Seven months later, on her mother’s birthday (surely a sign from God, her mother always said), and with a rare Memphis snow outside, Caelyn was born into this world.
After twenty years of feeling as if she was more or less alone, like a sudden gift from heaven, Gretta held a little baby in her arms.
* * *
Caelyn Mckenny Calton watched through the kitchen window as her mother poked at the fire underneath the homemade smoker. Watching her mother was like looking into a crystal ball; a time machine couldn’t have shown her any better what she would look like when she was sixty-nine. And they had much more in common than just their looks. Both had quick hands and quick emotions, quick to joy, quick to anger, quick to cry. Both were fiercely independent, opinionated, and strong.
Southern women. Southern pride. It shone in both of their eyes.
Yet as much as they were the same, there was a vast difference in their outlooks now. And the differences between them had grown larger with the passing of each year.
Caelyn had a softer side. A gentler side. A certain trust in God. Her mother was not like that. She was less feeling underneath. She’d lost her religion out in California and wasn’t particularly interested in looking for it anymore. She wasn’t hard-hearted, really, just less willing to feel, the experience with her husband having left her cautious and on guard. Like a drying limb on a gnarled cedar tree, she was strong and unbending, but tight and knotted up inside. Making her caution worse, the only good thing that had ever happened to her had been her little girl, and the years they’d spent together had proven far too short. Before she knew it, Caelyn had gone off to college and fallen in love with some army guy.
It had proven very hard for her mother to let go.
Which made their relationship difficult at times.
Chapter Eleven
Two Miles West of Chatfield
Nineteen Miles Southwest of Memphis, Tennessee
The man was exhausted. His muscles ached, his head hurt, his arms were sore from driving, and it was getting late. He was hungry and thirsty and more than ready to head home. He and the boys had been up since way before dawn. The sun was close to setting, and he knew how utterly dark it would be once it went down. And there weren’t any headlights on the old tractor that he was driving, which meant that if he didn’t turn around, it would be a long, stressful drive back home. He glanced up at the setting sun, thinking of the moon. Yes, it would be up there, but he almost feared it now. Bloody red. Evil looking. Like the devil glaring down.
He shifted in the old seat and almost swore. He didn’t understand it at all. They’d completed their assignment. It was time to go home. On the old tractor it was an hour’s drive, at least, back to his home.
Yet he kept driving in the other direction, steering the tractor down the road. “Keep on going. There are others,” the voice inside him seemed to say.
But there were no others. Whatever foolish prompting he was having, his mind told him it was wrong. He knew everyone who lived within their ward boundaries—he knew them very well. And no one else was out there. He had seen them all.
He slowed the tractor. It was time to head on home. He didn’t want to be out here after dark. He could feel the evil growing close.
Still, the voice persisted in his heart. “Keep on going. There’s one more.”
The driver shook his head. He was a simple man. He wasn’t ever going to make a million dollars or watch himself on TV; he’d never be famous or elected to some big-time public office. But this much he knew: The Spirit was talking to him now. He recognized the feeling. “Keep on going. Keep on going. Yes, there is one more.”
He mentally reviewed the list of ward members for the third or fourth time. No. There were no more. He had visited them all.
If it was the Spirit that he was hearing, then the Spirit had it wrong. No matter what it told him, he knew there were no more members down this road.
Still, he kept on driving, fighting the terrifying urge to turn around.
The Spirit wasn’t the only voice inside his soul.
“I own the night!” the evil taunted him. “Stay out here and I’ll kill you. I’ll send a mortal out to find you—there are dozens of them around here who are under my control. Fear the darkness. It’s my kingdom. Don’t be a fool. You’ve got the two boys. I could kill them too.”
The man hesitated, glancing fearfully over his shoulder.
“Stop,” the evil hissed again. “Stop and turn around!”
