The silence made the expectation more startling as if we hoped someone would show, but no one did.
“I guess that’s it,” Joey said.
“I’ll take care of this,” Sara said, holding the rabbit by the ears. She took a knife from a sheath on her belt and went to the edge of the yard by the woods.
“I’ll get some wood,” I said. “You dig a fire pit, Joey?”
Joey nodded, put away his handgun and went to work with a potting shovel he took from his pack.
I holstered my revolver, and walking a few feet into the woods, I walked the perimeter of the yard, picking up twigs and fallen branches for the campfire.
Sara quickly gutted the kill, and returned to help Joey with the digging.
With one arm wrapped around a bundle of kindling and dragging a long branch with the other, I was heading out of the woods when I spotted the hoof prints.
Chapter 17
I dropped the firewood into the grass, studied the tracks which led off around the house, opposite the garage. I followed them all the way to the backyard.
The tracks continued off into the tree line beyond. I heard the crush of the grass behind me and turned to see Sara.
“You saw the tracks?” I looked back to the woods.
“Yes. Did you see a rider?” Sara’s gaze moved along the tree line bordering the backyard.
“No. And I can’t tell anything from the tracks. The weather’s been good, who knows how old they are.” Sara knew as well as I did that a recent rain would’ve washed them away.
“So, what do we want to do?”
“Well, let’s tell Joey, we’ll figure it out from there.”
Back around to the front of the house, we found Joey just completed the pit for the campfire. I told him what we’d found.
“All this digging for nothing.” He threw the small shovel into the hole.
“What do you mean?” Sara asked.
“What do I mean? We’re not staying here, are we? These riders are nasty, dangerous people.” Grabbing up the shovel again, he brushed away the dirt and stuffed it into his backpack. “We should head back and tell somebody about what you found.”
“You think so, too?” Sara asked me.
“It’s probably for the best, but why don’t we take a look in the house first. Then we’ll go.”
“What about the rabbit?” Sara held up the carcass which she’d already skewered on a long straight stick, readied for roasting.
“Pull it off. I’ve got a bag.” Kneeling I zipped open the flap of my backpack, reached for a plastic bag and spotted my homemade map. Folded and tucked into its own plastic bag, I paused a second, thinking about how much further I’d have to go to get there, if I left now.
“Thanks,” Sara said, taking the empty bag.
“Oh, sure.” I smiled, but looked back at the map again, before pushing it down and closing the flap. “Okay, now, how do we want to do this?”
“First, take this,” Joey said, handing us each a Snickers bars. “The last of the last.”
I gave a nod of thanks. I knew giving up a candy bar meant a lot, so did Sara who smiled. I tore the wrapper loose. A little stale, the bar still tasted sweet. I chewed slowly and looked around the house, from the front porch and then to the second story windows. “Well, we’re not breaking in, are we?” I had to ask but I knew the answer. They wouldn’t be interested. I wasn’t either. For me going into a house always seemed like grave robbing, and just busting in, when it wasn’t necessary, made that feeling worse. “There. How about that?” I pointed to a window that could be reached from the garage roof. A narrow gap showed where the window wasn’t pushed all the way down.
“Sure,” Joey said. “But who can jump that high?”
“A ladder,” Sara said.
“Nah.” I headed to a maple tree, an upper branch stuck out over garage. “You keep watch. I’ll climb that.”
“Fine.” Joey pulled the automatic from his belt.
Sara took my backpack. “Be careful,” she said, touching my shoulder.
“Sure.” I smiled and worked my way up, arms wrapped around the trunk at first then I latched onto a lower branch, the bark rough against my palms. Further up I pulled myself onto a firm branch which protruded over the garage, and hand-over-hand made my way to the peak of the roof. I dropped, landing with a light thud. Loose grit from the shingles rattled down the roof.
“I’ll get in and open the front door.” I waved down, and Sara held up a hand.
With arms out I balanced on the peak, and then zipped up my jacket against a cool breeze. The leaves in the branches above fluttered. The house was there, looking lonely and empty, but it was still someone’s home.
