“When will the shipment take place?”
“At midnight two weeks from tonight. Remember, we don’t want any casualties if we can help it. The Corsairs will be riled enough after the raid without adding murder to their charges against us.”
“Very well. I should probably start back if there’s nothing else you can tell me.”
“Just out of curiosity, how old is your daughter?”
Sophie weighed the danger of giving out more information about her personal life but decided to trust Foxglove. “She’s four years old.”
“Your husband doesn’t know about your Watch activities?”
“I have no husband.”
“What made you want to join the Watch?”
“My daughter. The minute I first held her, I wanted to change the world for her, try to make it better. I knew she deserved everything I could possibly give her and more. I couldn’t bear the thought of her growing up in fear the way we did.”
“Then here’s hoping we may ever be successful.”
* * * * *
Sam’s nightmares returned on the early winter nights as he lay huddled near his fire on the frozen ground. His body shivered from more than just the cold, while his mind stalked the twisted paths of memories from the wars he’d lived through. Smoke, gunshots, fire, and the dead all around him in mangled heaps. His dreams sent him staggering through razed and barren fields. When he woke, the sweat that had fallen down his face would be freezing in his beard. By the time winter had truly arrived, Sam felt like he had never known a warm day in his life. He was born cold, and he’d be colder still in the grave. He would vaguely recall stories about a thing called summer where everything is warm under a burning sun. But he wasn’t sure he believed these stories in the dead of winter. They seemed mythological to him as he shivered under his blanket with the fire waning in the fog of early dawn.
He was used to nights sleeping alone. That had been his life for seven years. But this aloneness was different. It was loneliness without hope for the future, and that left a hole in him he could not fill. Through weeks of wandering forest and hills and border-crossing hunting trips, Sam sought meaning and purpose in the ruined lives of the people of Before. What could their stories teach him? Had they too lost loves, been thrown into the deep abyss, floundering for air? He knew the stories—those perpetuated by the Triumvirate and the more believable stories from Zacharias. The leaders painted them as fools and traitors, destined to be destroyed, no lives worth preserving. Zacharias told Sam the human stories of fear, desperation, and sacrifice for loved ones. Families huddled together in the last hours before only one or two were left from each decimated family. He told him of the type of lives they’d lived before the Disaster, stories of prosperity, creativity, and ease, a kind of life Sam could never fully understand.
And yet they had been destroyed. Their worlds had crumbled beneath their feet as Sam now found his crumbling. Would some traveler in the future find his bones among them and think him merely one of the mass wiped from the planet by their own indifference and arrogance?
What of his own parents? The first farmers and fighters, leaders in the First Revolution. After losing the war, living on the run with Sam in woods, caves, anywhere they could hide, until they were finally betrayed by someone among their own troops. They had loved, hoped, and trusted, and where had it gotten them? Exile and execution. Where had Sam’s love and trust gotten him? Somehow both journeys ended in the same place, with Sam shivering in the unforgiving forest of loss and regret.
One morning, Sam woke to a thick layer of snow over him. Shaking it off, he quickly got up and stoked his fire to a size that could actually warm him. The barren trees looked like black cracks in the brilliant blue of the sky. He went to the tree where he’d hung up his pack to keep it out of reach of those creatures which would scavenge his food. But it wasn’t in the tree. It lay on the ground as covered with snow as he had been, and its insides pillaged and stripped bare. All that remained were the inedible items, including the pistol Zacharias had pressed into his hand before he left—just for an emergency. It could have been an animal or a child that had relieved him of his sustenance, but it didn’t matter now. What mattered was how and what he was going to eat.
