by Linda L Zern
It was time for him to get home.
“Why would he do it? Why would he threaten us all with a stick of painted wood? Kilmer, I just don’t understand it.” Tess sat next to the cot where they’d laid her old friend. Under the blanket his body looked the way El’s had, worn out and fragile. Jess T and now Kilmer—gone. Her father killed. Grownups. Weren’t they the people who were supposed to be the ones in charge? Always around and full of answers?
Tess put her hand on his shoulder. “Kilmer, that man, Terry’s cousin, took ZeeZee and wanted us to believe that he was willing to destroy himself and her to get what he wanted. But I’m not even sure he knew what he wanted. He called for Mister Terry.” She leaned close to whisper to her dead friend, “And I would have given him over to save ZeeZee. I would have. If things had not gone the way they did. I would have done anything to get her back to us. It’s not the same as Mom, I know that, but . . . “
The infirmary of the Marketplace boasted a small, wood-burning stove in the corner with a stovepipe that ran along the wall, sending smoke up through a hole in the roof. The doctor had made sure there was a pretty decent fire going before she’d left Tess alone with Kilmer. He was beyond feeling or caring about mundane things like warmth and comfort. Tess shivered in spite of the fire.
“I’m sorry if I made any of this harder for you, Kilmer, because you helped save us. And I’m not sure I ever told you—The same way I never really told Father or Grandfather—”
“He knew,” ZeeZee said. Standing next to Tess, she put one hand on her shoulder. “Kilmer knew. He used to tell me that he didn’t need thank you cards because he’d rather have people bending over a row of green beans, weeding. That was a better kind of thanks to his mind.”
Ally, pale and thin, stood behind her twin, barely touching. “I think Father did too, Tess. He understood. But he didn’t make it easy for you. He told me one time that it was so much harder to look you in the eye because you’d been old enough to understand what had happened that day on the bridge.”
Surprise nipped at the dull thud of Tess’s heart. “He told you that?”
Ally sat on the ground, legs crossed, next to Tess. She pulled ZeeZee down with her. The sisters scooted closer to each other—for comfort, for warmth.
“After I came here that first time and was hurt, Father found me next to the river. I thought that it would be easier back then to let the water drag me under and away from everything that had happened. He pulled me back from the water and told me that you would need me to be strong. He told me that you made him glad every day that we were still in the world. He couldn’t forgive himself, Tess, but he never regretted you or us. He missed her every single day.”
Tess’s head fell forward, tears falling soundlessly into her lap. ZeeZee’s arms came around her big sister. She whispered, “I think I’m almost glad they are gone and at peace.” ZeeZee’s eyes, dry now, fell on the motionless figure next to them. “Father had been lost for a long time. He’s found now.”
“And Parrish—” ZeeZee began.
“What about him?” He’d gone, searching for the famous shooter who’d killed Colon ‘Boy-O’ Terry.
“Let me finish,” ZeeZee said. “I think as long as you’re in this world, he’ll never be lost again.”
A log collapsed in the stove. The air filled with the comforting smell of burning oak. The sisters, sitting close, stayed and watched over their old friend until the only sounds in the infirmary were the soft crackle of a dying fire.
The Hawk Brothers watched the walls of the Marketplace and the plume of smoke that poured into the sky from the heart of the triangle of mud. Winter wind grabbed the pall of burning and swept it away. The boys lay on their bellies from the top of the overpass.
“Is it burning down?” Little Hawk asked.
Big Hawk grunted. “Naw, there would be more yelling and stuff.”
“Maybe it’s a big fire to keep everyone warm.” The last time Little Hawk could remember being warm was when ZeeZee had hugged him in the old church, before the man with the gun. She’d said that they should run, and they had run.
They were still running. It was safer that way. “Is it time to get warm yet?”
Another grunt from Big Hawk let him know that he wasn’t going to get much more out of the cautious older boy.
Frustrated, Little Hawk rolled to his back and then sat up.
