We go west. At least, I think we go west. When Nathan's not looking, I try to find the North Star. Above us, stars pepper the sky, as abundant as granules of salt in an overturned shaker. It's hard to tell which one among them burns brighter than all of the rest.
We don't go far. I wonder how many times I would have to climb up and down one of the ladders in the bunker to cover the number of miles we've spanned in the past two days.
There's something up ahead of us. Nathan sees it first because he's looking for it. He stops where he is and I stop at his side. Nars says, "Jesus," and stands in front of me. I squint my eyes, trying to make coherent shapes out of the shadows, trying to see what Nathan and Nars see.
"Oh," I say when my vision adjusts to the dark. All the red on my skin shrinks back till I'm colorless. There's tire tracks in the sand but I see nothing that could've made them. There's two men in the sand too, almost naked, violet with blood.
My mother used to keep a blackberry bush in our backyard. It shriveled up in the mists and split off at the root when the first bomb came down. I think of it now, of picking blackberries in summer and eating them straight away, even though my mother said we should rinse them off first. I think of juice dribbling between my fingers, staining my palms, staining my clothes, till everything was red and purple and black.
That's the real color of blood, I guess; the color of death. It's not the bright, red blood that I saw on my hands before Nathan wrapped them up in the alley. The blood of dead men is darker, like a night without stars, like morning with no matchbook, with no flint stone and steel. Like a desolate nothingness. I put a hand over my mouth because I think I might be sick.
The eyes of the dead men are still open. I want to close mine, but I don't. I've never seen a dead person before and now suddenly, I've seen two. I'm seeing them. They're not what I would've expected. They don't look surprised or peaceful; they look angry. What a way to die, I think. I could've died yesterday, angry at Nathan, angry at a stranger, angry at myself. If I die today, what will be the last thing I feel?
I never worried about dying when I lived in the bunker.
The dead men are wearing short underwear. They've got their hair buzzed short like Nathan's. I wonder if he knows them. I wonder if they saw his flare, if he meant for them to see it. Were they on their way to meet us? Who crept up on them, out here in the middle of nowhere, in the deepest part of the night?
The dog is standing next to them. I can hear him barking now, clipped, urgent barks broken up by the occasional sniff and lick. I wonder if he knows that his people are dead.
A shadow moves in front of us, not mine or Nathan's, not Nars's, not the dog's.
"Well, I'll be damned," says a voice I think I recognize. We all turn around. I see the Beard and the slick, glinting edge of a pipe. I hear the dog growl. Somebody shouts, and then the desert is as black as tar and my ears are screaming, and I am utterly alone.
Chapter Fifteen
When I wake up, I see nothing. I think I've gone blind. Maybe the Beard's knocked my eyes right out of their sockets. Maybe I'll never see again. I shudder at the notion.
I smell something I've smelled before. Sweat and oil and sand. My face is wedged in skin, in somebody's neck. My legs are bowed over somebody's arms. I'm being carried, cradled like an infant. I'm wearing a blindfold. I'm not blind.
"Thank god," I whisper.
"Shut up, Cassidy," Nars says. It's not him whose carrying me; his voice is nearby, but it's still too far away.
Who, then? The Beard? My mouth puckers up with disgust.
The Beard holds me firm. Behind my ear, there’s a dampness and an awful sting. I wonder what might’ve happened to me after he whacked me with that pipe, after the desert went dark.
I recall the sweetness of his voice, the sly gleam in his eye, and my stomach turns over. I gnash my teeth against a surge of vomit. The Beard humps me up in his arms, getting a better squeeze on my thigh with his calloused fingertips. His heartbeat makes a quick chop, a nervous canter over my cheek, and my gut swells up with a gummy bile.
I start to squirm. I kick out my aching legs and shove against the Beard's broad chest while he struggles to hang on. He pinches me in places I don't want to be pinched, clutching for a good hold while I thrash about. He tries to maintain his grip on me, but I don’t make it easy.
"Can't you cooperate for two goddamn seconds?" the Beard says, only it's not the Beard's voice, it's Nathan's. He's the one whose holding me. He stops walking and sets my feet on the floor. His fingers shut over my shoulders like iron clamps, anchoring me in place.