One foot in front of the other I made it to the window, the blackness beyond the glass grew closer and closer. My face reflected back. Looking closer, I saw a big bed and dresser on the other side of the room. I pushed up the window screen with my palms and then slid my fingers into the gap under the window and lifted it.
What sunlight broke through the trees fell in a scattered mesh on the tan carpet.
I threw my leg over the windowsill and stepped in. My shadow ran long and thin along the carpet. A breeze coming in swirled the musty air.
Again, there was the double bed, the dresser . . . and a crib, against the wall opposite the foot of the bed, near the door. All covered in a layer of thick, gray dust. I looked at the crib for what seemed like a long time. I didn’t touch it, I didn’t touch anything. The emptiness and the silence were too much.
A muffled call from Joey came through the window, but I didn’t answer, not wanting to break the cemetery silence.
I left the room and stood at the end of the hall. Down on the right were three more doorways, but I went to the head of the stairs, not being interested in investigating more silent rooms . . . more silent graves.
At the top of the stairs, I glanced out a window which looked out over the backyard. The grass, yellow with the coming of fall, bristled against the wind. Past the far edge of the yard, the maples shivered in the breeze, leaves fell, and through a part in the foliage, in a distant field beyond, I spotted someone on horseback. A woman rode the horse which trotted slowly along the field. A breeze lifted and fluttered through her dark hair. The jeans and loose fitting shirt she wore were paled by the glare of the afternoon sun. She tugged the reins of her mount. The horse dropped its head and ate from the tall stalks of grass. The scene was peaceful, even serene.
Another rider, a man, came into view and then another horseman followed.
A sudden burst of panic caused me to take in a sharp breath.
The lead rider flicked the reins of her horse and continued through the tall grass leaving a wake of bent stalks. The others fanned out on either side of the woman, but the rest of their movement was blocked by the trees lining the edge of the backyard.
No more riders came into view, but there was no guarantee that others weren’t following or that they weren’t even the same group of marauders which attacked Joey’s people or mine. The days of the mass movement of people away from the bombed cities or from the plague that had raged to the west were long gone. The marauders were out there like some rogue moon, circling beyond our sight, waiting to come crushing back.
I could only tell that the riders were moving in a northerly direction, but a sudden pull of the reins would bring them toward the house.
A squeezing panic still gripped my chest as I took another breath, letting it out slowly; then I bounded down the shadowed stairway. I jumped to the landing. The front door stood directly ahead.
I expected Sara to be peering through one of the long narrow windows on either side of the door, but no one was there.
I grabbed the doorknob, turned and pulled. The door jerked but didn’t open. “Come on!” I said through gritted teeth. I snapped the bolt back with a twist of the brass lever and pulled again. The door swung open, banging against a short round table next to the entrance. A glass figurine shot o
ff the tabletop and hit the wood floor, shattering into crystal fragments.
In the middle of the front yard, Sara and Joey stood, hands raised, their eyes wide in fear. Between them and the front porch was a man mounted on a brown horse with his back to me. The collision of the door with the small table spooked the horse which reared to the right. The man in the saddle looked sharply around. The automatic he held came into view.
Joey dropped to one knee and snatched at something in the grass. This drew the rider’s attention again. He swung forward in the saddle, bringing his pistol hand around. His green fabric jacket flapped open as the horse trotted rapidly back, turning so its flank blocked Sara from sight. The horse snorted and gunshots crackled almost simultaneously in the cool air.
The rider reared back in the saddle, going back and back, rolling off the animal, his feet high in the air, and then he thumped onto the ground. Through the legs of the horse I spotted Joey rising to his feet, his automatic in hand. The horse continued a jittery trot to the side, stepping on the rider’s back; then it reared and charged off away from the house, past the garage and into the woods.
Sara lurched back, trying to keep her balance. Blood ran between the fingers of the hand she pressed to the side of her forehead.
I ran off the porch and grabbed Sara by the upper arm, steadying her. My heart thumped in my throat. So much blood flowed in long streaks down her arm.