He elbowed Big Hawk. “Hey, you see that?” He pointed to the edge of a retention pond laid bare by Myra’s fire. The Strandline’s missing horses sniffed the air and pawed at the water’s edge. “Won’t Miss Tess be proud if we catch them?”
“Yeah.” Big Hawk reached out to retie the hunk of cord around the plastic poncho he’d made for his brother. “After we eat.” He shoved a sticky chunk of honeycomb into Little Hawk’s hand.
“And then we bring the horses for the sisters. Right, Big Hawk?”
“When we catch them and yeah, they’ll be happy.”
A dead landscape? Only if you weren’t paying attention, Parrish thought. Scavenging coyotes slunk through the tree trunks just out of rifle range. Box turtles scrabbled from their holes, plodding toward palmetto shoots already springing out of the dirt. A mother cow, her udders swinging like sacks, kicked up a trail of ash as she hurried away from the smell of man.
Time for a roundup. It was something to talk about with Stone.
He’d lost the shooter’s trail at the edge of the Black Hammock muck fields. The man’s tracks had just stopped, dropped away, disappeared. Parrish admired the man’s skill. This wasn’t a fool bumbling through unfamiliar territory. This guy knew where he was going and how best to get there. Mud had swallowed the man’s existence as completely as quicksand. Where was he headed, and how soon would they bump into him again?
Parrish paused, his boots sinking into the mire. Layers of rotting vegetation sucked at his feet. He yanked back to solid ground. Cursing softly, knowing that he wasn’t going to be able to end the tale of the mystery shooter to anyone’s satisfaction, he slapped at the mud caking his pants. A lump shifted in his pocket and with it a hazy memory.
He searched the pocket and came up empty. The lump was still there, caught in layers of fabric. He pulled the pocket inside out, saw the ripped lining, and drew out the set of dog tags Roy Terry had been carrying around when he’d first been dragged into their lives.
Leaning on a stump, he rolled the chain through his fingers, felt the weight of the tags as they dangled from his hand. The duct tape they were wrapped in had started to kick up at the edges, trying to reveal secrets. He thought about throwing them away to let the mud drag them down. No. Not before knowing who they’d belonged to.
“Well, then, Mister Roy Terry, who have you been carrying around all this time and why?”
They came without being called: all of them. Everyone living at the fortress came to stand in the outer court in front of the big opening to the atrium. They came in two and threes. Some stood alone, their arms crossed across their chests, their weapons slung over shoulders or in holsters on their hips. They came on the strength of the rumors swirling through the tents where the men slept and on the whispers that crept through quilted fronts along the main hallway.
“Who’s guarding the gate?” ZeeZee asked.
“I set a rotation,” Tess said. If only everything were as easy as setting a schedule for the watch shifts on the wall. She sighed, hearing the murmurs and coughs that followed her as she walked from the atrium to the kitchen and back. They were all waiting, and they were waiting for Tess to be as brilliant as El: as comforting as a parent, as relentless as their enemies. The autobiography El had left for her chased through her head; oh, she’d read it, straight through. It was easy when you couldn’t sleep, easy when sitting and thinking made for bad, bad dreams. The Autobiography of Golda Meir, a great lady and a great leader in her tiny, fragile country.
Parrish had gone after the shooter. Shocked when he’d found out that Jamie had not taken out ZeeZee�
�s captor, he’d insisted on going after the man. There were too many questions to be answered, too many scenarios that could play out. Someone with that kind of skill set, running around the countryside making random shots. Why? And who?
It had been three days. He’d given her strict instructions not to come after him. There’d already been too much chasing around. Every cell in her body screamed to be gone from this place, to be out looking with him. The promise they’d made to each other not to be separated hadn’t lasted long.
Tess felt ZeeZee watching her and remembered to smile her reassurance. “The guards will let us know when he’s back. They will.”
Jamie stood near Ally at the edge of the group, not quite a part of the others. They’d been distant, or maybe a better word for it was private. Tess couldn’t blame them. They were deciding for themselves—to be committed to one another or not—a lot of decisions being made by a lot of people, today for sure. Gwen and Doctor Midge found each other in the crowd; Gwen’s boys mingled at the edge of the parking lot talking with Stone and his group of feral children—no other way to say it, not really. Tess hoped they’d decide in favor of the fort and a future, together.
