The Last Winter (The Circle War Book 2)

by Matt King

  He cleared his throat, trying to evade Amara’s glare. “You’re welcome.”

  When the doors to the amphitheater clanged shut and they were alone again, Amara turned to him. “You will never do that again. Do you understand?”

  “What did you do to them?” he asked. Something about Molly’s panicked look left him with a feeling of déjà vu.

  “I corrected their impression of what went on here today.”

  “Corrected how?”

  Her eyes looked like they were on fire. He’d never seen her so angry. “How and why I do things is of no concern to you. You had a simple job to do here today and you failed. It will be some time before I trust you to handle a task such as this again.”

  “But—”

  “Leave,” she said.

  Her unblinking stare followed him until he started to walk away.

  As he made his way up the aisle, he held onto the image of Molly’s expression as Amara made her corrections. He couldn’t put a finger on what made it seem so important. In some way, it felt like a memory he might have shared with her. A nervous twinge pinched his stomach. He buried it and walked quickly through the amphitheater’s doors.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The wind cutting through the sheared section of the Washington Monument was biting cold and smelled like soot. August sat with his feet dangling over the edge of the broken stone wall with a clear view of D.C. on all sides. Or what’s left of it. The top half of the monument was in pieces below, its white stone chunks scattered across broken sidewalks and ash-covered grass. He could see the tip lodged in a bank of snow.

  I could have stopped this. No matter how many times he went over the evidence, the conclusion was always the same. I could have stopped this and I didn’t.

  Footsteps on the staircase behind him drew his attention. Aeris’s brown armor stood in stark contrast to the ash-tinged walls of the monument.

  “You have to hop the last bit there,” he said. “Stairs are out.”

  She eyed the gap and made the jump with ease.

  “I hope you have a better way down,” she said.

  He peered over the edge. “Might sting a little.”

  “Yes, it looks like it would.” She leaned against the half-wall next to him. “You’ve been up here for some time. You must be cold.”

  He tapped the side of his mask. “You gotta get yourself one of these suits. Guaranteed to keep your body at 98.6 no matter what. Doesn’t keep the cold from coming in through the breathing holes, though. Or the smell.”

  She blew on her hands as she rubbed them together. “Is it always like this?”

  He looked up at her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m still getting used to it, too.”

  The wind played with the ends of her thick hair as she took in the ruins of Washington. “Despite how it may seem, none of this is your fault,” she said.

  He scoffed. “Right.”

  “You don’t believe me?”

  “Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but you weren’t there. I should’ve killed Gemini when I had the chance. He was right there and I let him slip through my fingers. Right there, and now…” He motioned to the rubble. “This.”

  “You can’t know for sure that you would have killed him.”

  “He’s just a kid,” he replied.

  “And look at what this supposed child is capable of.”

  “It’s not the same. He was weak.”

  “How do you know for sure?” She stepped away from the wall and sat down beside him. Her eyes looked like they were searching for his behind the mask.

  He avoided her look. “The old man told me I had a window to take him out.”

  “Paralos says many things.”

  “He’s got no reason to lie about that.”

  “He rarely needs a reason. Paralos has no regard for people such as you and I, meaning anyone that isn’t like him. We are disposable. Temporary. You could have been walking into a trap.”

  Her quasi-French accent melted back into the more tightly-rhythmic Vontani when she got heated, he’d noticed. What she said made him think back to the sight of Talus jumping down from the top of the castle wall. “Even if it was a trap,” he said, “I triggered it when I shouldn’t have.”

  “You were one man alone on an unfamiliar world, in the middle of enemy territory, asked to sacrifice yourself to save countless lives. It was certain death and you did it anyway, just as you did on Garoult.”

  “It doesn’t feel the same,” he said.

  “No, I suppose it doesn’t.” She scanned the broken countryside. “Seeing all of this tells me exactly who is to blame, and it is not you. These gods—Paralos, Meryn, Amara—they are the reason so many have died, the reason so many more will. You and I, we are nothing more than instruments to them, pledged to carry out their atrocities. If a thousand planets should die so that they might live, the lives they waste are an acceptable loss. Sometimes I think the reason we fight for them is so there is someone to mourn the dead in their wake.”

  “Meryn isn’t like that,” he said.

  “They are all like that.” She carved a circle in the dust next to her leg. “Where they don’t feel guilt, you and I do. I know something of guilt,” she said. “What I do not know is how your people deal with it.”

  “We climb up abandoned national monuments and wallow in self-misery.”

  She stared at him.

  “That was a joke.”

  “I’m surprised you would be in a joking mood.”

  “Well, maybe there’s your answer.”

