Awaken

by Bryan, Michelle

  Shizen! The thought of it being up to me...of me being the only hope of us getting out of here...well it kinda makes me stomach sick. I cain’t even make corn biscuits right! How was I ever going to save the four of us from the Prezedant? I hope you were right gra’da when you said that the gods will always provide, I think, ‘cause the way things are going right now, I needed all the help I can get.

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  Day four of our capture is almost done and we still ain’t any closer to any mastermind escape plan from the raiders. All day, walking in the merciless heat, my mind had been working overtime trying to come up with a plan...any sort of plan, but I had nuthin! None of us say a word as we are tied and bound again for another long night, but our guards are barely out of earshot before Tater starts whispering urgently.

  “Bad news I am afraid my dears. I overheard the colossal leader speaking with one of his men earlier today. It looks like we have until possibly morning before the Army will be here to collect us. It has, as my dear mother would have said, come to the final countdown. We have but mere hours to make our escape. Have any of you managed to concoct an infallible plan to get us out of our current situation? Please, I encourage you to lay any ideas on the table for consideration.”

  Did Tater truly have to use so many words to ask if any of us has a plan? But as irritated as I am at him I don’t say what I’m thinking ‘cause I don’t want to admit I got nuthin. None of us speak for a bit. Then, finally, Jax breaks our silence.

  “Whatever we do it will have to be soon, before the Army has us. If they get their hands on us we are done for. But there’s no way we are going to be able to take out all these raiders unarmed, that’s for sure.”

  I snort quietly at his words and mutter “Ya think?” but he chooses to ignore me. Instead he keeps talking to Tater.

  “Our best bet would be to wait ‘til nightfall, ‘til most of them are asleep. I’m an expert shot. If I could get my hands on one of their weapons we may stand a chance.”

  I nod my head. “Aye, that should work. Just grab one of their shooters. Oh...wait....our hands and feet are tied....and we have guards watching our every move. Got a backup plan genius?”

  He don’t ignore me this time.

  “Yeah, we just let the Army take you...its only you they want anyways freak...make a deal for the rest of us, see if we can keep ourselves alive!” he snarls, glaring at me. He ain’t whispering no more and it catches our guard’s attention.

  “Hey...what’s going on over there?”

  “Oh nothing to concern yourself with my good man.” Tater holds his tied hands up in a gesture of innocence. “It’s just that this young man is a little perturbed at being around a new blood is all. Nothing to worry about. It’s not as if we are making escape plans or anything...Hah!” Tater’s nervous burst of laughter makes me roll my eyes and groan inwardly. Did he truly just say that? The guard eyes us all suspiciously, pointing his iron shooter. He looks us over, trying to see if anything is amiss.

  “Yeah well none of us is happy having this mutie around but you don’t hear us all bellyaching about it. Keep it down. And don’t try anything funny...we’re watching you.”

  “Certainly, certainly good sir. We will be as quiet as a mouse.” He grins at the guard and holds a finger to his lips to further his point. The guard gives us one last hard look before he joins the rest of the raiders at the now roaring campfire. Busher is sitting cross legged by the fire watching us intently so we hold off on any more talk. Once he is satisfied we are behaving however he lets his attention be pulled away by the sudden appearance of a whiskey jug. Only then do we dare to continue our conversation.

  “Let’s get two things straight.” Tater jumps right back in. “If we stand any chance of escape it has to be tonight. Jax is right, once we are under the Army’s watch we will not stand a chance in hell. And if we are to escape then you must both let go of your annoying idiosyncrasies!”

  “Idio....wha?” I start to say but Tater cuts me off impatiently. “You have to stop fighting and work together...got it!”

  “Well why couldn’t you say that in the first place!” I snap hating how his way of talk always made me feel so stupid. He ignores my biting remark and continues on.

  “Earlier when I pretended to stumble into one of the guards I skillfully managed to relieve him of this.” One of his tied hands deftly pulls a small dagger down out of his sleeve for a quick perusal before it disappears again. I was impressed. I had seen Tater fall into the guard earlier and it had earned him a hard punch to the back, I had no idea there had been another motive for his contrived clumsiness.

