That tight spot inside Susanna clenched a little harder. She stood up, stowed away her bowl and spoon on her top bunk, and climbed into bed without another word. As she wrapped her blanket around her she felt the potato hidden in her shirt.
She pulled it out. From the sounds underneath her she could tell Donna was getting into bed too. The potato was a large one, resting in her hand with a reassuring weight. She had intended to give it to Donna as a gift.
Susanna started gnawing on it, careful to make as little sound as possible in case someone heard and tried to steal her snack from her. Most of all, though, she didn’t want Donna to hear.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The three refugees from the Righteous Horde looked even worse off than the machete men Annette had captured a few days before. Two haggard women and an old guy who was more dead than alive sat in the road in front of $87,953. Their captors, a farming couple, explained to Annette what had happened as a curious crowd gathered.
“We just opened up our farm the day before yesterday,” the farmer said, a shotgun sloped over his shoulder. “Me and the wife brought our livestock back from the New City stockade and found these three huddled in the barn. They’re porters, abandoned like the rest of them. They didn’t have the strength to retreat any further, so they sheltered in the barn and buried themselves under the straw for warmth.”
“And so you brought them here,” Annette said, not sure what to think or feel.
The farmer’s wife chimed in. “We fed them up for a day first. They wouldn’t have made it otherwise. You should have seen them, even weaker than they are now and dirty head to foot. It didn’t seem Christian to turn them out.”
One of the onlookers sneered, “The Pure One says he’s Christian too.”
The woman turned and frowned at him. “Any Christianity that’s rooted in hate is fake Christianity!”
“You don’t know your history. Plenty of messiahs during the City State Wars. And you ever heard of the Knights of Truth? They rebelled against the Third American Republic and almost—”
“Blame is still illegal in my jurisdiction,” Annette snapped. “If you don’t want to get branded and exiled I suggest you shut the fuck up right now.”
The man looked away. Annette breathed a sigh of relief. The last thing she wanted to do was brand someone. Deputy Jackson Andrews might have something to say about that. Luckily he was busy dealing with a property dispute between two scavengers on the other side of the Burbs. She turned back to the farming couple.
“So why did you bring them here?” she asked.
The man’s brow furrowed. “Isn’t that what you wanted? We heard you were taking in refugees.”
Annette grimaced and rubbed her eyes. It was too early in the morning for this shit. Back inside her breakfast was getting cold.
“Actually I was capturing prisoners of war for questioning.”
She looked down at the three refugees. They looked back at her with dead eyes devoid of supplication or hope. She realized that for weeks, months, maybe even years these people had taken all sorts of abuse and expected nothing beyond the basic essentials for survival. Annette knew with a horrible clarity that she could kick that old man in the face, offer him a crust of bread, and he’d happily sit by to get kicked in the face again.
A lot of people would get off on that sort of power. The Pure One sure did. Fly Daddy Bradley would see it as a business opportunity. And imagine what Abe Weissman would do with a bunch of them?
Shit. I either take them in or kill them now. Those are the only two merciful things to do.
“Pablo,” she said without turning around.
“How did you know I was here?” her son asked from his hiding place at the bar’s front door.
“I can see through walls and I have eyes in the back of my head. That’s why they named me sheriff. Go find Clyde or Uncle Marcus and tell them about this. Tell them we need more barbed wire and another tarp. We have to build a second enclosure.”
“OK,” Pablo said, running off in the direction of New City.
“Why not put them in the pen you already have?” one of the onlookers said.
“Because those are machete men in there. No telling what they’d do.”
“Who cares? They’re all the same,” the man said.
“No. These were slaves.”
“The machete men claim they were slaves too.”
“Slaves with weapons are different than slaves without weapons.”
“So can we go now?” the farmer asked. “We have a lot of work to do.”
“Yeah, go on,” Annette waved them off. “Thanks for bringing them in.”
I guess.
The couple started walking off. After a few steps the husband stopped and turned.
“Oh, I almost forgot. We passed a scavenger on the way in. He’s got another one of them. He’s bringing her to you.”
“Great. Thanks.”
Pablo returned ten minutes later. Annette still stood outside the bar with her new prisoners, and the crowd still hung around gaping at them. The refugees hadn’t budged, being too tired to move, and barely acknowledged the jeers from some of the angrier members of the crowd. Luckily those were few. The prisoners were too pathetic looking to arouse much rage.
“I found Uncle Marcus and Clyde in the operations center. Did you know Clyde as a telescope up there? He let me look through it. You can see—”
“Pablo, I’m busy.”
“Oh, yeah. They’re going to make an enclosure next to the wall. Clyde wasn’t happy though.”
“What did he say?”
“I could tell you but then you’d get mad at me for swearing.”
Annette grinned and tousled his hair. Just then a murmur from the crowd made her turn.
A scavenger led a woman down the street. She had a fresh bruise on her cheek and a tear-streaked face. She was younger than the other two female prisoners.
“You Sheriff Cruz?” the scavenger asked.
“Yeah.”
“I hear you’re taking in the people left behind by the Righteous Horde.”