“No,” the Spirit whispered, “there is another out there, someone the Father cares about. She’s been praying for you, brother. You cannot let her down. Don’t fear the darkness, it is empty. They cannot hurt you if you keep your faith strong. You are on the Master’s errand. He’ll protect you. Now please, don’t turn around.”
Chapter Twelve
Four Miles West of Chatfield
Twenty-One Miles Southwest of Memphis, Tennessee
Caelyn gave her dad a final pat on the shoulder, then moved toward the kitchen door. It creaked on its hinges, but the spring that pulled it closed behind her was firm and strong. Like everything else on the farm, the house was well maintained. She stepped onto the back porch. The clapboard home, two stories, white with dark green shutters, faced west and the sun was setting now, providing cool shade on the back porch. Her mother had moved around to the south lawn where the smoker had been set up at the edge of the grass. Caelyn walked to the side of the house and rested against the corner, taking in the view. Green pasture in the back, a heavy tree line on the far side, a strangely shadowed sky overhead. It was quiet, so quiet she could hear her heart pulsing in her ears. The road out front was completely deserted. No birds. No wind. No movement of the trees. To her left, a golden field of wheat had been cut down to the nubs, leaving only straw, the grain having been harvested back in July. What would they give to have the wheat back now? A lot. A real lot. But it didn’t matter, it was gone, sold to the granary on the edge of town, augured up into the silver tower, then dropped into waiting railroad cars and hauled off to General Mills or Betty Crocker or some other mill somewhere. Caelyn swallowed, wishing desperately that her father had held onto even a little of the grain, but he didn’t have anywhere to store it. Truth was, no farmers raised food for themselves anymore. They grew the crops and sold them, then, same as everyone, bought the finished products at the store. Turning her head, she looked north. Barns. An old milk parlor. A cement and metal manger where they used to feed the cows. Her father ran a simple operation. A little wheat. Corn. Soybeans. He had a herd of forty heifers but the yearlings had all been sold. Most of the mother cows were pregnant now and would calf again during the coming winter.
As a precaution, they had moved all the cattle into the back pasture, where they couldn’t be seen from the road. Was it necessary? She didn’t know. So far, they’d been left alone. A couple of the neighbors had come by a time or two, but those were the only people they’d seen since the EMP attack. Still, they’d heard rumors of things that were happening in the city and the suburbs: mean things, scary things, desperate stories. People were getting hungry now. Could parents watch their children begin to starve without doing something to help them? Not for long. So, thinking it might help avoid a conflict, Caelyn and her parents had moved the cows into the south pasture. Having the cattle out of sight would probably help, at least for a while, but eventually they were going to run out of hay to feed the animals. As it was, they had enough to last through December, but that was about all. And it would be impossible to buy any more; her father had checked. No one was selling. Without extra hay, come December, their mother cows would start going hungry. Caelyn knew it wouldn’t matter anyway; the herd would be slaughtered and eaten long before then. She didn’t know how or by whom, but it would happen. The cows were food. Food was scarce and getting scarcer. Eventually someone was going to come and take their herd.
The wind suddenly picked up and shifted from the south and the smoky smell of mesquit
e blew toward the house. She sniffed, her stomach growling, an empty pit between her ribs. She hadn’t eaten much over the past four or five days—partly out of nerves, mostly out of a sudden, deep-seated drive to conserve whatever food they had—and her mouth started watering as she smelled the drying meat.
She walked toward her mom. “How’s it going?” she asked as she approached the silver smoker.
Her mother lifted the lid from the metal garbage can, and a puff of white smoke billowed out. Picking up some old hot pads, she carefully removed the meat-covered grates fitted inside the can, dropped a handful of water-soaked mesquite chips into the fire box, replaced the grates, and put the lid back in place. “You know, this smoker your dad made is working really well.”
Caelyn studied the homemade smoker: an old metal garbage can, a metal chip box, a couple of metal grills. Her father had cut a six-inch hole in the bottom of the garbage can, dug a pit to allow for venting, then built a small fire and put the lid in place. He’d even installed a small thermometer, an engine temperature gauge he had taken from an old tractor, which read 224 degrees, right where they wanted it to be. “It’s amazing he could come up with this so quickly,” Caelyn said, glancing back toward the house. Her father had followed her out and was now sitting in the wicker rocking chair on the porch.