  Her eyes flicked to him one more time before she lowered her stare. “On Vontanu, we are more specific, I would say. We choose someone—an enemy—and we focus our feelings into combat. We make them the living image of our guilt. The idea is that the true strength of your conviction will carry you through to victory, while the lack of it will lead to defeat. In defeat, you accept that you have suffered enough and paid for your actions. In victory, you accept that others assume the toll that was never yours. No matter the outcome, you are free.”

  “Do you feel free now?” he asked.

  She hesitated. “Yes,” she said. “After the fight with the Phaelix, I felt free.”

  That’s not what I asked. He didn’t feel like arguing about it, though.

  “Suppose you were to handle this the Vontani way. Who do you choose?” she asked.

  “Gemini,” he said without hesitation.

  “Then you can begin to funnel your pain to him. Live each day between now and the time you meet preparing yourself for the fight.”

  “It feels like I’ve been doing that since this war started.”

  “Not like this. When you face him, it won’t be revenge you seek. It will be the release.”

  He sized her up, looking for any indication that she was bullshitting him. Her cheeks were rigid and her eyes piercing. He wasn’t sure if the Vontani even had a bullshitting mode.

  “Does it feel better to have chosen?” she asked.

  “Yeah, a little,” he said, even though he wouldn’t have called what he was feeling better.

  “That is a lie.”

  “Don’t tell me you can read minds, too. I really don’t want to hear that.”

  “No,” she replied. “But I know I would have said the same thing in your place, and I know I would have been lying. In the end, though, you’ll see. Freedom will come.”

  She stood and offered him her hand.

  He eventually took it. Snow and ash flaked off his legs as he got to his feet. “Where’s the rest of the group?”

  “Scouting across the river. We will meet beyond the large house.” She pointed to the Jefferson Memorial.

  “That’s as good a starting point as any.”

  “Before we go,” she said, putting a hand on his forearm, “I told the others that you came up here to keep watch for other people. That is why you took so
long.”

  “Okay.” He glanced to the Memorial. “Were they worried or something?”

  “No, but it is not the Vontani way to wait so long before choosing the outlet for your guilt. To wait is considered…”

  “Whatever you do, don’t end that sentence with ‘weak.’”

  “I was going to say ‘selfish.’”

  “Not much better.”

  She flashed a smile. “Come on. Better that we don’t give them a choice.”

  They found the rest of the group after walking across the Ohio Drive Bridge. The iconic white columns and domed roof of the Memorial were a dingy shade of black. Drifts of ash and snow blew across the monument steps. Dondannarin and her group were hidden behind the building beneath a stand of trees. Their gray uniforms fit in well with the surroundings.

  “Did you see anyone?” Dondannarin asked.

  He flashed a look to Aeris first. He shook his head. “Not a soul.”

  “Good,” she answered. She looked to Aeris. “Our food supply will hold out for a while, but we should find a source of water.”

  It hadn’t occurred to him that they’d need to find supplies for Dondannarin and her crew. “We can get some water from the river,” he said. “It’s fresh.”

  “No,” Aeris said.

  “Why not?”

  “There are animal bodies floating in the water. It isn’t safe to drink. We can use this.”

  She asked for one of the Vontani to hand her something called an erudisque. The soldier produced a foot-long metal needle from her pack, roughly as thick as a pencil.

  “What does that do?” he asked.

  “Watch.”

  Aeris plunged the thin needle into the earth, leaving only a few inches above the ground. A green ring lit up around the tip. Humming noises rose from the soil that lasted until the light ring turned blue. A small arm extended from the side of the needle, releasing a thin stream of water onto the ground. Aeris put her hand under it and collected a handful. She sipped it with her eyes closed.

  “Sweet,” she said. She nodded to the group.

  The rest of the Vontani took turns drinking from the makeshift well.

  “Do you have one of those that spits out food, too?” he asked.

  Aeris snorted. “Have you never hunted before? I was hoping you could tell us what to look for.”

  He glanced over his shoulder. The city was silent. “I’m not sure there’s anything left.”

  “Farther inland, then.”

  Her upbeat tone wasn’t lost on him, nor was the fact that she didn’t seem to wear her optimism well. Smiles and sunny outlooks fell away as soon as she thought he wasn’t looking. He appreciated the support, but when he was swimming in a river of shit, being told there was clean water up ahead didn’t exactly make him feel better. The words almost left his mouth until he considered how much effort it would be to explain what the metaphor was.

  “Will it be night soon?” she asked.

  “Who knows?” he replied. “Days are usually pretty short in the winter. We should find a spot to make camp.”

  “Being near a city invites trouble,” Dondannarin said. She eyed the nearby freeway like a suspicious parent.

