“Like you killed my father?”
“I did not kill your father. The Karn killed your father.”
“But it was your fault. Now you will pay. If I must die, I will take my loving sister with me!”
“Half-sister,” Winter barked, and without hesitation she slammed her head backward into Malak’s nose, shattering it. She pulled away from his grip, only to be knocked to the ground by the Midlander warrior.
kDira and Agis darted toward Malak, who was temporarily blinded by the pain and blood coming from his nose. Ari took advantage of the distraction to put an arrow through the warrior’s shoulder. He reeled back in pain, letting out a scream that confirmed the hit. Quickly, Ari loosed one more arrow, this one hitting the warrior in the throat, cutting short the scream. He fell to the ground next to Winter, hissing and gagging from the foreign object now lodged in his windpipe.
Agis reached Malak first and attempted to grab him from behind. Malak, regaining his senses, kicked backward into Agis’s knee, dislocating it with a very audible POP. Agis fell to the ground in agony.
Winter got to her feet just as Agis fell, but with her hands tied and one bad foot, she was severely handicapped. kDira, sword drawn, approached Malak. Omiroe rushed around to the side and went to assist Winter, cutting her hands free. Winter pulled the sword from Agis’s sheath, and Omiroe helped her to her feet.
“Well, mum. What are you going to do? Are you going to kill me now?”
“If I must. This is not what I wanted for you,” kDira said, hoping for one last chance to reason with her son. “A lot of people died today. Must there be any more killing?”
“Just one more,” Malak said, lunging at kDira. She parried the swing of his sword with her own, the clank of steel against steel resonating over the alarms.
kDira then countered with her own attack, which was blocked as well. She repeated the attack and again it was blocked.
“You have become quite a skilled warrior, Malak.”
“And you have grown old,” he sneered, quickly advancing his own attacks again. He didn’t see Winter coming up behind him. Before he could even react, Winter had him in a headlock and slammed him down onto one of the metal-top work tables in the room.
“Winter, you surprise me,” Malak said, trying to raise himself from the table. “What do you think you are going to do to me?”
“I am going to do what I should have done years ago, but out of respect for my mother, I did not.”
“And just what is that, my loving half-sister?”
“Kill you, of course.”
With that, she reached down and flicked a switch on the side of the table. As she did, Malak saw a jagged wheel of metal, one he hadn’t noticed before, begin spinning with a loud whirr!
“What are you doing? Let me up! I demand it!”
“Welcome to the future, and the end, Malak,” Winter said, as she slowly inched his head toward the blade.
“Wait! Stop! I command you! I am King Malak!”
And then, without further hesitation, Winter shoved Malak’s head into the spinning blade, the sharp metal slicing deeply into his forehead just above the eyebrows. His scream was very short as he died almost instantly.
“So that’s what that table does,” Omiroe said calmly, as though he just watched a piece of wood get cut.
“Omiroe, help Agis. I will help Winter. We need to get out of here now!”
Winter reached down and shut off the saw. Malak slid to the floor and began spilling blood on the floor.
Omiroe helped Agis to stand on his one good leg as kDira moved to help support Winter, then everyone headed toward the door.
cHAPTER 39
At the terminal, kDira and the other four met up with Lucas Brown and three other Survivors.
“Winter, so glad you are safe!” Lucas said. “Hurry, we must leave the complex now. We have no time. It may already be too late. Come, let’s get you on a trolley.”
Winter and Agis were each placed in a different trolley, and everyone else filled in other seats. As fast as they could, they pushed the throttles full forward, and the little trollies sped towards the west.
“There was nothing you could have done?” kDira asked.
“Malak had shut everything off. Most importantly, he shut the coolant pumps off. I think I got them turned on, but I fear it is too late. The temperature has risen high enough to begin melting the rods, and once that happens, there is nothing to contain them.”
“And then what happens?” Winter asked.
“The whole place goes up in a massive fireball. Everything for a hundred miles from here dies. The land will be unusable for hundreds of years.”
“Is Blackhorn safe?” kDira asked worriedly.
“I think it would be wise to consider packing up quickly and moving west. The radiation will most likely reach Blackhorn.”
“What is radiation?”
“It is like an invisible energy that comes from the metal rods in the reactors. If the metal rods melt through the containment around the reactor, the radiation can escape and make every living thing around it sick, or dead. And it stays for many, many years.”
“Malak said he turned it off,” Winter said.
“Turning it off is exactly what caused this. It’s not something that can just be turned off. The metal rods need to be cooled off completely before the reactor can be shut down properly, and that takes a long time. Without cooling it down, it will just get hotter and hotter. It will build up pressure until it cannot hold it anymore. And then, BOOM.”
The little reactor, having sat without circulation of cooling water for quite some time, grew hotter and hotter. The control rods were never inserted between the uranium fuel rods, so the reaction was never stopped. The water within the containment chamber had begun boiling hours earlier and was turning to steam. The zirconium-encased fuel rods were chemically reacting with the uranium and creating hydrogen in the process.
The pressure was getting so great inside the reactor that the seals were splitting, releasing the hydrogen into the reactor room, which began spilling out into the passageways and mixing with the air in the complex.