“Looks like I am. Where did you find her?”
The scavenger glanced at Pablo.
“Pablo, go inside,” Annette said.
Her son stepped into the bar.
“Pablo, go inside for real.”
“OK,” he said from behind the door.
Annette cocked her head and listened as his footsteps faded away into the interior of the building.
The scavenger moved up close to Annette, who wrinkled her nose. A lot of scavengers were none too familiar with the concept of bathing.
“I was headed for the mountains to get back to a cache of stuff I hid. Was going to bring it back here to trade and then sit out the winter in my tent. Anyway, I came across a camp of other scavengers. Figured I’d join them. Safety in numbers, you know.”
Annette nodded. “I know.”
“They had her with her. Captured her a couple of days ago. Had her stripped and tied to a tree.”
Annette’s stomach turned. How many times during her years wandering in the wildlands had men tried to do that to her? How many times had she killed to keep that from happening? The scavenger went on.
“They offered to give me a turn for some trade. That’s not the way I am. Well, I have a gun and they didn’t. So I took her away and brought her back here.”
“You know their names? The men who did this?”
“No. Sorry. I’d recognize them, though. If they winter here I’ll point them out to you.”
Annette only nodded. Before the scavenger left he gave the woman a small bag. She murmured a thank you and opened it. Mechanically she started eating the dried fruit it contained.
Annette turned to the crowd. “OK, spread the word. I’ll post a notice today but I want you to start telling everybody. We’re taking in any member of the Righteous Horde who surrenders. Anyone caught keeping one of them for their own. . .uses. . .will be charged with kid
napping. Now move along.”
There were a few grumbles from the back of the crowd, but none from those who stood closer. They had overheard the scavenger’s story.
Clyde came over with a scowl on his face that softened when he saw the four new prisoners. What Annette guessed was going to be a tirade about giving aid and comfort to the enemy turned into a muted grumble about the extra expense of more hungry mouths.
The next hour was spent building a new enclosure near the wall but well away from the machete men. Jackson managed to borrow an old sail from one of the fishermen to make a shelter. A market trader who had heard the story gave the rape victim a blanket and offered to take her into her own home. Annette was tempted but finally said no. She couldn’t accept the liability of having a member of the Righteous Horde wandering loose around town.
Once the four were enclosed in wire and were picking clean a cold chicken the market trader brought over, Annette scrounged some old magazines that had faded enough that they could be written over and posted her new announcement all over the Burbs. She stuck one on the wall next to New City gate as well. The guard objected but Clyde overruled him.
As she was walking away from the gate she spotted Pablo talking to Jeb through the barbed wire.
“Pablo! Get over here right this instant!”
Her son came running over, looking guilty as hell.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“He’s a baseball star. He was giving me tips.”
“You know better than to go talk to someone like that!”
“I stayed out of reach.”
Annette couldn’t help but smile. The kid had seen enough in the Burbs that he knew how to take care of himself. He had been in no real danger. But Pablo didn’t have her automatic suspicion of everyone’s motives. He’d been raised in the Burbs, not the wildlands, and still had a bit of innocence left. That was why she had settled here in the first place.
“Don’t go near him again, you got that?”
“OK,” he said, looking glumly at his feet.
“What did he say to you, anyway? Did he call you over?”
“No.”
“So what did he say to you?”
“I asked him for some tips. He told me how to carve a better bat.”
“Did he offer to make you one himself?”
Pablo looked at her like she was stupid.
“No. He’d need a knife for that and I’m not going to give him one.”
Annette laughed. “That’s my boy! Go run along now, and don’t talk to him again, OK?”
“All right.”
Annette looked long and hard at the prisoner. He nodded in acknowledgement and then turned away. What was he up to? Annette shook her head. She had to stop being so suspicious of everyone. Hell, she’d even doubted Marcus. This machete man had saved her life, had begged to be allowed to stay. Was it so strange that he wanted to talk about baseball with a kid? He was grasping for some normality in his life, just like she had when she first moved here.
Yeah, she should give him the benefit of the doubt. He seemed like an OK guy deep down.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The rising sun woke Jeb up early the next morning. A sharp breeze blew into his face from the shoreline barely a pistol shot away. In his sleep he had rolled himself up in his blanket like a sausage, but he was still chilled and stiff. He stood and stretched his aching muscles. One by one the other machete men rose and did the same.
All except one. The thinnest—Jeb didn’t know his name and didn’t care—lay huddled in his blanket, looking pale. Every now and then he let out a weak cough.
“You better not get us sick,” Jeb grumbled.
He was disappointed to see that it wasn’t the guy who saw him slip the knife to Leonard. He had to figure out a way to get rid of him without anyone suspecting.
Breakfast came and once again Jeb got a double share. As the guard served out the food Jeb asked if Annette was going to come.
The guard merely shrugged. “How am I supposed to know what goes on in the Burbs?”
“I don’t get that. It’s like you’re two different cities,” Jeb probed.
“There’s only one city, buddy. New City. That dump over there’s called the Burbs and it’s nothing but a bunch of drifters, scavengers, and hangers-on.”
