by Perrin Briar
“They call Grayskins monsters. But they don’t do such terrible things to each other. People do. I say neither are monsters. It’s just the way the world is now. We are who we are.”
Quinn got up and walked to a shelf in the back where all the larger books were kept. He pulled out a flashlight to read the titles.
“Where did you get that?” Siren said.
“Turns out that store had a few things worth taking after all,” Quinn said.
He walked back to the chairs with an atlas under his arm.
“I still don’t see why it’s our responsibility to help people we don’t even know,” Siren said.
Quinn blew the dust off the old book and read the title: Atlas of Texas Cities.
“Then don’t worry about helping them,” Quinn said. “Just think about helping the people you do care about.”
Siren looked at him sadly, frowning.
“Great,” she said. “Except they’re all dead.”
Quinn looked her in the eyes.
“You said your brother always saw something in you, like you had to prove something to the world,” he said. “He was always convinced you would do something great. So am I. This is your chance. We have to learn to change people’s opinions, influence them and get them to do what we want them to do. Maybe this is the great thing Wyvern was talking about.”
Siren did not seem convinced.
“You’ve never told me exactly how you plan to make this happen,” she said. “You’ve only said you want to influence people and bring them together with Grayskins. But how is that going to work? What do you intend to make these people do?”
Quinn looked Siren over, his eyes searching hers.
“I can’t tell you,” Quinn said. “Yet.”
He opened the atlas and ran his finger down the table of contents, the list of maps.
“Not until we’re both ready,” he said. “All I’ll say is that we have to learn to change people’s opinions.”
And, judging by Siren’s expression, the first opinion he would need to change was Siren’s.
QUINN slammed the atlas shut, frustrated. He tossed the large volume onto the center shelf unit of the library, and stared out the window.
“I have no idea where we are,” he said, embarrassed. “The maps in this book are old.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Siren said. “I know where I’m going. Don’t you trust me?”
Quinn gave her a direct look that made her feel like she was getting an x-ray. Siren looked back.
“I’m not going to run away,” she said. “I mean, I owe you now.”
She looked sheepish. She still had doubts about Quinn, and did not want to profess any loyalty to him.
“So where are we headed?” Quinn said.
Siren returned his expression. They were playing a game. Somehow, in that dress, she felt more confident, more of a force to reckon with.
“You won’t tell me your plan,” she said. “I think I’ll keep mine to myself ‘until we’re ready.’”
Backpack on, she walked toward the door.
“I think one of the houses will be more comfortable for tonight,” she said. “You coming?”
Quinn finally picked up his backpack and shotgun and followed her.
“Thanks for the ice cream,” Siren said with a smile.
AFTER a very restful night in the home of what must have been the most affluent family in the small town, Siren had enjoyed her favorite breakfast—canned peaches. They tasted great, but hardly provided the fuel needed for the long marches in the vast expanses between Texas towns.
It was midmorning and still a bit cool, but they had been walking for three hours and Siren was already famished. It was a feeling she was now accustomed to, but that did not take it away. It only made it expected, not a crisis.
A pair of two-lane roads intersected. Siren steered them right to go west. The sun was behind them, as was the wind. It was an easier walk. Siren was getting bored, and wondered what they could talk about, having more or less sworn not to talk about the most important thing. She looked at Quinn and wondered what he was thinking.
“Penny for your thoughts,” she said.
“You seem much happier recently,” Quinn said.
“That’s what you’ve been thinking the last three hours?” Siren said.
“I’ve been wondering where we’re going,” Quinn said. “But I know you won’t tell me that.”
Quinn shook his head, kept walking, looking down at the pavement two feet in front of him.
“You know, it isn’t any big secret,” Siren said. “I can’t keep it from you.”
She was toying with him now.
“Then tell me,” Quinn said, knowing she would not.
“I didn’t say I had to tell you,” Siren said. “But I can’t keep it from you. You can read the signs.”
“A riddle?” Quinn said. “You’re giving me riddles now?”
“Yeah,” Siren said. “Too bad you can’t have your Grayskin buddies think for you.”
Quinn scowled. He shook his head, frowned, and said nothing.
“Besides, it wasn’t a riddle,” Siren said. “I said you can read the signs. Get it?”
Quinn looked at her. Then he looked behind them. There were signs way back at the turn, but they only had numbers and letters that meant nothing to him. He looked ahead, not at the ground but far ahead on the road. A green sign said:
Whitegate 7
He stopped. Siren stopped. Quinn’s mouth dropped open. Siren’s mouth quirked into a smile. She watched him with curiosity.
“What the hell?” Quinn said. “What are you thinking? Why are you taking us back to Whitegate?”
“I thought that’s where you wanted to go,” Siren said honestly.
“Why on earth would I want to go back to Whitegate after what happened there?” Quinn said. “Why would you want to go back?”
“You said you needed a large community,” Siren said. “Well, this is the largest one I know about. What’s wrong with Whitegate? You’re already a known leader there.”
Siren genuinely could not understand what the problem was.
