Forsada: Volume II in the New Eden series

by Peter J Dudley

  “He didn’t give a shit about our father.”

  “He gave enough of a shit to die saving him.”

  “Shack didn’t have to die. And he didn’t have to save Shem.”

  “Then why did you carry Shem off when you could have gone back to help Shack instead?” Another question I’ve been avoiding all day.

  “That was a mistake.” He looks away. So he’s mad at himself, then. And this is why. “If any of us should have died today, it was Shem.” It’s hard to argue with that. “I never even looked back, Loop. I never even looked back.”

  “Consider yourself lucky.” The image of Shack looking back at me as he fell to the ground fights its way into my mind, and I hold back tears by biting down hard on my tongue.

  “But I should have left that bastard in the dirt and helped my brother!”

  As he yells, the door to Micktuk’s cabin swings open with a creak of old boards. Shem Shiver is startled to see us there, but it’s clear he heard Garrett’s last statement. And it’s clear that Garrett doesn’t care.

  Shem looks even more gaunt and haggard than this morning, his eyes red and sunken, the twilight shadows graying his face the color of his old half-beard. His jaw quivers as he glares from Garrett to me and back. In his hand is an empty bucket. He raises his other arm and brushes Garrett out of the way, mumbling something about water, and limps away.

  I don’t know how to feel, what to think. I figured Shack would be here forever. Part of me still thinks that when we go inside, he’ll be sitting there with one of Micktuk’s books, and when he sees us he’ll grin wide and tell us he fooled us, that we should be ashamed for thinking he was gone, that nothing will ever happen to us. We’ll always be together.

  I want to think of him that way. Not kneeling on the dirt in defeat.

  Garrett catches the door before it closes, and he slips into the dim room. I follow, trying not to look around for Shack.

  But all the others are there. The room is quiet. Sad. They look up when we enter, and the only one to move is Freda. She stands up from where she’s kneading dough, wipes her hands on her shirt, and comes straight to me. She doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t say she feels bad, or she’s sorry, or anything. She just looks me in the eye, and then draws me to her in a tight hug.

  It surprises me, but I let her. It’s nice that she cares, but it doesn’t make me feel any better. Maybe it makes her feel better. Which I guess is okay. I won’t ever feel better, no matter how many hugs I get from anyone. Not even watching Garrett kill Darius would make me feel better. Never. Nothing. But let them all try to heal me, if it will help them.

  Freda steps back. She looks deeply sad. But she didn’t know Shack. She only saw the crazy, weird Shack. She didn’t know the strong, noble, heroic Shack. What could I possibly say to her that would do any good?

  Micktuk watches for a moment, then destroys the silence which lies heavy over all of us. “Hey, you all done real good. You saved seven folk. They’d all be dead now, you know.”

  Part of me wants to yell that I’d give them all back to have Shack. And I would. And I hate myself for thinking that. To trade seven lives for—

  “Wait, what? Seven?”

  “Ya, de seven that came back with Tom.”

  “You mean seven plus Shem?”

  “No missy.”

  “But there were eight.” I flash a question at Tom in a glance. “All eight made it to the river. I saw them.”

  They all look around at each other. No answers in their faces, only more questions.

  “What happened to the eighth?”

  I don’t know why this feels so important suddenly. Maybe it just gives me something to think about that isn’t Shack. After all, I didn’t even know any of them except that one young boy.

  “Which one is gone?”

  They all look confused. Finally, Freda says, “We don’t know, Lupay. Only seven arrived with Tom.”

  One of the Lodgeholm guys, sitting quiet in the corner, says, “Maybe it was one of those hill people, or someone from Star. Maybe he just went home. Or he went off to Upper.”

  Sure, that’s possible, but something seems off.

  The eight faces run through my mind, and I know I’ll be trying to place them all evening—through dinner, through our evening planning, when everyone else is asleep. Which one is gone? And why does this bother me so much?

  CHAPTER 15

  “Up! Up! Get up! Now!”

