The Nature of Balance

by Tim Lebbon

  “Christ, only trying to help!” he screamed, his voice high-pitched and childlike. He sounded genuinely hurt. He jumped back inside and revved the motor, and it was only then that Peer realised the car was pointing directly at her.

  She went to jump back, squealed as her feet twisted and pain flared up her legs. The car reversed and handbraked again before heading away, the boy honking the horn well into the distance.

  It took her several minutes to compose herself and let the white-hot pain in her feet fade to red. For the first time she had a good look around, taking in her surroundings far as well as near. The fields lay in a neat pattern across the landscape, sprouting circles of trees here and there like hairy moles on an otherwise unblemished face. She noticed a wildness about the hedgerows that she had not seen before, an almost primal insistence to branch out, spread themselves, devour the countryside around them. In several places the hedges had broken completely from their uniformity, bleeding into the fields like blood from a broken vein rushing into neighbouring flesh. She had never seen this before.

  Across the fields nearest the motorway sat a huddle of farm buildings, built in a circle to shelter each other from winds rippling across the flat landscape. They were well kept, in a decent state of repair. Smoke was curling lazily from the redbrick chimney, spiralling skyward without a care.

  A herd of cows bayed noisily at the gate to their field. They were waiting to be milked. One of them was stepping in a circle, crying out, tail raising and lowering. From this distance, Peer could hear only the combined chorus of their cries, not individual voices, but the sound was forlorn and lost. Pained.

  She felt that she should be doing something to help them. But there was nothing she could do.

  She turned away and stared back in the direction of Newport, hidden behind hills but still spouting smoke. The cloud was charcoal black against the clear blue sky, smudged at the edges by distance. Even from here, several miles away, Peer could smell it. Rich, cloying, the smell of annihilation.

  She wanted to cry again but she was all cried out, and the tears would do no good. Instead, she started shakily along the hard shoulder, always listening for the sound of cars behind her. Two more passed without stopping, staring faces haunting her with desperate expressions.

  An hour later she reached the exit ramp and breathed a sigh of relief.

  She paused to take stock. Her feet were an agony, and blood had seeped between the stitching of her borrowed trainers. He elbows and knees had not been given a chance to scab, and her scrapes and cuts still dribbled the occasional tear of blood. The bar was a comforting weight nudging her thigh.

  From here she could see the service station. The hotel was silent, curtains still drawn in a stillness Peer recognised already. What mess awaited the chambermaids today? There were no lights on in the restaurant, but she could detect signs of movement behind the tinted glass. A Marks & Spencer lorry sat in the petrol station, cab door open, rear doors yawning, a mess of paper and cartons and clothes fanned out on the ground behind it. There was no sign of the driver, neither did there appear to be any activity in the petrol station kiosk.

  Peer hobbled down the access road, cutting across the grass and skirting rose gardens gone wild. Thorns promised plenty of pain. As she walked she scanned the parking lot for the Cavalier and Mercedes. There was no sign of them.

  The automatic doors still worked. For some reason she had been expecting them to be shut off, but their senseless operation instilled her with a warm, welcome flood of relief. Not all humanity was dead. There were still the things they had made, things still striving to make their lives that much easier.

  There were about twenty people in the restaurant area. Nobody seemed to be serving behind the darkened counters, and the mess of sandwich wrappers on the tables indicated that the lorry outside had been the source of food for those here. Some sat in groups, conversation muted. Others were alone, staring into space, apparently surprised by what they saw. A couple had dead eyes, as if they had been resurrected and were not too happy about it.

  Footsteps approached from behind and Peer turned, hand closing around the pipe in her pocket, to see a middle-aged man pass her by. He offered her a sad smile and then sat down alone. He picked up a photograph from the table and began turning it over and over, as if reviewing the image every few seconds would renew the life it had recorded.

