“It’s okay,” I said. “There’s no one here.”
In the middle of the fields stood a house and a barn. We watched for any sign of humans in the area but saw none.
Sage pulled the sleeve of my shirt. “Come on, let’s go this way.”
We began to pick our way among the trees when we saw movement, and stopped.
“What is it?” Sara asked.
People were emerging from the largest structure, the barn, and even from a distance I could tell there was something different about them. We watched as others, taller people, came behind them. Were the ones in front children? Was that what made them different? No, the people in back simply walked straighter. The people in front picked up tools and moved toward the field. The five people behind them were already carrying things.
“What are they doing?” I whispered.
“These must be the people who maintain the fields,” Blaise said.
“But something is strange,” Josh said.
One of the people in the front group tripped and fell as he entered the field. He landed on the tender seedlings. From behind him, a tall man from the second group approached him, lifted him by his shirt, and threw him into the dirt on the side of the field, away from the plants. Even from our distance, we could hear the taller man yelling. He kicked the person on the ground, who cried out.
Jonah’s body tensed. He wanted to go to him, to stop the abuse.
I pulled him back. I wanted to stop it too, but first I had to understand it.
Another man came and helped the man up. The two walked together into the fields.
We stayed hidden in the shadows as people from the first group moved closer to us. I saw now why they looked different. They were different. Each of them was deformed, as Trent would have said. It was in the way they walked or the shape of their face. I could see deep lines on some of their faces, so they were not young. Their expressions were not old, though. On the contrary, Juliette’s understanding was probably more than theirs. The man who had fallen and been kicked was wiping muddy tears from his face, his expression sad, beaten, and innocent. It was the sort of expression that made any sadness I had felt in my own life fall away by comparison.
Beside me, I heard sobbing. Juliette had wrapped herself around Sara, her body convulsing as tears streamed down her face. Sara’s arms wrapped around her, as if trying to contain her pain. Astrea wiggled in Sage’s arms, trying to get to her.
“What’s going on?” I asked, putting a hand on Juliette’s back.
Juliette didn’t answer.
“She was watching them, and when the boy or man began to cry, so did she,” Sara said.
Juliette tightened her grip around Sara, as her sobs increased.
Jonah whispered to Sara, “Take her back, away from here.”
He was right; they could not stay here. Her sobbing would alert those in the field to our presence.
I’d never seen Juliette cry like that, even at Faith’s funeral. When others had cried tears that rocked their bodies, Juliette had remained controlled. Sad and crying, but controlled. But this was not controlled. Something about this place and these people triggered something in her that death and violence did not.
I refocused on the farm, trying to understand what she saw. A group of ten in the field, mostly men, carried hoes and buckets. They were all thin, but only two of them were also muscular—a man and a woman. Those two stood straighter and their faces lacked innocence. They were older, somewhere between the age of my dad and Nonie. They directed the others in the field, speaking kindly. They were not their captors. If anything, I guessed they were caretakers.
Five people sat at the edge of the field, in the shade of a sprawling oak that was growing near the house.
We remained hiding in the shadows, and watched the older caretaker man arrive at the spot where Astrea and Juliette had trampled the field. He knelt, touching the earth, studying the crumpled plants and the prints left by shoes and paws.
A man came behind him. This man absently watched the caretaker.
“Simon, buddy, weed over there for me,” the caretaker said, pointing to a spot closer to the farmhouse.
“Okay, Mr. Tait,” Simon said.
Mr. Tait used his hoe to erase the evidence of the small person and dog. He glanced nervously toward the farmhouse where the five others were. Two now sat with their backs hunched, facing one another, heads bent, staring at the ground in front of them. Perhaps they were playing cards or some other game. Two others, a man and a woman, were lounging in folding chairs, facing the fields. The fifth, who sat by himself, stood out, his large curls visible even from this distance.
“Are you still there?” Mr. Tait whispered into the wind.
We exchanged cautious glances before Jonah whispered, “Yes.”
“What do you want?” he asked as he continued to hoe the ground, breaking the weeds free from the earth.
Jonah answered, “We were passing through and saw the farm. We stopped when we saw you coming out.”
Blaise whispered, “What is this place?”
Mr. Tait paused and lifted his head in our direction, as he stooped to pick the loose weeds and throw them in his bucket. “How many of you are there?”
“Four,” Jonah answered. It was better he not know about Sara, Sage, and Juliette.
“This is my home. My wife and our son and others we care for live here,” Mr. Tait said.
“Who are the people by the house?” Jonah asked.
“A family of scavengers,” he said in anger. “They came a month ago, in the middle of the night. They’d been watching us and knew we couldn’t fight.”
“Mr. Tait?”
Tait’s body became rigid. “Yes, Simon.”
“Who you talking to?”
“Shh. No one. Come on,” Mr. Tait said, guiding Simon away from us.
“What are we going to do?” I asked.
“I say we go kick their sorry—”
“Josh, that’s not helpful,” Blaise said.
“They’re abusing them, taking advantage of their lack of strength. That’s not okay!” Josh said, his quiet words brimming with outrage.
