“I gots me some secrets, girl.” Eli shouldered his own pack. “Stick around, and maybe I’ll share a few with you. For now, though, we walk.”
Shortly after they left the fusion cycle, Ghost Wind realized they were walking down an old road, the entrance now hidden from the highway. In places they waded through knee-deep snow, in others, they walked on cracked pavement, heated by the sun. Her gear was light for the most part, but it was unwieldy when the snow was deep.
She had repaired and greased her moccasins, but she began to wish that she had been able to make a pair of winter mukluks. After a mile, even with the bare stretches, the wet from the snow began to soak through her leather shoes and felted socks. At the two mile mark she felt the warmth draining from her feet.
“We’re gettin’ close, Ghost Wind,” Eli said. “See that bridge up there? That’s the old hatchery and it’s where the road to the village starts.”
“How much farther?” she asked.
“Getting tired?” he said, looking at her with concern.
“No. Not tired, but my feet are soaked and they’re getting cold.”
“Damn,” he said, looking at her soaked moccasins. “I should have noted that. I’m sorry. I could have gone on and retrieved some decent winter footwear from the village. I wasn’t being mindful.”
“I am… was… a scout of the Clan of the Hawk. I am not a wilting flower who cannot deal with the cold. I have stood in the Icicle River in January, up to my neck and controlled my body temperature while doing so…”
“Okay, okay. No knock on your skills or toughness was intended. But cold wet feet just plain suck. We keep a guard house at the old hatchery, and I’m sure Kenji will have his little hibachi set up to stay warm. You can dry your feet there while I go on to the village and retrieve a pair of boots for you. It’ll give me a chance to tell everyone we have company.”
****
Kenji was probably around sixteen years old and male enough to try not to be caught staring at the new female in town. He wasn’t entirely successful. As Ghost Wind hung her socks over a small dowel by the hibachi, she set her moccasins a little farther back and pointed the bottoms of her feet at the tiny stove. The heat was wonderful!
“So, do you always run this lookout, Kenji?”
He blushed. “Um… I’m, like… here on Mondays and Thursdays. Old Mr. Palmer is here on Tuesdays and Fridays, and Gramma Jones is here on Wednesdays. On the weekends, others rotate in.” He shyly looked back towards the coals.
“Ah. Well, your people have done a good job of hiding the road in here. Unless one has a Beforetime map it’d be unlikely someone would wander in here.”
“Yeah, but Kita says we have to be ‘always vigilant’ or slavers might raid us and take us away again.” Kenji’s face grew dark.
“You say that like slavers took you away before.”
He hesitated for a while, and Ghost Wind waited.
“I was a little kid. Back then, my name was Jimmie Franks. My mom and me had gone to try and find my dad, ‘cause he’d like… disappeared. We was just a day or two away from home when them bastards caught us. Chained us like animals and started marching us north. Eli rescued us and even gave us a ride on the Terror back to our farm, but someone had emptied it out. There was nothing for us to live on. Turned out our neighbor down the road had told the slavers where we were so he could pick our place clean.” Ghost Wind saw hate flare up on Kenji’s young face.
“What did Eli do?”
“Nuthin’. The guy had five kids, an’ all the food we stored was eaten. We were lucky to get some of our stuff and our two horses back alive. Eli talked Mom into comin’ up here with him, and we joined the village.” He looked up at her, his eyes warm again. “It’s good here, we ain’t gone hungry. Are you gonna join too?”
His hopeful expression put her at a momentary loss for words. “I… I don’t know. We’ll have to see how things go.”
“Just so you know, I don’t got a girlfriend. Just… just sayin’ y’know.” His face turned bright red and he looked back at the hibachi.
Well! You silver-tongued devil, she thought.
“Good to know,” she said, “Didn’t you say your name was Jimmie though? Why are you now Kenji?”
“Oh! I changed it in honor of Sensei Kita! She’s been teachin’ me naginata-do and Iaido. Several of her students have changed to Japanese names.”