“Sara, can you hear me?” I asked.
Her face was pale and the pupils of her eyes were wide black pits, but she nodded rapidly. “Oh God, I feel sick,” she murmured.
“He just rode up on us, right out of the woods,” Joey said, in a low voice. He stood looking at the dead man. “I never killed anybody before. I never did.” His face paled as well.
“We’ve got to get the hell out of here,” I said. “Now!”
“I feel so sick.” Sara leaned over as if she might vomit.
“I shot him—” Joey tried to continue, but I turned to him, put a hand on his shoulder and shoved him. He stared at me, his eyes wide, still stunned by what he’d done.
“There’s more of them! We’ve got to go!” I peered around and grabbed Sara’s snub-nosed revolver out of the grass as I tried to keep a firm grip on her arm. I slipped the revolver into my belt, saw that Sara still wore her backpack, and I only had to pick up my pack where it lay at her feet. “Move,” I said to Joey, who finally released his gaze from the dead man, whose gray-black hair was drawn back in a tight ponytail held by a blue bandana. His arms outstretched, his big hands clutching clots of grass. From what I could see from the side of his face, he was an older man, his eyes were heavily lined, and his beard thick and gray as well. He could’ve been somebody’s father or grandfather. Now, he was just plain dead.
“Pick up your pack,” I ordered Joey and he snatched up his bag and threw it over one shoulder.
A rumble of hoof beats sounded from the back of the house.
“Move!” I pulled Sara along, hoping she would keep on her feet. She moved slowly at first, but quickly picked up the pace to a sluggish run.
Straight across the front yard and into the woods, I ran parallel with the driveway we’d originally walked on the way up to the house.
Yells of people and the stomping of horses could be heard from the direction of the house.
I stopped running, grabbed Joey who would’ve kept going and pulled him and Sara down to the ground. The bushes around us were tall and thick, but we couldn’t hide in them forever.
“Let’s keep going,” Joey said, in grunting whisper. The mix of fear and anger in his eyes were unmistakable.
I put a finger to my lips. Joey was on the edge of arguing, but I pointed sharply at Sara. Blood still ran freely and contrasted starkly with the paleness of her face. If I could stop breathing altogether I would’ve been overjoyed, because every breath I took sounded like a typhoon blowing.
From the front yard of the house, a woman cried out the name, “Marshall,” and then her sobs followed.
In the lowest voice I could muster, I said, “If we can hear them, they will hear us if we keep charging like elephants.”
Joey rocked back on his heels, raising his hands to his lips, palms flat together as if in prayer. He nodded and closed his eyes. Sweat glistened over his face. He peered at me. “Fine, what do we do?”
I ran my tongue around the inside of my lower lip and said, “Go slow.”
A man’s voice gave an order for a search to begin.
I looked over my shoulder, then back to Joey. “Especially, now.”
Sara sat crumpled forward, her head propped up on her hands.
“Sorry,” I said, feeling like an idiot as she wiped her right eye, which was sticky from congealing blood.
She shook her head. “Let’s go like you said . . . but slow, please.”
Joey and I helped her up and we continued forward as if navigating a minefield, seeing every patch of dry grass and leaves, or a fallen twig as a trigger for a deadly explosion.
Again, the rumbling impact of hooves commenced and moved around us. I was comforted by the thought that the raiders hadn’t gone directly into the woods. But somewhere along the way, a breakout into the open was unavoidable. At times we settled down on our knees and rose a few minutes later and continued on, hoping to make it to the road.
The afternoon passed at a crawl because I badly wanted the night to come. A sweaty panic made my clothes sticky and when a cool breeze blew a chill ran through me. Sara faired worse as she constantly fought the effects of shock. The cloth I’d tore from my shirt made a poor bandage. Finally, as we neared the road, the shrubbery, which provided our only cover thinned out to nothing as the blacktop came into sight.
