by Neal Barrett
“Howie, we’ve got to get out of this place,” she told him. “We can’t stay here any longer.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Howie tried to see her through stone dust that clouded his good eye. He wanted to say something, but didn’t know what. He had the peculiar feeling he ought to explain it all to her, that it was important she understand what he was doing there, stretched out naked in a cold cellar.
He caught her looking at his face, and what they’d done to it, while she tore the straps from his arms and legs. She just looked, without saying anything.
“Kari… .”
She shook her head. “Don’t talk, Howie. Just sit there a minute. Can you move? Your arms and legs are probably going to be stiff, but we don’t have much time to warm ’em up. You think you can stand?”
Howie thought sure he was going to laugh, but knew how much it would hurt if he did.
“Come on, Howie.” She grabbed one leg and started slapping it hard. Howie sucked in a breath and grabbed the arms of his chair.
“Godamn, Kari!”
“Feeling coming back, huh? Good. Try to get up.”
Howie shook his head. More thunder rumbled outside. Close, then far away, then close again. Without warning, Kari ducked her head under his arm and pulled him up. Blood rushed to his legs and he let out a yell and collapsed, taking her with him. The fall jolted his head and he thought sure he was going under again.
“Howie…”
“I flat can’t, Kari.” He tried to look at her. Her face was swimming and it made him dizzy.
“You’ve got to,” she told him firmly. “We can’t stay here.”
“Why not?”
She looked at him, then got up and ran quickly out of the room. He tried to sleep but she was back again.
“Here.” She raised his head. “Try this.” Howie tasted water and clutched at the jug, trying to get his own hands around it. She pulled it away.
“That’s enough for now. You’re going to get sick.” He pleaded with her, but she wouldn’t listen. “When we get out. Okay? When we get out, you can have some more. Now. Try to get up again.”
With Kari doing most of the work, he made it past the door and halfway down the long hall. He took one look at the steps and shook his head.
“Kari. I can’t.”
“Yes you can. You haven’t even tried, yet.”
“Give me… some water.”
“At the top, Howie. Up there. You’ve got to get up there.”
He tried to think of something that would make her give him the water. His head was pounding hard and he knew he wasn’t going anywhere at all, but he wanted the water. He looked at the steps again. They were nothing but a blur. Kari’s face was melting again. He closed his good eye and started crawling…
“Better?”
“I don’t know. Some. Nothin’s swimming ’round no more.”
“Good. We can’t sit here all day, Howie.”
“Maybe you can’t,” he told her. “I don’t figure on gain’ anywhere soon.”
He drank a little more of the water and decided maybe she was right. His mouth and throat thought it was the best stuff ever, but his belly didn’t think so. Instead, he tipped the jug and splashed it in his face.
Down the narrow alley past the door where they’d come up from the cellar, the street was full of people. Some were running, or hauling carts full of their belongings, or clutching things they’d stolen from the shops. Some just stood and stared at nothing. A woman was crying somewhere. Soldiers clattered by on horseback, one man carrying a tattered pennant that said ’2nd ARKANSAS. His shirt had been burned away and there was blood on his arm. The air overhead was thick with smoke, turning the sky pale orange. Howie could smell wood burning. There was gunfire, some of it close.
Thunder struck again nearby. Howie winced. The ground shook beneath him. He turned to Kari. “Listen… what the hell is that, anyway?” Until now, it hadn’t even occurred to him to ask.
“Boomers,” Kari said shortly. “’Least that’s what the troopers call ’em. It’s powder and stone all wrapped up tight in barrels. The Rebels sling them over the walls from big machines. Same thing as a cartridge going off in a chamber, sort of. Only these go off outside. I heard about ’ern before, only nobody ever made one work. Look, Howie…” She gave him a hard, stern look. “We simply cannot stay here any longer. Don’t you understand? If the Rebels get over the walls… and they will, too… nobody’s going to get out. Can’t you just try, Howie? Just try?”
He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall. “Howie!” She was on her feet, glaring down at him. “You can’t go to sleep, Howie!”
He tried to listen to her. It was so easy not to do anything. She was probably right, too. They ought to do something. Only, it didn’t seem real important anymore. And if they did something, what would it be? He couldn’t think of anything very helpful.
“Kari,” he said wearily, “If Rebels are comin’ in, how are we supposed to get out? And where’s there to go, anyway?”
“We can get out,” she said stubbornly, “because we’ll have horses. Nobody can stop us if we have horses.”
“Horses?” He decided that was worth waking up for. “Kari, what’s the matter with you? Ain’t nobody goin’ to give us horses.”
“Of course not,” she said crossly, “you’ll have to shoot someone, Howie, and take them.”
He laughed, even if it hurt. But Kari wasn’t laughing. “If you ain’t had a good look at me, you better look again. I don’t much feel like shootin’ nobody.”
“You could if you wanted to. If you had to.”
He wasn’t really sure that was so. What if he did, and missed? He hurt too much to think about getting hurt again.
Kari seemed to guess his thoughts. “I know you don’t think you could be any worse off than you are,” she told him. “But that’s not true, Howie. You sure will be if you just keep sitting there.”