“Siren, they think you’re a murderer,” Quinn said. “And they probably think I’m a traitor for letting you go.”
“Good,” Siren said, turning to start walking again.
“Stop!” Quinn said.
Siren Sensed powerful fear in him. She had to use her Skill to help him. She Pulled using his confidence, his ego. They were always working inside him, more powerful than his fear.
“This is not in any way good, Siren,” Quinn said. “You could have chosen any community. Why this one?”
“You said we have to learn to change people’s opinions,” Siren said slowly, deliberately. “If we can change them here, we can change them anywhere.”
Quinn posed with his hands on his hips. He still wasn’t convinced.
“And if we can’t?” Quinn said.
“Then we won’t have much to worry about, will we?” Siren said.
The unspoken truth hung over their heads like a dark cloud. Quinn was heading home. Siren, most likely, was heading for a jail cell.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“FEAR,” Siren said.
As they moved within sight of the town and got serious, she had lost the humorous disposition she had when she was making fun of Quinn.
“They have been killing a lot of Grayskins,” Quinn said.
Without him, Whitegate people had to fight off Grayskins on a more or less regular basis. For Quinn, the last hour had been a time not of contemplation on his return to his former home, but of furious strategic thinking.
He had decided the best way was to approach them straight-on without hiding anything back. He had learned from his experience with Siren. He looked over at her as they walked. She was beautiful, smart, and a superior fighter. If she stopped moving long enough in a place like Whitegate, boys would notice. Men of all ages would notice. He wondered how
she would handle that, remembering their good times, her smiling and laughing with him, back in the last town. That would only matter if they survived the first minutes and hours here, preferably without bloodshed on either side.
Quinn shook his head and tried to focus. He could not send the Grayskins away, or people would get suspicious. He became aware of them, marking their locations in his mind. He gave them a simple instruction not to attack, nothing more.
On the other side of town, a woman at her kitchen door armed with a steel pan, watched as the Grayskins outside the door stop trying to break in, and just stood there. She opened the wooden screen door and cracked him on the head with the pan.
The wind picked up as they passed a sign that said Welcome to Whitegate. Quinn thought he saw a bullet hole in the sign, but did not stop to investigate.
The sun was high in the west and hit their faces like a light in a police interrogation room. They passed an auto repair shop on the left, an old dance hall on the right. The dance hall had wagon wheels stuck in the dirt on either side of a yellow sign with moveable letters on it. The letters did not make sense because some of them had fallen off.
They passed a cemetery, then the church that belonged to it. It was made of red brick, just like the Methodist church they had seen in the other town. It had a small brick tower leading to the steeple. There was a man inside, probably with a rifle, but he was just a lookout. He had no doubt signaled the rest of the town of the arrival of Siren and Quinn.
Quinn remembered the church being in good repair when he was there last. It was used on a regular basis for its intended purpose as a house of worship. But now the windows were boarded up. The doors swung freely in the wind, and inside he could see the pews were in disarray. A number of them were missing. Used for firewood possibly, he thought.
“Well,” Quinn said. “What do you think?”
Siren looked over at him like he should have already known.
“Fear,” she said.
She reached back and made sure her arrows were accessible. Her bow was there too, but Siren did not draw it. She was taking her cue from Quinn, who still had the sixteen-gauge strapped across his back. Not that it was loaded, but nobody else knew that.
“You said that before,” Quinn said. “But there’s always fear.”
Quinn had his attention on the windows of the houses around him, many with eyes staring out at him and his companion. They were close enough to recognize him. But they did not come to meet him. They did not greet him and they did not attack. Whitegate sure had changed.
“No, this is different,” Siren said, looking up and around.
Down one street a woman gathered her boy in her arms and ran inside a Cape Cod house painted a dull white.
“Not fear of something that might come,“ Siren said, her face turning grim. “This is fear of something right beside you. Very close. Like family.”
They came to a well-maintained communal garden. Not a single weed poked out of the ground amidst the corn, tomato, and potato plants. No one was in the garden, no one on the streets. The town was not abandoned. The whole population was present. But the people were all inside, hiding. It was like a scene from an old western. Except that Quinn and Siren did not have any working guns.
Down the street was the main square. Quinn could see the statue of a Confederate war hero on his rearing horse. The sight of it always chilled him and excited him at the same time. Off to their left was the old Baptist church that had been used as a meeting place. In the churchyard were picnic tables, some of them turned over, as if a strong storm had hit and blown them out of place.
To the right was a two-story, plain, square brick building painted white. It had sliding glass windows, and a set of double glass and steel doors. On the doors in gold letters were the words Whitegate Chamber of Commerce.
Siren and Quinn stopped walking. This was the building where the town council met, and where their leader, Quinn’s father Greer, had his office. Quinn looked at Siren, whose look told him she understood. They had to go in.
The front doors were unlocked. They walked in and through the lobby. It was round, with a terrazzo floor, and a raised round reception desk. There was no one at the reception desk.
Greer’s office was on the fourth floor, down a dark hallway. The hallway reeked of cigar smoke. Strange, Quinn thought, as Greer didn’t smoke cigars.
