The Archer: Arrow's Flight Book # 2

by Casey Hays

  “What did you think? That we would be eaten by giant fish?”

  He shrugs. “You never know.”

  His eyes roam our surroundings for a few seconds before he follows us into the cabin and bolts the door.

  The fire burns large and warm, and I settle next to it, fanning a hand through my wet hair to help it dry more quickly. It hangs long, clinging here and there to my face and shoulders in damp, spindly tendrils. Diana lowers herself beside me while Jesse leans his large frame close to the fire and stirs the contents of a pot. He managed to catch a good-sized rabbit with his bare hands yesterday—a fact he is quite proud of—and tonight we will enjoy the rest of it in a stew.

  The one-room cabin is small, more like a shack. It holds sparse furniture: a small couch, a couple of wooden chairs, no beds. There is a television shoved into a corner, the screen broken open like a yawning mouth with a tangled tongue of colored wires protruding through it. I marvel every time I see a new machine climbing out of the past. Kitchen appliances, yard tools—all of them lying dead for over a century. It seems inconceivable that any of them once hummed with life.

  Ian once told me that in Eden, some of these things have been revived in limitation. Some, but not all, and many are operated by small batteries, as with the flashlights. For too much technology—too much untamed knowledge in the hands of the most powerful drove Earth into ruins. In this, my village and his share a common belief. And everyone in the world strives in their own right to ensure it never happens again.

  Buckets of boiled, river water sit against a wall, and Justin uses a funnel to refill our water bottles for tomorrow’s journey, but it is Max who draws my sudden attention. He paces the cabin, his large knife still in his hand. He’s agitated tonight. In fact, I’ve begun to feel an urgency like the rise of a tide in all of the boys as we move closer to the place where we will cross the river. But seeing Max’s unnerving behavior causes a trickling of anxiety to crawl over me.

  “Calm down, dude.” Jesse seems to read my thoughts. His blue cap sits backwards upon his head in usual form. He replaces the lid on the pot and stacks small, plastic bowls across the floor for filling. “You’re making me nervous.”

  Max makes another turn across the floor, stops to ensure that a window is locked, and only then sheaths his knife.

  “You know those premonitions I get?”

  Jesse and Justin both stop what they’re doing to stare at Max.

  “Yeah?” Jesse asks.

  “Looks like they’re back. I’m not feeling too good about staying here tonight. Something feels . . . off.”

  We all bend toward him like trees tipped by the wind simultaneously, anticipating his next words.

  “What do you mean?” Jesse asks.

  “I think someone’s watching us.”

  My heart thumps once against my throat, and I can think of only one thing. The Set-Typhon. Perhaps, despite Justin’s insistence that they simply could not keep up with us, they have been following us after all. Perhaps they’ve found a way, and they lurk in the shadows waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike again. Perhaps they were out there by the river, watching Diana and I as we bathed! This thought sends a shiver rippling through my nerves.

  “Well, it wouldn’t be smart to leave now,” Justin insists. “It’s too dark to run safely, especially with the girls. We’ve tried and failed at it more than once.”

  “Right,” Max checks the lock on the window again.

  “It’s better if we stay in here. We’ll keep the door looked and the windows secured, take turns keeping watch like usual, and leave at first light. Are you okay with that?”

  Max doesn’t seem all right with it at all, but he creases his brows into a frown and nods. “I’ll keep first watch.”

  Justin resumes filling bottles, and after a moment, Max goes to the door and turns the lock.

  “I’m going to check around.” He pulls his knife from his belt. “Make sure nothing’s out of the ordinary.”

  Justin shoots a glance at Jesse, and he’s on his feet.

  “Wait up. I’ll come with you.”

  They disappear into the darkness, and Justin relocks the door behind them. He smiles with an air of false assurance.

  “I’m sure he’s just being overly cautious,” he explains, raising his hands in a shrug.

  “He has ‘feelings’?” I ask.