He looked up at her. A Boomer hit somewhere down the street and shook the earth. “I owe you, Kari. I can’t tell you how I feel ’bout what you done. Coming down and getting me out and all. But I don’t feel like doin’ nothing about it, Kari, and I don’t figure you got no need waiting around for me any longer.”
Her eyes showed shocked disbelief. “What do you mean?”
“I mean if you want to go shootin’ someone and stealing horses, just get on about it.”
“I won’t, either,” she said fiercely, “not without you!”
The words wrapped around him like something warm and easy, for a moment, pulling the hurt right out of him. Why, she felt something for him! She honest to God did. It had taken a whole war to pull it out of her, but there it was.
“Kari…” He pulled himself up, fighting off the nausea that came with standing. “I’ll… try, Kari. I’ll give it the best I got, and I can’t do no more than that.” He looked at her. There was dirt on her face and her hair was tangled and powdered with dust, but he’d never wanted her more.
“I couldn’t let you down,” he said. “I just couldn’t. Not now.”
“Good,” said Kari. “I knew if you just thought about it you’d see it.”
“See… what?”
“Well that you owe me, Howie. Like you said. I wish we hadn’t had to waste so much time talking about it.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
He felt some better with pants on. The man had been killed when one of the Boomers exploded right beside him; there wasn’t much left of his head and the shirt was half torn away and blood-soaked, but the pants were all right. He didn’t care about the shirt, and boots were out of the question.
Kari held the pistol and kept an eye on the street while he changed. The way things were in the city, Howie didn’t figure anyone’d understand why he was stripping a dead body in the alley.
“I hope you don’t expect me to shoot anybody,” Kari complained, “because I told you I don’t know how to do that.”
“You
did all right back there,” said Howie, trying to get his bad foot through a narrow trouser leg. “Just keep watching, okay?”
“That was different. It’s not the same when you can go up and just… touch somebody with it.”
“Kari…” He stood and took the gun from her. “Just shut up, all right?” He tucked the weapon in his pants and limped out of the alley.
“I don’t know what you’re so mad about,” said Kari. “You do that all the time. You want me to be like you, and I’m not, Howie.”
“You ain’t like anybody,” he said darkly, “you don’t need to worry none about that.” He stopped, glanced up at the sky, and pulled her back in a doorway. A Boomer arced high overhead. He followed its wobbly path; the big barrel hit beyond them and exploded. The ground shuddered. Black smoke roiled into the street.
Howie moved out of the doorway. “What I’m mad about is I don’t like bein’ used,” he told her. “You think someone’s doin’ something ’cause… Shit, you find out it ain’t that at all.”
“All right, Howie.”
“No!” He turned on her. “It ain’t all right. Comity’ down there and gettin’ me is one thing. Why is somethin’ else. Don’t you see that?”
She brushed hair out of her eyes. “Didn’t we talk about this? Do we have to do it again? We don’t have time, Howie.”
Howie glared down at his foot. It was throbbing again and starting to hurt something awful. “You wanted someone who could shoot and catch horses. That’s about it, ain’t it?”
“I told you,” Kari sighed, “I know everything there is to know about guns. But I don’t know how to use one. Is there anything wrong with that?”
Howie stopped and looked right at her. He could see her and hear her and touch her. But she wasn’t really there. Nothing had changed at all, and nothing ever would. He could see it, plain as day, and he wondered how long it took to get from seeing to really knowing.
The Rebels were in no hurry to occupy the city. Their great catapults were well out of range of government riflemen, and well-placed sharpshooters discouraged heroes from leaving the walls. Earlier, the Loyalists had mounted a desperate attack to put the Boomers out of action, but the Rebels were too much for them. The fields before the city were dark with the dead and dying.
Rumor had it that the troopers were dropping their weapons and fleeing the city through the north wall, leaving it to Lathan’s marauders. It might be true, Howie decided. You didn’t have to know too much about battles to see this one was lost. He wondered how many soldiers would get by the Rebels if they tried. Not many. It was pretty clear Lathan was determined to make this fight count for something.
The noise wasn’t so bad anymore. The Rebels had shifted their hail of destruction toward the center of the city. In the eastern sector, anyway, the streets were practically empty.
That was fine with Howie. He guided Kari past an alley choked with debris from the start of the battle. The broad avenue beyond was nearly impassable. The Boomers had hit buildings on both sides of the street, and the ancient structures had collapsed without a will. Howie took one look at the mess and turned back. They’d have to find another way.
“Wait,” Kari stopped him, “over there.”
He followed her gaze. Through a veil of black smoke was a portion of the wall. One section, a good five yards wide, had collapsed nearly to ground level. The stone on either side of the hole was dark with black powder and the fire that had come after. Kari started toward it without even looking back. Howie caught up and grabbed her arm. She frowned and jerked away.
“It’s a way out, Howie. You don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”
“It’s a way out if you want to get killed bad enough. Kari… you got the idea in that stubborn head of yours that you’re goin’ to get out, even if you get dead doing it.”
She fixed him with big, curious eyes. “You want to stay, Howie? I can see how you would, considering you had such a fine time here.”
