“You wouldn’t do that.”
“No, I can’t do that. You know it too. So just save us both the trouble and come with me so I don’t have to carry you like a sack of pepperines.”
Gabi’s eyes dropped to the dirt in front of her as a heavy sigh escaped her lips. The welling anger ebbed from within her, and she shook her head. Rising to her feet, she said, “Fine. Just… just give me another minute, okay?”
“You’ve given her enough minutes.”
Gabi ignored him and swiftly picked her way through the graveyard to another equally old marker. Though heavily weathered, it was still bound together, bearing the unmistakable shape of a cross. She put her knees to the dirt next to it and traced her fingers along the faintly visible name chipped into the crossbar: LUIS SERRANO.
“I’m sorry, Papa,” she whispered, nearly choking on the words. “You’re not alone. We’re just leaving this place behind. I know you’re with all of Raphael, and we need you all with us now. Please, Papa… watch over us. Sing us to sleep, and keep a watch for us through the night, from now until forever.”
Gabi’s lips quivered and she could feel tears roll down her face as a slight breeze kicked up. She sniffed and wiped away the tears, taking in a deep breath to force away her loneliness. When she felt she was calm enough, she rose and faced Will.
“I’m ready.”
“No more Sorrow,” he grunted. “We move on. We put the past and our losses behind us. All of us.”
Gabi nodded in hollow agreement. As Will handed Gabi her bow and turned from the cemetery to make the trek to the sea, she retrieved her battered, muddy backpack. It was a drab green color, torn in several places and sewn back together with thread made from the palms that shaded the now silent Camp Eight. It had been patched by a dozen hands over the years, but like all supplies in the village, it was never thrown away as it could still be used. A loop of fabric from another torn pack had been sewn into the right edge, serving as a quiver for her six rough-fletched arrows. A similar but smaller loop adorned left edge; in this she had stowed her tomahawk.
Will had given her the axe on their fourth hunting trip. It was fashioned from a cut down and lightened hatchet, the original wood handle had broken long before and been replaced by jaguar bone wrapped in worn, salt crusted leather. The first thing that Will had taught her was how not to cut off her own limbs on accident. The second thing that he had taught her was how to hone the blade to a razor’s edge, making the first lesson all the more valuable.
Will moved swiftly along the overgrown foot trail, brushing blue green vines and shrubs alike from his path. Gabi had to stay on his heels to keep the rebounding plants from whipping her face and body, but she had grown used to doing just that on their many hunting trips over the past year.
They reached a snarl in the trail formed by nearly a dozen palms, twisted and thrown across the hillside by the most recent hurricane to slam into the island. As Gabi scrambled to the top of the pile of splintered timbers, she glanced up at the hill that Camp Eight rested on. The heights were not so far away that Gabi couldn’t make out signs of fresh damage in the decaying village. The roof of the once comforting Palm Palace had peeled back again, and now flapped slowly in the wind as a vivid reminder of the colony’s failure. Burned and collapsed shells of cottages accentuated the now ruined village, and the farmland on the adjacent hill was an overgrown mess of pepperine and vinewood.
Gabi hopped down from the logs and formed up behind Will one more time. They made their way into the valley and past the makeshift tents that lined the once bustling shoreline. The rotting, rusted hulk of one of the old sleeper pods lay heeled over and half buried in the sand, now only usable as emergency shelter during storms. Dark red rust stains streaked every surface of the pod, and where they met the white sands, they spread like trickling blood. She scanned the horizon in vain for signs of the second pod, but the salt, storms, and surf had ripped it to shreds two years earlier, leaving only the barest trace visible at the lowest tides.
On the sands at surf’s edge rested the contraption that Will swore would be their saving grace. It looked ridiculous to Gabi; it was merely a few fishing canoes strapped together with palm rope, with another log sticking straight up with a few woven fronds strapped to it. Stout logs jutted from both sides of the boat to other clusters of logs at their ends. Will had called these things ‘outriggers’, though it looked to her almost like a giant gull laying its wings between two trees on the water. The whole boat looked to her like something Aidan would have thrown together as a toy when he was bored.