  “Ask and ye shall receive,” he says to Jax, grinning from ear to ear. “Now as you said a moment ago we wait until most of them are asleep. These past two nights I have noticed our guards have been taking forty winks at their post. Obviously with Tara’s lack of any show of power they have become a little lax about our threat assessment. We wait until they are asleep tonight, I cut our bindings and we make a run for it.”

  I look to Tater expecting to hear more, but he don’t say anything else. Jax and Finn look just as expectant, waiting for Tater to go on. Finally...

  “That’s it? That’s the plan?” Jax asks, not bothering to hide his disbelief.

  “Yes...that is all. Do you have a better idea?” Tater says looking at all of us as if he don’t quite understand. “I free us, we run. What else do you expect? As you most astutely pointed out we cannot go up against so many armed raiders.”

  Tater is right. “Sounds good enough to me,” I say. “Finn you make sure you stick to me like a shadow...I don’t wanna lose you in the dark.” He nods at me all serious.

  “If we get split up head east into the hills....that will keep you onto the path to Littlepass.”

  A loud whooping from the group round the campfire interrupts Tater and he clams up but they ain’t paying no heed to us. The whiskey jug is being passed around freely and they’re celebrating like they already got their reward. Busher catches my eye and raises the jug to me in a mock toast before taking a big swig of the brew. I hope he chokes, I think, but it don’t happen. I drop my eyes and look toward the horizon....not much longer ‘til sunset I reckon. Tonight would be our only chance. Tater’s plan was sound...sorta…but since it was the only plan we had, we’d better make the best of it. For some reason I had this sinking feeling it just wasn’t good enough. I’m hoping I was dead wrong.

  The first inkling we get that something ain’t right is when hat head, back to being his cocky self again now that he’s been swigging the whiskey, saunters up to us all wobbly like. He brushes past Tater and Finn to stand directly in front of me. I get to my feet. I don’t like having to look up at him and I ain’t sure what he’s about to do. He stares at me, swaying back and forth like he downed the whole jug himself. There ain’t no way he drank enough to be this wasted, I think.

  “You don’t look like no freak...” he says, least I think that’s what he says, his words are all slurred like his tongue is too big for his mouth. He wobbles a bit more then points his finger at me.

  “Ya...nawe...bood...”

  Huh? What the hell is wrong with him?

  Then suddenly his eyes roll back in his head and he falls with a loud thud, face first into the ground. I jump back. Shizen! What’s happening? Before I can get a word out though, I hear another thud...then another. The raiders. They’re falling like leaves in a big wind, one after another.

  Busher is the last to be standing. He is wobbling just like hat head did but he’s fighting it. He lets out an angry roar and he kicks the whiskey jug over. His eyes, so full of hot anger, seek me out. He looks like a mountain bearing down on me and I cain’t help but back away, as far as the rope will allow me. But he don’t get to me. He falls to his knees before he can get more than four paces. Trying in vain to push himself back up he gives me one more burning look before he also face plants the ground.
...hard.

  “What the gods....?” Tater is looking at me but I’m just as dumbfounded. I shake my head at his unspoken question. It wasn’t me...I don’t have no idea what just happened!

  I look around at all the raiders on the ground laying where they fell....are they dead? I think. Finn’s panicked “Tara!” pulls my attention away from the bodies on the ground and I follow his scared gaze to a figure approaching us from the trees. It was walking kind of hunched and shuffling but I recognize it right away. The creature I had seen that night in the sand lands and again in the valley on the other side of the mountains. I was right...it had been following us! It comes closer and I get a better look at its face. Shizen! What the hell is it? It resembles something more out of a night terror than a human face. Its yellowed flesh hangs in loose folds ‘round its neck and the skin on its odd shaped head that wasn’t covered by tufts of hair is dotted with visible veins. There ain’t much nose to speak of, just a bump with two holes where a nose should have been and a fleshy mouth that looks too wide for the face it was on. I can feel the bile rising in the back of my throat and I find myself searching the ground looking for anything that I can use as a weapon. Finn cowers against me and I hold him close as it approaches. I can hear Tater muttering something, praying maybe, and Jax starts tugging at his ropes, cussin’ under his breath. It’s almost like the creature ain’t real....and tied and bound like we were there ain’t nuthin we can do but watch helplessly as it shuffles closer.

