Beyond the New Horizon (Book 4): Dark Times

by Conaway, Christine

  Charlie chuckled, “Thought I felt someone staring at me.” He sat up with a groan and stretched, “I feel like I must have died as soon as I sat down.” When Charlie looked around his face mirrored his surprise by how high in the sky the sun was. “You shouldn’t have let me sleep so long. We should have been out of here already.” He peered at Lucas, “Did you get any sleep?’

  Lucas shook his head, “No, and you have to see what’s out there. We can’t go any further because the road is gone.”

  “Well, I guess we’ll have to make our own way then, it can’t be that difficult.” Charlie yawned, rubbed his eyes and looked around, “Abby still asleep?”

  “Yup, I didn’t want to wake either of you unless I had to, but I think you need to see what we’re facing.”

  “Just let me sit a minute and get my wits about me. Maybe you should just tell me what it is that you think I should see?”

  Lucas shook his head, “No words that I have could ever do that first look justice. Nothing I could say would adequately prepare you for what’s out there or in this case, what’s not out there.”

  Charlie lifted his hand toward Lucas who had climbed tiredly to his feet, “Give me your hand boy. Help an old man to his feet and show me what you think is important enough to stare me awake.” He accompanied his words by his now familiar chuckle, and Lucas took no offense to being called, boy. He figured Charlie must have perfected his ready use of the word, with his own sons.

  He pulled Charlie to his feet and stood patiently while the older man bent and twisted to limber his muscles up. When Charlie appeared ready, Lucas led the way to the drop-off. A few feet from the edge Lucas heard the sharp intake of breath when Charlie looked past him.

  “Holy mother of God!” Charlie walked out to the edge and stared around much the same as Lucas had. Lucas let him take in the whole view before he said anything. He was rewarded when Charlie came to the same conclusion that he had.

  “I knew something was telling me to stop when we did. We could have walked right off that edge…” Charlie turned from the left where the road ended to the right, taking in the whole view. His eyes locked on to where the two walls of rock met. He pointed, “That’s where we need to go, right down there.” He looked over the edge, “the question is, how do we go about getting there?”

  “I could take Jinx and ride back the way we came to see if we missed a trail leading off that way.”

  “Or, you could lie down and get some sleep while I use your horse and do the same thing. By the look of you, I assume that you were up all night, so you going anywhere isn’t going to happen. Abby can sit up and keep an eye on things while I ride back, and don’t argue with me. You’re no good to us if you’re going to fall asleep at the helm.”

  “At the helm? What the heck is the helm?”

  “It’s an expression for one who is in charge like in a boat. The person steering is considered at the helm. Now, pick yourself a spot and lie down for a while even if it’s only until I get back. Maybe Abby will build us a small fire and heat up the rice.”

  Abby had heard Charlie because he had deliberately raised his voice so she would hear him. She sat up and looked around. “Holy cow! Look how high up we are.” She got first to her knees and then her feet. Abby walked toward the edge with her her wonder written on her face. “It almost feels like we’d be in the clouds if there were any.”

  “I don’t have to remind you to stay away from the edge. We don’t know how stable the ground is and one shaker, if it’s undercut at all, could send you right to the bottom.”

  Abby stepped back, as Charlie had said the words, she felt a warning of shivers up her spine, and she wondered if the hillside could slide out from under them if the ground began to shake again. She turned to watch Charlie with Jinx and wondered if she should offer to go back. As agile as Charlie had seemed yesterday, today he appeared to be older and slower. His face didn’t look its usual healthy pink either.

  Charlie had untied all of the bags she and Lucas had tied to the saddle. When Charlie dropped the backpack, Abby was reminded that she still hadn’t looked inside of it. Unconsciously, she fingered the piece of rawhide string around her neck with one silver key hanging off of it. It was the last thing her father had pressed into her hand when they’d said goodbye. Abby was still angry that he hadn’t let her stay with him and Lucy.