Gathered around the boat was a sight just as ludicrous to Gabi. Several figures waited idly by, some standing with their hands shielding their eyes, others hunched over the sand in a semicircle, drawing figures on its surface. Gabi brought a hand to her eyes to shield them from the sun. Once her eyes adjusted, she identified them as Kristin Vandemark, Gina Bryant, and the two surviving teenagers from the Baker family: Caleb and Karina. Karina was a hair older than Kristin, and more solidly built as well. Caleb was a bit of a bruiser for a thirteen-year-old; he was both nearly as tall and as stout as his older sister.
“Damn it,” Will cursed. “The other boats left yesterday, and we’re losing the tide. We need to go now, or we’ll be another day behind them.”
He sprinted across the sands ahead of Gabi, whose legs struggled to cross the span at a rate even close to Will’s. He tossed his bow into the boat; the soft clatter of vinewood against palm wood met her ears. A few seconds after she caught up, she hopped aboard and presented herself in front of her companions.
Damn it, she cursed to herself.
Gabi’s eyes locked on Marya Brennan. Now thirteen years old, Marya stood several inches taller than Gabi, though over a foot shorter than Will. Her hair was bleached by the sun, and her skin had a deep bronze quality to it. Marya covered herself with a loose jaguar fur vest and shorts. In her palm cord belt she had secured two battered fur sheaths. The angular hilts that jutted out were easily recognizable as two of the last completely intact steel knives in the colony: a pair of bayonets.
Gabi shook her head and brushed past the older girl, hopping onto the boat and plopping her backpack down into the center canoe, just below the mast. Haphazard stacks of canteens and scavenged supplies in packs lay within the makeshift hold. At the bow of the boat she caught sight of Aidan Brennan, his back to her, staring out at the sea. By his side was Gabi’s younger brother, Diego, and Gina’s half-sister, Daphne, who were busy kicking their legs in the sparkling surf.
“Hey,” Marya called out. “We better not have a problem out there, Gabi.”
She ignored Marya and continued making a nest for her pack amongst the cluttered supplies. She cleared a small space between the hold wall and several canteens, and slid her pack securely in the space. As she did so, she spotted the stock of a rifle, buried under the supplies. Her heart skipped a beat as her finger traced over the cold metal.
What? Where did this come from?
“I’m serious,” Marya harped as she walked onto the small ship. “Are you going to be able to handle this without flipping out?”
Gabi hid the weapon quickly and stood up. She narrowed her eyes and walked to within inches of Marya, flinging her bow carelessly to the deck. “I don’t want to be here with you either, so just shut up.”
For a moment, the two were locked in a duel of stares, slowly breathing in and out through clenched teeth as their eyes danced and darted at each other. Despite the older girl having a decided height advantage, and Gabi being unarmed, she did not back down. Will stepped in, gently pushing on each of their shoulders and stepping between them.
“Enough. If you two cause problems, I’m throwing you both overboard,” he growled. “Marya, get to the back of the boat and get ready to push. Gabi, grab a paddle and get ready.”
With one last burning glance, Gabi turned away. She grabbed one of the wooden paddles from the deck and made her way to the port side near the bow.
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br /> “Diego,” she yelled at her brother. “Get down in the center of the boat and wait there.”
He rolled over and looked at her through his tangled locks of sandy blonde hair. The very sight of him made her blood boil; he was the living embodiment of everything that had gone wrong for her since her family landed on Demeter.
“I don’t wanna,” he protested.
Gabi hoisted the paddle above her head in a grand swinging motion. Diego saw this and his eyes widened as far as they could as he let out an ear piercing shriek. His short arms and legs clawed at the logs of the deck, and he quickly scurried to the edge of the cargo hold and rolled inside with a thud. Gabi smiled smugly and dropped her knees onto the rough bark of the deck.
She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up. Kristin Vandemark stood above her, oar in hand. Her dark brown hair was woven in a single, long braid, and she wore a grim look of disapproval on her face.