  The muttering gets louder and I almost yell at Tater to shut up when I realize the sound ain’t coming from him. In fact Tater don’t look worried at all. The muttering is coming from the critter. Its mouth is moving all odd like, like it ain’t used to forming words...but that’s exactly what it’s doing. It’s talking! Good Gods...it’s talking! As much as it terrifies me I find myself straining to hear what its saying.

  “Mus...ove....mus ove..”

  I don’t understand but it keeps moving towards me like its words were meant for me and me alone. It comes straight for me and I’m shocked to see its eyes. As strange and wrong as the rest of it is, its eyes....they’re so human like! It grabs my wrist with a skeleton like hand and the contact sends a tingling up my arm. The dark eyes bore into mine with such fear I shiver, I cain’t help it.

  “Mus..ove!” It speaks with more force this time and suddenly I understand.

  “Move! We must move!” I say. It nods, in relief I think. I can feel my tension easing some as I come to realize the creature wasn’t trying to harm us, but help us.

  “Men....come.” Its long finger points to the trees.

  “There are more men coming?” I ask and it nods again. Tater looks at me fearfully.

  “The Army,” he says and the creature confirms.

  “Ess...yes...must go.”

  Tater don’t hesitate. The little blade suddenly appears and he starts sawing at his bindings. The creature is also prepared. It pulls a wicked looking blade from the sash round its waist and starts at my ropes. The smell of it so close to me is overwhelming but I just hold my breath and let it continue sawing my ropes, then Finns. As soon as we are free I reach for hat head still lying at my feet and pull the shooter out from underneath him, throw it over my shoulder. Tater by now has freed Jax and they get the same idea grabbing the nearest weapons they can find. Tater even takes the time to scoop up his hat even though the creature is making frantic movements with his hands trying to hurry us. But there’s still something I need to know.

  “The raiders...” I point at the bodies on the ground. “I’m guessing you did this, are they dead?”

  “No...dead....sleep. Po no kill.”

  “Po?” I say, not knowing what the critter means by this. It points at itself and says again

  “Po ...no kill.”

  “Is that your name? Po?” It nods a yes and I find myself amazed that the creature...that he (I assume it’s a he) had the smarts enough to carry out such a plan. Somehow it had figured out a way to put a sleeping herb or such in the raider’s whiskey. It must have been waiting for its chance for days to do so. Why though? Why was it helping us? I don’t have time to ask however ‘cause Tater, hat now planted firmly back on his head, interrupts.

  “I hate to interfere with your getting acquainted and all but as the mutie so accurately pointed out earlier, we must move!”

  I realize the cause of his growing concern as I hear the dull thumping coming from the ground below us. Horses....a lot of them, and they were coming fast! The Army was here!

  “This way!” Jax makes a beeline for the closest grove of trees and we hightail it behind him. We hear shouting and then popping sounds...they were shooting their iron shooters! Did they see us already? But then we hear more shouting and I remember the scouts Busher had planted around the campsite. They ain’t had a chance to drink the whiskey, they were still awake. And from the shouting we were overhearing the Army weren’t greeting them none too friendly like. So much for honor amongst thieves or such. I grab Finn by the front of his tunic and drag him faster trying to get into the cover of the trees. I don’t want to be in view when they reach the campsite. We stumble into the trees and I look round wildly, fearing either raiders or Army to be waiting for us but we’re alone. Tater bends over, hands on his knees and starts wheezing loudly.

  “Tater?” I say worriedly but he just waves a hand at me and keeps gasping.

  “I’m okay,” he manages to croak but Jax grunts impatiently.