He boiled a pot of snow, drinking it down to warm and hydrate himself. He could only hope to find something to eat from the land which the animals, children, or both hadn’t already retrieved. Wandering among the trees and fallen branches, he felt himself like one of the little snowbirds, pecking the ground for any tidbit of food. He found a few berries left frozen on a bush and ate them quickly. Surveying his surroundings, he realized he was close to Teardrop Point, which looked out over the valley. Something in him beyond his control led him to the top. He ran as fast as could up the point, faster and higher than he’d ever been. Perhaps if he ran fast enough, he could shed the scales of the past holding him in a dying grip, like a snake sheds its skin. The thick wind chafed like a rope against his neck and face. Looking out from the point, he did what he’d always done, what he couldn’t stop himself from doing, no matter his situation—he searched the landscape for Gemma’s fire. But the clouds had settled below him near the base of the mountain, obscuring his view. They danced and skirted the ground, waiting to sprinkle another helping of snow. But Sam knew that wasn’t the only reason he couldn’t find Gemma. She was truly no longer his, no longer to be found in his searching eyes.
For days, Sam tried to make it back to Zacharias, back to the village where he could find respite and nourishment. But he had traveled far, and after several days without food, he found his strength failing him. He began sleeping in the day as well as the night. The specter of death haunted him, playing hide and seek like a child among the blackened tree branches. Sam wasn’t sure he wanted to escape from its grip. Lying cold, dirty, and completely defeated in a snowdrift against a mammoth aspen, he contemplated the barren land before him. Devoid of color, sound muffled by the snow, he felt the void calling to him, beckoning him to let go. What use the fight? What purpose the struggle? It would be so much easier to just sleep. The emptiness of his stomach and heart felt like a great ocean he could simply fall into and continue falling, floating weightlessly in its folds.
Through the haze and delirium, Sam thought he saw movement in the snow, but all was white before him. He strained his eyes to see more clearly. Again, a short, jerky movement, but all white. Something brushed an overhanging branch, causing a shower of white dust to cascade down in a heap. That’s when he saw it, the snow piled around its thin and muscular legs, a great white buck, which would have been completely invisible if not for its massive antlers growing like a tree from its head. The deer looked directly at Sam, standing perfectly still. In a corner of Sam’s mind a memory prickled of the pistol he carried in his pack. But he had no wish to shoot this majestic creature, as pure as the snow it rivaled.
Sam hadn’t fired a gun in years. The very thought of it propelled him into a state of almost panic. Days of need and desperation far greater than his current state. He closed his eyes tight, trying to wipe the visions from his eyes. Visions of Gemma, Kyle, and himself doing anything necessary to survive.
“Sam! Sam, we have to do this. We don’t have a choice. We either attack now while we can take them by surprise, or we’ll be dead by morning. You know they’ll do anything to find us.” Gemma stands with her hands on Sam’s shoulders, trying to shake him into submission.
“I think we can get away, Gemma,” Sam tries to convince her and himself.
“Why do you have to be such a coward?” Kyle chides. “Don’t you want them to pay? They killed your parents, and now they’re after us. Come on, there are only four Corsairs down there. We can take them if we go now.”
Sam shuffles his feet in the bank of snow, creating a hole.
Kyle takes charge as always. He’s older and assumes the responsibility to protect the group. “I’ll take the two on the left. Sam, you take the one sitting down. Gemma, the one
on the right. Once they’re out of the way, we can raid the camp. Come on now, there will be food for a week down there. Move out!”
Sam grips the rifle to his chest. It’s as tall as he is. He tries not to trip in the snow that’s dragging his feet as they run down the hill. They each practically fall into the trunks of the trees they hide behind. Within a split second of stopping, Kyle spins from behind the tree, aims, and fires off two rounds in succession. His aim is flawless. Two soldiers hit the ground. Gemma fires before the second soldier has fallen. Her soldier on the right lands directly on top of his comrade. Sam’s soldier, sitting on a fallen tree trunk, has risen and is reaching for his gun. The picture freezes along with Sam’s shaking hands. He holds the rifle, aimed and ready to shoot, but he can’t quite fire. The three soldiers on the ground lie in strange, unnatural angles. Their blood runs together in a pool beneath them, staining the snow and mud. The cabin they had sheltered in has been painted with a new coat of blood. Slowly, the soldier gets closer and closer to his gun. Now it’s in his hand. Now pulled against his shoulder. Sam looks in his eyes and sees the tears about to run down his cheek. The soldier in Corsair uniform is as young as he is, maybe younger.