“That was horrible. He’s your brother. Don’t even think of hitting him,” she glowered.
“Fine, I’ll drown him then,” Gabi retorted.
“You even try it and I’ll throw you over myself.”
Gabi’s cheeks flushed and her temper flared. It was all she could do to stay quiet; she did not want to anger Kristin or her brother. The journey ahead was going to be very long, and she knew that any one person on the boat could make her life miserable. Three of them were almost certain to, no matter what she did.
She watched as Aidan took the oar from Kristin and took a position on the opposite side of the boat. At ten, he was just barely younger than Gabi and two inches shorter as well. He was a very quiet and withdrawn boy, and fiercely guarded by his older sister. He used this to his advantage and would antagonize Gabi when he felt like it, then run and hide behind Marya.
Gabi glanced over her shoulder at Marya. Though she could barely remember the actual incident, Gabi knew that Marya had broken her arm years earlier. Likewise, she knew that at some point she had retaliated and almost drowned the girl, and for years the two had been at each others’ throats. Before, there were plenty of adults to break up any squabbles. But as the Sorrow wore on, the population dwindled as villagers succumbed to disease and fighting. Then the hurricane came, and wiped out just about everyone else. Now only Will and Kristin were left to keep the fragile peace, as the other twenty survivors had already left on their own ships the day before.
Her eyes wandered under the mast and caught sight of Diego. She clenched her teeth and her hands wrung tightly around the handle of the oar. Diego was the first child born in Camp Eight, just over five years earlier. He was also one of only two Demeter-born children to survive the Sorrow. He shared blood with Gabi, but the bond was not full. With her dark brown hair and almond skin, a casual observer would think she was a mismatch for Diego’s sandy hair and pale, sunburned skin. But the resemblance in their faces was unmistakable. Looking at him reminded her of the mother they lost, and she hated him for it. Her anger was fueled further by the fact that their mother died when he was just a baby, so he was living with no memory of her.
After their mother’s death, Gabi and Diego were cared for by Chief James Vandemark for four years until his demise during the great storm. The two surviving Vandemarks took in the Serrano children as foster siblings.
The deck of the boat lurched forward and Gabi heard the stern scrape along the sand as it was pushed into the water. She waited for Will to yell “Now!” and then plunged her oar into the water and pulled hard against the roiling surf. The bow of the boat rose up and crashed down, almost knocking her to the deck.
“Dig deep,” he shouted from the rear. “Pull!”
Gabi focused on the waters just ahead as she thrust her oar into the waves over and over. Cool water sprayed her face as the vessel slammed into another roller. There was a momentary sensation of backward movement, and Gabi clutched her oar tighter.
We’re never going to make it.
“Get ready… DIG!”
Her oar splashed as she caught the top of the next wave. Again the boat lurched, but Gabi kept rowing as hard as she could. Another wave approached a few seconds later, but this time it barely lifted the bow, and did nothing to slow their momentum. She looked down over the side and saw the mottled floor of the sea well below. A glance back revealed that the shore was well behind them. Something seemed off to Gabi. The pod wreck on the shore was too far off to the left. As she turned forward, a glimpse of a dark form out of the corner of her eye made her heart plunge into her stomach.
Her arms reacted as quickly as her mouth. She thrust the oar out has hard as she could just off the bow to fend off the black mass and yelled, “Pod wreck! Turn right!”
A split second later, Will’s voice powered over the droning of the sea. “Aidan, Marya, Gina, back paddle now! Everyone else dig!”
Gabi’s oar caught the corner of the jagged steel hulk that lurked just under the surface, which ripped the oar from her grasp, slicing her left hand open. Searing pain gripped her as she fell back to the deck, grabbed her wrist, and screamed. Then the whole ship rose on the port side and a terrible crack pealed through the air. Gabi tumbled backward into the cargo hold and hit her head on the mast. She rolled to her side, sucking in a huge gulp of air and letting it out in a loud moan. Her eyes closed and her fingers and toes began to tingle.
Shouts from her companions came from all around her, and then the deck shifted again with a loud splash and the scrape of wood on metal.