  Before she could voice her concerns about his health, Charlie had put a foot in the stirrup and mounted quickly, contradicting her thoughts about his physical abilities. He clucked at Jinx, and with a wave of his hand, they jogged back the way they’d come.

  Abby shrugged and set about collecting rocks. Loose rocks were everywhere, and it didn’t take long to assemble them into a ring. Once she had a good blaze, she set the grate on top. It sat too close to the flames, but she thought that if she kept stirring the pot, it wouldn’t burn. When it was heated through, she looked at Lucas. He was lying on his back with his mouth wide open, she knew he was tired and didn’t want to wake him just to eat, so she moved the pot to a rock she placed beside the fire. She was tired of stirring it every time it cooled down, and it seemed the more she stirred, the gummier the concoction became. Abby hadn’t learned to do much more than using the microwave from her father and anything more complicated in their diet, he took care of. She had signed up for Home Economics; a new class they were re-introducing for the latter half of her freshman year, but with the school year just started when the chaos began, she hadn’t taken the class yet.

  Abby walked out and looked over the edge. Her foot nudged some rocks over the edge, and the sounds from the sliding gravel reminded her of the danger. Charlie had said the top edge could be undercut and could crumble out from under them at any time if they got too close. She took several steps back until she felt safe and studied the terrain below.

  Something caught her attention, and she leaned out as far as she dared. It is hard to see over and through the taller trees still clinging to the side hill, but she did see something. Abby studied the moving figures until she was sure they weren’t grazing deer. “Cows!” she finally crowed, “Lucas, I see the cows.”

  Lucas was awake in an instant and sitting up. He had no idea what had woken him in such a rude way until he heard Abby holler about seeing the cows. He worked his tongue around inside his mouth and curled his lips in disgust, he needed to find his toothbrush but realized it was still in his parent’s wagon. He didn’t see anything to drink to wet his mouth either. He used his tee-shirt to clean his teeth and wiped the hem of it over his tongue. He finally worked up enough spit that his lips slid over his teeth rather than sticking to them. He felt like he’d just fallen asleep and his eyes burned from the sunlight. He rose with a groan and walked to where Abby stood not far from the edge. “Where? I don’t see anything.”

  His eyes were having trouble focusing and felt gritty under his eyelids. He tried to follow the direction Abby was pointing in but saw nothing but trees and the rock walls.

  “Down there. If you’d just come a moment earlier, you could have seen them too. They were walking right down there, but now they’re in those trees.”

  Lucas peered over and looked. He thought she had to be seeing things because he could barely make out the trees, let alone an animal from so far away. “I don’t see them. I can barely see the ground from up here.”

  “Oh, don’t exaggerate. It’s not that far down. They were right there. Why would I say I saw them if I didn’t? I’d forgotten your Dad and Sam brought them up here until I saw them. They were only little brown shapes moving across the grass, but what else could they be?”

  Lucas could see him showing his doubt, which was upsetting for Abby and she was right. She had no reason to make something like that up. Maybe Charlie would have some good news when he got back.

  Lucas stood with Abby for several more minutes, but never saw anything that looked like the cows. He had serious doubts that Abby had seen anything. It was true that they hadn’t come across the
cows yet, but how could they have gotten down there? It almost looked like either the walls of rock across the gap had risen straight out of the earth, or the ground between them had dropped, but either scenario sounded far-fetched to him, and in his need for sleep, he couldn’t think of anything else right then. He turned away and walked back to where he’d been sleeping. Not even the smell of food could deter him from closing his eyes as soon as he laid back down.

  Abby watched him until she saw the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest and dragged her backpack over beside the fire. It wasn’t the heat that drew her to it, but the comforting crackle of burning wood reminded her of better times when she and her father had camped. Abby slipped the leather thong off over her head and put the key into the padlock.

  She was still puzzled why he had locked the bag, to begin with. As soon as she opened the top flap, she knew. “Now why would he leave me this?” Abby carefully pulled the rifle out. Zip tied to the trigger guard was a small key that would unlock the folding mechanism. He had told her it couldn’t be fired as long as it was folded and this feature made it an excellent bag gun. She cut the tie with her pocket knife and unlocked it.