“Fire, damn it, fire!” Kyle cries in panic.
Sam closes his eyes and squeezes the trigger. It’s done. They’ve won the skirmish. They will live to eat, sleep, and fight another day. Sam drops the gun at his feet, the muzzle sizzling in the snow.
“We had to do it, Sam. It’ll be alright. They would have killed us. We had to do it.” Gemma’s words fail to comfort him, but she keeps repeating them for her own sake. “We had to do it.”
Sam opened his eyes, half-expecting Gemma to be standing there. But the only creature looking at him was the buck, its chest puffed out in pride and majesty. He had not moved nor broken his gaze in several minutes. Sam knew what he had to do. He tried to convince himself this situation was different. He was starving. He wasn’t killing a human being. But the innocence of the animal assailed him, rebuked him. The pistol shook in his hand, pointed at the ground.
“Go on,” he shouted. “Get out of here!”
The deer gracefully took a step forward, and another. He was walking toward Sam, not away. And then a realization began to wash over Sam like the sunrise coming up over the mountains. He knew he’d been given a chance at redemption. The innocence the animal offered him was his own, and he was giving it freely to Sam, who would walk out of the woods a different man than he was when he entered. With great effort, he raised the pistol and fired a single shot, accepting and honoring the gift.
* * * * *
The gentle strains of Schubert’s piano “Serenade” filled the yard from the gramophone on the back porch before being broken by the crack of an axe splitting wood. Music was sometimes the only thing that could soothe Sophie’s frayed nerves. Music coupled with physical labor. She took out all her fears, frustrations, and anger on the chopping block before her, cutting them to pieces along with wood for the fire.
Although it was the middle of the day, Sophie had kept a large fire going in the fireplace to heat the fresh chicken soup she’d made for Bridget, who lay ill in her bed. She had taken sick the night of the Watch’s raid on the Corsair’s shipment of horses and guns. The raid had been a success but had taken all night. Even now, several of the horses resided in a barn obscured by a thick overgrowth of trees on the northern edge of Sophie’s farm. But when she returned in the early morning hours after the raid, Mrs. O’Dell was ministering to her sick child, trying to control the fever. The fear welled in Sophie’s heart along with the tears in her eyes. Bridget had always been such a healthy child; she’d never had to worry over a situation like this before. That was four days before, and the fever had yet to break.
Crack! Another piece of firewood broke and bowed to Sophie’s will. She had tried all of the home remedies she knew to fight infection and bring the child’s fever down. Teas, tinctures, oils, constant liquids. But still Bridget languished rather than rallied. The next day was Market Day when the Council of Doctors would be in town. Sophie knew she’d have to approach them for medicine for her daughter, but she dreaded it. Dreaded the risk of revealing her undocumented daughter, born illegally. She slammed the axe down, giving the soft white pine another blow with all the force of her fears.
“Still doing everything for yourself, I see.”
The man’s voice sent a chill down her spine colder than the air around her. Without turning around to face her intruder, she put another piece of firewood on the chopping block. “You shouldn’t be here, Griffyth. We agreed, remember?” The axe came down again.
“We said a lot of things back then. I come to Market Day every week, but I never see you there anymore. I hate to admit it, even to myself, but I’ve missed you. I just wanted to see you for a minute.”
“Well, you’ve seen me. Now you can go.”
“Sophie, look at me, will you?”
She continued her task.
“I don’t want to compel you, but you know I could.”
Slamming her axe into the chopping block, Sophie wiped the sweat from her brow and turned around. Her red hair fell out of her braid in wisps around her face. She stared directly into Griffyth’s cold eyes, although they held some heat for her.
