by North, Geoff
“Mom was born in Rudd.” Willem’s smile faded a second later.
“And she was taken from there when she was younger than you, after Burn won Rites that spring.”
“Stupid Rites. Why can’t the towns just get along? Why do people have to fight and die every year?”
Cobe sat on a rock, and Willem plopped down beside him in the brown grass. “Pa used to say we all came from one town.” Willem shifted uneasily at the mention of his father in the past tense. Cobe patted the boy’s boney knee and continued, “He said that village grew so big and the people became so hungry and mad, the whole place went to war. Folks with less stuff fighting folks with more. People with funny skin fighting people with different ideas. The whole town just went crazy…killing each other for no good reason.”
Willem nodded his head solemnly. “Until half the gawdamn town packed up and left. I know all about that from school. And the Rites was set up to keep things balanced.”
“Yeah, but they don’t teach you everything in school. Them people left and formed Rudd, but the fighting kept on going. Once the snow melted after winter, the two towns would meet halfway and start warring all over again. Hundreds would die each spring. It went on year after year until some older folks, from both towns, came up with the idea to only send out a dozen people each year to fight.”
Willem looked at his brother with a puzzled expression. “But they only send one man every year to the Rites now. What happened?”
“Every few decades they scaled it down more and more.”
“Were they running outta folks to send?”
Cobe shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe they started to forget what the fighting was all about.”
“So why don’t they just stop it altogether?”
Another shrug. “Maybe someday they will, but I kinda doubt it. Seems like the Rites are more about tradition these days than fighting over anything real. Like how Ma used to make us gifts to mark the days we were born. That’s tradition.” If Cobe’s Ma had made him something this year, she never had the chance to give it to him. He wondered if she had time, in those last few days, to even consider it.
The sadness on his face spread over Willem’s. “Some kids back in Burn said Ma was a slitch. Is that true?”
Slitch. Short for ‘slave-bitch.’ Cobe had heard it said before, but never had any of those children said it to his face. They wouldn’t have dared. “Ma’s grampa lost the fight that year. Usually them folks offered up fight to the death, but his opponent let him live as long as he agreed to give Ma up as part of the deal. You won’t have to listen to them damn kids no more.”
Willem nodded solemnly. “How come they make the oldest and weakest fight? Why wouldn’t they send their strongest?”
“Because, win or lose, most folks that fight die in the end, and if they don’t, they probably wish they had.” Cobe’s head moved slowly to the right as he took in all the flat, cracked land between the two towns. Somewhere out there in that desolate land, hundreds, if not thousands, of people had met willingly and fought to the death over the centuries. “The world ain’t fair, brother, but I guess it knows how to use up what it’s got. The oldest are the most expendable…and the weakest…well, they’re the ones that are different. You know what I mean. People born missing arms and legs. Ones that don’t think or talk so well. The world don’t want them neither.”
“The ones with shortcomings and abnormalities.” Willem waved his one arm in the air.
Cobe smiled weakly. “Aren’t you glad we left?”
Willem shuffled around on his bottom and faced west. He was done with Burn. Their parents were dead, and now it was just the two of them. “So, where are we going?” The hill spread out below them at a more gradual rate. There was more forest on this side, but nothing much alive. The leaves on the twisted branches beyond had long since curled up and blown away. The seasons of fall and winter could settle in for many months, years sometimes. Spring and summer, on the other hand, were fleeting and short, like distant dreams barely remembered to someone as young as him. “Anyone ever come this far?”
“Sure they have. It’s where they gather most of the wood for fires and building.”
“But has anyone ever come this far and not turned back? Has anyone ever gone farther?”
“Not yet.” He pulled his brother up and they started down the hill. Cobe was certain other people had gone farther. None, as far as he knew, had ever returned. Whatever lay beyond the dead forest and setting sun was a mystery. He could only hope those few that hadn’t returned to Burn had chosen not to. Maybe they’d found something better. Maybe there was more out there other than howlers and rollers. And if there wasn’t, Cobe had a feeling they wouldn’t have to trudge on much longer to find out. One way or the other, their miserable existence in Burn and all this unfair world had to offer, would be left behind.