Samuel hadn’t lasted long. The Marketplace filled him with too much anger every time the Amazons eyed him with malice and suspicion. He hated them—for his mother. Tess recognized the danger of his bitterness and sent him to the bunker to watch over the animals. It was enough for now.
The paper in her hand felt too thin, the words too small for the job she had to do.
Mister Terry stood behind her, holding a rusted step stool for her to stand on.
Tess stroked the rabbit fur tomahawk bag—for luck and for remembering; the Strandline had fed them and kept them, and it had been good for a long time, and now they were going to make something good again.
The crowd shuffled their feet in the clear winter air of the early morning.
She nodded to Mister Terry and climbed onto the stool. She cleared her throat.
“Be advised that this document is binding and overrides any other signed before this day. This place will hereafter be known as Fort Kennedy. If any of you wishes to remain within the walls of this place, you will have to sign the Title of a Free People. You cannot stay if you won’t sign. You can’t. We can’t do this if we aren’t of one mind and one heart, not the same in size or shape or experience, but the same in purpose, because unity makes the house stand.”
A soft rumble crept across the outer courtyard as people repeated what she’d said.
She unrolled a piece of aged parchment—one of Mister Terry’s suggestions. The paper had the Declaration on one side. Someone had found it stuffed in a closet on the upper level—the closet that smelled of beeswax. It was behind a stack of dusty mismatched jars that had, most likely, been used for mixing and brewing. The parchment smelled strongly of mint and matches and smoke from the wildfire.
Tess balanced as the stool rocked a bit and read, “I promise that according to this oath, I will remember that life is sacred, that freedom is essential to be able to live that life, and that I am responsible for what I do, what I earn, and what I give. I pledge to give my all for the defense of freedom of this stronghold for my children, my loves, and my family. I swear it honestly, as a free person, on my sacred life.”
“You will sign this with your name—a settled name that you will be known by—from now on—or you will leave. If you fight against this, you will be banished. A temporary Committee of Law will be working on a document of our rights, laws, and rules over the next weeks until elections can be held. I will honor Ella Summerlin’s last wishes and govern in her place until that time.”
She waited for the whispers to die down and the Doe Kids, who dragged at Stone’s arms, to stop hissing questions. He raised a finger to his lips and shushed them. She went on.
“A keep was the heart of a castle. It was the last place of safety where the people could run to be protected in times of siege or warfare. Fort Kennedy is our keep. It’s our last safe place. We will defend it to the last. Vendetta ends here. Disputes and blood feuds will be settled by the rule of law, the rule of law that we decide—as one people. We’ll speak to everyone, each and every single one here, to address your ideas and concerns. Be thinking about what you want to say.”
Roy Terry stepped closer so that he could stand next to her, looked up and asked, “May I?”
It felt natural to hesitate. But then something in his eyes, some small sadness she couldn’t define, made her step down.
He took his turn on the stool, balancing with a hand on Tess’s shoulder. He cleared his throat.
“Most of what Miss Tess has read was finished before she came to this place. Ella wanted something new and different for our home, this home.” He stopped and dropped his head. Swallowing hard, he continued, “She wanted families to live together. She wanted safety for little girls and boys.”
Tess watched the remaining Amazons shuffle their feet in the dust, shoot each other hot looks and frown their objections to each other. She wondered how many would sign.
“I have been a bad man. El knew it, and allowed me to be here anyway. We’ve all walked filthy roads to get here, but the hate and fear end now. Don’t sign the pledge today. Think seriously. Tomorrow will come soon enough.”
The guards at the gate shouted a warning, the gong clanged. The crowd parted like waves rolling away from a shore.
Children didn’t wait to be told. They ran.