“Whether we like it or not, that’s the way of the world now,” Blaise said. “There are no longer laws to protect the weak, and without that there is no reason not to dominate and take.”
“We don’t!” Josh exclaimed.
“We’ve never been like the rest of the world, Josh. You know that.” Blaise touched his back.
“Yeah, but we weren’t the only ones. Others lived like we did,” he said, his anger turning to defeat.
“And there still are,” Blaise said, her hand still on his back. “These people would be safe back at the town with East and Haz and everyone there. They would be welcomed and protected.”
“Is that it? Us and them? Are we the only ones in this country who aren’t monsters?”
“There are more, many more,” Blaise said. “There always are, but they are quiet and unseen.”
“Maybe they shouldn’t be and maybe we shouldn’t be,” he answered.
“Maybe that’s why East and Haz stayed,” Blaise said, leaning against him. “Maybe they were tired of letting evil win.”
He wrapped an arm around her.
“Yeah, maybe,” he said, leaning his head against hers.
Jonah stood beside me. “Do they have guns? I can’t tell.”
Our focus shifted. Perhaps we couldn’t save the world, but we could save this family. Or at least free them from the scavengers.
I squinted.
Blaise said, “I think the man in the folding chair might have a rifle.”
“And the woman next to him?” Josh asked, staring into the distance.
Jonah answered, “A crossbow, maybe?”
“Ooh, I would love to have a crossbow!” Blaise exclaimed.
“Consider it yours, my love,” Josh said, pulling his wife to him.
“Such a romantic gift,” I said, teasing t
hem.
“Are you kidding? With a crossbow, I could hunt and not waste bullets. I can’t think of anything more romantic.” Blaise pulled Josh tight against her.
Jonah asked, “What about the other people? Are they armed?”
“I can’t tell,” I answered, standing on my tiptoes to see.
“There might be some sort of weapon on the ground beside them, but I can’t be sure,” Josh added.
“What are we going to do?” Sage asked, the sound of her voice making me jump.
“Where did you come from?” I asked. My heart was pounding hard.
“I’m good at being quiet,” she said with a pleased expression.
“Where’s Sara?” Blaise asked.
“With Juliette.”
“Is she any better?” I asked.
“No,” Sage answered. “She’s rocking back and forth, holding Astrea. She’s still sobbing. And of course, she won’t tell us why. It’s awful. I had to leave.”
Blaise said to Sage, “The five people there have sort of captured the other people, so we are going to free them.”
“I like freeing captured people,” Sage said, rubbing her hands together in excitement.
Jonah said, “The only way to sneak up on them is to wait until they are in the barn or the house.”
Sage scanned the sky and said, “It’s early afternoon. They probably won’t go in until dark.”
“What else can we do?” Blaise said. “Our weapons won’t reach that far—not that we would just start shooting people. Besides, the land is open between us and them.”
“What if … we lure them out to us?” Sage said.
Jonah was leaning against a tree and surveying the fields. “If we go out there,” he said, “we risk being shot.”
“I wasn’t thinking about us,” Sage said. “I was thinking about Astrea. If we could get her to run out into the field and then run back to us, that might make enough of a commotion to get at least some of them to check things out.”
“Use her as bait?” Blaise said.
“Sort of,” Sage answered.
“Do you think Juliette would allow us to take her?” I asked.
Sage turned from the field to face us. “Something about this place hurts her more than it hurts the rest of us. So yeah, I think she’d want us to get it done sooner rather than later.”
Jonah said, “It does seem unlikely they’d shoot a dog, at least from that distance.”
“Do you think she’d come back to us?” I asked.
“Astrea loves us,” Sage said. “She might run and greet some of the people in the field, but when we called her, she’d come.”
“I hope you’re right,” I said. “Juliette loves that dog. If something happened to Astrea, I don’t know how she’d survive.”
Sage crossed her arms. “You underestimate her, Bria. Whatever she went through before you found her—or she found you—was far worse than losing a dog.”
I knew Sage was right, but Astrea was helping Juliette heal in a way nothing else was.
Sage went into the trees. A few moments later she returned, carrying a squirming Astrea in her arms.
“Be careful,” Blaise said quietly to the dog, before kissing her on the top of the head.
Sage released her, and Astrea stood, panting, beside us. Her little tongue hung loosely in her open mouth.
Sage nudged her, saying, “Go, run.”
Astrea looked up at her and then to the people in the field. In a moment she was gone, running toward Simon. He didn’t notice her until she jumped on his back.
He screamed, and then when he realized what it was, he clapped and squealed, “A dog, a dog!”
Astrea left him and ran around to the others in the field. Each of them was excited to see a playful puppy.
“It’s working,” Jonah said, standing taller and preparing for a fight.
The scavengers stood, watching the dog run from person to person. As they approached the field, Astrea noticed them and stood motionless. I bit my lip, hoping she would not go to them. The man and the woman who had been facing each other, playing a game, stood and began running toward her. Astrea waited and then trotted back toward us, as if she knew she was to lead them to us.
“Here, puppy,” the woman called sweetly to Astrea. “Come here.”