  Peer walked to the food serving area and searched for something to drink. She remembered she had no money and felt a vague twinge of guilt, but no one even seemed to notice. The soft drinks dispenser was still working, though when she tasted the fizzy orange it was tepid and flat. The gas had run out and not been replaced. She found a spare table and sat down gratefully, conscious of several sets of eyes following her every movement. An involuntary groan escaped her as the weight was taken from her abused feet. She looked around for the boy with the shaven head, but she could not see him. He had given her his trainers. He had promised to wait for her here.

  “Excuse me,” she said, loud enough for the whole restaurant to hear, not too loud to sound aggressive. Most heads turned, though nobody said anything. “I wonder if any of you have seen some people travelling in a Cavalier and a big Mercedes. A girl with broken legs, a boy with a shaven head. I was supposed to meet them here.”

  There was a tense silence as the whole place seemed to hold its breath. Several people were on the verge of speaking; a big man with a ponytail broke the tension. “Been and gone,” he said flatly. “Left ten minutes ago.”

  Peer frowned, feeling extraordinarily let-down by the boy who had issued such a casual promise. “But he said they’d wait for me. We were going to find another car…”

  “Plenty of spare ones about,” a young girl said. “Hotel’s full of dead people.”

  “Sorry, love,” Ponytail continued, “but they just shot off quickly. Actually, it was my fault. I told them I’d just come up from Chepstow. Then I told them what was there. And off they went. Pointless, really. I’m sure they didn’t believe me.” He looked down at a half finished carton of orange juice, pinching the end of his straw, picking up liquid, releasing it with a gurgle that could be heard across the restaurant. “No point going anywhere, from what I hear. I’ll just stay here.”

  “What is there?” Peer asked, knowing the answer before she spoke.

  “Well, it’s not on fire like Newport,” the young girl said. “Other than that, it’s much the same. It’s full of dead people.”

  Peer closed her eyes. Something nuzzled at her left hand. She jerked the bar from her pocket, tangling it in the material of the coat.

  “Hey!” a voice said. “Only my dog. He’s friendly, you know. Loyal. He needs me. Everyone needs someone. Even dogs. Here Spike!” The dog sauntered away, sniffing at table legs and pissing against a plant pot.

  Peer looked over and saw a pale, thin face peering above a low partition. The woman was holding an open packet of sandwiches in one hand, a cigarette in the other. Peer had given up smoking years ago. Now, she craved one.

  “Want to share?” the woman asked. She waved the sandwiches like a lure.

  There was a lorry full outside, begging to be plundered, but Peer welcomed the invitation of company. She nodded and walked around the partition, sitting at the messy table and staring in disbelief at the range of food scattered across its surface. There was hardly any table to be seen. “Thanks.”

  The woman smiled across at her. “I’m Mary,” she said. “I’m not contrary, and I’ve never had a garden.” She held out her hand.

  Peer snorted a laugh, noticed the spiked chain on the seat next to Mary, realised she was still holding her iron bar. “Peer,” she said.

  “Dig in!” Mary grabbed another unopened packet of sandwiches and ripped it apart, throwing one of them to the obedient Spike. “They’re free.”

  Peer thought of the lorry outside, doors open and its insides torn out. “I suppose so.”

  She ate. The woman watched. The dog dribbled f
rom messy jowls, tattered ears pricked up in readiness for any more scraps.

  “I’m glad I found you,” Mary said.

  Peer was suddenly too hungry to listen to anything else. Or to register just how peculiar this statement was.

  15. Dead Rainbows

  He will have a woman with him, Fay had said. If he hasn’t when you find him, then he soon will. It’s the way things must be forced to proceed, it’s an inevitable event. It’s the route he’ll have to take. He may not know his own mind – he will not understand his own drives – but this will fall into place around him: he will have a woman. And this woman be dangerous, to you as well as me. Watch her. Mark her. Wait for the right time.

  Mary had not asked how she was supposed to recognise this Blane. Fay implied that she would know him when they met, and so she left it at that. She had felt unable – unwilling – to question Fay, because the woman with chains was so right, so correct, so totally aware of Mary. How do you question the person you love? Why should you?

