The Last Survivors Box Set

by Bobby Adair

  “Brighton is different now,” said Fitz, pointing to the other side of the square, where Blackthorn’s former residence sat on the corner. “I live there.”

  “In Blackthorns’ house?” To Oliver, it didn’t seem possible.

  “You’ll live with me, too,” said Fitz. “There’s room for ten or twelve, at least. Ginger lives there, too, and so do a few of the other women who are helping.”

  “Helping?” asked Oliver.

  “We have a New Council—not just three, but sixteen of us. We’re trying to figure out how to make Brighton a better place.”

  “How will you do that?”

  “In truth,” answered Fitz, “we haven’t had much time to talk about that part of it. We’ve spent most of our time preparing for this day. Survival had to come first.”

  “Survival?” mused Oliver sadly. “Father Winthrop used that word once when I asked him why we burned so many people on Cleansing day. ‘Survival,’ he said. If we didn’t kill the unclean, the spore would taint us all and Brighton would die.”

  “This was a different kind of survival,” said Fitz. “We had to defend Brighton.”

  Oliver apologized immediately. “You’re right. I think you saved Brighton from the demons.”

  “We all did it together,” Fitz corrected.

  “I’ve heard so many lofty words,” Oliver continued, “from Father Winthrop, from General Blackthorn, from Minister Beck, from Jingo. I saw all those men in Blackthorn’s army get killed in the forest by the monsters. The demons killed the soldiers in a canyon on the way to the Ancient City, and they massacred us on a hill by the river. All along I heard words that made sense, and I heard words that sounded insane. Even when Father Winthrop spoke his insanity, everyone raised their swords and followed. And they all died thinking they were doing something noble. I don’t understand. Maybe I’m too young. I know what words mean. But I see words lead men to do evil things, to one another, and to themselves. How do you know when your words are good words and not bad ones?”

  Fitz wrapped her arm around Oliver and pulled him close again. “Maybe it’s not your words. Maybe it’s what’s in your heart when you say them.”

  Nodding, Oliver said, “You have a good heart.”

  “So did Franklin,” replied Fitz. “Let’s try to keep that heart alive.”

  Chapter 103: Bray

  Bray, Kirby, and William rode the horses deeper into the forest. Every so often, Bray glanced back at William, as though he might disappear. Sometimes it felt like William was a ghost he’d been chasing since the Ancient City. But this William was real, and Bray would make sure he didn’t go anywhere this time.

  “At least we have someone to ride the extra horse,” Kirby said with a smile.

  William smiled back. He kept his fingers clutched on the reins as he rode.

  They traveled away from Brighton, keeping a steady pace and looking out for danger. They hadn’t seen any men—or demons—since the last encounter.

  He wasn’t sure where they were going, but the only thing they were clear on was that they needed to avoid Brighton.

  They traveled for a long while, keeping a steady but appropriate pace for the horses, until the sun disappeared below the tree line and the sky turned crimson orange.

  “We should find a place to rest,” Kirby suggested.

  “Not a bad idea,” Bray agreed.

  They kept traveling, until the trees around them were just getting dark and they came across a building that was three or four stories tall, covered by dying brown weeds, stuck in the middle of the forest and reaching above the tops of the trees, as though the Ancients had dropped it there.

  “I’ve stayed in this ancient building a few times,” Bray said, pointing at it from his horse. “It should be safe. We’ll just have to find a place for the horses on one of the lower levels.”

  “I’ve stayed here, too,” William said, recognition crossing his face as they halted their horses.

  Bray looked back at him with a frown. “You have?”

  “I stayed here with mom on the first night we left Brighton.”

  A wave of guilt hit Bray as he looked up at the old structure, which contained parallel layers of ancient stone, each with gaps about five feet wide between them where he could see inside the building, which was filled with shrubs and bushes. Square posts supported each level. He envisioned Ella and William staying there, keeping each other safe from the demons in the wild. That image gave him a sadness he didn’t know how he’d ever be rid of. “Do you want to look for another place?” he asked William.

  William stared up at the building, his eyes glossed with memories. For a moment, Bray thought he was going to tell them to keep going. “Actually, I think I’d like to stay here. It has a nice view.”

  “It certainly does,” Bray agreed.

  “We slept on the roof. We saw the mountains from up there. I think I’d like to see that again.” William smiled.

  Bray nodded, looking away. He wanted to tell William that he’d buried his mother on a rooftop, too, that he hadn’t forgotten her.

  He would, in time.

  Sensing the mood, Kirby said, “Why don’t we head inside?”

  Bray and William agreed, and they guided the horses into the building, following the sloping floors up. The structure was darker than outside, filled with weeds and bushes, but enough light slanted through the gaps in the levels to see where they were going.

  “At least I know what this place is, now,” William said. “It’s a building where the Ancients stored the objects that carried them from one place to another. Like the one we saw in the Ancient City, Bray. Remember?”

  “I do,” Bray said.

  “Cars, you mean,” Kirby said. “This is a parking garage.”

  Bray and William looked at her in surprise. “How did you know that?”

  Kirby just smiled.

  Chapter 104: Fitz

  Insomnia.

