by A. S. Hames
“Take her inside,” Ax orders the old man.
The old man looks uncertain, but Ax isn’t someone you can argue with. There’s a moment where I feel he’s about to dish out the same treatment, but the old man leans down, grabs the woman’s hands, and begins to haul her back to safety.
“It’s for the best,” Zu tells him.
Our captain then orders us back to the trail. We’re southbound once more.
5. Questions
BEN
We cover a few miles before I begin to feel safe from the Riverside rebel threat. Thanks to the bloodstains on the map, there’s still no visible detail relating to where we are – but what can we do? With the sun sinking toward the horizon across the west of these wide open flat lands, we can only keep going as long as possible.
Then, as bad luck would have it, we see a lake.
“Looks like birds on it,” Zu says.
“Ducks,” Jay says. “Dare we shoot?”
And that’s the bad luck, because shooting birds would be heard miles away and could easily draw attention to us. The way things have gone so far, that’s the last thing we need right now.
“Maybe a couple of shots,” Ax says.
“Are you sure?” I say. “I’d rather starve than be chased by rebels.”
“I reckon we’re far enough.”
“From the town, yes – but what if there are more of them south of here?”
“We need to eat.”
“I suppose… I’d just hate us to take on more bad luck than we’re already carrying.”
Jay weighs in. “It’s alright, Ben. We’ll keep our eyes and ears open. We’ll hide at the first sign of anything.”
“Even so,” says Ax. “We’ll limit our shooting and we won’t hang around too long.”
With the plan agreed, we get into a good position and settle, nice and quiet. Once everything is still, Ax, Jay, and me line up our shots.
“Okay, get ready,” Ax says. “In three, two, one…”
Krak-krak-krak!
A flurry of feathers… the birds head east… leaving an injured duck flapping on the shoreline.
“Was that you, Ax?” Zu says.
Hmmm, she’s way too impressed by him.
“Come on, Von,” I say, and we hurry over there. I don’t like to see creatures suffer so I switch my mind to other things while I grab the bird and wring its neck.
When I get back, we hide in some bushes, dribbling with hunger, and wait to see if we’ve alerted anyone nearby. Two gut-gurgling minutes later, when nothing has happened, we leave the lake and walk for an hour. By then, with dusk falling, we’ve found a creek – and we’re stopping and making a fire to cook our duck.
The meat, oh the juicy, fatty meat – it tastes fantastically good and we eat fast and efficiently. There’s no conversation, no eye contact, just the business of tearing, chewing, and swallowing quickly so we can tear and chew some more – like filling our stomachs is some kind of competition. It didn’t take us long to lose the difference in the way humans and wolves eat.
JAY
Morning wakes me from a restless sleep, although I can’t recall any of the nightmares I know I’ve had. The air feels fresher here. I believe we’re in a dip in the landscape and there’s the creek nearby, of course. It makes a change from the dry, dusty trail.
In myself, I’m beginning to feel useless. We’re still hundreds of miles from a place we have almost no hope of reaching and I’m carrying a detailed report I can’t read. Ben was right to ask about it. We’re risking a lot – for what? In the end it comes down to hope. But is it right to believe in an official of a government that distorts the truth in so many ways?
I head off to take a closer look at the southern horizon. Von comes with me.
“What do you think, Von? Do you think we’re crazy? What if we’re walking into something worse than we’ve left behind?”
Our wolf watches me. He’s keen and intelligent. I’d sometimes like to hand him Ax’s captain’s badge. Out here in the quiet morning, it’s much easier to get a sense of him. He’s calm and ready. In my mind, I tell him to sit.
He doesn’t.
“It’s not that difficult, Von.”
I look across to the east…
“Oh…”
Feeling a little excited, I cover fifty yards to some bushes alongside a creek and start picking and eating berries. Once I’ve called everyone over, we’re all eating berries and digging up worms and bugs alongside the water.
Ax goes off by himself, maybe to think about things. I watch him from a distance and once more wonder about his time away. I find myself going to join him.
Seeing me, he seems to tighten up.
“Not more questions about empaths?”
“No… no… I keep wondering about the Representative. You know, whether we can trust in what he told me.”
“We’ve been through it a dozen times. I wouldn’t trust him, but we have no choice. As for what he said about military men… I want this war to end as much as you do.”
“And the colonel?”
“I never got the impression he loved the war. I always assumed he was just waiting for the day he could make a worthwhile change, like maybe shoot the Leader.”
“I don’t think the letter will stop the war, Ax.”
“Nor do I.”
“But what if it could?”
“There’s that little problem again.”
“The Representative was in the north. What do you think he was doing?”
“No idea. It wasn’t a social visit, that’s for sure.”
“You think he planned all the fake stuff with the redcoats?”
“Maybe.”
“The colonel told me you fought alongside them.”
“I did. I went with them into the East State as a spy. I did things there I’m not proud of. Bad things. But necessary things.”
“What things, Ax?”
He shakes his head and won’t say. I try to get a sense of him, but there’s nothing. It’s like he doesn’t exist.
“What are the real redcoats like, Ax?”