  Mary drove away from the house without once glance back. She was leaving her old self there, her whole history, decaying into dirt and filth along with the bodies of those who had used and abused her. She mourned nothing. The dog sat behind her, panting foully into her ear, eager for a sniff of air from her partly open window. In the wing-mirror she could see him dribbling onto her shoulder, his saliva thick and tinged pink. She did not care. Nothing mattered, except the job she had been given by Fay, the woman who needed her.

  Go north, you’ll find him, Fay had said, stroking Mary’s hair like a mother nursing a child. He’ll be heading south, and he’ll probably have others with him. They’ll be confused, wary. The fools don’t know what’s happened, not even him. But I can let him know. If there are others, your job may be more difficult. But not impossible. Nothing is impossible, Mary, with love.

  “With love,” she muttered, enjoying the words, relishing something so important, so honest in her mouth after so long. Spike ignored her, eyes squinted shut in the breeze as he sensed a thousand breakfasts waiting to be eaten.

  She headed north, away from the coast, driving carelessly. She had not been in control of a car for years, and she revelled in her new-found freedom. Roger had never let her drive, insisting that she would not be able to, making her believe she was useless with his insistent mockery. How she wished he could see her now.

  She eased the car blindly around corners, unconcerned as to whether there was anyone coming the other way, sure that there would not be because she had a job to do for Fay. Fay would not let her die in any petty, meaningless way. If she had to go it would be glorious, a death that everyone would recognise as that of someone significant. Not a runt of the litter of mankind. Not a worthless piece of shit, as Roger had so often said.

  Mary was someone!

  She drove up from the marshy flatlands until she hit the motorway, and then suddenly realised how hungry she was. Now she could eat what she wanted, not only what the others happened to be eating. She had a choice.

  She glanced down at the motorway as she circled the elevated roundabout; it seemed deserted in both directions. No signs of any cars, buses, lorries, motorbikes, nothing that a normal weekday morning would bring. Nothing. Silence, desertion, abandonment.

  Mary did not find it difficult to accept what had happened. Fay had touched her. Understanding came in a flash. There was nobody in the world she would miss, and the ripple of shock she felt initially was soon overwhelmed by the realisation that she had survived. She was superior, now, to the millions of dead lying rotting in their beds. More important. More beneficial to those who had survived; especially Fay.

  “Well, and how the world has changed,” Mary said, scratching behind the dog’s tattered ear as it stuck its head between the seats.

  She turned the engine off for a moment and breathed in the silence, taking deep breaths as if purging her lungs of foul smoke. Imbuing her body with the changed state of things. Noticing, for the first time, how wonderfully fresh the air tasted today.

  She started the motor again and rolled slowly down into the service station. There was a food lorry in the fuel area, back doors standing wide open. She accepted the invitation and dragged armfuls of food into the restaurant, making two trips before settling down for a feast. She ignored the other people there. They were meaningless, echoes of the passing of humanity. They had no idea who she was. Besides, she had nothing to say. She had not truly communicated with anyone in years, apart from Fay.

  The dog sat with her, accepting food, trotting off to mark out new territory. Nobody approached her, or complained about the pissing dog. She hid herself away behind a partition, defiant but still slightly intimidated. The dead she could gloat over, certainly, but the living may still hold her in low regard. She saw that in their eyes, sensed it in their whispers or the way they looked away quickly, disregarding her totally.

  The only sound came from the humming lights and the occasional shuffle of feet or crinkle of food packaging. Less often, a quick whispered sentence. Shock had all but stolen the gift of speech. Mary smoked, throwing the dog ends on the floor. Nobody objected.

  Soon after, a woman entered the restaurant, hobbling, clothes bloodied and tattered.

  I don’t know what this woman will look like, Fay had said, but she’ll be powerful. Rich in nature. Clothed in the colours of dead rainbows, waiting to be enlivened again. The power will not be visible, but now, I think, after this talk … well, you may see it. You may not. If you do, remember to exercise caution. But also, propagate hate for this woman. She would threaten me. You may, eventually, find a moment when you can rid me of her. You’ll know when.

