The Ruins Box Set

by T. W. Piperbrook

  Kirby chuckled quietly. “Tech Magic. You people from Brighton really are backward.”

  Bray frowned as he pointed toward the horses, which were drinking from the brook next to where they slept. “Backward? You were the one who had never seen a horse.”

  “The people in my settlement never had them,” Kirby explained, not for the first time. “Just like your people never had guns. Horses were the things of legend. The knowledge of the old world—the Ancients, as you call them—is spread differently, depending on where we come from. I think that’s something we’re both figuring out, as we travel farther from our homes.”

  “You’re right about that,” Bray agreed. He’d seen enough recently to question what he thought he knew about the wild, though he wouldn’t freely admit it.

  After he’d finished cleaning and tying off his wound, Bray stoked the remains of the dying fire they’d built the night before so he could cook breakfast. Kirby collected her things, falling into the dark mood that seemed characteristic of her since they’d been nearing her settlement.

  Bray noticed she’d been eating less, staring between the trees while she rode, and even missing some opportunities to make a joke at his expense.

  He wondered if she was looking for ghosts.

  Kirby had told him several times that the people of her settlement were dead. She’d been very clear she didn’t want to be there any longer than needed.

  “Don’t worry, you’ll have food in your stomach soon,” he said as he pulled a rabbit from his bag and started skinning it.

  “I don’t feel much like eating,” Kirby said.

  “You’re not sick, are you?” Bray asked.

  “No, nothing like that,” she answered vaguely as she walked over to check on William, a habit she’d developed over the last couple of days. Bray suspected her sympathy for William—and the fact that she and him were both infected—was one of the things keeping her here.

  Confirming William was still asleep, Kirby joined Bray by the fire. “Did you hear the demons howling last night?” she asked.

  “Yes, but they never got close,” Bray confirmed.

  “With so many killed near Brighton, it’s hard to believe there are any demons left,” Kirby said.

  “We’ll be getting further away from Brighton. Who knows how many are out in other parts of the wild?” Bray shrugged. “All I know is, I’d feel a lot safer with an armful of guns.” He grinned.

  Kirby smiled back as Bray hung the skinned rabbit over the fire on a stick. Movement from William’s blanket distracted them. William was finally waking up. He rubbed his eyes, cast aside his blanket, and pulled his shirt higher over his neck. It seemed like he was still hiding his warts, even though he was in no danger from Bray or Kirby.

  Maybe he was ashamed.

  “Did you sleep well?” Bray called over to William.

  Confusion crossed William’s face for a brief moment before he remembered where he was. “Yes,” he said. “It was cold, though. I heard demons in the night.” William stood from his blanket. “Did I, or was I dreaming?”

  “It was demons,” Kirby confirmed. “But we’re okay. You don’t have to worry.”

  William nodded, but he no longer seemed fearful of the twisted men.

  And why would he be? William could talk to the vile, stinking things. Bray wouldn’t have believed it, had he not witnessed it several times in the Ancient City.

  A few times while they were traveling, Bray had seen William staring between the trees as the demons screeched far away in the forest. Bray had promised to keep William away from the twisted men. But with so many temptations in the wild, that promise was a continuing challenge.

  Who knew taking care of Ella’s boy would be so difficult?

  “Thank the gods the demons didn’t come near here,” Bray said as he turned the rabbit in the fire, hoping to change the subject. “They stink like a corpse rotting in the sun. Nobody needs that stench ruining breakfast.”

  “We already have your stench doing that.” Kirby laughed at Bray.

  Ignoring her, Bray said, “As soon as we’re done eating, we’ll get moving.”

  **

  After stamping out the fire, they rode the horses through several miles of dusted snow. Kirby led, while Bray and William rode behind, single file when the trees were too thick and clustered, or next to each other when there was room, following terrain that grew steeper, with more and more cliffs standing over the surf. Bray looked for signs of demons or men, but saw nothing except the small footprints of an occasional squirrel.

  “There’s been a lot less snow along the coast,” William observed, looking at the ground.

  “My settlement is on the water, north of the place you call the Ancient City,” Kirby explained.

  “I still can’t believe you’ve never seen the Ancient City,” Bray mused as he looked over at her.

  “My people were so busy fighting off demons that we didn’t have time to explore.” Kirby shrugged. “We planned to, of course. But most days, we were lucky enough to just eat.”

  “I remember you said your settlement was built with wood.”

  “Yes,” Kirby said. “We built it in a bowl-shaped valley surrounding a bay, protected by a wooden wall. Almost immediately after we landed our ships, the demons started attacking.”

  “Ships,” Bray said, the word as much of a marvel as the concept behind it. “We haven’t talked much about where you settlers came from.”

  Kirby looked away. “Across the ocean,” she said. “I’ve told you most of what you need to know. The place I came from wasn’t much better than here.”

  Kirby didn’t elaborate, and Bray knew better than to push, especially with the mood she’d been in.

  They continued riding until there was no more snow. The weather had warmed, but every so often, a frigid breeze blew, giving Bray a chill that made it worse than where they’d come from. Bray figured it was from the ocean. He’d felt similarly cold in the Ancient City.

