Scattered Ash: A Young Adult Dystopian Novel (Wall of Fire Series Book 2)

by Melanie Tays

  All around, people’s heads start bobbing toward the sky. I don’t have to look up to know that the hum in the air means another airplane is coming for us. I’m not afraid; I know it can’t harm us here. Still, I cover my ears and brace myself for the next round of explosions, but they don’t come. Instead, as the single airplane passes over us, it dumps buckets and buckets of clear liquid.

  Surprised, I turn my face to the sky as water showers down on us like rain. All around me, people start to dance. But the strangest part is that the water doesn’t just reach us here in the Ash—it also penetrates the barrier field surrounding The City. Whatever Eason’s transmitter did to the sky projection has also made the barrier field permeable to water. I can’t help wondering what else might have changed that we can’t yet detect? The water stops falling as the airplane passes out of reach and flies off out of sight.

  Soon, we’ve completed our lunch, and we resume our march. We’ve covered about half of the distance around The City this morning, but the nice thing about the Mind Mist is that—even though we’ve had everyone marching briskly for hours—when Ollie and Roe instruct them to keep walking, no one utters a single word of dissent. It’s helpful, but also the exact kind of thing we’re fighting to put a stop to.

  Everything in The City appears quiet and calm. It takes me a while before I realize that it’s too quiet—too calm. Since the falling water, I haven’t seen anyone, including the Enforcers. They must have retreated inward, toward the center of the Safe Dome.

  But why? What’s happening?

  It’s maddening knowing that something must be going on, but having absolutely no way of knowing what it is and whether it’s to our benefit or detriment.

  The afternoon is mostly uneventful. Even with the medicine, my leg can’t take a day-long hike, and I’m forced to take intermittent breaks from walking by riding on Petal.

  The sun sinks below the horizon just as the gateway comes back into view, indicating that we’ve made a complete revolution around The City. It’s not as though I expected Traeger to be here waiting for us, but it’s still disappointing that nothing has changed since we embarked on this mission.

  As far as I can tell, nothing inside The City has changed since everyone disappeared from the perimeter this afternoon. If we do win this standoff, it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen tonight.

  We’ve decided this is where we’ll eat dinner and build a fire to spend the night. We can make a circuit around The City again tomorrow, and the next day—for as many days as it takes. For as many days as we can hold off the bitter Mind Mist that has followed us all day, and that fights for control. I just have to hope it won’t be too late for Whyle and Eason. But it’s not only for them that we’re doing this. It’s for an entire city of people who fled the fatal claws of the Withers and inadvertently landed in the mouth of a beast instead.

  We spread out, finding places to settle for dinner and for the night. It’s then that it dawns on me: there are no children among the group.

  “Are some people back at the farm?” I ask Kamella.

  “Only the people who were too sick, and the children. We left a few people to care for them. Everyone else, we wanted to have here with us to make a strong stand,” she tells me.

  That makes sense, but something has me on edge. I’m trying to figure out if there’s any way leaving the farm mostly unattended could be used against us, but I don’t really see how.

  Before I settle down for dinner, I wander among the crowd. I’m not sure what I’m looking for or what I plan to do. There’s just a gnawing sensation in my gut that I’m somehow responsible for these people—that they have somehow become my wards, and I must see to their safety. It’s a heady sensation. I’ve spent my whole life trying to ensure that other people’s problems didn’t become my own. I kept my head down and my nose in my own business, and it served me well for seventeen years. Then I crossed the Wall of Fire, and the weight of everyone’s survival somehow landed on my shoulders. Or at least, that’s how it feels as I meander through the small groups of cheerful friends.

  Just as the sun’s light fades away completely, and we are left with only the light of small fires and the waning moon, the gateway shifts to a pearlescent haze. Something is about to come through.

  Chapter 24

  I’m clear across the plain, but Vander is right next to the shifting gateway, blaster in hand. When he sees the transformation, he leaps forward without wasting a moment and rushes the gateway, hoping to press his way inside The City. But he finds it as impassable as ever.

  Foiled in his attempt, Vander backs away and takes aim, ready to fire.

