Yes.
“No. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s going to work, and then we’ll be on our way to Blackvale to rescue everyone else, like we said.”
It occurs to me how ridiculous that sounds. We’ve been pinned down for half a day by one single blackcoat sniper, who had probably been unfortunate enough to get assigned to patrolling what used to be their southern border, making my worst fears come true. If I’m having this much trouble with one man and his poor aim, how am I ever going to free my people from an entire government and its colossal army?
I take a deep breath and think about the fact that I only have one main objective: don’t die.
“Merrin?”
She’s fiddling with the hair again like she’s playing with a dolly.
“Hey, listen to me, honey.”
“Huh? What?”
“If anything happens to me—”
“Don’t say it.” Her eyebrows dip inward and her lips pinch together as she interrupts. “And you better not leave me.”
“But I have to if this is going to work.”
“No, I mean…alone. Don’t get hurt or let them take you, okay? You have to come back.”
I touch her cheek, gently, and then push her wild hair behind her ears, then off her forehead. “I will. It’ll work.”
“Promise.” She pouts, bottom lip protruding so far it reminds me of a shelf on a wall.
“I’ll try, but this is—”
“No,” she growls. “Promise.”
“Okay, okay. I promise.” I salute her and add, “Orders heard, soldier. But, Merrin, listen. Stop. Look at me. Let me finish. It’s going to be dangerous, really dangerous, and I need you to understand that you have to get away if anything happens—stop, hush. If anything happens, you run. Got it? You remember how a rabbit jumps around left and right, all crazy and never in a straight line?”
“Yeah.”
“You run like that. You get out of here like a rabbit running from a fox, understand?”
She nods in the affirmative, but I can tell she doesn’t like the idea. It’s a promise that only has half a chance of being true, yet I say again that I’ll be back, and she has nothing to worry about.
“Time to go, little miss.” I hang the makeshift Caroline on the twine. Up close, it looks nothing like a human, much less like my twin. It’s a shoddy, thrown-together lump of clothes, twigs, and green moss. A river of doubt washes over me. I clench my teeth and force it away. I make up my mind to go before I completely lose my nerve. Through the trees and the falling rain, maybe even through a scope, it’ll pass for me for a few seconds, and that’s all I need.
“Change spots with me, and when I give the order, you sling this scarecrow down the line as hard as you can.”
We make our bodies small and rotate spots behind the pine’s trunk. The blackcoat hasn’t fired in a while, and I can only guess that he’s wondering what we’ve been up to for the last hour while he waits for a clearer shot.
Merrin grasps the scarecrow around the waist and tests it. The smooth rock slides against the main line, and it should have no trouble racing down the hill.
I lie down on my belly and whisper for Merrin to put some wet leaves and needles on my back as a disguise. We had discussed this while we were creating the scarecrow. I need to put some distance between our bait and my crossing spot so that the sniper doesn’t immediately see me from the corner of his eye. When she’s finished, I begin the careful crawl to a tree thirty yards north.
Slowly, inch by inch, I slither along, and no shots are fired. It’s working. Mud and muck slide down the front of my shirt and gathers around my belly, the hem of my pants working like a shovel scooping it up. It feels like hours pass. Maybe it’s minutes. I can’t tell. Once I reach the tree, I slide over the last remaining gap in a flash by pushing myself to my feet, then propel forward where I stop, my back resting against the bark. I’ve made it. It worked.
I take a deep breath, nod to Merrin, and hold up one, two, three fingers, then I point at her, mouthing the word “Go.”
She slings the scarecrow down the line, and I make it across a third of the clearing before the first shot is fired.
14
The blackcoat sniper fires three more times, rapidly, before there’s a pause in his trigger finger. I can feel it. He can sense that something is amiss as I sprint through the open space, landing lightly and nimbly, but driving hard off the balls of my feet. Head down, fingers pinching my rock of salvation tightly in the slingshot’s leather pouch, I reach his side of the divide.