“That’s very interesting. She seems to command a great deal of respect.”
“Eli may be the rescuer, but it’s Mamma Kita who holds us all together and makes thing work at home.” He lowered his voice conspiratorially. “Eli is a great dude, but he gets the urge to roam a lot. I think he wants to bring law and order to this area, but that’s a pretty big order, what with the Road Sharks and the Red Slavers owning so much o’ the area.”
“So he’s not at home much?”
“Oh! I don’t wanna make it sound like he’s gone all the time, he ain’t! But most of us like to stay hidden here in the mountains and only go down the hill when we need to scrounge something, or trade with New Hope. Eli though, he likes to get on the Terror and ride.”
“Hey, Kenji,” a voice called from the door. “You’re not supposed to tell her all my secrets!” Eli entered the guardhouse through the narrow door.
“I have a feeling Kenji here barely scratched the surface,” Ghost Wind said. She noticed the bundle he was carrying. “For me?”
He unloaded the package to show her a pair of Beforetime boots, with an inner felt liner and a pair of homemade wool socks.
“Got a little somethin’-somethin’ here,” he said, smiling. “Try ‘em on!”
“These socks are SO soft!” she said, pulling them on.
“We got alpacas!” Kenji exclaimed, “Most of the ladies are pretty good on the looms, and some of us men, too!”
“Nothing like wool, and this is some fine wool.”
Eli watched her enjoyment as she put on the socks. There was a sensuous smile on her face as she put them on. He found his heart beating a bit faster.
“Do you ever use your wool for trade?” she asked him.
“We trade some loomed wool to the folks down in New Hope, but there aren’t that many communities out this way to do business with, and we’re sure not going to try and trade with the Road Sharks. Maybe someday the area will be less like a war zone and we can actually start an economy.”
She thought about that for a moment. “Is that why you’re trying to bring law and order to the ‘badlands,’ Sheriff Eli?”
“Part of it,” he smiled wryly, “and also I just hate vermin that prey on their fellow human beings. I’ve seen enough of it that I want to put as much of an end to it as I can.”
“I’ve heard worse goals, Eli.”
“Yeah, well, don’t get me on my soapbox. If you’ll put these boots on, we’ll go meet Kita.”
“Do you think I’ll make a good impression?”
“Lady,” he grimaced, “nobody makes a good first impression on Kita.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Kita
****
“Well, this is home,” Eli said. “What do you think?”
The village of Yama No Matsu was bigger than Ghost Wind had thought. Almost fifty small homes, made from a combination of stone, raw lumber and scrounged materials from Beforetime structures, dotted the landscape with muddy paths joining them all.
Though the construction of each was pretty eclectic, she was impressed by the sturdy-looking buildings and the elaborate metal and stone chimneys that extended from sheet metal roofs. Though the village was warmed in winter by wood, the chimneys were designed to stunt the raw smoke going into the air, and she hadn’t smelled them ’til she was almost to the township itself. She also thought she saw a few solar panels at various points.
“I… I haven’t lived with this many people for over a decade, but it’s very impressive. You’ve gone to a lot of effort to make this place hard to find”
“Considering the state of things in the world, I doubt anyone could blame us for that.”
“I wasn’t complaining.”
Eli stopped at a snug little cabin. “This is it, my little corner of the world.”
It was very well built, with a small porch with three old wooden chairs sitting on it. It looked like a nice spot to sit and listen to rain ping off the slightly rusty sheet metal roof.
“I like it; it looks warm in the winter,” she said.
“Would you like to take a look inside? You can leave your gear here while we go do the meet and greet with Kita.”
****
Kita lived in a nicely appointed cabin almost at the end of the village. It was small but sturdy, with a trickle of smoke coming from the stove pipe sticking out of the green and rust colored metal roof.
“Where did your people get all the building materials, Eli?”