“No! Kris!” Will’s voice was near panic and Gabi could hear his long strides moving across the deck. “Hang on!”
Gabi struggled to her knees and opened her eyes. Her vision blurred from the pain of her injuries, and her hand nearly slipped from its perch from the blood that poured from it. Will was flat on his belly over the port side of the boat, drawing his oar slowly closer, with his hand fully extended. Their other companions, Caleb and Karina, were hunched over his shoulders.
“I’ve got her. Keep paddling, we need to get deeper.”
Caleb and Karina scurried to their positions on the port side and began rowing furiously. The outrigger thumped again on the side of the pod, but cleared quickly once they gained forward momentum. Will heaved with all his might, and pulled his sister out of the water and onto the deck, where she coughed and spit up a mouthful of water.
Will left his sister where she lay and hurried over to Gabi. “Let me take a look.”
He spun the top of a canteen open and grabbed Gabi’s hand, then gave it a quick rinse of water. The warm splash stung and she was unable to stifle a yelp. Will muttered and swore under his breath, then took Gabi’s head in one of his massive hands and turned it to get a better look.
“Your head’s fine. We need to fix your hand up.”
Gabi sucked in a deep breath and then cycled it out. “Where’s the med kit? I’ll take care of it.”
“The hell you are,” he said as he rummaged through a row of packs laid on their sides. “It’s pretty bad, I think it needs stitches.”
“Fine,” she grumbled and winced. Though sharp, the pain was not as severe as when she had broken her leg three years earlier.
Will fished the battered metal case from its pack and opened it on the deck, careful not to let the extra supplies stuffed inside fall out. His hand found a bottle of peroxide, which he splashed on the wound after Gabi nodded that she was ready. She bit her lip hard and took a deep breath to force the sudden wave of pain from her mind. Will stopped for a couple minutes until the ship was in deeper, calmer waters. He selected a suturing needle, wiped it in alcohol, and threaded it.
Gabi stopped him just as he was about to plunge the needle into her flesh. “Where did you get the guns?” she whispered.
He looked around to ensure no one was listening. “I’ve been hiding them for years in a cargo pod out in the jungle. I thought Dad was nuts to order them all destroyed, so I kept a few for myself.”
“Why? We can hunt just fine with bows.”
&nb
sp; Will shrugged. “Thought they might come in handy someday. When we get to the other colony, they might be good for trade. Keep us from starving, you know?”
“If we get to the other colony,” she corrected. Gabi nodded her readiness for him to begin.
Pain throbbed in her hand with every suture that Will wove, but she took care to breathe deeply as he worked, and made sure she did not make any sudden moves that could make the damage worse. Any mistake might not only delay her recovery, but stiffen her hand once healed. Once the sutures were tied, Gabi applied a salve of thorn root, packed gauze on the wound, and dressed it. The last part took several tries since Gabi was left-handed, and the necessary motions were awkward when working with her right hand. When her work was finished, she flexed her fingers. The bandage made her hand stiff, but she could still curl her hand enough to crook her nock fingers.
Good. I can still use my bow.
“Paddles in,” Will cried over the wind as he turned his attention to the sails. “We’ve got good wind.”
Glancing around, Gabi saw all of the voyagers pull in and stow their oars. They were far from shore now, with the tall palm trees in the distance looking more like blades of grass, the orange globe of Bravo hanging above the land. A bald hill just to the right of the river’s mouth marked where the now abandoned Camp Eight sat in repose. Out to the horizon, the ocean extended without end. Kristin came over to the hold and sat next to her. Diego curled up at Gabi’s feet, hugging them and whimpering. Gabi curled her lip at him. Will lashed the rigging and joined them.
“You okay, Kris?” he asked. His sister nodded. With a relieved sigh, he flopped onto his back. “That was close. You saved our bacon, Gabi. If you hadn’t seen that, we’d have ripped off the port outrigger.”
“Thanks,” she muttered as she picked at the dressing on her hand. “Remember that the next time you want to throw me over.”
Project Columbus: Omnibus Page 105