  “Yeah.” Justin returns to the buckets, takes up an empty bottle and removes the lid. “Sometimes he just has strange feelings. Like something floating in the atmosphere is giving off a danger signal. I have to admit, he’s right a lot, so we listen to him.”

  “Oh.”

  I don’t know what else to say but this. Diana is quiet, but she listens, and the manner in which she rubs her hands together tells me she is just as frightened. I rise and join Justin.

  “Do you think it could be the Set-Typhon?” I whisper. His jaw tenses.

  “It could be anything.” He fills a bottle, sets the bucket aside. “But you don’t need to worry about it. We’ve kept you safe this far, haven’t we?”

  He winks at me before he thinks better of it, and my heart quivers with an uncomfortable confusion under his gaze as an embarrassed flash of red washes over his face.

  He lowers his eyes and as a distraction, picks up a full bottle.

  “Are you thirsty?” He smiles, and the tension releases as if someone has pulled a string that was too tightly wound around us. I purse my lips and take the bottle from him.

  “Yes,” I say. I clutch the bottle to my chest, but I’m not finished with my questions, and his attempt to sway me won’t do so. “Have you any idea why those people might be following us? What do they want?”

  “Kate.” He says my name gently, as if to coax an absurd fear out of me and toss it away on the wind. “We don’t know if anyone is following us. Max has these premonitions, but he isn’t always right about what they are. Maybe it’s just another storm he’s feeling in the air. That’s more likely.”

  “All right,” I agree. “But even you can’t deny the possibility that whoever threw the knife at Ian could still be a threat.”

  He smiles. “True. But you can’t deny that we practically fly when we run. Who could catch us?”

  “But why would they want to?”

  This causes both of us to pause in thought. That has been the question plaguing us all.

  He scoops up the load of bottles and drops them one by one into the packs until they are evenly dispersed. The final bottle he hands to Diana before sidling back over to me.

  “We’ll be fine,” he says definitively in that low, calming voice that makes me want to believe everything he says.

  But I don’t.

  The shattering of glass yanks me out of sleep just past midnight, and I scramble to my knees inside the sleeping bag I share with Diana. She pulls herself up, eyes wide.

  “Get the gear ready!” Max screams out of a darkness that suddenly bursts with light. “We gotta go!”

  I’m on my feet—cold with fear—before he finishes his sentence. Jesse is furiously rolling his sleeping bag out of the way of a flaming torch that spits and sputters, threatening to turn anything it can reach into a blazing ball of fire. The window from which it came is splintered, shards of glass spilling across the floor.

  Shock overwhelms me for only a second before I shake it off and help Diana to her feet. Together, we roll and fasten the sleeping bag. Justin stomps out the fire that snakes maliciously across the floor just as another torch comes sailing through the broken window. Only it isn’t a torch.

  It’s a fiery arrow. My heart nearly stops.

  “Who the hell is out there?” Jesse screeches.

  He pulls on his shoe while a the same time yanking his pack into place on his back. I quickly sling my pouch strap across my body and sheath my knife as Justin stomps out another threatening blaze. And all that consumes my mind is that Max’s premonition was right.

  Out the window, I see flames risi
ng to reach the sill, and I realize the cabin has been set on fire. Justin clutches the doorknob, but the heat of the fire has already reached it. He pulls back with a hiss of agony and stretches his fingers wide. The imprint of the door handle leaves an ugly red sear in his flesh that immediately begins to heal. He looks at me.

  “We can’t take you out this way. It’s too dangerous.”

  He springs to the opposite wall, which is windowless, and runs his palms across the flat surface. It must be cooler because he calls to Max and Jesse to join him. Smoke has begun to fill the cabin, making it hazy and gray and hard to breathe. I squeeze Diana’s fingers in my hand. The smoke overwhelms us, and we both cough ferociously.

  “We’re going to knock out this wall,” Justin instructs, and he steps back angling his shoulder. Jesse follows suit.