I'm too wound up to be still. I try to jerk away from him but he doesn't let go. He gives me a firm shake, but that just riles me up more. I stomp my foot, plowing down with the sole of my shoe, but he steps out of the way just in time.
There's a scraping sound, like the sound of flint on steel but so much louder, and then someone's grabbing me, lighter hands than Nathan's, with fingernails that make sharp half-moons in my skin. I stumble forward into a vat of cold air and someone brushes past me, and then the scraping starts up again and I can tell, even behind my blindfold, that the darkness is heavier, wherever we are.
"Nars?" I say.
"Yeah, it's me," he says. "Is it just the two of us in here?"
No one else speaks. "I guess so," I say. Nars must be wearing a blindfold, same as me.
My hands are numb, really numb this time, strapped together at the base of my spine. I can feel my pulse thud against the restraints. "Are you tied up, too?" I say.
"Yeah." I think I hear him sit down. It's not like him. When Nars is angry, he paces, he throws things. I guess that's hard to do when he's bound and blindfolded. "You think he planned this?" Nars says.
"Who, Nathan?" That thought hadn't occurred to me.
"Who else?" Nars says. "He's not here, is he? Hey, Nate!" He's shouting now. That makes me feel better, somehow. That's the Nars I know. "He sent up that flare, Cassidy," he says.
I bite my lip. Something just doesn't add up. I don't know Nathan well enough to trust him, but I think I can hold him to a higher standard than this.
I tap my foot. I'm too tense to sit down. Nars starts kicking his boots against the wall and yelling "HEY! LET US OUT OF HERE!" But nobody comes.
I count off the seconds that pass in my head, the way I did when I climbed up the barb wire fence, the way I did when I tried to measure time in the desert. It calms me down, till I can sit with my back against a cold, stone wall and close my eyes underneath my blindfold and just wait.
"What do you think Adrienne's doing right now?" Nars says. "You think she snuck out, too?"
"No," I say. "I think she's all alone in the bunker. Why'd you leave her there?" I'm angry, I realize. I'm angry with him. He could've reunited the three of us, but he left Adrienne behind.
"I saw a chance to escape and I ran with it," Nars says. "You left, too."
"I had to leave," I say. "You didn't."
"You don't think I had to leave?" He says it like it's an accusation, like I should know him better than that.
He kicks the wall again, but he doesn't shout anything at our kidnappers this time. I think that kick was just for me.
I stop counting the seconds. I wallow in my own disappointment; in all the bitter words I would say to Nars if I didn't love him so.
A small part of me worries that these might be our last moments together, that we might end up like those dead men in the desert, naked and angry, slowly disintegrating into sand.
Ugly words resound inside my head, but I keep my mouth shut. If any word could be my last, I don't want it to be an ugly one.
I'm not sure how much time has passed when I hear the door scraping open again. Too much time. The silence between Nars and I is angry and thick.
"Bring them out." It's a woman's voice. She's either bored or annoyed or both.
Bodies make the air move around us. I stand up and someone shoves me along, into a space where many people ar
e murmuring.
"Quiet." It's the woman's voice again. She snaps her fingers and the murmurs die off, till there's nothing but the sounds of people breathing all around us.
"Enough with the blindfolds, Karsci." It's Nathan's voice now. I'm sure it's his. "You're making a big show for no one."
"Fine." I imagine her rolling her eyes.
I feel Nathan's hands behind my head. His fingers are quick, loosening the knot on my blindfold. He yanks out rogue strands of hair while he works and I try not to wince. I don’t want him, or anyone else in this room, to see me cower.
A scrap of fabric falls away from my eyes, but the world remains dark. I squeeze my eyes shut and open them again, trying to bring the dull shapes that surround me into focus. I want to know where I am and who’s with me, but it’s an impossible task. I can barely see my own two feet on the floor.
Nathan is behind me; I know that much. I wonder how I could’ve mistaken him for the Beard, or for Nars. He’s bigger than the both of them, and his body is as hard as cement.