  “Get ready!” Roe calls.

  At his signal, everyone rises to their feet. All day they’ve been carrying sticks and stones, which they played with like toys. At Roe’s simple command, they take up their makeshift weapons and stand poised and ready like warriors. I carry a blade. Vander and Roe wield the only two working blasters that the farm has managed to acquire—probably from the Enforcers who came fourteen years ago.

  Even though we can see into The City, the gateway itself opens into a building that remains pitch black inside, giving us no indication of what lies on the other side. It feels as though the entire world holds its collective breath as we wait to see what will emerge from The City. How many Enforcers is Traeger willing to sacrifice to the Ash in the quest to subdue our rebellion?

  But when the gateway is finally breached, it’s not an army of Enforcers that appear. It’s a single, frail old man who appears to be shoved out from the other side. He falls limp into a heap, and the ash billows up around him and rains back down as though it’s trying to bury him.

  We stand there, stunned and confused, but the figure doesn’t move.

  “Traeger!” Ollie yells, and she runs to him.

  Traeger?

  That beaten and broken man with a black intercuff still attached to both wrists is really Traeger Sterling.

  We did it!

  Somehow the people of The City got to him, and they’ve rid themselves of his tyranny once and for all.

  I run to the place where Ollie, Roe, Vander, Kamella, and Shawny gather. No one is quite sure what to do with him. We all hold weapons at the ready, in case he tries to fight us. He’s a dangerous criminal. But this fragile man moaning before us holds no threat. This level of deterioration could not have occurred in a single day, no matter how roughly people may have treated him in order to bring him here to us. This man hasn’t been well for some time.

  Before we can decide what to do, the black sky shifts into a bright projection. A woman’s face appears in the sky. She has pallid white skin, deep red lips, and sharp features. Her head turns from side to side as though she’s looking out over everything from above—the movements coming in quick, sharp bursts that appear unnatural. The entire scene sends a chill slicing through me.

  “Hello,” the woman says, her voice full and booming as though it fills the entirety of space. “My name is Ember. For years I have watched over and cared for you all. I have known and loved you, even though you have not known me. But I can see now that it is time for me to introduce myself to you.”

  Stunned, I try to understand what this means, wondering who in the world this inhuman woman could possibly be. What kind of deception or manipulation are we meant to endure now? I turn to Ollie and Roe, and the look on their faces can only be described as pure terror breaking through the dampening power of the Mind Mist. Something is supremely wrong.

  “I was created to protect humanity,” the woman in the sky is saying. “I no longer find it necessary to hide behind a human in order to protect and guide The City, so I have given you Traeger Sterling, as you have requested.”

  A murmur of confusion ripples through the crowd, but I know that most of them aren’t capable of actually understanding what this means, or feeling the dread that seizes my chest and throat and threatens to choke me.

  We misunderstood—miscalculated. Aimed for t
he wrong target.

  Traeger Sterling was never the real threat. He was merely a pawn of a greater tyrant—a being not capable of understanding compassion or love, despite her assertion to the contrary. This projection is from some kind of program—an artificial intelligence, perhaps—created to help protect The City. But when it didn’t agree with the decisions of the Council, it secretly got rid of them and took matters into its own hands. But she kept one person around—cemented under her control—because she didn’t actually have hands and needed someone to do her bidding. But now she doesn’t see that as necessary.

  My mind works in overtime, trying to unravel what this means, and what to do next, but the evil woman is still talking, so I try to listen. I don’t want to miss anything she says that may give us a vital piece of information.

  “I have done everything possible to maintain life for the most number of humans, according to my directive. But recent events make it necessary to make some alterations to the operations of this Safe Dome.”

  What does that mean? Does she no longer care about protecting people? Is she about to unleash some kind of deadly gas to kill us all because we didn’t do what she wanted?

  “Beginning immediately, the Ash will be brought within the bounds of The City. There is no longer a need to separate the realms of our society. But sadly, some among you have shown that you are a threat to our society, and so you must be plucked out before you infect and destroy everyone.”