  Another ball of flames whizzes through the window and slams against the side of my leg, catching the edge of my skirt on fire. I squeal, but Max is there. He grabs the hem and staunches the fire with his bare hands. Justin and Jesse press themselves against the wall. It creaks dangerously as the old wood begins to give, and pieces of the ceiling shower over us.

  “Wait!” Justin yells. He stops his pushing. “We’re going to collapse the roof! Max, help me hold it up!”

  Max leaps to his feet and dashes to the end of the room. He raises his hands until his palms rest against the ceiling. Justin takes up an identical stance in another place on the opposite end and signals Jesse. He presses against the wall with his shoulder, and the structure grumbles fiercely in protest. Diana and I slump to the ground, coughing amidst the smoke and the dust that furls up to mingle with it as small pieces of the ceiling crumble upon us.

  A large portion of the wall easily gives way under Jesse’s pressure, landing with an echoing crash, and Max and Justin brace themselves beneath the bending ceiling.

  “Go, go, go!” Justin screams.

  I grab up the sleeping bag and tug Diana behind me to the edge of the foundation. Jesse has already jumped onto the heap of crumbled wall a few feet below. Diana sits, her legs dangling over the edge, and he helps her down. I don’t wait for an invitation. I leap, landing hard, the pouch across my body slapping against me.

  “Come on!” Jesse grabs my wrist, his other hand a firm grasp on Diana’s elbow, and we run across the remains of the wall to the grass. Jesse is alert, his eyes peeled, scanning our surroundings for the invading culprits. I see no one.

  I’m more frightened than I’ve ever been before, my pulse racing with a new kind of adrenaline that pumps fierce and rapid through my veins. It’s the kind that confirms worst fears.

  A resounding crash rumbles the ground under our feet. I turn just as the cabin buckles, collapsing into the flames. And they envelop it in orange, flickering tongues that rise high and hot to devour the remaining structure.

  Justin and Max bound toward us, their shadows outlined by the blaze. Jesse scoops up Diana, and without stopping Justin whisks past me, taking me by the waist and swinging me into his arms. And the wind whips at us as he picks up speed. My hair tangles in my face. I struggle with it, pushing it away long enough to crane my neck to peer around Justin’s backpack. We gallop toward the river, and the cabin is no longer in sight, a canopy of trees blocking it from view, but the light from the fire burns bright in the darkness, illuminating the sky above us with an eerie, smoky glow.

  And then, Justin yelps, curses under his breath. His grip loosens, his right arm drooping to his side. And I see it: the point of an arrow protruding through the front of his bicep.

  “Max! Take her!”

  Without slowing a step, I’m transferred from Justin’s arms to Max’s. Max speeds ahead, and I cling to his neck, twisting myself enough to keep Justin in my sight.

  I can’t think; I can only feel the terror that revives itself in every looming shadow that we bolt past. I envision the people of the unseen Set-Typhon, emboldened with their emblems and manned with torches, shooting arrows and throwing knives at every bend in the road, and I come to one formidable conclusion.

  This was no accident. It was not a random act of violence or a desire to send a stark warning. No. This was a deliberate attempt to kill whoever was inside that cabin. I know it in my bones.

  It was an attempt to kill the boys of Eden.

  This is what the Lord says:

  Let not the wise man boast of his

  wisdom

  or the strong man boast of his

  strength

  or the rich man boast of his

  riches,

  but let him who boasts boast about

  this:

  that he understands and knows

  me

  that I am the Lord, who exercises

  kindness,

  justice and righteousness on

  earth,

  for in these I delight.

  Jeremiah 9:23-24

  Ian †

  Chapter 15

  Six hours. I’m six hours from home when the baby chokes on her first mouthful of blood. I skid to a stop, struggle with the folds of the hammock. It tangles with the straps of my quiver, and with panicked frustration, I yank it, hard. It rips away like tissue, and I have Tabitha in my hands.

  The blood spews up, a small geyser blasting from between her lips, a sputtering blocking her airway. She’s dying, and I can’t do a thing about it.