He tugs the elastic band out of my hair and my bun falls away, as heavy and dry as an old drape. He rakes my tangled locks over one shoulder and ties them off there, making a pony tail.
The gash at my ear is exposed now. Muggy air lumbers over it like a comb, like teeth, and it stings. In my mind, I try to recount every new scrape and bruise I’ve acquired since I left the bunker behind.
A dribble of old blood is caked at the base of my neck. It makes the skin beneath my earlobe tight. Nathan scrapes it off. He wets his thumbs and scrubs my skin clean.
I’m too proud to stop him. Goosebumps erupt beneath my clothes and I’m glad, just for a moment, that it’s dark. Maybe Nathan won’t see.
I keep blinking until I can make out the shapes of people, lots of people, a throng of hard faces, and all of them staring at me.
Nars is at my elbow. Nathan unties his blindfold, too. He doesn’t linger, the way he lingered with mine.
"What about our hands?" I say.
"You won't need them," the woman says.
I try to place her. Wherever we are, it's murky and cold. The walls are made of stone, bearing wide sloughs. Someone carries a lantern. I catch glimpses of the crowd by its flickering light, white faces and red faces, the blue shadows of protruding bone. There are people with patches of missing hair, people with blistered skin. Some people don't look quite like people; their features slough off like the walls, but I think it must just be a trick of the light that makes them look that way.
I see the Beard. "Nathan," I say, "it's him. The man from the church."
I don't know what makes me whisper. We're standing in such close quarters, I'm sure everyone can hear me. My voice echoes. Somewhere, water drips. I want to ask for a drink, but I won't. I won't ask the Beard or his friends for anything.
"You should be more selective with your inductees," Nathan says. "That one nearly lost you an asset."
"Beggars can't be choosers," the woman says. I see her now. She's so close to me, I can't believe I didn't see her before. My vision improves, the longer we stand in the shadows, till I can make out the faded geometric pattern on her clothes. "Loring is new," she says. "He didn't know you were a friend."
"I'm not your friend," Nathan says.
"Really, Nate," Karsci says, "you're being cruel."
She's not as old as I thought she was when I first heard her speak. There's a deep, even resonance about her voice, the assuredness of trying years, of victories. Looking at her now, I think she might be younger than me. Her skin is dark like Nathan's, painted bronze by the sun.
"Loring's learned his lesson," she says, "I assure you." She shrugs, a flippant maneuver, as if our misgivings are unwarranted.
I look up at Nathan and his expression is hard. There are deep groves on either side of his mouth. His frown is as solid as a fractured slab of stone. He knows this woman, I think. He must know her very well.
"I don't think he has," Nathan says.
Karsci rolls her eyes, but I think her apathy is put on, a costume that won't quite zip up all the way. She snaps her fingers. She has long fingernails and they're packed to the hilt with dirt.
There's dirt on her clothes, too. She wears a cotton dress that might've been white once. Now it's beige and black. The hem pools at her heel, two inches too long. For some reason, she strikes me as the sort of person who never trips.
Her lips are red, which is strange when the rest of her is so filthy and plain. She's got mousy hair, fraying at the edges, and brown skin as thin as paper, striped with old sunburns and flaking off over the bridge of her nose. Her eyes are brown, not hazel or cinnamon or any color worth dwelling on. They're just brown, and her flaky skin is brown and her slinky, greased up coils of hair are brown. But her lips are painted red.
It's been a long time since I've seen a woman with makeup on. I try not to stare at her, but I can't help myself. I'm enthralled by the shapes her red mouth makes when she talks.
My mother wore lipstick like that, before the mists, before the bombs. She let me wear it, too, sometimes, but I could never color my lips just right. I always had smudges of red on my chin. Karsci’s mouth is as perfect as my mother’s ever was.
The Beard steps forward, looking like he's tied his own tongue in a knot. His lips are all pinched up and he keeps pushing a fist over his mouth, like he's wiping off old crumbs.
He glares at me, radiating something unpleasant, something that reeks of missed opportunities. I take a step back. I think I’ll push my ego aside for just a moment and shrink into the safety of Nathan’s shadow. Nathan puts a hand on my elbow and holds me firm.