The day ended, and the clouds broke on the horizon, revealing an orange sun already cut in half by land. Cobe and Willem marched on out of the dead woods and back into more depressing plains, their throats dry and their stomachs grumbling. Cobe stared directly into the sinking orb of light. It was too dull to hurt his eyes and too far gone to offer any warmth. When it finally winked out, leaving a narrow strip of pink above, Cobe stopped walking. Willem bumped into him and thumped back down to the ground.
“Why we stopping?” he asked, but no longer really cared. He had already placed his arm under the side of his head and curled up into a sleeping position.
“I thought we would’ve found water by now…an old stream, a dirty sinkhole…something.”
Willem yawned and shut his eyes. “Maybe tomorrow.”
Cobe studied the boy’s still form in the gloom. He’d started the day crying, terrified of what lay beyond the relative safety of town, and now, here he was, going to sleep in the middle of it. He kicked his brother a little harder than he meant to. Willem struggled and sat back up. “Whatcha do that for?”
“I’m sorry I brought you out here. I should’ve thought things through better….I should’ve planned more.”
“A blanket woulda been nice…and some water. But I ain’t scared no more. I think all them stories about howlers and rollers were just that…dumb stories.”
Cobe debated whether or not to kick the boy again and tell him the stories were true, but he seemed at peace now. If something came for them in the night, he knew it would be quick. Maybe Willem wouldn’t even wake up if they attacked fast enough.
“I smell smoke,” Willem said sleepily.
“We’re too far from Burn to smell smoke anymore.”
“Not from Burn. It’s comin’ from over there.”
Cobe looked back to the west. There was a thin wisp of black rising into the air against the pink sunset. A moment later he saw the flicker of a small fire dancing beneath it. His heart raced. He pulled Willem back up. “Come on.”
Willem saw it a second later. “Don’t howlers keep fires?”
Cobe was jogging ahead. “Howlers steal fire from others ‘cause they can’t see to light them. They keep ‘em burning real big and for as long as possible after that.” He whispered the last sentence. They were getting closer to the flame’s source, tucked between a boulder and a pile of rocks sitting out in the open.
Willem caught up and clawed at his brother. “You sure it ain’t howlers? Maybe a roller done built the fire.”
“People build fires, not monsters.” Cobe sniffed the air. “That’s meat cooking. You smell it?” Willem nodded, and the boys walked towards it. Cobe held his hand. Both were shaking from hunger and cold. “It’ll be alright….I promise.”
From thirty feet away, the boulder turned its head and made a deep snorting sound at the boys. Cobe and Willem stopped in their tracks; hunger, cold, thirst, howlers, and rollers all forgotten. There was a click as the Lawman stepped around his horse and pointed his rifle at their faces.
Chapter 6
Willem didn’t speak a word. He was too busy stuffing his mouth w
ith cooked meat and washing it down with warm water. The water didn’t taste fresh, and he had no idea what animal or bird he was devouring, but he didn’t complain.
Cobe didn’t eat as fast as his brother, and his eyes never left the rifle resting across the lawman’s knees. He wiped the grease from his lips and broke the silence. “Is this like a last meal?”
The lawman stared back, his gray eyes flickering in the firelight.
Cobe tried again. “You gonna kill us after we eat, or are you gonna see us swing back in Burn?”
Willem stopped chewing. A piece of burnt skin hung from his open mouth.
Lawson reached for an old, dented metal kettle resting on a flat rock next to the fire. Cobe watched as he poured steaming coffee into an even older, more dented cup. Not many people owned metal eating utensils. Metal was used mostly to fashion weapons and tools for farming. And no one drank coffee except for the lawman. No one Cobe knew grew the stuff, but old Lawson always seemed to have a pouch of grounds on his person. He swallowed noisily until it was empty and poured another. His throat and gut must be made of metal too, Cobe thought.