“I got my eye took out,” he said sourly, “only it was a knife that done it. It wasn’t no Boomer or a rifle bullet. You ain’t making any sense, as usual.”
“I am to me.”
“Well you’re—” The noise turned him around quickly. He took one look behind him and jerked her back around the corner.
“What is it?”
He didn’t answer. He limped back over the short block, crossed the street, and angled down a narrow alley toward the wall.
“Howie…”
“Just shut up, and listen. The way we come back there’s filled with Rebels. They must’ve got through another break further down.” He muttered under his breath. “They’re goin’ to be all over the damn place in about a minute. They see us wanderin’ around out here they ain’t goin’ to stop to talk.”
The little crease between her eyes started working. “Then we’ll have to go out through the wall.”
“And meet ’em comin’ in that way, too?”
“All right. What do you suggest, Howie?”
Howie ignored her. He imagined he could hear boots scraping on cobbled streets. They could stay where they were and get caught—or keep moving, and run right into more Rebels, for certain. Either way… He stopped, sniffing the air. There was sure something besides smoke and black powder in the air. Something a lot stronger than that. He moved to the end of the alley and risked a look. The smell was overpowering, now. A man didn’t even need one eye to track down an odor like that.
There were maybe a couple hundred head—bucks, mares, and even colts. They’d broken out of their pen somewhere and nobody’d bothered to round them up. They were scared stiff, cringing together against the high wall, eyes glazed with fear. From the look of them, they hadn’t eaten in days.
Howie watched another long minute, then turned back for Kari. She was full of questions, but he wouldn’t talk to her until they were back around the corner from the herd.
“Kari…” He took a deep breath. The next part wasn’t going to be easy. “Kari, I want you to take your clothes off.”
Puzzlement, then anger, started at the corners of her eyes. He waved her off. “Now it ain’t what you think. I want you to take your clothes off ’cause we’re goin’ to drive that meat out of here through that wall, with us right behind ’em. Now don’t say nothing, just do it. There’s no other way and I figure them soldiers ain’t going to kill no stock. It’s ’bout the only thing they’re not shootin’ at.”
Kari found understanding. Her mouth dropped open and her big eyes widened. “You are crazy as you can be, Howie. If you think I’m going to run around naked out there… with meat…” Her mouth closed with revulsion around the word.
“They ain’t goin’ to look,” he said wryly. “I don’t like it no more’n you do, Kari, but we’re goin’ to do it. ’Less you got something better in mind.”
She stared as he dropped his trousers and stepped out of them, keeping only the pistol. He searched around and found two blackened sticks. He handed one to her. She shook her head.
“You won’t go without me, Howie. You know you won’t.”
He didn’t look at her. He took his stick and hopped down the alley as best he could and out into the sunshine. He waved his stick at the frightened stock. They’d probably never seen people without clothes on, he decided, but there were a lot of unusual things happening in the world, and even meat was going to have to get used to them.
Chapter Thirty-six
There was no problem getting the herd moving. They were glad enough to have someone tell them what to do next, and didn’t much care what it was. Once the point got turned in the right direction, the others followed—right through the shattered wall and out of the city.
There was noise and confusion out there and plenty of things to frighten an animal. But stock was like that. Howie’s father had always said meat felt a lot better being led to slaughter than having to think of something else to do.
The land rose up slightly outside the walls an
d the Rebels had placed their siege engines on small hillocks some two- hundred yards from the city. There were only three of the big catapults close by and a few troopers milling around them. That was one break, anyway, Howie decided. The real fighting had evidently shifted to the north wall and the bulk of the soldiers had followed it there. The Boomer crew would be taking a care where they dropped their missiles, with their own men entering the city from the east.
“Howie,” Kari moaned, “I can’t take this anymore. I mean it.”
He glanced over his shoulder. She had stopped a few yards back, standing with her legs rooted to the ground, hands stiff against her sides in tight little fists.
Howie was horrified. “Godamn, Kari!” He ran back and jerked her roughly forward. She pulled away and he smacked her soundly on her bare bottom.
Kari let out a little cry. Her eyes turned black. “Don’t you ever do that again, Howie. Not ever.”
“I won’t,” he told her, “less I have to. Just stick right up here where you belong… with the rest of us meat.”
Kari went white. He thought for a minute she was going to hit him. Instead, she gave him a dark look and stalked off ahead.
He had to grin at the red brand of his hand across her shapely rear. Karl’s slender, almost fragile figure stood out like a sore thumb against the sun-darkened, dirt-encrusted stock. He felt just as bad about the whole thing as she did. But he wasn’t about to tell her that. It made him feel queasy all over. It wasn’t right, people mixing with stock. It was against just about everything. It was some better than getting caught by the Rebels and maybe getting shot on the spot, but that didn’t make him feel any more comfortable doing it.
Someone fired a shot on the rise ahead and he hobbled off to the right for a look. He couldn’t tell what was happening, but troopers were swarming all over one of the big machines. The whole business made him nervous. What he’d like to do was swing the herd further to the left, as far away from the soldiers as possible. To do that, though, he’d have to move out of the rear and shout them over, putting him in plain sight of anyone watching.