With a better angle, I’m able to narrow down his location while I run, but I can’t pinpoint him exactly. He’s south of me by twenty-five yards, if he’s that far, almost directly west of where Merrin and I have been hiding. There’s good cover between here and there, so I should have no trouble getting within a decent range.
I slow down, scampering from tree to tree, lifting my head over some branches and looking underneath others, trying to do as Brandon always taught me—find some spot of color in the woods that doesn’t belong.
The wind whips around and darts back to the west, pushing a limb to the side.
There it is. A speck of red flashes among the green leaves of a mountain maple. The stripes on his jacket disappear when the breeze dies down and the limb returns to its natural position. The thick foliage will pose a problem for me, and I’ll have to get closer than I planned for a clearer shot. I pray that if I can’t see him, he can’t see me either, especially if he’s not expecting my approach.
Another breeze shifts course and brings with it the smell of mountain flowers, sweet on top of the rotting scent of wet leaves. Also mixed in with it is something I haven’t smelled in a long time.
I crouch behind a mighty oak that fell ages ago and sniff again to make sure.
Tobacco. Not the kind that some of the Elders smoked when we had a supply that came up from the capital, back when I was Merrin’s age, but the kind some of the others chewed. I remember Grandpa having a pouch; maybe it was peach-flavored. He would pull wads out, thin and stringy, and tuck it in his cheek. I can remember the fruity smell as if it were yesterday. In addition to that, I remember trying a piece of it when he wasn’t around one day. That’s how I learned it wasn’t candy, and that’s how I learned that it’s hard to throw up when you’re trying to hold your own hair back.
Now is my best chance to get as close as I possibly can. With the wind blowing in my direction, away from him, his nose won’t catch any smells coming from me, and I already know that he’ll have a hard time spotting my approach unless he’s looking in my direction.
Okay, Caroline. You can do this. Go, go, go.
Before I can, he fires another shot. I look toward Merrin and see a shower of pine needles falling from a low-hanging branch.
Good, he’s focused there. Go, now. Do it.
I duck and move, thrusting myself ahead, running as silently as possible, but as fast as I can. If I still had my Kinder abilities, this would be so much easier.
Well, if I were still a Kinder, this would’ve been over yesterday, about two minutes after Merrin revealed that he was trailing us.
I get close enough that I can see his boot dangling overhead, and he hasn’t spotted me yet. I’d be dead if he had.
Two more steps and I plant my feet firmly, my right foot ahead of my left in a stable stance, and then I draw the slingshot back, feeling the rubbery material stretching as I pull.
A branch blows upward, revealing his head, one eye glued to the scope, looking east at my former hiding spot. I see the bulge of tobacco pushing his cheek out. I aim up and to the right—his temple is my target.
There’s no honor in shooting an unsuspecting soldier.
I don’t care. Tell that to the bastard trying to shoot two young girls.
I wait on the breeze to die down, hoping for every advantage before I shoot.
When it does, however, I get an overwhelming sense that he and I are not alone.
I hear it before I feel it.
The whish of something sailing through the air comes just before I feel the sharp crack on the side of my head. Knocked senseless, I stumble and spin around to see another blackcoat. He grins at me and knocks me on the forehead again with the stock of his rifle. The realization sinks in that there was two of them all along as I trip over my own feet and fall back onto my butt. Ears ringing, vision swimming, I look up at him. He’s as tall as James was, with his hat sitting crooked on his head and a thin face, brown from filth and a time when the sun still managed to show its rays more often than it hid behind the cover of clouds.
Fear cinches my stomach and I want to crawl, but I’m too dizzy. Sparkles continue to dance in my eyesight. “Merrin,” I mumble.
The one up in the tree says, “Whoa,” as if he’s just now realized how close he was to death.
The one who hit me says, “Saved your hide, Blotter. This one here had the bead on you.”
Blotter readjusts his cap and pushes himself back from the branch, slinging his rifle over his shoulder. “Good thing, too. He’d not be happy you came back with one less sharpshooter.”
“That indeed. Get on down here and keep an eye on this one while I go get the other.”