There was no greater evidence of the intellect that remained inside him than his uncanny ability to build or fix almost anything on the farm, working on machinery as if he’d designed it himself. He couldn’t tell you who the president of the United States was, balance a checkbook, or add up a simple column of three-digit numbers. He couldn’t follow a story from a newspaper or tell you anything about the war, yet he could quote the batting records of his beloved Yankees for every year since 1970 as well as every Super Bowl final score. Most times it was like he was in a deep fog. But sometimes the stupor lifted. Muttering, he would scribble on hastily arranged pieces of paper as old designs and formulas popped into his head. It was as if he knew, somewhere deep inside him, that his brain used to work on a different level than it now did, as if a part of him remembered the statistical formulas and chemical theorems he’d spent so many years coming to understand. Sometimes she could see the frustration that was bottled up inside. “It’s still there,” his eyes would plead. “Can you see it? Do you believe me? The intellect is still inside me! But it’s just so jumbled up!”
It was as if, after the accident, part of his brain had been sent back to when he was a small child, making him almost impossible to predict or understand. But from time to time there were powerful reminders that the man trapped inside the wounded mind was still there.
Her father saw that she was staring at him and he smiled happily, the youngster inside him always friendly. She smiled and waved back, then turned toward the smoker. The jerky was almost done, a full side of beef, enough to keep them in meat for at least a couple of months.
If they were careful and didn’t waste it.
And if other people left them alone.
Her mother adjusted the garbage can lid, making certain it was tight, then brushed a smoky strand of hair away from her eye. “Where’s Ellie?” she asked.
Caelyn nodded over her back. “Last I saw she was chasing Miller around the other side of the house.”
Gretta turned and shaded her eyes to the dropping sun. “She’s doing okay, I think. Don’t you?”
Caelyn pressed her lips before she answered. “She doesn’t really understand what’s going on.”
Gretta frowned a little, her eyes moving constantly up and down the road. “I don’t know,” she answered carefully. “Sometimes I think little kids know more than we give them credit for. She hears us talking. She hears the tone of our voices. But it’s more than that. Children have a sense for these things. Ellie certainly does. She’s a smart girl. She knows something’s going on.”
Caelyn folded her arms across her chest. “I hope not. I really hope not. She’s far too young . . .”
“She’s a strong girl, honey.”
“Yeah, but she is a little girl. Hardly more than a baby. I don’t want to steal her childhood. She deserves more than that. I absolutely want to keep things on an even keel for her for as long as we can.”
Gretta hunched her shoulders, thinking. “Maybe that’s not the right thing to do.”
“How’s that, Mom?”
“Maybe you should tell her. I don’t mean tell her everything, but you know, give her some idea why things have changed. You can’t hide it from her forever. She’s eventually going to know. We’ve got no car. No electricity. No running water. We’re scared to go into town. You don’t think she’s noticed any of this already? No, she’s noticed, and she wonders. I think you need to tell her enough so she won’t worry even more. If you don’t, trust me, Caelyn, her imagination is going to kick into gear. And a six-year-old’s imagination can come up with some pretty scary things all by itself.”
Caelyn thought before she answered. “I don’t know, Mom. I don’t want to worry her. There’s no reason to make things any worse.”
“Caelyn, she already knows that something’s very wrong. You need to give her some information, even if just a little. Assure her, yes, we all need to do that, but you’ve got to explain to her that the world has changed.”
Caelyn put her hand out toward the garbage can, exposing her palm to its heat, letting her fingers drift through the smoke that was seeping from under the heavy lid. “She’ll be okay, Mom.”
“She’ll be okay! Caelyn, are you kidding? What is there about this situation that makes you think any of us are going to be okay?”