Over the next several hours, the entire complex continued to fill with radioactive hydrogen and steam. By the time the Blackhorn and the few remaining Survivors reached the surface at Lexton, it was already finding its way down the tunnel to the west.
kDira and her friends raced to Blackhorn, assisting Agis and Winter as best they could. Agis demanded more than once to be let down and that the others go on, but kDira was not going to allow it. Ari and Omiroe assisted him, sometimes carried him just to move him along. kDira assisted Winter, who despite her heel injury that had yet to heal, was able to make decent time with not too much assistance.
They were minutes from the Blackhorn village when they heard a rumble in the distance followed by a distinct, loud BOOM. The ground shook, and everyone stopped to consider what had just happened.
“That was the reactor blowing,” the engineer said. “There is no going back east now. It is a deadly wasteland.”
“Let us go, we must get to Blackhorn and clear out the village.”
When they reached the walls of the Blackhorn village, they were surprised to find Elick had taken control and everyone was getting ready to evacuate. Carts were being filled, and packs and weapons were all made ready. There were dozens of Survivors assisting in the packing of the carts, helping any way they could.
Elick and Guller had filled a cart with their tomes and scrolls, and any extra room they had was filled with furnishings from their huts.
Charlomine and Star raced to give kDira, Agis, and Winter hugs. Their relief in seeing their sister and parents alive was accentuated by the tears they shed.
Agis and Winter found places on carts, along with the children and elders too frail to walk. When it was evident that all were ready to depart, kDira called everyone around.
“Brave Blackhorn, and those of you from the Survivors, I have
few words to express how I feel. But I am glad you are all still here with me. And I am glad we are making this trip with friends. We must go west now to seek safe ground, away from the deadly cloud that is about to wash across the land. Though it appears the wind is blowing to the east, that could change at any time. We must hope that we can find a good spot to rebuild and start fresh, without the threat of Malak, or any Midlanders ever again.”
“The west is uncharted territory, and we should look on it with excitement, so let us get this caravan rolling, and we will see what the new world brings us.”
Everyone erupted in cheers as the wagons, carts, and people began moving out of the south gate. As they left, kDira looked back at her now abandoned village of Blackhorn. There would be a new Blackhorn Village in the near future, and with the help of the Survivors, it would be stronger, smarter, and bigger than it had ever been.
Winter lay back on the small pile of blankets and garments that occupied the cart she was riding on. She thought about all that she had been through. She thought about Aaron. She thought about how he would have still been alive if not for her. Tears welled up in her eyes. The doctor had been her first and only love. She was not aware of his child slowly growing inside her.
Winter’s
Reign
pART 1
Go West
cHAPTER 1
The mushroom cloud rose high in the sky, but the retreating Blackhorn tribe, unaware, could not see it over the trees. A roar from the Kaiba Forest to the east gave little warning as to what was headed their way.
One of the Survivors from the underground complex shouted what was to come by name: “Shockwave!” Within seconds everyone became aware of what that word meant.
It was the shockwave uprooting trees and cracking limbs over their heads and the storm of debris flying past them at unbelievable speeds that confirmed that something terrible had happened. Anything not tied down went flying, and the roar of the world being ripped to shreds around them was deafening.
As the dust and debris settled, kDira, having been tossed off the path and into the woods as though she were a leaf in the wind, stood up and did an assessment of her body. Satisfied that she was not seriously injured, kDira began looking around to see if others needed help. Several people were already getting up from their landing places and brushing the twigs and leaves from their clothing and hair.
kDira could hear children crying, and suddenly it became most important to find her own daughters Winter, Charlomine, and Star. She was relieved to find her eldest daughter, twenty-year-old Winter, sitting in a wagon being assisted by Miss Davis, one of the Survivors.
“Winter, are you okay? Is your foot okay?”
Winter, her foot still in the brace that had been fashioned to help her Achilles tendon heal, shifted to find a more comfortable position. “I’m fine, mum. Go check on the others.”
“I am so glad you’re okay.”
“Winter!” Benithan called, rushing up to Winter, accompanied by his friend Cayban. “Are you okay? That was a big wind, wasn’t it?” Benithan and Cayban were born the same year as Winter, but to different Princess Mothers; Cayban to Nepra and Benithan to Abril.
“I’m fine, Benithan,” Winter replied.
“Can I do anything for you? Do you need a drink?”
“Beni, I am fine. Go… go find Nissy and Abadella and… help them.”
“They are just kids. Besides, they can take care of themselves. I am here to help you.”
“I can see you are in good hands, Winter,” kDira said with a smirk.
kDira turned and went to the next cart, again relieved to find her two younger daughters were all right. Fifteen-year-old Charlomine was comforting her sister Star. Although Star, at ten seasons of age and the youngest member of the tribe, was crying, she was sitting safely in the cart with several of the other children of the tribe. Star had the warrior instinct that would not let anyone get the better of her, but the blast from the shockwave had been enough to unsettle even the strongest adult warriors.
kDira hugged both her younger daughters and kissed them gently on their foreheads. An elder woman was tending to all the children in the cart and cleaning any superficial wounds with a damp cloth.