  “Rich in nature,” Mary mumbled, staring at the woman. She seemed lost and forlorn, but there was a power in her eyes, a glimmering awareness yet to be realised, even by its owner. Mary could see it. She could sense it because Fay had told her so. And the woman, who spoke to the others without seeing her, was clothed in grey, lax light. The light of dead rainbows. The negative radiance of wonders waiting to happen.

  For an instant Mary wondered just how this woman could threaten Fay. But then she saw: this woman was good, in the true definition of the word. Fay was good also, but in a different way. Good for herself. Good for Mary. Not necessarily good for others; like Rupert.

  Mary giggled, then stood. “Hey!” she called. The woman was about to brain Spike, send a pound of iron into his head. “Only my dog. He’s friendly, you know. Loyal. He needs me. Everyone needs someone. Even dogs. Here Spike!” The dog pissed on some plants and ran back to her, sitting patiently by the table for more scraps. She waved the packet in her hand; the woman looked hungry. She looked suddenly dangerous, too, with the metal bar clamped in her fist. “Want to share?”

  The woman nodded and walked around to her table. Mary’s heart was racing. It was a long time since she had enjoyed any real, one-to-one company. Always forgetting Fay, of course, but she was so different, so much more. This would be discourse on the same level, mutual appreciation rather than a one-way monologue finished off with some abuse, then rape.

  Fay had done so much for her.

  “I’m Mary,” she said. “I’m not contrary, and I’ve never had a garden.” The woman laughed. Mary remembered the garden back at the house, scattered with the bones and mouldering parts of dead animals. Sometimes, Roger had made her clear it up and bury the incriminating evidence in the mud. That was the only type of planting she had ever done. No pretty maids would grow from there, that was for sure.

  “Peer,” the woman said.

  “Dig in! They’re free.” Mary lobbed Spike a chicken tikka sandwich. He snapped it from mid-air like an unwary bird and swallowed it whole.

  “I suppose so,” the woman, Peer, said.

  Spike sat watching them. One day, Mary thought, her dog may breakfast again. Chew into the throbbing throat of this bitch who would deign threaten her saviour, her mistress Fay. Tear out her pulsing fucking throat, swallow the blood, bite
into her tits, rips out great chunks of dripping flesh, slashing her skin with his carrion-sharpened teeth.

  She watched as the woman ate, sensing the power inherent in every movement but finding, to her surprise and delight, that she did not fear it. Rather, she loathed it. Her body shivered with the desire to end it here and now, but Fay’s words echoed in her mind, and she would never disobey Fay.

  Watch her. Mark her. Wait for the right time.

  “I’m glad I found you. The light loves you,” Mary said. The woman looked up, surprise registering in her bright eyes. “It caresses your skin.”

  “Thank you,” Peer mumbled through a mouthful of sandwich.

  For now, it only touches your outsides, Mary thought. When my Spike has his time, and I command him to do my Fay’s bidding, he’ll lay you open.

  Then, it will touch every bit of you.

  16. Open Wounds

  Fay had lost many of her old powers, yet she was still far greater than most. She mourned the loss, laid blame where she thought it was due, but revelled in what she had left.

  For what she needed to do, it was enough.

  She could only observe the larger power at work around her, with perhaps a finger dipped in here and there if it suited her purpose. She enjoyed seeing it exercised, smiled at its twisted cadences. She could sense it coursing through her body, circling molecules in their place and subtly altering them, changing her into something new, changing everything. Many would not notice until it was too late. Few would have any comprehension of what was happening, or the ability to halt things if they did.

  Fay knew. She wanted it to happen. She found it amusing.

  There had been a time when her joyful laughter had set the world singing, a jubilant echo of the wonder she felt. The birds had perched in the trees and serenaded her across forest floors. In the valleys, deer had bounded from cover and leapt around her, and rabbits had frolicked in the long grasses at her side. The world had flowed into and through her, filtering itself and emanating only the true rightness of nature. The very idea of her had set nature on a straight, ordered route, and kept it there.