  All those nights spent preparing for battle until she was ready to drop, planning and arguing, even fretting when she finally did get to bed, the last thing Fitz expected when the battle was over was insomnia.

  She’d tried to sleep.

  She’d laid in bed for most of the night, but a line of worries marched in circles inside her head, picking up recruits as they went, chanting her inadequacies, telling her that every solution to every question had a better answer than anything she thought of.

  Finally, she gave up and went down the stairs to Blackthorn’s great room, sat in his ornate old chair by his ancient table, and watched the embers smolder in the hearth.

  One of the girls who kept the house tidy, one of Blackthorn’s former serving girls, was awake and found Fitz. Before the room grew cold, the servant girl piled logs onto the fireplace, and then she asked if Fitz wanted breakfast, even though sunrise was still hours away.

  Fitz reluctantly agreed.

  Stroking the table’s fine, polished wood, Fitz fought off memories of a naïve girl from a life that no longer seemed hers. Tenbrook had brutalized her at the table where she now sat. She’d never forget that, or what he’d done to Franklin.

  Fitz still had wounds that ached in her soul, still wore scars on her skin, branded there by Tenbrook’s inhuman fetish.

  Time heals all wounds?

  Can anyone live long enough to heal more than they bleed?

  In the frenetic days preparing for the battle, Fitz hadn’t given much thought to what victory would feel like. And now, instead of celebrating, she found herself with a new crop of worries.

  Over against the wall sat an aluminum wagon filled with several boxes of bullets and hand grenades, Tech Magic hauled over the mountain by Oliver’s new friends. Extra ammunition, they’d called it. They’d asked her to protect it, so others in tow
n wouldn’t steal it. The wagon was worth a fortune. It was a trove of power, and it was a reminder of a whole list of decisions that seemed to have no obviously good answer.

  The wagon stood by the wall, not because Fitz wanted what it held, or knew what to do with it. She knew she had no right to steal property, let alone the most valuable thing that had ever rolled into the walls of Brighton. But she couldn’t leave the wagon with Ivory and Melora. They were both staying in Ivory’s father’s house in a part of Brighton where people stole whatever they could sneak away with.

  The wagon couldn’t stay there.

  Even letting Ivory, Melora, Beck, and Jingo keep their Tech Magic rifles concerned Fitz.

  What evil could a man like Tenbrook reap with a rifle in his hands?

  Round and round the worries went.

  She’d had Jingo and Beck escorted by the cavalry to the Academy.

  A mistake?

  Possibly.

  But Jingo had to go somewhere secure until the demon-killing fervor in town subsided and the women who’d won their battle could be counted on to face him with their heads, and not their hearts. Still, secrets never stayed under wraps for long. By morning, everyone in Brighton would know that a three hundred-year-old, wart-covered genius was holed up in the Academy.

  Would the townsfolk decide he was a cannibal or a Tech Magic savior?

  She pictured a mob of women with torches, building a pyre, or storming the Academy.

  Would it come to that?

  If it did, how many would die once Beck and Jingo started firing their rifles? Hundreds? Thousands? If Jingo and Beck were to be believed, the five with rifles had killed thousands of demons with no help from Fitz’s army.

  And having put Beck back with his people in the Academy, would the revolution he’d been plotting against Tenbrook be redirected against her and the New Council?

  Fitz heard the sound of someone coming down the stairs, but she didn’t turn her eyes away from the flame.

  “Why are you up?” asked Ginger, as she came into the room.

  Fitz shook her head. “I can’t sleep.”

  Ginger paused and listened for sounds from outside. “The victory chants seem to have finally tired out.”

  “Yes, they stopped a while ago,” Fitz told her, looking up to see Ginger’s red hair standing out in every direction from her head. “I think the storm finally forced the tired townsfolk to get some sleep.”

  “The howling wind woke me up,” said Ginger.

  “It’s snowing. Did you notice?”

  “Yes.” Ginger scooted a chair out and took a seat to Fitz’s left. “Maybe the early snow means good luck this time.” Ginger noticed the look on Fitz’s face. “But it looks like you’re still worrying. What about?”

  “At this very moment?” Fitz looked back at the blazing fire in the hearth. “Brighton’s future. The questions are all too complex, and I don’t know any of the answers. What bothers me most is what happens when the next Tenbrook comes.”

  “There’ll be no next Tenbrook,” Ginger said firmly. “You’re our leader. Where would a Tenbrook come from?”

  “One day, I’ll die,” said Fitz. “And someone will come after me. Maybe that person will be good. I hope so. But everybody in Brighton knows the story of our founders, Lady and Bruce. Lady was strong. She knew everything, never made a mistake—”

  “According to legend,” Ginger interrupted. “But legends are just lies with all the crusty parts polished off.”

  “Yes.” Fitz laughed darkly. “But I don’t know who followed Lady as the leader of Brighton, or who came after. The legends don’t tell us those things. But eventually those leaders led to Blackthorn, and Winthrop, and Tenbrook.”

  “And Beck,” added Ginger.

  “Do you think Beck’s a bad man?” asked Fitz. “I never knew him well. I got to know Scholar Evan, and he held Minister Beck in high regard.”