“Next time we do this, Chalmers, you’re hiding in the tree. I can’t feel my doggone legs anymore.”
Clarity begins to creep back in, and I use my arms to push myself away. “Merrin,” I say again, a little louder this time.
The blackcoat known as Chalmers stomps down on my ankle to prevent my escape. “Won’t be a next time, bud. We get this ‘un here back, we’re all done for a spell. Think we might’ve just earned a few weeks of R and R.” Chalmers grinds the heel of his boot harder against my leg, and I grit my teeth, trying desperately not to show how much it hurts. He says to me, “He said you’d try something like this, sneaking all around the woods, but I didn’t believe a word of it. I figured you might be a bit smarter than that, and, matter of fact, you cost me twenty dollars, little piglet.”
Chalmers uses the barrel of his rifle to poke my cheek. I swat it away.
“Feisty,” he says to me, then to Blotter, “but she won’t be too much trouble.”
“Roger that.” Blotter, down from the tree now, grunts and hikes his pants higher.
Chalmers twists his boot against my skin and the striking pain clears my head fully. I have to do something about my seven-year-old ward. I have to warn her. Can she see? Does she know what’s going on?
“Merrin!” I scream. “Run!”
Chalmers flicks his eyes and chin upward like a hound that’s caught the trail.
He chuckles and says, “Flushed ‘er for me, little piglet. Good job.” His rifle goes up to his shoulder.
I wrench my foot free from underneath his and roll over. Across the way, I can see Merrin scampering through the woods.
She’s not darting like a rabbit. She’s running due east in a straight line.
Fear shrouds me from head to toe. The only thing I can scream is, “Rabbit! Rabbit! Rabbit!”
Chalmers makes the subtle sound of gunfire with his mouth.
I close my eyes and listen to the real gunshot echo through the hills.
“Merrin,” I whisper.
I don’t feel like I’ve merely lost a battle.
This feels like I’ve lost the entire war.
I get brief flashes of the world around us as I’m carried across their shoulders, each of them taking turns. It’s hard to tell how far it is after Chalmers smashed me across the head again, but it feels like a mile or so until we reach two horses.
They raided my backpack before we left and they’ve bound my wrists and ankles with the same twine I brought to catch my own prey.
When they toss me across the back of a brown horse the color of the forest floor, my tears for Merrin run down my nose and drip like raindrops.
They let her go. Chalmers missed his first shot, and then Blotter convinced him to allow her escape. “Ain’t nothing but a wee one,” he’d said. “Asides, we’ve got the one he wants.”
Chalmers had grumbled and groused, eventually agreed, then briefly sent my vision to blackness with the butt of his rifle.
Still, I cry. Merrin may be alive, but she’s out there in the woods, on her own and miles from home. She can do it, I think. If she remembers how to get back to the encampment, there’s plenty of food hoarded in Hawkins’s basement. She’ll be able to survive for years if she stays smart.
And, admittedly, with the help of Brandon’s spirit if he’s really there.
If she heads due south, back up and over Rafael’s Ridge, she’ll be fine.
Meanwhile, the rocking of this horse’s pace makes my head throb. I’m slung over the back of it, behind Blotter’s saddle, tied down like they shot a small doe on a hunting trip. Blood rushes to my head while I hang here and eventually, I either fall asleep or pass out from the pain. I can no longer tell the difference.
I drift in and out of consciousness, mostly seeing nothing more than the horse’s hind legs, the green grass of fields, the occasional rock and a bubbling stream. We pass through woods, we traverse a river that comes up to the mare’s belly, and it splashes me in the face. We climb and descend hills. The clip-clop of hooves on a hard surface wakes me.
Craning my neck, I see ancient markings on the side of the blacktop road—signs, I think they’re called—each one with a different set of letters and numbers that make no sense. A large green one, big and wide enough to use for an entire hut’s rooftop, appears to the left once we round a corner. It reads, “Blackvale – 6mi.”, and I assume that means we’re only six miles from Hell.