“Are they all okay?” kDira asked about all the children in the cart.
“They are all fine,” the elder said, re-dampening her cloth with water from a bota bag. “No serious injuries. We did lose a donk, though.”
“Make sure we hitch up a spare from the back of the caravan.” kDira knelt and hugged her two youngest children again and wiped the tears from her youngest. “Mum will be back,” kDira said. “I have to make sure everyone else is okay.”
“Yes, mum,” the two said in chorus, forcing a smile.
kDira, surprised to find her own eyes watering, realized that the relief of finding all her children safe had overwhelmed her a bit. Now she just had to find…
“Agis!” kDira yelled, after spotting her mate in the distance, sitting on a log and rubbing his injured knee. She ran to him and immediately bent down to put her arms around him in a hug. “Are you okay?” she asked concernedly.
“No,” Agis replied. “A branch flew from one of the trees and hit me squarely on my injured knee. I am in a lot of pain. I worry that I may never walk again.”
“Maybe one of the Survivors can help you with that. I will get Tina Davis over here to look at that knee.”
“Thank you.”
“Don’t go anywhere,” kDira said, rushing off to tend to others.
“Don’t go anywhere, she says…”
kDira came across Ari, who was busy assessing the damage to carts and belongings.
“Ari!” kDira said, putting her arms out to her good friend. Ari accepted the hug and then stepped back.
“kDira, so glad you are okay!”
“I’m happy to see you well, also.”
“None of the carts are broken. As soon as everyone has gathered their wits, we can continue onward.”
“Good to hear. Thank you, Ari.”
“kDira,” a male voice called from further down the caravan. It was one of the Survivors: engineer Lucas Brown. “Is everyone okay?”
“It appears so,” kDira replied. “Aside from some minor cuts and scrapes from tree limbs and branches flying about, the only major injury appears to be Agis, who had a limb fall on his bad knee. He needs someone to look at it.”
“Yes, that blast was pretty bad. We call it a shockwave. It is what happens when a nuclear power plant like the one we had explodes. We must move westward as soon as possible. The radiation released from the fueling rods will make us sick if we stay too long this close to ground zero.”
“You speak some strange words, Lucas. I will just take your word for it for now; later I will ask you to explain all of that to me.”
“Of course. I will see that Agis is taken care of.”
“kDira,” a familiar voice called from the rear of the line of carts and people. It was Omiroe, a sad and concerned look on his face.
“What is wrong, Omiroe?”
“It’s your mother; you need to come to her right away.”
“Why? What’s happened?”
“Just hurry,” Omiroe said, turning and hurrying toward the rear of the caravan.
They slowed when they reached a small gathering where kDira’s mother, Jilleane, was lying on the ground. Edu, Jilleane’s mate and kDira’s father, was kneeling on the ground next to the elder Princess Mother. Tuviast, kDira's seventeen-year-old younger brother, was also kneeling next to his mother and father. Jilleane looked pale white, a trickle of blood leaking from her mouth and nose. Tuviast was crying, and Edu was trying hard not to show emotion as they each held a hand of the dying Princess Mother they both loved.
“What happened?” kDira asked, her own emotions barely held in check as she knelt beside the others.
“A limb came crashing down and hit her, knocking her into the side of the cart. She hit her head hard.”
“Mother, can you hear me?” kDira asked.
Jilleane slowly turned her head to look into her daughter’s eyes. She managed a smile as a tear trickled down the side of her face.
“My dear kDira,” Jilleane said softly.
“Don’t try to speak, mum,” kDira said, gently placing her hand on her mother’s cheek.
Slowly, more of the tribe found their way down to where the elder Princess Mother was lying.
“Now listen, daughter,” Jilleane said, mustering as much dignity as she could, “I want you to know I am very proud of you. I want you to promise me that you will take care of Tuviast after I’m gone.”
“Don’t talk like that,” kDira protested softly. “You’re going to be fine, mum,”
“I don’t think so; I cannot move. I want you to go on without me. Do not mourn my passing. Years ago, you saved me from a life worse than death. Do you remember?”
“Yes, mum, I remember.”
“Now I can rest and just be content knowing that the tribe is in good hands with you. Go now. Be brave and take care of the tribe. The tribe has never had a better Queen Mother.”
“I am staying with her,” Edu said, seeing the sadness in kDira's face grow. “She will not be alone. Tuviast must also go ahead with you.”
“No, father!” Tuviast protested. “I want to stay! I can help you—”
“You can’t help with this, my son,” Edu said. “The tribe needs you. You must go with your sister kDira.”
“Will we see you again, Edu?” kDira asked.
“I don’t know. It isn’t very likely because I am so old anyway. I may just wander and live off the land until my time is done. Now you must get going; you are wasting daylight.”
Tuviast turned to his father and gave him a hug, offering no further argument to stay. Then he hugged and kissed his mother, and she smiled.
“I am very proud of you, my son,” Jilleane said softly, almost in a whisper. “You will be a great warrior one day. I know it in my heart. Listen to kDira. She will train you well.”
The kDira's World Anthology Page 45