Astrea stopped and hesitated, as if deciding if she should go or not. My heart quickened as I realized Astrea didn’t know to be scared. She didn’t know to run. She didn’t know how cruel people could be. She didn’t know that if these people would enslave Mr. Tait and his family, they would do worse to her.
“Astrea,” I whispered, frantically trying to get her to come to me. She heard my voice and resumed her path to us.
The couple began running toward her. “Come on, I haven’t had fresh meat in so long,” the woman said. She called again, “Here, puppy, here sweetie,” and clapped a hand against her thigh.
Astrea stopped and turned, not moving toward them, yet not running from them, either.
“They want to eat her,” Blaise whispered in horror.
“Astrea!” Juliette’s voice rang out behind us. Strong and commanding. Astrea now understood what she was to do. She ran as fast as she could toward the trees. The two scavengers slowed for a second and whispered to each other. They had heard Juliette. Everyone had heard Juliette.
Astrea entered the shadows of the trees, bounding to Juliette, who lifted her. Hugging her tight.
“Get out of sight,” Jonah whispered.
It was too late. The two scavengers ran full speed toward us—toward Juliette—and Sara, who stood behind her. The rest of us were hidden, waiting for them to enter the shadows.
As soon as they crossed the barrier, I swept my leg under the woman. She fell and scrambled to her feet, startled and furious. She saw me and swung the metal pipe she was carrying. I jumped back behind a tree, met her on the other side and side-kicked her in the kidneys … silently thanking East for teaching me to fight. I didn’t like to do it, but I was good at it. When the scavenger woman fell, she dropped the pipe. Sage picked it up. The fight was now fair.
The woman charged toward me. I easily pushed her to the side. She turned and moved toward me. I waited for her to throw a punch, blocking it with my left arm, connecting my right hand to her chin. Blood poured from her mouth and she cried out in pain, shrinking against the base of a tree.
Blaise held her rifle pointed at the woman.
Jonah must have knocked the scavenger man down, because he now scrambled to his feet, the crowbar in his hands. Jonah pulled one of the spears from the homemade quiver that hung from his hip. He used it like a knife, lunging for the man and missing. The man swung the crowbar, missing Jonah by only a few inches.
“Get in there,” a woman’s voice called. “Why are you just standing here?”
I turned. In the field the curly-haired boy stood watching the fight. A woman with white-streaked red hair and a tall man with brown hair ran toward him and us. Those two had weapons they could fire, and would, as soon as they could get a clear shot.
The man fighting Jonah cried out as Josh kicked him in the back. Jonah kicked him sideways, sending him into a tree. Josh stepped on the man’s hand and pulled the crowbar from it.
A shot fired, and a piece of the tree in front of me exploded.
Blaise returned fire, hitting the brown-haired man who was running toward us, in the thigh. He fell to the ground, dropping his gun. The woman screamed and fired her crossbow, the arrow flying between Blaise and me. Blaise had told me that emotion, and anger in particular, was the biggest barrier to hitting your target. Maybe that’s why she was such a good shot; she was always calm.
Josh, on the other hand, was not. He barreled forward without thought. The woman fired at him and miraculously missed, though she was only a few feet from him. He reached her before she could fire again, and tackled her to the ground.
“You tried to shoot my wife,” he screamed, pulling the crossbow from her.
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Sage ran to the field to grab the gun knocked from the man’s hand. The curly-haired boy stood nearby, his bat held limply in his hand, within swinging distance of Sage.
“Hit her!” the woman screamed, and Sage jumped back as if she hadn’t seen the boy until then.
The boy stood, unmoving.
“Swing your bat,” the man commanded as Sage held the gun pointed at him.
The boy responded by dropping the bat. The fight was over.
Mr. Tait ran to his house and returned a moment later with rope. A few minutes after that, the five scavengers were tied to trees, their hands and feet bound tight, their backs pressed against the trunks.
The woman with streaked red hair and the tall man were violent in their words, spewing putrid vile at each of us, but most intensely at the curly-haired boy.
He was not really a boy, but not quite a man. He did not try to stand or struggle, like the others did. He merely slumped in the dirt like a beaten dog. I assumed those screaming at him were his parents. He looked like the tall man, but shorter and younger.
“That’s enough,” Josh screamed, after another round of expletives aimed at the boy left the mother’s mouth.
My father had been uninterested in me before the light, but he was never cruel. These people were cruel, and I found myself feeling sad for the curly-haired boy.
“You go, help them get what they need. We will stay here,” Blaise said as she and Josh guarded the prisoners.
“I’ll stay too,” Sage said. She was watching the boy who was about her age.
“Help us do what?” Mrs. Tait asked.
Jonah and I turned, leading her and her husband from the woods. The others were already in the field, playing with Astrea.
“You can’t stay here,” Jonah said. “Even if we killed these people, which we aren’t going to do, others would come. You have food, and your family can’t fight. You will not last long in this place.”
Simon and the others squealed as they played with Astrea, and I knew they had only one true hope.
Mr. Tait said, “We have nowhere else to go, and at least here we have food. They were the first ones who found us.” He gestured toward the scavengers.
“More have come since,” Mrs. Tait said with caution.
From the Shadows (The Light Book 3) Page 12