I don’t see any indications of my people. My detour to the encampment has given the blackcoats ample time to get the PRV citizen-slaves into their capital city of Blackvale.
I can only hope that the evil demons running that foul place will give them some time to rest before they’re forced into mines and factories with shovels and hammers in their hands.
Blotter glances over his shoulder at me, sees me staring up the road. “Won’t be long now,” he says.
“I can walk.”
“Oh no. You stay right there where we can see you.”
“I said I can walk. Where am I gonna go? I’ve been bounced around back here for miles, and if you don’t let me down, I’m going to puke all over your horse.”
“Nope.”
“Keep me tied, Blotter. Tie my hands to your saddle, and I’ll walk between you two.” Really, it’s all I want. I don’t have any great escape plan or even an inkling of what kind of trouble I can cause. My ribs, chest, and insides are bruised. I’m sick of being lightheaded and swaying. I say to them both, “Please just let me walk in there with some dignity. Give me that much.”
I hear Blotter scoff, then he asks Chalmers, “Think we oughta?”
I imagine Chalmers shrugging when he says, “Eh, why not? She ain’t going anywhere. Get ‘er down, tie ‘er up. She don’t want a free ride for the next six miles, that’s her business.”
Blotter clicks his tongue at the horse—I think he calls it Daisy—and pulls the reins. We slow to a stop, but before he gets down, Blotter reaches around, grabs a handful of my hair, and yanks it so I’m facing him. “You try anything, by God, and I’ll cut you a new smile underneath your chin. He said bring you alive if we could, but dead would work just as well.”
No need to wonder who the “he” is that they’re talking about, because I’m sure I already know.
15
In hindsight, maybe I should’ve ridden on the back of Blotter’s horse.
On a normal day, back when guarding the encampment was the only life I’d ever known, patrolling six miles through the woods was an easy day. Sometimes I’d do double that if there had been reports of roving Republicons in the area.
Now, however, after weeks of running, hiking through the mountains, surviving on Mint Monster and a few bites of a nutrition bar, even after I gorge
d myself on the General Chief’s hidden stash, it’s not enough. The stress has been too much. I’m out of energy—completely and totally done for.
We’re on the outskirts of Blackvale, standing beside a large, sweeping road, four lanes wide with one side going north and another going south. A strip of land in the middle divides it and it’s all I can do to lift one foot and put it in front of the other.
I have blisters on top of blisters, and I can almost feel my sodden, wrinkly skin sloughing off inside my socks. To make things worse, once we get closer to their capital, the cover of the forest disappears and is replaced with the green hills of rolling farmland. We’re exposed out here in the wide open, getting drenched in a waterfall of a downpour with no trees or bushes to block what’s coming.
I should say that I am. Blotter and Chalmers are wrapped up in large gray raincoats. I’d heard stories of these types of jackets, the ones that turn away water like a beggar at your door, but I’d never seen one. I’m jealous. Oh how jealous I am. How handy would a raincoat have been over all this time?
Chalmers laughs at me when I try to walk on the eastern side of his horse for a little protection from the rain, then he yanks my tether, telling me to get back up front where they can keep an eye on me.
I hate giving him the courtesy of a “Yes, sir”, but I do it anyway. My face is already cut and bruised from his blows. I’m not winning any battles by giving him more chances to knock the remaining sense free from my head.
So, I walk. I trudge, rather, trying to delay what’s coming. I do this until Blotter and Chalmers notice and goose me in the ribs with a rifle barrel. I walk another few hundred yards and do it again. This happens over and over until we stop at a white sign with black letters that reads “BLACKVALE CITY LIMITS POP. 129,415.”
Chalmers eases his horse to a stop—his is called Buttercup—and readjusts the raincoat’s hood. He clears his throat, wipes the rain from his face and says, “Ain’t seen that for a while, huh? Sight for sore eyes.”
“Welp,” Blotter says, “we made it. No worse for wear, really. ‘Cept her. Reckon we should get ‘er cleaned up before she heads in to see him?”
The Light of Hope Page 10
