caught up to him easily and stepped right in his path. “Zack, what are you doing?”
Zack tried sidestepping her, but any attempt was too slow with the massive cast around his broken leg. “Mom, get out of my way.” His voice was irritated and pathetic, sounding like nothing more than a sniveling toddler on the verge of a tantrum.
“No, not until you talk to me. You’ve hardly said more than a few sentences to me since we’ve arrived here, and the times where we do speak to one another are cold and nasty.” Wren waited for a reply but received none. “Zack, I can help.”
“You can’t!” Zack’s throat cracked at the sudden burst of volume in his voice, his scream just as shocking and violent as the explosion she’d heard the night before. The outburst sapped his strength as he hung from the two crutches like a lifeboat. “They’re dead,” he said between sobs. “They’re dead because of me.”
Wren placed a gentle hand on the back of her son’s head. “Zack, what happened last night isn’t your fault, it’s—”
“No,” he said, sniffling. “It’s not from last night. My friends. In Chicago.” He looked up, and even in the darkness, Wren saw the tears running down his cheeks. “My friends are dead bec
ause of me.” He collapsed forward, leaning all of his weight into Wren, who was caught off balance by the sudden fall.
Wren pulled his head up, wiping the tears from his eyes. Her heart broke in two as she watched her eldest fall apart in her arms. She helped him over to a log, where the two sat down, his head leaning against her shoulder as she gently stroked his hair. They’d never spoke about what happened at the abandoned factory she pulled him out of before they escaped the city. “What happened at the factory, Zack?”
He took a few deep breaths, trying to force his composure, but struggled with finding any strength in his voice. “It wasn’t the first time,” he started, pulling up from her shoulder, wiping his nose with his shirt sleeve. “We’d gone there before. The place was shut down a long time ago.” He shook his head. “It was stupid, I know. The day of the attacks, we had talked about going, but some of my friends had a test they said they didn’t want to miss. They wanted to stay. But I made them go. I told them that the class was a waste of time, that one test wouldn’t flunk them out. So they went. We took Jesse’s car, since he was the only one with a driver’s license. When we got there, everything was fine. We were just hanging out, joking around like we always did. It was getting later in the afternoon, and they wanted to get going, since school was letting out soon, but I told them to lighten up.” Zack grimaced, the tears returning unabashedly. “And then the explosions went off. It was like bombs were dropping all around us, and I knew it was down the street, but the building and the equipment inside were so old that I guess all it took was a light tremor to bring most of it down. Everyone was screaming, running, trying to get away. I turned around and saw them reach out their hands for help just before the vats crushed them, then my leg.” Zack uttered a few more words, but he was so distraught that Wren couldn’t decipher what he said.