  Holding the body, Abby unfolded the stock, and when it locked open with a satisfying snick, Abby placed it against her shoulder and pointed it out over the valley. She had seen the rifle in her Dad’s pack and wondered why he hadn’t used it. When she’d asked him, he said it was good for hunting small animals and game but that it wouldn’t be ideal for anything larger, unless he’d loaded it up with the hollow point and he was saving them for darker times than they had right then. It was a newer Keltec Sub 2000, and it shot the same ammunition as her .9mm.

  He had been a firm believer in carrying the same type of weapon to minimize the type and caliber of bullets they had to carry. He felt the 9mm could stop someone as well as being used to hunt with. She had shot it many times at the range as well as broken it down and cleaned it more than once. Abby hadn’t been as interested in the shooting practice as she’d let her father think, but she treasured the time they’d spent together. While her friends were planning their future dates and fussing about clothes, she was learning to be a competitive shooter.

  “Holy crap! Where did you find that thing?”

  Abby jumped and grabbed the rifle before it could slide off her lap. “It was in my backpack. Dad must have put it there. Come see.”

  He crawled over to her, not bothering to get to his feet for the short distance. He sat back on his heels and dusted his hands on his pants. Lucas looked between Abby’s still full pack and the rifle. “That’s kind of cool. Have you shot it?”

  Abby nodded, “Yeah. My Dad made me shoot every gun he owned. I liked this one the best.” Abby rubbed her hand down the stock and realized it still had a thin film of oil on it and wondered if this was the same one she’d used or the one he’d promised to buy for her when she was older.

  “I don’t suppose he packed you binoculars or at least a scope so we could look down below?”

  “I don’t know. Taking this out is as far as I got. Why?”

  “I keep thinking about the cows you said you thought you saw and wondering how they got down there.”

  “Not thought I saw. I did see them. I’m not even sure they were yours, but for sure they were cows.”

  “I believe you. I just wonder how they got down there.”

  Abby cocked her head in thought, “Maybe they were there before the quake, or maybe they found another way down.”

  Lucas looked around after rubbing the sleep from his eyes, “I guess it’s possible. There's no telling how long that rock has been down there, or which quake made them appear, but I bet it was the last one.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “There's nothing growing on them. Even solid rock has pockets of dirt and grass if it’s been around long enough.”

  “That’s true. Dad took me to Deception Pass, and there’s a rock sitting out in the water with trees growing from the middle of it.”

  As if realizing they were still alone, Lucas looked around to be sure, “I guess Charlie didn’t come back yet?”

  Abby shook her head. “It seems like he’s been gone for hours. The rice is getting pretty dried out, but if you want to eat some, it’s still warm. I can tell you for a fact that it will stick to your insides.”

  Lucas looked at the sun and saw that it was sitting far to the west. He agreed with Abby. It just didn’t seem like it, but Charlie had been gone for hours. “He has been gone almost all day. I hope nothing went wrong and he’s okay.”

  Abby stared at him, her finger tapping on the side of her cheek as if contemplating her next words. “Did you two make a plan for if he didn’t return? We need to find some water for the horses and for us too.”

  “Nope. We didn’t. I guess it never occurred to either of us that he wouldn’t return, so I guess we’ll just wait. He has his Taurus, and I’m pretty sure you would have heard it if he ran into trouble.”

  “That reminds me, if he only has the one gun, then why does he carry both shotgun shells and .45 bullets?”

  Lucas chuckled, “he used to do some competitive shooting way back when he was younger, and he told me the Taurus takes care of snakes of both kinds, the slithery ones, and the two-legged ones because the gun shoots both the 410 shells and the .45 bullets.”

  They sat in a comfortable silence, waiting. Lucas wondered how Abby could be so different from his sister. Sherry could never have sat for a few minutes let alone a few hours without chatter.