  Frantic shouting raises me to my feet, half asleep and unsure where I am, but certain of my knife in one hand and my whip in the other. I wobble as the darkness spins around me, solidifying into: glowing embers nearby, a dozen other groggy people dim-lit, a door open on a blue-black night and filled with the shape of a man. Micktuk’s house. This is Micktuk’s house. And the shouting comes from the man in the door.

  It’s Tom. “Come on!”

  My mental haze clears, and in an instant I’m shaking the sleeping ones, lifting the waking ones. I find my boots and follow Tom out into the night.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Doubled over and gasping, he points down the hill. Flames leap up high into the night, a mile off but illuminating the treetops with its hellish light. Can I feel its heat, or is that my imagination?

  Looks like a house fire, a big one. “Whose house?” I ask. “Anyone hurt?”

  We need to get down the hill and put the fire out before it spreads. The parched hillsides will go up faster than that meadow did, and Darius is sure to see a fire that big and send his trolls to find the people who set it.

  Tom shakes his head. “No, no one hurt. We have to go. Now.”

  “Right. I’ll get the buckets.” I look around, trying to remember where I saw them. Maybe around back—

  Tom grabs my arm as I turn to go.

  He shakes his head again and stands, recovering his breath.

  “The army. Darius. They’re here. They torched the house.”

  The night air prickles all over my skin and freezes my nose as I try to breathe. So it’s finally happened, the worst possible thing. They’ve found us. How?

  That doesn’t matter now. Garrett’s escape plans fill my thoughts. Three options: Make for Lodgeholm over the ridge trail, sneak around the army and try for Upper, or flee over the hills into the Desolation.

  Think, Lupay. Which is best now?

  Lodgeholm: familiar, easy to reach, near the lake. But exposed and vulnerable. Like escaping the bear by running into its den.

  The Desolation: unknown, treacherous. No one has ever returned from there. It’s said to be scorched nothingness for hundreds of miles. Death from starvation or Radiation within weeks. Maybe days. Like escaping the bear by jumping off a thousand foot cliff.

  “Upper,” I conclude. “Get everyone together. We’ll make for Upper, through the hills.”

  Tom shakes his head. “No time. No way around them. They’re all over the bottom of the valley.”

  “Then Lodgeholm,” I declare, and I’m a little relieved. I have no desire to cower behind the walls of Upper, waiting for inevitability.

  Tom shakes his head again. “No. They patrol that now. There’s another place. Somewhere safe.”

  What the hell does he know? He didn’t grow up in these hills like Garrett and me and Micktuk. He didn’t roam all over them, doesn’t know each house—

  Tom’s white face almost glows in the night. I can see why a four-year-old might think him an angel. How must Tom have looked to little William Shiver a decade ago, scooping up his half-dead mother and sweeping off to god-knows-where? Somewhere safe. Maybe Tom knows these hills better than I think.

  “Hidden.” He doesn’t have to explain. He’s a Subterran.

  The memory of Subterra’s caves is still fresh and crushing. The darkness is so complete you can’t tell when your eyes are closed or open. The stagnant air tastes bitter. And the screech of those hellish watchdogs makes my skin itch. I hate the idea of going underground. But what else can we do with forty famil
ies? More than a hundred people? We’ll keep them safe for now, but I won’t shut them up forever in Fobrasse’s prison. That would be like escaping the bear by drowning yourself.

  “It’s okay,” Tom says. “These tunnels are sealed off from Subterra. Fobrasse won’t even know.” He looks straight into me, and it’s eerie to be staring into his nearly colorless eyes. It’s like looking at a statue, or a drawing in a book.

  But this has to be good enough. I nod and turn back to the house, where everyone’s assembled and ready, even though they don’t know what they’re ready for. Less than two minutes. Good planning, Garrett.

  “Minutemen, just like in that Paul Revere book,” Garrett says from the doorway. “What’s up, Loop?”

  “Southshaw. The army. They’re here. Gather all the families like we planned, and meet up with Tom—” I look to Tom and ask, “Where?”

  “The big ruins, just below the house where—where the bee meadow is,” Tom says to Garrett. “Around the south side. There’s a gap in the wall near the back corner. Go inside. You’ll see where to go from there.”