“Well,” he looked back at her as he stepped on to the porch, “if one were to take a survey of the Beforetime homes in this area, one would find a lot of empty foundations lying about. Our villagers make a pretty good reclamation team and if you look carefully, you can see most of the cabins have solar panels nearby. We keep looking for a fusion charger, but so far, we’ve only found a small one, fit only for motorcycles and carts, but we’re doing pretty good up here.”
“Yes,” she said, a speculative tone in her voice, “and you’re far enough up in the mountains that you’re probably not bothered much.”
“That was the idea. Continued experience shows this is a time when it’s best not to let strangers know your home address.”
Eli rapped gently on the wooden door, and a few moments later, a senior woman opened it. She appeared to be in her early sixties, compact and muscular for one so short. Her black and steel gray hair was cut close and her face was quite smooth for one her age. It was set in an emotionless mask until she saw it was Eli standing there, then the mask slipped away and was replaced by a pleased expression, sub-texted with mirth.
“So, wandering one, you have finally decided to grace us with your presence again,” she said.
“Ah, Kita, you know me. I was born under a wanderin’ star…” He started to take a deep breath, and the woman raised one finger.
“Please, no singing. That is NOT one of your many talents.”
Eli assumed a tragic expression, “Kita, really. I’m gone two weeks, and this is the reception I get?”
“I have heard you singing with the men when a new batch of ‘shine’ has cured. It is not to be endured by anyone with a reasonable sense of tone and pitch.”
“Okay. Fine,” Eli said with a wounded air. He gestured towards Ghost Wind, “Kita, I would like to introduce you to Ghost Wind, former scout of the Clan of the Hawk up there to the north.”
Kita looked at the younger woman, the emotionless mask fell back into place. “You brought her here, directly to the village without taking her to the waiting house first?”
Eli seemed surprised, “We’ve traveled a while together, I’ve gotten to know her and I vouch for her. My word should mean something, as co-founder of this place.”
Kita looked back to the scout. “And why, girl, are you a former scout of the Clan of the Hawk?”
Ghost Wind flushed slightly, but she stood straighter and said, “I was banished.”
Kita turned to Eli with a ‘what the hell were you thinking’ look, then, turning back to the younger woman asked, “Why exactly were you banished? Tell me the entire story.”
“I… I made a horrible mistake.” Ghost Wind could no longer hold her head high and found herself looking at Eli’s boots. “I was seduced by a man. We met on the sly and he… he… seemed wonderful. I fell in love with him.”
For a moment, the iron haired woman’s face softened. “That seems like a small thing to be banished for.”
“That was not the reason.” Ghost Wind’s face grew more red. “He did not love me as he said he did. He was using me to get close to my teacher. I took him to meet her and he murdered her. She had been a formidable thorn in the side of the kilabykers and slavers of that area and he used me as a tool to remove her.”
“And you were banished,” Kita said, matter-of-factly. She reached out and raised Ghost Wind’s chin, “Was that scar part of your punishment?”
“Not officially.” The young scout’s voice quieted as she pulled her chin from Kita’s fingers. “It was given me by my sister. She also assumed I had been a willing accomplice to my teacher’s murder.”
“And were you?”
“I was NOT!” The girl’s face came back up, angry, “I loved my teacher! She was like a mother to me from the time I was eight years old. I would have died to have prevented what happened! Instead, I almost died because I couldn’t. I cannot return to the Clan lands upon pain of death. I am alone.”
“And you are still alone.” Kita raised her hand to stop the angry outburst starting from Eli’s lips, “Perhaps all is as you say or perhaps you are a skilled infiltrator sent by our enemies to find our weaknesses. If not the latter, then you are simply a warrior with extremely poor judgement. In either case, I can see no place for you here.”
****
Kita saw astonishment on Eli’s face. He couldn’t seem to believe what he was hearing.
He rounded on her, turning his back on the young scarred woman he had brought unannounced into their village. “Goddamn it Kita! What. The. FUCK!!”
The woman had seen her long-time friend angry before, but in their fifteen years of building Yama No Matsu, she had never seen him this enraged. She had a momentary urge to take a step back, but that was not the way of Bushido. She simply gave him a flat look.