“You remember the last time we spoke?” the lawman asked.
Cobe nodded slowly. “Couple days ago. You told me my sixteenth birthday was coming up.”
“Why would I know a fact like that,” he reached for something tucked in his vest pocket, “and why would I mention it at all if I planned on killin’ you a few days later?”
Cobe answered the questions in sequence. “I ain’t got no clue how you knew my birthday was coming up. And I’m pretty sure you weren’t planning on killing me two days ago ‘cause I wasn’t even planning on running from Burn ‘til yesterday.”
Lawson reached into another pocket and pulled out a crumpled brown leaf. He placed the wad of dried tobacco—more stuff only the lawman seemed to possess—from the first pocket into its center and rolled it together, his eyes never leaving the boy. “I hold lawbreakers accountable. I bring ‘em in to see justice served. But I was also the man what taught yer dad to read and write long before you and yer brother were born. We were…friends.” He pulled a stick from the fire, by the end not in the flames, and lit his cigarette. He inhaled deeply and exhaled blue. “Some way for friends to treat one another, hey?”
“Pa said you two became friends after you was hurt bad in the Rites. He said my ma patched you up and saved your life.”
Willem’s mouth dropped open even wider. A piece of meat fell into his lap. “You fought in the Rites? Holy gawdamn.”
Lawson nodded slowly. “That was a long time ago. One could argue I was a young man then. Felt older than hell when the match was done. Yer ma patched me up good, and I returned the favor by teaching Elward how to read and write.”
Willem looked to his brother. “You told me only the weak and old ones fought.”
Cobe winced. Why did his brother have to keep asking questions? Why couldn’t he just eat and keep his mouth shut?
“That’s mostly true,” Lawson said. “But The Rites was also a good way of gettin’ rid of troublemakers. People in Burn didn’t know what to make of me back then. They volunteered me for the Rites, hopin’ I wouldn’t survive.”
“What happened to the other one?” Willem asked.
Lawson regarded the boy with a raised eyebrow. “The other what?”
“The one you fought. Did you kill him? Did you blow his gawdamn brains into the dirt?”
“Guns ain’t allowed in the Rites. You fight with yer fists…and with this.” He tapped the side of his head with a long finger.
“Pa said you shoulda died,” Cobe added. “He said Ma ain’t ever patched up anyone since that lost so much blood and lived.”
The lawman shrugged and stared back into the fire.
Willem tossed a bone to the flames. “Can I see the guns?”
“Shut-up,” Cobe urged.
Lawson ignored them both and flicked the spent butt in after the bone. They ate the remaining pieces of chicken—or what Cobe hoped was chicken—in silence. Something started to wail out of the hills the way they’d come.
“There’s some dead wood over yonder,” the lawman indicated with a thumb over his shoulder. “You and yer brother go gather as much as you can. We’ll need to keep a good fire goin’ through the night.”
Rollers are scared of fire, Cobe thought. He’d never seen one, but he’d heard of people who had. They were all skull and teeth and ran on thick wrists with claws curled back into their furry forearms. None of those people had ever said anything about how the rollers sounded, but Cobe had no difficulty matching those awful noises with creatures that had half-foot long claws instead of fingers. “You taking us back to Burn in the morning?”
Lawson stood and stretched his long limbs. He sauntered over to his horse. Horses were as rare as guns, coffee, and tobacco, but the lawman had somehow managed to take ownership of all four. “Ol’ Dust here don’t much care for them night sounds either. Don’t you go worrying about where we might be headed tomorrow. I haven’t made up my mind one way or the other.”
A surge of hope flooded through Cobe. “You’re going to let us go?”
The wailing started up again, much louder and closer. “Go and get the wood.”
Over yonder was less than ten yards away, but both boys ran after securing an armload of wood. Willem worked twice as hard, tearing the bigger pieces free and resting them into a pile at his feet first, with only one arm to work with. Cobe scooped some up along the way, helping his brother out as much as he could. Lawson comforted his nervous horse as the boys worked. Cobe watched from the corner of his eye as the big man stroked its muscular neck and whispered into its ear.