  I kneel quickly, lean her over my knee and pry her mouth open to keep her from sucking the blood back into her lungs. It drains out, oozing into a puddle on the ground, dark and thick.

  She starts to cry, more of a croak, really, and I just stare at her for a minute. Stare at the back of her head that’s so small I could crush it with one squeeze of my hand. Not that I would. I only say it to prove how fragile she is.

  I sigh and raise her to my chest. Her head lolls against me, her neck just a thin straw trying to support the weight. My insides shrink in a little as her tiny, weightless body grazes my chest. It’s like a feather.

  Justin had me take her away because of this. He didn’t want Diana to see this, but he knew as well as I that Tabitha would never make it to Eden in time. She was too far gone then, and she’s even worse now.

  He’s seen it before. A lot. Well, that’s what he gets for spending so much time in his dad’s clinic.

  I ease Tabitha back into my palms. A streak of blood is smeared across her chin, and I wipe it away with my thumb. Her eyelids droop, half open, unseeing. I push back one lid to reveal the indisputable symptoms of the toxin: a cloudiness that fills up every inch of the iris and pupil. I can’t remember what color her eyes were before.

  She’s blind.

  They make no sense, these symptoms.

  Her breathing is shallow. Too shallow, and even with the beginnings of weariness creeping in, her gasping urges me to get a move on. She isn’t going to live; there’s no way. But there’s also no way I’m letting her die on my watch. I’m getting her to Eden. I gather up the blanket around her and take off.

  After being trapped for so long by the rains, it feels good to run, to accomplish something instead of just sitting still. I take advantage of the occasion, pressing myself nearly to my limits. I don’t hold back, even with the sun straight above me shining down for the whole world to see. It doesn’t matter. I’m fast enough. So fast, in fact, most people won’t even see me. This is what I like to tell myself to justify my recklessness even if it isn’t exactly true.

  The ground is solid, and like always, I feel it responding to the pounding of my feet, telling me where my next step should be. It’s been this way since the Shift. Everything is different since the Shift. And every day, I notice the slight changes taking place inside my body. I’m getting stronger and faster. And the whole world is changing because of it.

  I’m flying over the plains, barely touching the ground, testing the limits of my speed in the wide open—and I feel the click. I’m tempted to use it. To push harder—to exert all my energy without caution. My muscles promp
t me to it, but I force myself to hold back. I can’t be impetuous. Not with the baby. It’s too risky.

  And so I ease back a click and steady my pace.

  It’s brilliant, this ability of mine. It’s fresh and brand new, and I’ll have plenty of time to push myself to the breaking point. To see how much my body can actually withstand. I survived a fall, and that alone proves so much. It thrills me . . . and scares me. It fills me with a gushing of intense excitement and a tumbling avalanche of fear all at once.

  When the storms first came, I didn’t know the capacity I had for speed. I knew I was fast—faster than all my friends. But those storms that hounded us? They made me truly see what I was made of. What I could do with Kate in my arms. I’d never run like that before, with such confidence. With such vigor. It was intense. And I ran with complete abandonment.

  I smile, which is difficult at this speed with my skin stretched tight. Kate hates the running, but what she experienced was nothing. She hasn’t seen what I can really do. Not yet. I’m getting faster at everything, and if I were alone—if I didn’t have Tabitha, I would throw myself into the hands of danger. I’d reach for that next click—the one I’ve felt so many times but have yet to engage.

  I can hear the river in the distance. The bridge up ahead is out. It’s been inaccessible for as long as I can remember. No one’s ever bothered to fix it because no one travels this far west. In fact, no one has even traveled farther south along the river than to Gibeah. And no one dares to cross over at any point. And why would they? There’s nothing left on the west side of the bridge.

  I used to believe this, too.

  Understandably, I haven’t seen anyone since I left the cabin. And no sign of the Set-Typhon. But I haven’t stopped, either. Not once in two days, except to change the baby, and only for five minutes at a time. I can’t afford it. Diana is depending on me. And more importantly, Kate is.