  “I don’t trust him.” Ginger looked like she wanted to spit. “He was part of the Council.”

  Shaking her head, Fitz mused, “The Council was just Blackthorn, though, wasn’t it? Everybody in Brighton knew who was in charge. And it wasn’t Beck.”

  “But Beck was there at every Cleansing,” argued Ginger. “How many burned while he sat on the dais and watched? His hands are as bloody as Blackthorn’s.”

  “All of us watched,” said Fitz. “Thousands, all afraid to raise a sickle or a pitchfork to a few hundred blue shirts and cavalry. Are our hands bloody, too?”

  Ginger turned to the fire with a scowl on her face.

  “What about Winthrop?” Fitz asked.

  “A pig,” spat Ginger. “Don’t compare him to any woman in Brighton.”

  “No comparison,” said Fitz, shaking her head. “That’s another issue we face. With all his injuries, I don’t understand why he won’t die. What will we do with him?”

  “Burn him, of course.” Ginger sat up straight in her chair and turned to Fitz with an intense look on her face. “No one deserves it more than him.”

  “I agree,” responded Fitz, “but when we put him on the pyre, does that not make us just like him? We’ll stand on the dais and proclaim his death, and someone will put a torch to the wood, just as the Elders did to many others.”

  “Everyone will jump at the chance.”

  “And everyone will be guilty.”

  “Guilty isn’t the right word,” Ginger argued.

  “Again, I agree with you,” said Fitz. “But I’m afraid of what happens after that. Even if putting Winthrop on the pyre is right, will that make it easier to burn the next one? And the next? And if we do that, does there come a day when the pyre waits for anyone we dislike? And what about The Cleansing? Do we still burn the unclean?”

  Ginger crossed her arms and slumped in her chair. “Maybe Winthrop will do us all a favor and die tonight.”

  “Knowing him, he won’t. It’s ingrained in his bones to hurt others,” said Fitz. “While his heart beats, others will suffer.”

  “Let’s burn Winthrop,” said Ginger resolutely, “and then ban the pyre. Let’s do away with it.”

  “What about the unclean?” asked Fitz. “What about the Cleansings?”

  “You have a three hundred-year-old genius monster in the Academy. Maybe he knows.”

  “Should we put him on the New Council?” asked Fitz.

  Ginger laughed. “I’m not sure what some of these women will do…”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t know,” admitted Ginger. “I honestly don’t. Half of the women in Brighton are pig-headed and ignorant. But…”

  “But?”

  Ginger smiled, and her eyes were a little glassy with held tears. “We beat the demon horde together. All of us. No General Blackthorn. No militia. No cavalry. We did that, we weak and stupid women.” Ginger laughed out loud.

  “No man will call women weak and stupid again,” said Fitz, with resolve on her face. “Not in Brighton.”

  Chapter 105: Beck

  “You’ve been quiet ever since we got to the Academy,” Jingo said.

  Beck broke from his trance, looking from the chair he was sitting in and around the library, which was lined with mostly empty shelves, homes for books the Academy hoped to add to their meager collection. Ancient artifacts gave the shelves the appearance of purpose. Old pictures covered the walls.

  Earlier, the room had been filled with the Scholars, welcoming him back. After the kind words had been said, almost everyone had retired to their quarters except Beck and Jingo. Beck could still hear some of Fitz’s cavalry women in the hallway. They were shifting and talking, and it didn’t sound like they were leaving.

  “We should probably stay here a while,” Beck said.

  “A smart idea,” J
ingo said, nodding. “The townspeople are already deciding what to do with Winthrop. They don’t trust us.”

  “I spoke with Adam-John about being my representative, until things settle,” Beck said.

  “Probably good, as well,” Jingo agreed.

  “He’ll be requesting a seat for myself and a few others from the Academy on the New Council. And for you, of course.”

  “Hopefully they grant it,” Jingo said with a nod. After a pause, he asked, “Are you upset about what happened to Scholar Evan?”

  “I feel like his death has been added to the toll of many others on my hands.” Beck stared from the walls, back to his hands. “Evan knew what he was participating in. But I feel responsible, just the same. Lack of planning and logic has led to many of the outcomes that have plagued Brighton. I was sad to hear of his death, and the deaths of the other insurgents.”

  Shame filled Beck’s face as he realized he’d barely given a thought to the Academy—or Brighton—in his absence. He’d been too busy worrying about keeping himself alive.

  “As you know, there is nothing that can be done to change the past,” Jingo said.

  “Of course not, but I hope to avoid such things from happening in the future.” Beck sighed. “Perhaps being in the wild has given me a new perspective on what it means to survive. We separated ourselves from the demons by the circle wall, but maybe we weren’t so different, after all.”

  “A keen observation.”

  Beck fell quiet for a moment, reflecting. “In any case, I’m glad to be back to Brighton. We’ll see where things go from here.”

  Chapter 106: Fitz

  Unexpected pounding on the door startled both Fitz and Ginger.

  Ginger stood with her hand on her sword, looking to Fitz.

  “Who can that be?”

  “I have no idea,” said Fitz.