Willem dropped his second load next to the fire. “Why’d you name him Dust?”
“I had another horse once,” the lawman started. He whispered more soft comforts after an especially long howl. “His name was Wind, ‘cause nothing could run as fast or free. The town folk put him down after he broke free from his pen during a storm.”
That’s when the townsfolk turned against him, Cobe guessed. It probably wasn’t long after that they put him up to fight in the Rites.
“But you’re the lawman,” Willem said. “How could they do a thing like that without you…well…without you getting mad?”
“I got mad as hell.” It looked like he was going to explain further but changed his mind. “I found Dust here a few years later, wandering out in the plains. He was ugly as sin, what with only one eye and his hide all cracked and peeling. Guess he ain’t much prettier to look at these days neither.” He patted the horse’s back and a small cloud of dirt puffed up around the lawman’s hand. “I called him Dust ‘cause that’s about all that’s left of him, and when he runs…well, he ain’t as fast as Wind was, but he does alright. He still leaves all other animals in the dust.”
He looked at the boys and waited for them to laugh. They didn’t.
The fire was built up and the sounds in the night lessened. Lawson drank more coffee and Willem fell asleep. Cobe was grateful for that, because he didn’t want his brother to hear what had to be asked next.
“Why’d you let them kill our Ma? If you were such good friends, why’d you just sit there and watch as Lode done what he did to Pa?”
“Yer pa was a drunk.” Lawson looked quickly at the boy; the hint of an apology lingered for a moment before he continued. “That’s to say there was nothing anyone could do for him that hadn’t already been tried. Once you mix drink with a loud mouth, you’re on yer own.”
“But you could’ve spoken up for Ma; you could’ve stopped it.”
The lawman added one of Willem’s sticks to the flames. “I couldn’t have stopped it. I only enforce the law…I don’t make the rules.”
“You’re good at breaking them.”
Lawson regarded him with a scathing look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“The biggest rule of them all—no books, no reading. You taught Pa how to read, and that�
�s what got him and Ma killed in the end. Where’s the justice in that? Shouldn’t you have to pay for breaking the rules too?”
“I’ve paid more than you could ever imagine, boy,” Lawson said in a rumbling whisper. If any of Cobe’s accusations were going to end up with him receiving a hard slap or worse, that time had passed. The boy started to breathe again and the lawman continued. “Yer ma was a natural healer…I seen that with my own eyes as she saved my life. I needed her to know the things I’d learned from my…my travels. I needed her to become the best she could be. But some of the other folks in Burn became suspicious o’ what she’d accomplished by healin’ me. They saw more to fear in the good she’d done. People are like that. Ignorance makes ‘em afraid.”
“So you taught my Pa to read and write. You wanted him to teach Ma in private so all the other people in town would leave her alone.”
Lawson nodded. “Pretty much.”
“Still doesn’t change the fact they’re both dead and you ain’t.”
Lawson pulled his revolver out and aimed it towards the boy. Cobe held his breath and waited. The lawman’s thumb cocked the trigger and he took aim. Cobe shut his eyes. The explosion it made was terrible. Something fell somewhere beside and behind Cobe. The boy opened his eyes and looked down at his wet crotch. He’d pissed himself. Willem was sitting up, his lips moving but making no sound. Cobe followed his terrified eyes and looked over his shoulder. A creature with two arms and two legs was lying in the dirt less than six feet from Cobe’s back. Half its head was missing.
Lawson stepped past Cobe and kicked it over. “Howler. Must have got separated from its pack and smelled the smoke.”
Cobe and his brother remained speechless. Both boys stood side by side staring down at the horrible remains. The thing’s naked body was more human than Cobe had imagined a howler to be. The head, however, was a different story—what was left of it. The lawman’s bullet had torn most of the brains out on the left side. It only had one eye left. But even that wasn’t right, Cobe thought. Instead of an eyeball and closed lid, there was only a scarred patch of black.