No raiders had been heard in sometime, maybe as much as a half hour, but I couldn’t be sure. We decided to stay off the road and headed in the direction of the bridge we’d crossed earlier that day. The sound of running water was never so reassuring. We were going to hide under the bridge until dark and then head home.
We made our way through the woods to the bank of the stream. About forty feet to the left was the shadowy underbelly of the bridge. Crouching as low as possible along the bank, we walked in the stream. The cold water filled my shoes chilling my feet. I went first, my revolver in hand. Sara followed and Joey came last with his automatic drawn.
I peered over the crest of the bank as we neared the bridge, the fear that some rider would appear increased. My mouth went dry. But no horse came into sight.
We moved into the shadow of the bridge and worked our way up the slope to where the bridge butted into the bank. The odor of moist earth rose from the embankment as we settled on the damp ground. Sara’s teeth began to chatter. I wrapped an arm around her and would’ve enjoyed that closeness more if I hadn’t seen the horse step into the stream from the direction we had come. I gently pressed two fingers to Sara’s lips to get her attention and carefully touched Joey’s arm. He frowned and then nodded as I pointed.
The horse and rider drew nearer. Its hooves splashed lazily in the water. A long brown cloud of dirt drifted with the stream and under the bridge. All I could think was that our tracks had been spotted where we’d entered from the bank.
In the middle of the stream, the horse halted, its caramel color reflected in the water. As the animal took a long drink, the woman in the saddle waited, pulling the fur collar of her jacket snuggly around her neck. A rifle rested across the saddle. She surveyed the area and paused. Her eyes fixed on the bridge.
I swallowed, hearing a popping in my throat which I was sure the rider heard, but then her gaze moved on. She coaxed her mount back up the bank and traveled into the woods and the late afternoon light.
Sara shivered. I pressed my hand to her forehead, feeling the heat rising from her flesh. In the cold dampness of our hiding place, we waited, but night wasn’t coming fast enough.
Chapter 18
Sara groaned as I tried to rearrange the bandage on her forehead. The s
un had set and I could hardly see in the darkness under the bridge. I didn’t want the wound to begin to bleed again, so I left the wrap alone, still the wet stickiness of blood covered my fingertips. To have a simple medical kit, that small plastic box my mother had in the kitchen cabinet. Some gauze pads and surgical tape. I could’ve used that. And my mother. She could’ve dealt with this.
I shook my head. I chuckled once, down in my throat. What would’ve been said, “Hey, Mom, could you take a look at this? Sara’s been shot in the head!”
“Sara?” My mom would’ve questioned. “Who’s Sara?”
“She’s my girlfriend . . .” I said in a whisper.
Sara’s eyes fluttered and she frowned. What she could’ve heard, there was no way to tell. Nestled against my shoulder, her face and head radiated so much heat, but her hands were cold. Fabric torn from the bottom of my t-shirt as a bandage was all I had to help her.
“We’ve got to get out of here, Joey,” I said.
He grunted, and said, “Yeah.” For the last few hours, he’d sat hunched over, keeping watch with his arms wrapped around his knees, pistol in hand. He might’ve been thinking about the raider he’d killed, but he remained silent as stone.
Other than the woman, no riders had come by, but the tension stayed high and edgy, even as the sunset. We waited for darkness, being the best time to travel back. Sara had grown more lethargic. The cold and damp from the stream and the wet ground intensified with the coming night, which was dark and partly masked by slowly drifting clouds.
I slipped off my jacket and put it over Sara’s shoulders. I reached for my pack. A panic sparked when all I clenched was dirt. I reached further into the space where the bridge met the embankment.
“What’s wrong?” Joey asked.
“My pack. I can’t find—” My fingers touched the strap. I pulled the bag out of the dark niche. “I got it,” I said, letting out a sigh of relief. It wasn’t just a pack, but my map inside, which was something I didn’t care to lose.
“Come on,” Joey said, moving in a crouch to the edge of the stream. “The water’s going to be cold, though, we might want to climb the bank and cross the bridge.”
Dark Land: An Apocalyptic Novel Page 12