  Garrett looks skeptical, but I nod at him. “It’s okay, Garrett. Tom’s okay.”

  He still looks distrustful, but we don’t have time for a debate. It’s our only choice.

  Tom says, “Be sure they don’t see you. If you’re being followed, go up into the hills, away from the ruins. If they find us there, we’re all dead.”

  Garrett gives me one final look. He hasn’t liked Dane’s arrival, and I think he doesn’t trust any of them. Not Freda, not Tom. I don’t blame him. There’s plenty not to like.

  Without another word, we split up, each bolting off to our assigned families. I sprint down the hill toward the house that Ginger and Susannah moved into, but I don’t get far before I see them coming up the hill toward me. Susannah carries Honey on her hip, and Ginger leads the other two little ones by the hand. They look terrified, only half-dressed which might have been okay in August, but the night breeze knifes in with a new chill. Ginger is struggling to wrap a coat over the middle one’s arms as they rush through the woods.

  At least they’re all wearing shoes.

  As we reach each other, I avoid Susannah’s eyes and scoop up the middle one, the four year old, I think it’s Daisy. Ginger picks up the youngest one, and they follow me as fast as they can run through the woods carrying children.

  I know what Susannah is thinking. I told her she’d be safe here. That her little ones would be safe here. And in just two days, I’ve failed them. These poor little girls, torn from their beds. How must their mother feel, having to do that? Pulling them through the woods as the house they left burns and big, scary men chase them into the darkness? All Susannah wanted was to keep this war from her daughters. And I told her I could do that. I told her they’d be safe.

  Who am I to promise that kind of thing?

  We bull our way through the woods until we hit the old cart path which will lead us to the ruins. Susannah does not run fast, and Ginger isn’t strong enough to carry that little girl all the way there. No time to wander the deer tracks through the hills—too long. We’ll have to chance the road and hope the army isn’t coming up that way.

  When we hit the cart path, I pause and look back. Susannah is right behind me, and Ginger’s on her heels. Smoke flows up the hillsides from multiple fires below, and the peaks around us are lit with their orange glow. The smoke burns my eyes and stings my lungs as I gulp at the air.

  I ask Susannah, “Do you need a rest? Only a second or two, though.”

  She shakes her head, gasping. Instead of speaking, she just nods forward with determination in her eyes. Ginger doesn’t seem as tired as I expected, so I charge ahead. It’s downhill from here, only a quarter mile along the path, around the wide bend. It takes only minutes, and the big ruins take shape before us in the shadows of the hill.

  I don’t know if Susannah has ever seen anything this big. It’s ten times bigger than the biggest house in Lower, and as big as three Lodgeholms, maybe bigger. It used to be five or six levels tall, but most of it has crumbled. The shape of the dark silhouette against the green-black hillside is familiar. I’ve seen it only twice, but its colors and windows and twisted balconies leap into my imagination as if I were looking at it at midday.

  “This way,” I gasp, and I lead them to the closer side, around the back.

  The place seems entirely deserted. Why wouldn’t the army have come this way first? If they discovered the Sikwaa turnoff at the river, this is the main way, the obvious way. I look down the hills into the valley and see the pattern of house fires. It’s like they’re making their way up the hidden trail directly to Micktuk’s place. It’s like they’re tracking our footsteps rather than just coming into the valley.

  “Here,” I say as we reach the corner of the building by the road.

  Centuries ago, there used to be a grand patio on this end of the building, as big as the central square in Lower maybe. It would have been beautiful, sitting there looking up at the long line of Lift Poles ascending to the summit. But the posts have rotted, and the patio slumps and melts away from the building’s structure to make a kind of enormous lean-to with the hill on one side and the ruins on the other. It’s into the lean-to we have to go. I don’t like to have to go slow, but I’m relieved at getting around the corner and behind the building, out of sight of the road.

  I pause a moment to look back and peer into the darkness to make sure we’re not being watched. I look for half a minute and see nothing, but as I turn to follow the others, motion catches my eye. I spin back to look for it, but I see nothing. It was up in the trees, across the cart path, a whitish shape that might just have been my imagination.