“There aren’t any – as such. One of their leaders wears a blood red coat, so we used that. Next thing you know, the whole of the Nation has a fear and hatred of that uniform. If you tell people it’s the redcoats attacking our towns, it’s easier to control public opinion.”
“So what are they like? As people?”
“If you really want to know what they’re like, think of home. Think of the people you know back there. The redcoats are just like that.”
“Like us, you mean.”
“Yes, the enemy we’ve been taught to hate is a bunch of people just like us. The Nation used them to cover the fact it was our own people rising up against the tyrant you call the Leader.”
I think of Ma calling the Leader a liar.
“Do they have freedom?”
“In the north? More than anyone living in the Nation, that’s for sure, but it’s a tough life. Winter in the far north is dangerous, but, if they don’t freeze to death, they do okay.”
“When you said you did bad things… did they know you were capable of that, Ax? Is that why they chose you?”
“You really do ask too many questions.”
“Why did you put me into bad situations?”
“What?”
“You had me crawl to that outpost and I felt I’d die of fear. Then you put me on a firing squad…”
“Yeah, well, I’m sorry about that. I just… hated you so badly. You were like a traitor to your own family.”
Not for the first time, his words stab me. I can’t stop a tear forming.
“I never meant to hurt you or Ma and Pa.”
“It’s not just that. It’s… those bad things I did? At least I knew some of the truth about the Nation. But every so often, I’d be in a tent somewhere, lying awake at night thinking about you spouting garbage about the Leader and… I just wanted you to feel a small piece of what clog
s up my heart and soul.”
“Oh, Ax… I used to lie awake in my bed thinking about you. And all I could do was pray for your safety.”
“Yeah, well… I’m starting to see it different now. For what’s it’s worth, I hope you get to be a teacher and have a good life. You deserve a better brother than me. Just make sure you teach facts. I mean real facts.”
I want to reach out to him, but I’m not sure how.
“Did you have to kill many people, Ax?”
“Didn’t you hear what the general said? I cut out the beast’s heart. Or some motivating crap like that.”
“He said you’d faced the dark-hearted enemy up close and slain that devil-monster. He said you tore out its entrails and stabbed out its eyes.”
“Yeah, except it wasn’t a devil-monster. It was a woman called Julia Longwood.”
“A woman?” I feel sick. “You did all that… to a woman?”
“I married her first, and influenced a vital war decision, and… if there had been a choice…”
“You married her? Then… you butchered her?”
“It’s what we do with thought-stealing empaths, Jay. It gained me a lot of trust. Trust is useful.”
“She was an empath? The poor woman.”
“You obviously never met her.”
“Was she bad?”
“Oh, she was bad. Just don’t ask me for details.”
We’re soon back on the trail, taking with us as many berries as we can carry. It’s steady progress. We’re on alert, of course, but there’s time to study the map and use a fingernail dipped in spit and dirt to pencil in features over the bloodstains, such as the hills and the railroad that joins us on the right. I prefer that to thinking about Julia Longwood with her eyes stabbed out.
Toward the end of the day, when the heat has slowed our progress to a trudge, Zu says she feels sick. My mind turns to the berries, but it can’t be that. It must be the fact that we’re trying to go too far on too little. We pull off the trail and settle down. By the time we’ve eaten more berries, she looks a little better.
It turns the other way overnight though and I fear for our unwarlike friend. We mop her brow and give her water. I think of the child-sergeant alone or dead in a distant forest, and I think of Taff, forever trapped in a sinking car. I wonder if we’ll have to leave Zu on the trailside.
6. Everything Changes
JAY
I’m with Julia Longwood, an empath with great powers. She shows me how she gets into people’s minds and discovers their secrets, which she threatens to reveal to their friends and family. Strong people bow down before her as they have no way to defend themselves. And they can’t kill her – she’s guarded by armed men, so nobody gets close.
Julia takes control of settlements and towns. Her authority grows. She likes to avenge murdered empaths by punishing those who are guilty. She shows me how to do this… by taking a long, rusty knife…
I sit up. My heart is racing. It’s almost dawn, so I go to check on Zu. She’s sleeping, so I leave her be.
A little later, as the sky begins to turn from gray-orange to blue, I’m pleased to see she’s recovered enough to force herself onto her feet. Once we’ve eaten more bugs and berries, Ben gives her his straw hat, and we continue on. And when Zu decides she can’t go on, we halt our journey once more.
Most of my thinking is dominated by Julia Longwood. When I was young, and those people wanted to cut out my organs with a rusty knife, I thought of empaths as victims. As I grew up, I could see how temptation and opportunity would affect an empath as much as an ordinary person, but, somewhere in me, I always supposed empaths would aspire to a higher ideal. It was only lowly, suspicious, non-empaths who were capable of vile deeds. But now? With Ax? With Julia Longwood? I’m worried. I believe the Representative was an empath, and yet he was a rotten individual. So is that it? Empaths are just as likely to do bad things, only they’re able to do so in far more effective ways? That doesn’t inspire me.
Later, when I’m with Ax, I ask him about it.
“About Julia Longwood… you said if there had been a choice. Would you have let a bad woman live?”