  Kirby was taking them up a hill, and the horses were working harder, bobbing their heads and keeping a steady pace. When they reached the crest of the hill, Kirby halted, putting up a hand so that Bray and William stopped, too.

  Kirby pointed down the hill. “This is—was—my home.”

  Below them was a large, bowl-shaped valley by a bay, just as she’d described. The majority of the valley was blackened by fire. Within it were thousands of trees that had been cut to stumps, and the remains of what must be a thousand bodies, now skeletons.

  “Those are the bodies of the mutants we fought over the years,” Kirby explained.

  Past the bodies and the stumps, to the right from their view overlooking the valley and the bay, were the remnants of the stockade—tall, wooden logs, many of which had been knocked over or burned, and a dozen or so tall, wooden towers that extended high into the air. On the shore, hanging half in and half out of the water, more incredible than anything else Bray had seen, were enormous, metal objects, the backs of them rocking with the swells of the ocean.

  “Those are your ships,” he said with amazement.

  “Yes,” Kirby said sadly. “All that is left of them, anyway.”

  “They carried you here?”

  “Yes, but they’re too rusted and destroyed to use. Most are tipped, as you see.”

  “What happened to them?” William asked.

  “They were washed up by a hurricane we had years ago,” she answered.

  “A hurricane?” William asked, not understanding the term.

  “A bad storm.” Kirby fell silent as she looked across the valley.

  After a moment of reflection, she trotted her horse down the slope and toward the valley. “Be careful,” she warned, pulling her gun from her holster. “The mutants made homes of my settlement. I killed most of them before I left last time, but there might be more lurking within the buildings.”

  Bray and William drew their swords.

  They led their horses down the hill, fol
lowing behind Kirby until they reached the valley, riding through a maze of stumps and bodies, unable to pry their eyes away from the destruction. Everywhere Bray looked was a skeleton lying at some ugly angle, or scattered bones no longer in the shape of a person. William stared from one to the next, as if he was recalling something. The gods knew he’d seen enough.

  “Most of these skeletons are from demons we fought over the years, as I said. The bodies you will see inside the settlement belong to my people. And there are fresher demon corpses there, as well.”

  “You’re certain no one survived?” Bray asked.

  “During the days after the fire, and after the demons attacked, I looked for some of my people,” Kirby said quietly, as she rode. “Some of them ran into the forest. As I mentioned, some went crazy from the spore. But I thought the ones that were lucid would eventually come back to get more weapons, or to search for other survivors. None did. I’m pretty certain they’re dead.”

  They kept riding between the stumps until they reached one of the gaps in the stockade. Bray peered through the broken, burnt timbers around it, getting a better view of the handful of tall, wooden buildings spaced out all over the settlement and creeping several stories into the sky. The structures had large, square bases, but narrowed as they got higher, leading up to what looked like observation platforms at the top. Between them were numerous smaller, wooden buildings. Some of those buildings were built in rows to form makeshift streets. A hundred yards past the last street were the ships and the water. The remains of a lone, destroyed cabin stood on the beach. Bray didn’t have a view of everything, but he saw no signs of demons anywhere.

  “Maybe the demons left,” he said. “That will make it easy to get the guns and leave.”

  Kirby nodded as they rode quietly. “The guns are in one of the ships,” she said. “We’ll go right there, and then we’ll leave.”

  They rode through the gap in the wall and past a few of the buildings.

  William tensed on his horse. He pointed. “What was that?”

  Bray and Kirby followed his gaze. Deep in the distance, down by the water, two men with bows crept across the ruined settlement. It looked like they were heading for the ships. Like Kirby, they wore strange, green and brown clothing, but their hair was long and unkempt, so much that it looked to be in a few, solid tangles. Bray could just make out some strange markings on their faces.

  “It looks like some of your people survived,” Bray said, looking over at Kirby as they watched the men in the distance. “I recognize the jackets.”

  Kirby glanced sideways at Bray with a look of fear that he’d never seen her wear. “Those aren’t my people.”

  Chapter 2: Kirby

  “Hide,” Kirby hissed. She waved Bray and William behind the nearby building before they could ask any questions.

  They spurred their horses behind the nearest charred, collapsed tower, which was tall and wide enough to conceal them. Sensing the moods of their riders, the animals snorted, acting as if they’d rather bolt in another direction. Kirby kept a tight grip on the reins, and an even tighter grip on her gun as she appraised the rest of the settlement, suspecting other strange men might be lurking between the buildings’ crevices, planning an attack. All she saw were skeletons’ hands, reaching through the gaps in the tower behind which they were hiding, some of her people’s last attempts at freedom before they’d died from the fire. All around them were the dead bodies of demons, gnawed and partially decomposed.

  “Did they see us?” Bray whispered.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “You said those aren’t your people. Who are they, then?” Bray asked worriedly.

  “I’ve never seen them before,” Kirby answered. Nodding at one of the neighboring buildings that hadn’t been destroyed by fire, she said, “I stashed some things after my people were killed. They must’ve found our jackets.”

  “Do you think they found your guns?” Bray asked.