They walked to the door and knocked. The door opened. They walked through. Greer’s desk was in the center back of the room.
But Greer was not there.
Rafael sat at the huge desk, smoking a cigar.
Fear indeed.
Chapter Twenty-Four
GREER’S office was paneled with dark wood. The walls displayed pictures of men in suits shaking hands. There were also pictures of men with fish and deer they had apparently caught or killed, trophies of a hunting pastime. In one corner was a pile of now useless computer equipment.
The office had previously been occupied by the president of the Chamber of Commerce, which was not a very glorified position in this little town. Still, it was glorified enough to allow the occasional fishing or hunting trip. Siren allowed herself to imagine such a time, when hunting and fishing were hobbies. When grocery stores were living businesses, not trash heaps as dead as the animals pictured on Greer’s office wall.
Rafael seemed an unlikely character to have taken over Whitegate. He had been a factory supervisor, the kind that became supervisor due to attrition and seniority, not from any leadership ability. He always needed someone else to blame or look to for instruction. Not the kind of man who could take ultimate responsibility for anything.
The room was crowded. The door had been opened by a tall, thin, gray-haired man who now stared at Quinn and Siren. But most of the other women and men standing around the room did not make eye contact. They all knew the pair before them.
These were the town’s leaders, the council. But it did not look like they were practicing democracy. It appeared Rafael was passing along some kind of orders.
“That’ll be all,” Rafael said. “It appears I have guests. Leave us and close the door.”
He said it as if he were speaking to a servant. The council filtered out into the hall. Rafael turned the gaze of his small black eyes on Quinn, who was now seething. Siren could see his hands clench into fists, but they were not shaking.
“What the hell is going on?” Quinn said. “Where’s Greer?”
Rafael looked at him as if he were Greer himself, counseling his son.
“Your father has been voted off the council,” Rafael said.
He leaned back in his chair, took a draw off the cigar, letting his words slowly sink in.
“After Mitt’s death and the loss of our supply line from the Merchant—well, he was no longer seen as an effective leader,” Rafael said.
He closed his eyes smugly, then looked directly at Quinn.
“Oh, and I almost forgot, his son betrayed us and let a murderer go,” he said, glaring at Siren. “Welcome back, by the way.”
He grinned under his black mustache. Siren’s fists clenched too.
“So,” Rafael said. “Greer was out, I was in.”
“They put you in charge?” Quinn said, face registering disbelief.
Siren didn’t get it either. She did not know anything about politics, but this man did not look like he could handle anything on his own. He seemed more like a glorified henchman or gopher.
“I had a plan,” Rafael said. “I explained how I could provide the same things we were getting before—protection and supplies—by making a deal with the Raiders. So I did. And it is working.”
Rafael darted a look back at them both. Siren could Sense his need for approval, even from outcasts like her and Quinn. He stood up behind the desk.
“I am no longer in your father’s shadow, Quinn,” Rafael said. “I am running things here. Greer has not only been removed from the council, he has been banned from Whitegate altogether. He cannot se
t foot here again.”
Quinn was enraged now.
“What?” he said. “He founded this community! You can’t just kick him out!”
“He is no longer Whitegate’s best chance of survival,” Rafael said. “I am.”
“Where is he now?” Quinn said. “I want to see him.”
“No one knows,” Rafael said. “But wherever he is, you should let him be. No one wants him here any longer. Besides, you have other things to worry about. Namely, your crimes.”
He looked at them sternly. Siren Sensed his lust for power. He wanted to build his own strength in the town by making examples of them.
“Quinn didn’t let me go,” Siren said, looking him straight in the eye and Pushing.
Rafael’s ambition could also be fueled by a need to appear as a just and compassionate ruler. Siren could use that.
“He was my hostage,” she said.
“You looked mighty warm cuddled up by the fire when I arrived,” Rafael said with a smile.
“You know my ability, what I can do to people,” Siren said, a twisted, smug smile affixing her face. “I didn’t need to force him. He was my pet. He still is. And I can still be useful to you. You know I can.”
Siren exuded nothing but confidence. She thought Rafael was a wild card. Weak as a leader, and unpredictable as a man. The more pressure he felt, the worse things were going to get.
Siren Pushed hard, and Rafael’s fear subsided as his ambition took the reins. He believed her, mainly because his arrogance clouded his sense of reality. She was getting good at this, Siren thought to herself. But Rafael was weak now, his emotions calm. She roused his excitement at the possibilities he would have, the control using her gift. She Sensed his head fill with dreams of power.
“Greer should never have had the power he had alone,” Siren said. “He should have shared the leadership. He never knew your full potential.”
Rafael looked at her sideways, suspicious, a slight smile forming at the corners of his mouth.
“You know what, little lady,” Rafael said as the smile grew wider. “I think you could be a real asset to this community. You can stay. We’ll review you periodically. It’s possible that a mistake has been made with regard to your guilt in Mitt’s death. It certainly deserves more investigation.”