CHAPTER 62
Tess took her newly inherited place on the wall next to the guards at the front gate. They pointed in the direction of the dilapidated town of Oviedo. A boil of dirt and ashes kicked up in the distance. Someone was coming. The guards tightened their grips on their weapons as the dust cloud got bigger.
The guard next to Tess raised her rifle. Tess reached over, pushing the barrel down. “Hold up and look.” It was her turn to point.
Through the dead landscape the Hawk Brothers rode the S-Line’s missing horses. The boys and animals were coated in filth and snarls. Riding with makeshift halters and gleeful faces, they trotted straight at them. Little Hawk rode ZeeZee’s mare while her foal pranced and snorted next to her.
ZeeZee took Tess’s hand, laughing. Ally joined them, out of breath. She waved and called out, “Hello!”
Big Hawk had a death grip on the big stallion, but he took a chance and gave her a quick flip of the hand. The stallion shied, but Big Hawk clung like a burr. He took another chance and looked up at them. “Hey, Miss Tess, we found the horses!”
“I see that.” She laughed. “What’s the status on the gate?” Tess turned to the guard.
“Sealed shut.”
“Chop it down,” she ordered. “ZeeZee, would you tell the men we need to get this gate open? I don’t care how they do it. We’ll start over if we have to. Let’s get those boys inside and safe. Ally, find Jamie and tell him the Hawk Brothers have brought us a present.”
ZeeZee scooted by Ally and started down the ladder.
Ally reached out to touch Tess’s arm. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say those sounded like orders, Miss Tess.”
Ally’s face was filled with humor and affection and curiosity.
“Like them?” Tess sighed. “They’re my first official orders.”
The Hawk Brothers sat next to the wall of the cistern like two frowny frogs contemplating a fly shortage. Sunlight glittered along the top of the water. Stone and Tess stood next to each other, trying to decide who was going to handle the prickly brothers assimilation into life inside the fort.
“Rock, paper, scissors?” Tess held out her fist.
He laughed. “No, I’ll go. I’ll talk to them.”
“Stone, are you sure?”
He was already walking toward the boys, focused on the assignment of convincing the Hawk Brothers to give the village a chance.
“Stone!”
He stopped, turned back to her, and was surprised when she walked straight
to him to give him a giant hug.
She pulled back to say, “Thank you. One of the best things that ever happened to us was when you brought them to the Strandline, all of them.”
She laughed when he blushed and ducked his head.
“Convince them.”
He nodded. She left him to it.
At the artesian well, Stone squatted and waited. The water splashed from the pipe in an endless flow.
“The water stinks,” Big Hawk offered. It was a pretty decent opening shot.
Stone nodded. “Sure does. But it doesn’t dry up. It isn’t full of gators. And it’s not full of dead men.”
Little Hawk turned his head to stare at the well. “ZeeZee made us leave her and then we found the horses and now we’re here, but we—” He stopped and then rubbed at his nose with the back of his hand. “There’s too many people here. We don’t like it.”
Big Hawk nodded.
“Strength in numbers, boys. That can be a very good thing.”
“They’ll make us get clean and stay clean,” Little Hawk added.
Big Hawk grunted.
“It’s a question of not getting sick. No more lice and ticks.”
The older boy chewed at his lip. “But they want us to have one name and keep it. You told us it was those Indians, those Timucauns, it was their way to have new names to mark important stuff.”
Stone picked up a stick. He started drawing circles in the dirt.
“I did. When we lived together in the big barn. I remember. And when it was just us, it was easy to keep track of all the great things you two did. Now, there’re going to be so many great deeds it’s going to be impossible to keep track of them all. Like finding the horses. But you’ll be doing bigger and better deeds all the time. I can feel it. We need you,” Stone said, pointing to the inhabitants of the courtyard, “to have one good, solid name—for all the day-to-day hero stuff.”
He could tell he was on the right track, the way their eyes lifted, their shoulders squared.
“This place is like our base. You’ve caught those horses, but they can’t live here all the time. They’ll need pasture. The grass is already coming back. We’ll need two strong men with solid names to help us serve and protect the herd.”