  She had the same question on her mind. “They weren’t carrying them. If they didn’t find them, they will. Everywhere I’ve lived, people come to steal what they don’t have, and they don’t leave anyone—or anything—behind. I’m surprised I was able to hide here as long as I did.”

  “We can take care of them, before they get farther.” Bray raised his sword to emphasize his point. “We can make sure they don’t find the guns, if they haven’t already.”

  “We don’t know how many men there are. It wouldn’t be wise to rush out there.”

  Kirby glanced over her shoulders at the break in the stockade through which they’d ridden, as if some more strange men might come pouring after them. All she saw was the charred valley, filled with skeletons and tree stumps.

  Riding back to the edge of the blackened tower, she peered toward the water, ready to gallop in another direction, if that’s what they needed to do. The men were walking away from the remains of the solitary cabin on the beach that had once held fishing supplies, but was now a pile of burnt logs, crisped bodies, and ruined goods. There was nothing for the men to find there. But they must know that already. Set back from the cabin was a row of small, wooden buildings that formed one of the makeshift streets behind it. The men walked farther onto the beach, scanning everywhere, aiming their bows, making muddy, wet tracks in the sand. They seemed alert, but not alarmed. Gentle waves lapped at the shipwrecked boats, making it look like the giant objects were crawling toward the settlement, even though Kirby knew those ships would never sail again.

  She scanned the rest of the beach for footprints, but saw no more.

  Bray followed her to the edge of the tower and whispered, “I don’t see anyone else.”

  “Maybe they’re scouts, and the rest of their people are watching for danger.”

  “They might be watching us.” Bray looked around cautiously.

  Kirby checked on William, who remained safely behind the tower, hiding and watching them.

  “I’m not saying we rush to our deaths,” Bray told Kirby. “But we traveled a long way to get more guns. And you said we need more ammunition after what we used in Brighton. I saw what those weapons did to the demons. They’d be of great use to us.”

  “Dead people don’t need guns,” Kirby said with a grim shake of her head.

  Bray pointed at the grenades on her belt. “You have those things, too. You haven’t shown me what they can do, but they can surely take care of more than two men. Or maybe we can use those small, metal things laying everywhere. Is that ammunition?”

  Reminding herself that Bray had only a surface understanding of guns, Kirby said, “Those are casings that used to hold bullets. They’ve already been used.”

  “They’d fetch a hefty sum in Brighton, whatever they are,” Bray muttered.

  “That might be the case, but we aren’t going back to Brighton, and they won’t help us now anyway. My guns won’t necessarily help us, either. A person is a much more difficult target than a demon. Demons run at you without considering their lives. An enemy will hide, fight, and bring others. War draws the attention of everyone.”

  William rode over. It looked like he’d heard the conversation. “We could wait until they leave,” he suggested.

  “They won’t leave soon,” Kirby said. “Once people find a place to pillage, they keep coming until everything is gone. That’s what scavengers do.”

  “So what do we do?” Bray asked. “Let those dirty pig scratchers make off with your loot?”

  Kirby knew Bray was trying to provoke her into action. She couldn’t help but feel a sting of anger as she thought about the men combing through her people’s clothes and belongings, desecrating their memory. She’d done similar things when she’d lived across the ocean: killing, plundering, and stealing. But she’d been a slave, unable to make her own choices. She’d been forced into wars in which she had no stake. Her people had come across the ocean filled with hopes of leaving their violent pasts behind, and instead they’d received the same death that they�
�d sailed hundreds of miles to escape.

  These scavengers would never know about her people’s struggles. They’d stomp on those memories while they stole away anything they could carry.

  She wanted them dead.

  Before she could consider turning that anger-fueled fantasy into reality, William asked, “You said you hid the guns in one of the ships. Which one?”

  Kirby watched him. “The third.”

  “The overturned one, laying sideways and facing us?”

  “Yes, the one with the holes in the deck.”

  “What’s a deck?”

  “The top of the ship, normally.”

  William positioned himself so he could see past Bray and Kirby and glimpse the men. “They’re headed toward the first ship,” he said. “I don’t think they’ve been here before. They look like they’re exploring.”

  “We don’t know that for sure. The ocean might’ve washed away their footprints. This might be their second trip.”

  “Maybe we can scare them away without being seen. Maybe we can do it quickly, and get the guns, if they’re there. Then we can leave. How do you use the weapons on your belt?” William asked. “They’re called grenades, right?”

  “Yes. You pull the pin and throw them. They make an explosion that destroys most of what’s around them, and kills or injures anyone nearby.”

  “I’m having trouble picturing that, but it sounds like they cause a big disturbance.” William nodded excitedly. “Maybe that would scare the men off, and we wouldn’t have to take as big a risk.”

  “I like William’s way of thinking.” Bray grinned.

  Kirby looked down at her belt. “An explosion would definitely scare them, especially if they’re like you, and have never seen weapons like mine.”

  William and Bray nodded.

  “Still, I want to make pretty certain these men are alone before we try anything.” Looking around, Kirby located another of the towers that hadn’t been burned, closer to the gap where they’d come in. Pointing at it, she said, “Bray, take the horses, and William, and hide behind that building.”