“They’re bigger than you.”
“And there’s more toxic land than green. I guess that’s just the way of the world.”
“But they fought at your side,” Jeb objected. For some reason he felt offended by this guy’s attitude.
“Yeah, and nearly got the whole place destroyed. If we hadn’t let them in your spies wouldn’t have shot The Doctor. Hell, you guys almost got the gate open!”
“I didn’t have anything to do with that. They didn’t tell us anything.”
That was true to a point. The Pure One had sent the spies ahead of the main force. They’d been living in the Burbs for more than a month, posing as scavengers and traders. Even the Elect didn’t know about them until just before the attack.
“We would have lost a lot fewer citizens if we had just let the Burbs people stay outside the walls like usual,” the guard said.
Jeb blinked. Like usual? So on previous attacks—and there must have been previous attacks, the wildlands had been full of bandits before the Righteous Horde wiped them out—the people of the Burbs had been left to fend for themselves?
Jeb’s reaction must have made it to his face because the guard went on.
“What, you’re surprised? We’ve never let those people inside before, except for the kids and the associates, who are sort of half citizens. Why would we? Civilization stops at the wall.”
With that the guard turned and left. Jeb watched him go.
Yeah, civilization stops at the wall, but on which side?
Jeb sat down to eat his breakfast and watch New City and the Burbs waking up. Citizens strolled in and out of the gate, some casting curious or hostile glances in his direction. One guy flipped him off. Their pen was set a little to one side of the gate so he couldn’t see inside, but he imagined the well-fed residents of those cozy homes all going about their business without a care in the world now that the Righteous Horde and been slaughtered and driven back into the wildlands. The smell of baking bread wafted through the air from that direction. The bread he’d been given along with the two eggs for his breakfast was still warm and fresh. He guessed it must have come from that unseen bakery inside.
If we’d won we would have had as much bread as we could eat, but hell, I’m getting enough now and this place still stands. I think I got a better chance as a prisoner here than a member of the Elect wandering through the wildlands right now.
It had gotten bad after the defeat. The Pure One had given a furious speech about how God had abandoned their cause because there were too many sinners in the ranks. His bodyguards had rounded up some of the Elect, those who were slow to pray and quick to mock, and had gunned them down as an example. While hardly anyone he knew had taken The Pure One’s theology seriously, Jeb had always been careful to tow the line. The smart ones all did.
The Pure One then said that the army had to cleanse itself. Most of the women were ditched, there were prayer meetings morning, noon, and night, and any members of the Elect who didn’t join in enthusiastically enough were shot.
The whole thing was ready to explode. He and the other members of the Elect had always resented the bodyguards for getting the best women and food, and the bodyguards knew it. Some Elect got all subservient, trying to please their masters. Others deserted. On the third day of the retreat some started a coup. That came as a surprise to Jeb—he hadn’t been asked to join—and after a quick appraisal of how the battle would go he threw in with the loyalists. The coup was stamped out within an hour and the surviving rebels were crucified.
There had been a lot more executions in the following days. Jeb knew that sooner or later his number would be up, that sooner or later he
’d make some mistake—not bow his head enough during prayer, not smile enough to some bodyguard in a bad mood, or simply be caught standing too close to the wrong conversation. He had to get out of there. So one night when he was on sentry duty at the perimeter he’d clubbed the man next to him and lit out for the wildlands.
And now he was here.
A citizen emerged from New City gate pushing a handcart. Its top was piled with something covered in a sheet. As he passed by, heading for the Burbs, Jeb and the others caught a whiff of freshly baked bread. He and the others crowded up to the wire and watched the cart disappear down the main street toward the market. Even the sick man roused himself to watch the bounty go by.
As the baker disappeared out of sight, the machete men lay back down in the same listless postures as before, except for the one who knew his secret. He edged up close to Jeb.
“Hey man, looks like we’re not so bad off now, eh? That lady sheriff is taking good care of us. I guess once they’ve pumped us for what we know they’ll let us loose, huh? You think?”
Jeb didn’t respond. Instead he looked around. They sat under the tarp and the sentries couldn’t see them. Not that the sentries cared. They could see the wire perimeter and that’s all they needed to see. If the machete men tried to make a break for it, they could pick them off at their leisure. The guy next to him continued.
“So how did you end up getting double rations? Is it because you saved Annette? Or at least they think you saved Annette. Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me.”
Jeb kept looking around. There were a few people about, but no one was looking in their direction at that moment.
“So remember who your friends are, OK? Maybe put a good word in for me and get me some extra food? I could be real useful to—”
Jeb spun and gave the machete man a savage right hook. The man sprawled out flat and didn’t move. The others looked at him wide-eyed. Jeb checked the guy’s pulse. He was alive. Alive and a bit smarter than before. He’d love to kill this piece of shit but that would look suspicious. He needed to figure out another way.
Standing up, he dragged him over to where the sick man lay. Maybe this idiot would catch it.
Refugees from the Righteous Horde (Toxic World Book 2) Page 12