“I would have tried to turn her toward clemency, Jay, but it’s a long process and I had my orders.”
“How would you have turned her?”
“It’s a power I have. You have it too. Well, you always had the potential. Maybe you’ve lost it by now.”
I’m surprised. It takes me a moment to gather my thoughts.
“Could you help me get it back?”
“We don’t have the time. Or the energy.”
I sigh. At least he said no for a good reason.
“Do you think the colonel was an empath, Ax?”
“No idea. Why do you ask?”
“Before I left home, I overheard Ma talking with him.”
“Oh?” Ax seems interested, so I explain that part of the story. I don’t mention anything about getting Ma reported. I still can’t work out how Ax might respond to that.
“Did you know Pa was friends with the colonel?” he says.
“Yes, the colonel told me.”
“Okay, so after I volunteered, it was Pa who persuaded the colonel to train me as a spy.”
I think the heat has got to Ax’s brain.
“Pa died three years ago, Ax. Before you went into the army.”
“Pa’s not dead.”
“What?” I feel dizzy. I have to get away but I can’t breathe. Ben, Zu, and Von come to my aid, so I can’t say anything – but my mind is tumbling over and over. Pa? Alive? Nothing makes sense. Nothing!
It takes a while for me to regain some kind of composure. Then I almost laugh. I want to be a teacher, but how can I teach when I know absolutely nothing? What did Ax say? Teach facts? I don’t know any!
It’s another half hour before our strung out line allows me to get back to my brother in private.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “You were so loyal to the Nation. Too loyal for us to…”
“You didn’t trust me?”
“No.”
“But… I wouldn’t have… I mean…”
“Sorry, Jay, but we couldn’t risk telling you anything. The thought of Ma being executed because of your blind loyalty to that piece of shit in the Lake Towns…”
I just want to cry like a baby, but I bite my lip and sniff. I know the mistakes I’ve made. My only contract with myself now is that I won’t be making those mistakes again. I don’t trust the Leader, but I do believe it’s our duty to end this damned stupid war if we can. After that, the Nation needs to be reborn.
“So where’s Pa now?”
“The truth? I don’t know. I haven’t seen him in a long time. He went into the north and, like I told you, that’s a dangerous place to be. We have to accept he could be dead.”
I breathe out a long sigh.
“Poor Pa. I miss him.”
“Me too.”
“I miss Ma too. One thing she did warn me… last time I saw her… she said the Nation is about to fall.”
“She was right.”
“Is that why you married Julia Longwood? And why you killed her? To stop the Nation falling? Or was it to speed it up?”
“It’s more complicated than saying I’m for or against the Nation.”
“You can explain it to me.”
“The situation has moved on. I’m not sure where we’re at now. All I can tell you is the two families fighting for control of this land won’t stop until one of them wins.”
“Are you saying all this death is down to two families fighting?”
“Yes, and I believe one of the families is made up of empaths.”
“Wow. I think the Representative was an empath… so… the Leader might be too.”
“You’re probably right. Now do you see how complicated everything is, and how little you knew when you were professing your loyalty to the Leader.”
I think of the Leader and the Representative, and I think of Col
onel Steven Rose and how little I understand people and their true motives.
“But… the letter. The Representative said he’d worked out a deal where the Leader wouldn’t suffer a loss of face.”
“That’s the only reason we’re heading south, Jay. Because if he was telling the truth, that might actually be enough to end the war. Be warned though. The situation might have changed and we could be risking our lives for nothing.”
“We need to read it, Ax.”
“We do.”
“Only, I didn’t pay enough attention to Pa’s games. I don’t think I can do it.”
“That’s okay, Jay. I guessed if you genuinely knew how, you would have done so by now.”
“I didn’t know Pa was teaching me code-breaking. I’m so stupid.”
“No, you’re not. That’s one thing no-one could ever say about my little sister.”
So we walk on – with me wondering if we’re right to continue.
At the end of the day, I spend time thinking about the way this land might be managed better… and how we might stop empaths abusing their powers. And I wonder about the Leader. Is he an empath? If so, how can he be satisfied at holding back his people’s knowledge? Is it like Ax says – all about control?
I study the envelope. Will this persuade him to end the war? How can I know unless I work out how to read it?
I remove the letter and stare at the first few lines…
3 098/9&+ ~9809/. a+ a& 3 #53b~9 820 18a275~ 05+ +6 +9~~ 65 +#8+ +#9 $8/ a2 +#9 26/+#-$9&+ 069& 26+ g6 $9~~. 65/ g929/8~ #8& ~a90 +6 65. $9 8/9 b/a2ga2g 4#a~0/92 a2+6 65/ 7ag#+a2g /82k& 26$.
If I weren’t too weak to concentrate properly, and if I had some fresh paper and a pencil, and a few spare days… but right now, frustratingly, the four pages of the letter just blur into a mess.
“Hey, you okay?” Ben asks.
“I’m fine, thanks. You?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
I get a strong sense that Ben wants to spend some time with me. That’s not my intuition at work, I think he likes me. While we rest, he asks me about life on the farm, so I put the letter away and tell him – leaving out certain facts relating to Ma and Pa.