  But then again…

  Time to go. Anyway, it was probably just an owl.

  The six of us pick our way around the crumbling building, through overgrown bushes and weeds and tall grass. There’s no path, so we do our best to step through and around the plants. It’s slow going, but it’s not far, and in five minutes we’ve made it to the back corner where the building merges with the rising slope of the hillside.

  Noises behind us.

  “Shh,” I whisper and wave at Ginger to keep them all hidden. I pass Daisy’s hand to her, and she gathers Daisy into her arms so the three of them make one cuddled blob in the darkness.

  I creep back along the way we came, listening. People are following us. Sneaking along, like we did. I feel for my knife on my hip and slip it into my hand. I slow my breathing to stay quiet.

  “Lupay?”

  It’s Garrett’s voice. I relax.

  “I am so happy it’s you,” I whisper.

  “Me too,” he says, and his grin flashes white in the darkness. “Others?”

  I shake my head but realize he maybe can’t see me. “Not yet. We only just got here ourselves. You get yours?” He was responsible for three families below the ruins. The farthest from Micktuk’s but the closest to this place.

  “Yeah, all here.”

  We pick our way back toward Ginger. “It’s okay,” I say to the darkness as we get closer, and I almost step on Ginger before I see Daisy’s eyes. I stop and stoop to smile at the two little girls. “You guys hide really well,” I say. “I almost walked right on by, you were so quiet! That’s good.” I think I see them smiling back at me. But it’s probably my imagination. Why would they have anything to smile about?

  Now we’re fifteen, and Garrett and I lead our group down through the gap where a small part of the crumbling wall has been bashed out and pulled away.

  I wish I had a light of some kind. But we can’t chance it. I feel my way with my fingers. We’re beneath the building, which carves into the hill above us and extends away from it to our right. Enormous wooden and steel posts that support the foundation have held up well over the centuries, but for how much longer? I try not to think about the whole thing falling on us right now.

  Ginger has been gripping my belt as I creep along in fron
t. I don’t know where I’m going, but this is where Tom said we’d meet. If we just go far enough back, we’ll be safe from the army until Tom arrives.

  “Lupay,” whispers Ginger. I stop. “Here.” I feel her hand touch my hip, and when I reach behind me she slips a rope into my fingers. “Garrett’s idea. For the little ones.”

  It is a good idea. But the rough, scratchy rope in the darkness makes me a little sick. I know we’re not in the tunnels of Subterra, running from those demonic dogs. I know it’s not Freda and Dane holding the rope, but the blackness presses down on me just the same.

  I say nothing, but I let my fingers brush Ginger’s in thanks. Her touch is welcome and comforting, a warm friend in nothingness. Her hand leaves my hip, and I grip the rope tight. Then her other hand lets go of my belt, and now all I feel is a little tug on the rope.

  “Ginger?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Maybe you could keep holding on to my belt. Okay?” It sounds so stupid and weak, but a little tension on the rope is not the same as knuckles against my back.

  “Okay.” Her fingers entwine around the belt again and press into me.

  “Stay close.” I try to say it like I’m a protector keeping her from danger, but I wonder if she can hear the fear in my voice. I hate being scared. But I am.

  We inch along for another few minutes before I feel a tug on the rope, followed by Ginger yanking back on my belt. Clearly, someone in back needs to stop. Immediately my head is filled with visions of the little girls falling off the rope and slipping down the hill under the ruins. The footing hasn’t been treacherous, but in this darkness, and with rattlesnakes all over the hills…

  I plant my feet into the crumbly soil and squat down, settling on my hips so I can turn. Before I do, though, another hand touches my shoulder. “Hi, Lupay. Good work.” It’s Tom. He’s breathing a little heavy but otherwise sounds almost cheerful. “Only another few yards.”

  There must be at least some light seeping through the ruins above us because I can make out the pale circle of his face in the darkness, and his ghostly hands. Just their presence, though. I can’t see the fingers or his nose or mouth. Just the paler spot of black amid the nothingness that surrounds us. “Another few yards to what?”