It took a moment for the tall dark skinned man in front of her to master himself, his corded muscles unclenching. She took that moment to seize control of the argument.
“You say she is a lost waif warrior alone in the wilderness, but she has already been used to cause the death of one of her masters” Kita said, voice sharp as a sword blade. “Who is to say whether or not she has told you all of the truth of that story, or if she has just woven some truth into a web of lies. For all you know, she’s joined the groups we strive to avoid and is mentally taking notes of all our defenses to take down to Shell and his gang.”
“The hell.” Eli’s sensuous lips narrowed to a thin line for a moment and she waited for him to continue, one eyebrow raised. He took a deep breath, obviously trying to control his anger.
“Now you listen to me, little sister, I may not be the great organizer you are, and I may not be the leader of a dojo full of warrior wannabes, but I have been around a LONG time, even longer than you. In those years, I have learned a little bit about people, and this young woman is not a liar. She may be proud, stiff necked, and not always able to see what’s good for her, but by God, she is not with those fucks down in Bend.”
“It is my place to watch over this place and these people,” she said. “I do not have the luxury of wandering all over the region playing rescuer to every lost soul wandering what remains of the old roads.” Her own voice began to rise, “You brought this girl here, completely violating and bypassing all the safety protocols we’ve set in place and expect me to welcome her with open arms? Really?”
“Kita,” Eli said, obviously trying to get his anger under control, “Ghost Wind is special. She’s already a warrior. She’s a tracker and a scout, two things we desperately need and I’ve never seen anyone who could appear and disappear so damn well, not even in the Beforetime when I was with all the Special Operations people.”
“And what if she is playing you?”
“She saved my life. Without her, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. In fact we wouldn’t ever be speaking to each other again without the use of a séance.”
Kita was silent a moment. “Tell me.”
“Remember I went to see if I could smoke out Lester and Benny? Well, that didn’t work out so well. It was a trap. They’d somehow been expecting m
e, and left a few well-hidden bear traps lying around. Being a little overconfident…”
“You? Really?”
Eli gave her a flat look of his own. “If you don’t want to hear the story…”
“Please! Continue.”
“Those two rejects from a pigsty actually managed to get me caught in a rusty iron bear trap, which I might add was one of the most painful things I’d ever experienced until I was worked over with rebar clubs and then nailed to a big wooden X out in the cold, windy, farm area south of the river.”
“Dear God!” Kita’s expression was one of disgust and horror. “And your… ‘special healing powers’ couldn’t fix you?”
“There’s only so much super-genetics can do. I wasn’t in a position to consume mass quantities of food. I was too busy trying not to freeze to death. So, guess how I survived?”
“The girl?”
“Got it in one. She appeared out of nowhere, practically under the noses of Benny and Lester and got me off that damn cross. The turds came to investigate, and she disappeared back into the sagebrush. When they were getting ready to use me for spear practice, she managed to kill both of them, with no gun, and they NEVER saw her coming.”
“I… did not realize that she helped you that much…”
“She didn’t ‘help’ me Kita, she flat out saved my life. Then she took the time to nurse me back to health. I’d say that makes her pretty ‘vouched for’ in my book.”
“Think for a moment, Eli,” Kita looked up at him, “If you were going to infiltrate us, can you think of a better plan? No one would miss Lester or Benny, numbskulls that they were, not the Road Sharks, not the Red Slavers. This ‘warrior woman’ just happens to appear, right when you’re at your worst and ‘rescues’ you. Who is to say she didn’t betray her people in reality and join with this lover of hers against them? You have only her word how she received that scar. It could all be an elaborate hoax to find Yama No Matsu so it can be pillaged and its people enslaved.”
“I see two problems with your theory, Kita. One: I was not born yesterday. In fact though most might not know it, I’m older than you are. I have worked with some of the most devious people in the world and I’m pretty sure, buried bear traps notwithstanding, I can see through the bullshit of even a seasoned actor.”
The Road Sharks Page 9