“Where’s the child?” he asked, looking toward the house.
“Do you really think I’d let you see her?”
“A father has a right to see his own child.”
“The law doesn’t recognize her, so it doesn’t recognize your right. Besides, you have never been her father.”
“I was curious about her, I suppose.”
“Curious? Is that all we are to you, a curiosity?”
“Come now, Sophie, you and I never had any illusions about us. It was business from the start. You’re the one who brought a child into the mix.”
“I can’t do this with you, Griffyth. Now, we made a deal. I wouldn’t turn you into the Corsairs, and you’d leave us alone. I’ve kept my end of the bargain.”
Griffyth stepped forward, running his rough hand across Sophie’s flushed cheek. “Yes, you were always very good at keeping up your end of things. Can’t we at least . . .”
With one swift motion, Sophie held the axe again in her hand and placed the blade almost gently against Griffyth’s throat. “Can’t we what?”
“Nothing,” he hissed.
“Alright, then. Go on.”
Sophie waited until he had left the yard to drop her axe, leaning over, her head between her knees. She breathed heavily, trying to work down the fear in her throat. She knew she’d pushed him too far. Griffyth was not one to forget slights or offenses. But she depended on the fact that Bridget held the proof of his guilt in her very veins.
In an effort to preserve valuable and scarce resources, the Triumvirate insisted on controlling all aspects of procreation. Extramarital attachments and relations were strictly forbidden. No one knew what the exact punishment was except that offenders were removed from the village and never returned. Sophie had no intention of being one of those people. When Griffyth had first approached her years before, she didn’t feel she could refuse him. He was a government official, after all, holding power and influence within his grasp. He had set his sights on her and not relented. Sophie felt sick again at the thought of allowing him into her bed. But her saving grace in more ways than one had been the birth of Bridget.
“What do you mean you’re pregnant? How is that even possible?” Griffyth paces in the kitchen, slamming dishes in the sink.
“I haven’t taken the medications for years.” Sophie tries not to smile about the serious situation but can’t help feeling the joy of being a mother despite the fear it also evoked.
“For God’s sake, why?” He takes a deep breath. He will not lose his composure. He is in control. “It doesn’t matter why. You can’t have this child without a permit, that’s all there is to it. The blood tests for an identification card will trace it back to m
e. And I will not let that happen.” He picks up his hat, turning his back on her as he walks toward the door. “Get rid of it.”
There is nothing that will induce Sophie to get rid of her child. She’s going to be a mother. She’s going to love her child no matter what. And she’s going to do it without Griffyth in her life. She is in control. She speaks with a measured cadence, “I’m going to have this baby, Griffyth. And you are never going to come back here again. I will not reveal you as the father. I will not register the birth. But you have to agree to leave us alone. For good. Do you understand?”
Griffyth says nothing and walks out the front door.
Sitting down on the back porch steps, Sophie heard the needle skipping on the gramophone record. The song had come to an end. Her legs were still shaking as she considered the consequences of what she had to do tomorrow. But she didn’t have a choice. She wondered if she should have handled things differently with Griffyth just now. But did she ever have a choice in how she handled him?
* * * * *
The footprints were unmistakable and fresh, not yet filled in with snow, and the smell of smoke was near. Ethan knew he’d probably find Sam over the next hill. As he crested the hill, he was happy to see his quarry in the valley below. The journey had been tough, but not unexpected. He was glad they’d share a fire that night.
Sam heard the boy approach. “Sneaking up on me again, boy?”
“How’d you know it was me? Could’ve been an animal.”
“Not likely. I heard you first. Then when I looked, there you were in the wide open with your black hair standing out against the snow like ink on a blank page. You’ve got to skirt the trees when you walk, son. Takes longer, but it’s safer.”
“Been looking for you for a couple of days, Sam.”
“So I figured. Now you’ve found me.” Sam chuckled to himself. “I guess that means I was the Lost Boy this time.”
A Light From the Ashes Page 7