  Finally, Abby spoke, “He’s pretty old, what if he had a heart attack or something?”

  “Charlie? He’s not old! Why would you say that?”

  Defensively, Abby answered. “His hair is white, and he has a beard, and he’s got lots of wrinkles?”

  Lucas laughed, “Geez Abby. As long as I’ve known him, his hair has been white, and Uncle Sam grows a beard every winter and Charlie isn’t any older than my Dad. He probably has wrinkles because he’s spent his whole life outdoors. I never thought of him as being old. Now, if he was still as heavy as he used to be before the lights went out, then I would worry about him, but shoot, now he’s almost skinny.”

  “Well, he looks kind of old to me.”

  “I think he’s just tired. Heck, I’m still tired, and I’m young.”

  She nodded and folded the Keltec in half, locked it and set it to the side. Abby added the key to the one on her leather thong and tied it back around her neck. “Let's see what else is in here because I’m pretty sure the rifle didn’t account for all of the extra weight.”

  Lucas moved to sit beside her and waited while she lifted the next items out. Lucas counted as she pulled them out. There were twenty boxes of .9mm FMJ bullets, six boxes of the regular .9mm and another half dozen of .45 caliber. Lucas picked one up and frowned, “I understand these,” he said touching a box of bullets, but why the 45’s?” He pulled the top of the bag his way because Abby was slow and he couldn’t stand the suspense.

  He grabbed a camo-colored pouch, lifted it out and unzipped it, “Ahah! Here’s the reason. Dang Abby, your dad was taking care of you.” He held up a new Glock .45.

  Abby didn’t appear to hear him, but he heard her sniffle. Abby never acted or sounded like a girl and for her to be crying was an anomaly. “What? What’s the matter?”

  Abby looked up, and her eyes were glassy, she held a piece of notebook paper up in one hand, and wiped at her nose with the other, “He wrote me a note.”

  She pulled it away when Lucas went to take it, “Not yet. I haven’t finished reading it.” Her eyes skimmed down the paper, and she handed it to Lucas, “I guess he wrote it for you too.”

  “Me? Why would he write anything to me?” Puzzled, Lucas smoothed the wrinkles out, held it up and began reading.

  He skimmed over the first half of the letter. He didn’t need to read about her father’s love for her or how much he wished he was beside her right then until he came to the part
that concerned him.

  Lucas, If Abby is reading this, I am sure that you are with her. The Glock is for your use. It’s a better fit for your hand than her’s, and she already has one. I know you might feel you are incapable of defending the two of you because of your age, but trust me, there is no one else I would rather have with Abby than you. Take care of my girl. Ben

  Chapter five

  John stopped the tractor and looked around. They had reached another dead end. The hills which he had believed would be their salvation had turned into the enemy. His tractor was almost out of diesel, and they hadn’t found a way down to the river. The last big quake had changed the topography of the land enough that roads disappeared with the changes. They had backtracked countless times until John had finally sent Matt and Sherry ahead on horseback to find them a way through. He was beginning to think they should have stayed at the ranch, and the volcano be damned. How much worse could it be than wandering around in a land that he no longer was familiar with? They had passed where he thought that he and Sam had left the cattle, but not only were the cows not there, but neither were the creek or the meadow.

  Columns of rock stood where sloping hills used to be, the terrain had gone from rolling hills and valleys to perpendicular walls of stone and dirt, closing them in on both sides. The last couple miles, John had felt as if they were cattle being funneled down a chute and now they had reached the end. There was barely enough room for him to turn around.

  Matt and Sherry had been gone since they started that morning and he’d told them to come back as soon as they found a way through. He had seen their hoof marks when they’d headed up one of the last climbable grades, but no returning set of tracks.

  “We’ll make camp here until the kids get back,” he said after turning the tractor and trailer around. Mark pulled past him into the wider spot and got his rig turned facing out the way they’d come. He parked beside John and climbed down.