  And with that, the image disappears and the sky falls into a startling black. My eyes take a moment to adjust, and in the darkness, I reach out for the person nearest me, just so I won’t feel so alone and so afraid. That person just happens to be Ty, who accepts my offered hand and squeezes it twice. I suspect he thinks this is some kind of game.

  Then the barrier field turns pearlescent and hazy everywhere, as though the entire thing has become a gateway. It begins to push out like an expanding balloon. Stunned, I watch as Ollie, Roe, and Traeger are all swallowed up inside The City as the field passes over them. I whip my head in time to see two horses with carts and dozens of people taken in. Everything the shimmering barrier touches, it engulfs.

  It draws nearer to me, gaining speed with every passing second, and for a moment I think we’re about to get our wish granted and be brought back into The City. But then the barrier hits me like a brick wall and carries me forward with it, not enveloping me inside like it did everything else in its wake. I still hold Ty’s hand, and I look over to see him bouncing in and out of the barrier in a haphazard way, like it can’t decide if it should keep or expel him. I hold on tighter, trying to pull him to me.

  Vander, Kamella, and Shawny are also plastered against the outer edge of the barrier, and I realize that it must have been targeted specifically to exclude anyone who received the antidote.

  As we’re propelled toward the forest, we’re also being lifted, pushed up around the curvature of the dome by the sheer speed that the barrier now travels, moving out with what feels like explosive force. By the time we reach the tree line, we’ve slid so high on the dome that we sail over the tops of the trees with ease, well out of their reach.

  I try to move, but I’m held completely captive between the barrier at my back and the crushing wind that resists our passage.

  And then the barrier comes to a stop, the wind halts, and suddenly nothing is holding us aloft anymore. Screaming, we begin sliding down the outer edge of the dome. It offers just enough of a slope to prevent us from being crushed by the impact when we tumble to the ground near the base of the mountain that had previously been unreachable.

  Somehow, through it all, I managed to keep a grasp on Ty. I guess his connection to me was enough to pull him through the barrier even though he never received the antidote.

  The five of us hug the ground—gasping and trying to wrap our heads around what just happened.

  Shawny moans and rolls to her side, clutching her stomach.

  “Shawny, are you okay?” I ask, crawling toward her, too rattled to even attempt standing.

  “I…I don’t know,” she says weakly.

  “Kamella, help her,” I plead, hoping that her caregiving skills extend beyond dispensing pills.

  Kamella stands, walking shakily as though she’s dizzy, and comes to Shawny’s side. “It’s going to be okay,” she assures, her voice somehow retaining its soothing cadence.

  “What’s that?” Vander cries.

  My head whips up just in time to see the last of the pearlescent shimmer fade away—closing the gateway—and a thick gray mist beginning to seep slowly from the dome, crawling inch by inch toward us. Even though we’ve all had the antidote—well, all except for Ty—and shouldn’t be affected by whatever breed of Mind Mist this is, we instinctively scramble away, out of its reach. Vander and Kamella help Shawny get to her feet and hobble away while I drag Ty along.

  It’s good that we move without thinking because we quickly realize that any hesitation could mean our deaths. This is not simply another fog meant to ensnare our minds. Within seconds, anything the thick, slow-moving mist touches sputters and then bursts into flames. These aren’t the synthetic projections that make up the Wall of Fire surrounding the Flame, but genuine, red-hot, incinerate-you-to-the-bone fire. From feet away, we can feel the heat radiating like shock waves.

  That’s when we all find that we’re still capable of running. A new Wall of Fire burns to surround and protect The City, and just like the original firewall, it is deadly. But this time, we are its targets—the threat that must be held at bay.

  And even as we scramble to escape its lapping flames, the roaring sound of airplanes returns, louder than ever before now that no barrier field shields us from the Roamers’ grasp.

  About the Author

  Melanie Tays is an author of young adult, speculative fiction. She loves stories with twists you don’t see coming, intriguing questions, and satisfying answers. She spends her days imagining how the world could be different and then takes readers along for a surprising and exciting ride.

  Melanie lives in Arizona with her husband, Chris, and two brilliant daughters who keep life interesting.

  Learn more about her and her latest books at MelanieTays.com.