Caelyn dropped her eyes, feeling the burden of responsibility once again. “It’ll be okay, Mom. You’ll see. There’s help out there. We aren’t in this alone.”
Gretta stared at her daughter. “I love you, honey, you know I do. I love you more than anything I have left in this world. But you’ve got to understand something. I’ve been alone for almost my entire life. Yes, I’ve had your father, but you know the situation there. He’s loyal and dear and I love him through and through. If there is any justice in this world—and maybe in the end there isn’t—but if there is, he will die and go to heaven without having to stop at Peter’s Gate. He’ll be saved with all you Mormons, he’s that good of a man. But that aside, I’ve been alive long enough to know you’ve got to take care of yourself. And that’s truer now than it’s ever been. We can’t count on anyone to help us. We are alone now, you and I.”
Caelyn nodded slowly but didn’t say anything.
Gretta checked the temperature on the garbage can, started to say something more, then cocked her head and listened. “You hear that?” she asked.
Caelyn turned toward the road, catching an occasional sound drifting and fading with the wind.
“Something’s coming,” her mother said anxiously, turning toward the house. Walking across the grass and onto the porch, she told her husband, “Come inside with me, okay?”
Caelyn faced the road and squinted. Her back to the house, she heard the screen door behind her open and then shut. She stepped toward the road. A large, green farm tractor, the raised exhaust pipe belching black smoke, pulled a small wagon down the road. Two young men steadied themselves near the front end of the wagon. The tractor driver was hidden inside the tinted cab.
Caelyn lifted her hand to protect her eyes against the sun. The tractor lumbered closer. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end.
Chapter Thirteen
It was a worn-out John Deere, old, layered with dust and tinted with rust spots on the metal fenders that wobbled over the back tires. The glass cab reflected the slanting rays of the late afternoon sun as the tractor turned into the driveway that led toward the detached garage on the back side of the house. Caelyn glanced toward the wagon. Two young men balanced themselves beside old cardboard boxes stacked three high. She tensed as they approached. She didn’t know these men. Somewhere behind her, she heard her mother calling, “Elli
e, come on in here.” The urgency in her mother’s voice left no room for the little girl to argue, and almost immediately Caelyn heard the sound of light footsteps across the porch. Caelyn kept her eyes on the strangers, her shoulders square. The tractor moved toward her and stopped. The driver cut the engine, the cab door popped open, and a white-haired man dropped from the tractor to the ground.
“How you doing?” he called out. He stood beside his tractor, pulling leather gloves from his hands. Caelyn studied him quickly. Weathered face. Dark, drooping eyes. Old Wranglers. A checkered shirt. Obviously a man who’d spent his whole life on the farm. She answered cautiously, “Doing good. How are you?”
The old man shrugged, then nodded around him. “Been better, I guess. Figure we all have.”
The two young men—she could see now that they were no more than teenagers—moved to the front of the wagon and seated themselves, their legs hanging over the edge. They didn’t say anything. She quickly took them in. Short hair. Clean faces. Old work clothes. Neighbor farmers? Probably. She started to relax.
The older man took a step toward her and frowned. “You alone?” he asked, glancing over her shoulder to the old farmhouse behind.
She immediately grew tense again. “My mom and dad are in the house,” she answered quickly, her voice hard.
He stared toward the house. “Are you sure?” he pressed.
Caelyn’s eyes grew angry. “Of course I’m sure.”
“You’re Caelyn, right?”
She hesitated. “Maybe. Who are you?”
The old man turned away from the house and focused on her.
She knew she had to be careful but, as she looked into his soft face and friendly eyes, she relaxed again. She had a sensitive spirit. It was one of her gifts—she could sense a person’s goodness before that person said anything—and looking at him, she knew instantly that she need not fear this man.
The stranger took a step toward her. “I’m Brother Simpson.” He extended his hand. “You probably don’t remember me. You and your husband were out here a couple summers ago. I used to be the bishop. We met once or twice at church.”
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