"Give them back the ticket, Loring," Karsci says.
"You're being foolish, Karsci," the Beard says, but he takes my yellow envelope out of his pocket and hands it to Nathan. He must've stolen it after he hit me with the pipe. The thought of his hand touching my thigh makes my whole body shake. "People kill for those tickets," he says.
"It takes more than a ticket to get to the Reservation," Nathan says.
"I know that." The Beard spits when he talks. His teeth are all crowded together. Some of them are black. "I've got sense enough to know that, but not everybody's got the sense that I've got. Desperation's making people mad. They spend so much time wanting a ticket, they start to think it's all they need to get out of this shit hole. You get people giving up their kids for a ticket, you get people who will give up anything for a ticket."
"Who would give up their child?" I say.
"Plenty of folks. Your folks, maybe," he says. I don't know what to say about that. "So they'll give up their food, all their provisions, things we need," the Beard says. "That ticket's a gold mine and you're just giving it back to them, Karsci."
"Nathan's an asset," Karsci says. "He can get us things that no one in the city has access to. Your job was to meet Sister Nanette at the convent and return to us with food. Instead, you attacked an innocent young girl and returned with nothing." Her words are sharp and articulate. I watch the Beard's mouth disappear behind his facial hair.
"Why'd you take the uniforms, Karsci," Nathan says. I watch her face go soft. Her lips turn up. Her hard, narrow eyes are suddenly bright.
"Our clothes are threadbare," she says. "They get holes in them just like yours."
"And the jeep?"
I remember the tracks in the sand. Karsci winks at me. It's the first time she's looked at me, head on, and I don't like it.
"He's always been skeptical of me," she says.
"You're a murderer," I say, and suddenly, I'm sure of it. "You murdered those two men we found in the desert."
"Oh, no, sweetheart." Karsci's red mouth opens up. It's impossibly large. "We've murdered many men in the desert." She smiles. The glimmer in her eye sends a shiver down my spine.
"We don't have things handed to us the way Nathan does, the way you did in that bunker before he snatched you out of it," she says. "Don't you wish he'd left you alone?" She's almost cooin
g now, terrifyingly sweet.
I bite my tongue. She's right, I do wish I was back in the bunker. I wish Nathan had never come to see me. I wish nothing had changed. It feels like a betrayal, though, to say it out loud. I'm not sure why.
"There's a lot you don't know about the outside world, little girl," Karsci says. "But I don't fault you for that. You're the product of circumstance, as much as any of us are. So don't fault me, darling." She takes a handgun out of her belt and aims the barrel straight at me. I hadn't even noticed it there, but now it's black eye is square with mine.
Nars leaps forward, shouting obscenities, but somebody yanks him back into the shadows. I hear a thud and then nothing aside from a few scattered giggles.
Nathan folds his arms across his chest. "New toy?" he says. I can't believe he's so calm. I recall the hard thump of his heart against my ear, the quick succession of beats that resounded like a drumroll when I thought he was the Beard.
I wonder what worried him then, why he’s not worried right now. I’m your ticket home! I want to say. I matter! But I say nothing. I think my voice will waver if I try to speak. I swallow my protests and all of my good sense and hold my tongue.
"I have a little grocery list for you, Nate," Karsci says.
"I expected as much."
"I want you to put a rush on it."
"It might be a month," he says. "I've got a shipment to make."
I think he might be talking about me.
Karsci arches a brow. She chews her cheek the way Nathan does when he's considering something. Then she shrugs. "We can wait a month," she says.
"Like hell we can." Someone from the crowd, a man much older than me, and much skinnier, charges forward. The Beard grabs him by the shoulder and hauls him back into the congregation.
Karsci doesn't even spare a glance for him, for any of the commotion behind her. She holds up two fingers for silence, and silence is what she gets.
"Thirty days," she says. She reaches into the little v at the collar of her dress and withdraws a slip of paper. She hands it to Nathan. He glances over it briefly.
"Enough with the theatrics," he says. He hands the paper back to her. She flips over the safety on her gun.
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