  “We don’t got time for this old man.” He ignores my glare and paces around a bit. Finally he jerks a hand over his shoulder.

  “This way,” he says but Po puts a restraining hand on his arm, much to his obvious disgust.

  “No,” the creature says and points with his bony finger. “There.”

  Nestled away in the trees was Winnie and Busher’s much larger horse, grazing contentedly, unaware of the trouble around them.

  “Faster,” Po says and I nod in agreement.

  “Po’s right. Finn, you and Tater on Winnie, you two ain’t so heavy....she should be able to carry you both easily. Jax, you me and Po on the other beast if we can.”

  As I speak I head for the two animals and quickly untie them from the trees. We help Finn and Tater onto Winnie’s back then I mount Bushers beast and take his reins, thankfully he don’t resist. Jax nimbly climbs behind me but the mutie don’t move.

  “Po, come on!” I say urgently. The shouting is getting louder now and I know they have found the campsite and the other raiders. The creature shakes his head.

  “Go,” he says and I ignore Jax’s muttered “You don’t have to tell me twice...go”

  “No, he helped us, we ain’t leaving him!” I hiss at Jax.

  But the creature shakes his head firmly. “Go! Po will hide....they look for girl...they no find Po.”

  “You heard him...they no find Po,” Jax hisses back but the creature is done debating. He smacks the horse’s rump and we bolt off without warning. I struggle with the reins but finally I get the horse under control and I glance back over my shoulder. Finn and Tater are riding directly alongside us but Po is as good as his word...he ain’t nowhere to be seen. What I do see however is much more frightening. Emerging from the grove of trees we just cleared is a line of riders, all on big black powerful looking beasts.

  The Prezedants Army! My heart starts pounding in my chest and I grab the reins tighter for fear they will slip out of my sweat soaked hands.

  “Don’t look back, just ride!” Jax shouts in my ear and I know he is right but deep down in my gut I fear we are doomed. We may be able to out ride them on Bushers horse but Winnie don’t stand a chance against those beasts. And there ain’t no way in hell I’m leaving Finn behind! Oh gods why didn’t I make Finn ride with me, I think as I look over at him hanging on for dear life to Tater, his eyes closed in fear.

  And that’s all it took was that one moment of inattention.

  I hear Jax’s shout of “Look out!” an instant before t
he horse stumbles and I find myself flying weightlessly through the air. I hit the ground hard, the breath knocked out of me in a loud ‘whoosh’. The loose rocks on the mountain trail bite painfully into my face and hands as I slide across them a bit before I come to a stop. The beast we were riding gallops past me, rider less, missing my head by a hair. Dazed, breathless, I hear Finn’s cry of “Tara!” and I know right away what he and Tater are about to do.

  “Don’t you dare stop!” I try to scream at him. “Keep moving!” but it comes out as a whimper...I have no voice. I push myself to my knees and watch in horror as Finn jumps from Winnie’s back and heads straight for me, unaware of the brown robed rider closing in on him. I watch, as the rider leans low in his saddle...arm outstretched...ready to scoop Finn off the ground and take him away. Take him to the madman.

  “Finn!” I try to warn him but he cain’t hear me over the pounding hooves. The rider is on top of him now, the arm encircling his waist and I see Finn’s eyes go big with fear.

  “Nooooooooo!” The scream is forced from my lungs as I try to push to my feet. I have to do something! The slug whistles over my head and I duck instinctively. They’re shooting at us! I think at first but then I see the rider about to grab Finn fall from his saddle. His foot still entangled in the stirrup, he is dragged by his horse away from Finn and bashed mercilessly about by the rocky terrain. Finn, finally realizing the danger, takes cover behind a large boulder, his frantic eyes watching my face...checking to see if I am okay. I whirl around to find Jax standing above me, shooter aimed and ready. The shot had come from Jax! He had fired on the rider!

  “We gotta move!” he yells, the noise of the approaching riders almost drowning out his words. I just stare at him dumbfounded. He grabs my shoulder and shakes me none too gently.