  Aeris looked up and down the river. “This is your land, August. Which way should we go?”

  The rest of the Vontani stopped their packing to look at him.

  “I’ve…done some thinking on that,” he said. “Just, you know, putting together some last minute details. I was thinking we should go west.” That seemed general enough. “If we hit I-70, we’ll eventually make it to the Midwest, and…oh! God damn, I almost forgot about Omaha. I think there’s a military base there.”

  Aeris looked at him.

  He cleared his throat. “I mean, there is a military base there. Offutt Air Force Base. We used to work out of it sometimes at my old job. Supposedly, that’s where the President goes if there’s a nuclear war. Seems like this might count.”

  “Will the way be treacherous?” Dondannarin asked.

  “We’ll be on Interstates, mostly. I haven’t found any cars that work, but maybe we’ll get lucky farther down the road.”

  Aeris studied her group before returning to him. “What about other people?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe. It’s an easy way to travel.”

  “Then we should stay away from it.”

  Why? he wanted to ask, but then he considered what it might be like for the Vontani to get mobbed by curious travelers. By the looks on their faces when Aeris asked, they weren’t looking forward to it.

  “We can stay off the road if you want. As long as we can get a general direction from it, we should be okay.”

  “All right,” Aeris said. She moved her gold headband down to her forehead, letting her hair fall over her shoulders. The rest of the women followed suit.

  “Are we getting ready for a fight I don’t know about?” he asked, looking around.

  “No,” she said. “Just on alert.”

  He started them out along the river, then moved inland when Dondannarin advised against spending too much time in the open. They eventually made it to Interstate 66, and from there, they kept it within sight as they moved through side roads and empty fields. Traveling was slow, even with a group that seemingly never got tired. They must have hiked for three hours straight before he made them stop for another drink of water.

  Finally, after they crossed into the town of Germantown in Maryland, Aeris signaled that it was time to find a place to rest for the night. They decided on a section of forest near the Interstate behind an abandoned white church.

  The faded and chipped white slats of the outside walls brought on a dizzying sense of the forgotten past. All that was missing was a tall white steeple and he would’ve been back at the church overlooking Fairview. He lost himself in the memory while the Vontani scoped the grounds. He saw Ray and Bear and the rest of them, all huddled together as the Pyrians tried to claw their way inside. For some reason, all he could think of was the old smell of the church carpet as he bent over Ray to hear his advice: Stay close to my Johnny.

  He smiled and let out a short laugh.

  “What is it?” Dondannarin asked.

  “Nothing,” he said. “I was just thinking about how bad I am at following directions.”

  As the Vontani ate their meals—small piles of stuff reconstituted to look like limp grass—he and Aeris discussed their plan for the next day. He’d found a map in one of the abandoned cars along the highway and showed her where he thought they should go. Their path went over the Maryland hills before it flattened out on their way through Pennsylvania and Ohio. Offut was only a few days’ travel from there.

  Aeris chose a section of ground covered with Sycamore gumballs for her bed. The prickly seeds didn’t seem to bother her thick skin. She and the others slept in a tight group. Aeris was the last to close her eyes.

  “You should sleep,” she said. “We will need our strength for travel.”

  “You go ahead. I’ll take first watch.”

  “There is no need. If something gets close, we will know it.”

  I’m sure.

  He walked off to find his own section of dirt, one that befitted his sensitive skin and lack of built-in radar. He found some grass near the edge of the woods and settled onto his back. He pressed the button to hide his mask. The cold air bristled his lungs. Overhead, black clouds tinged with a grungy shade of yellow floated by.

  It was over an hour, he guessed, before he let himself drift into something resembling sleep. Unwelcome memories ran through his mind—he and Bear behind Meryn’s shield, the Lawson farm drowning in flames—all of them conspiring to keep him awake and swimming in a sea of self-doubt. How had it all gone so wrong?

  A warbled thud rattled the inside of the church, followed by heavy footsteps on the floor. He shot up. When he stepped out of the woods, Aeris and Dondannarin were already on their feet.

  “I’ll go,” Aeris whispered.

  “No,�
� he said.

  She glared at him.

  “It might be a survivor. If they see any of us, it needs to be me.”

  She traded a silent look with Dondannarin before nodding.

  He closed his mask and stepped gently toward the building, his ears ringing as he strained to listen. The window in back was too high for him to look inside. He avoided the rocks next to the foundation, choosing instead to keep to the grass where the snow underfoot masked his steps. When he got to the front corner, he drew one of his swords and winced as it came out of the sheath with a hum.

  He kept the blade still at his side. A noise rumbled through the window pane, a throaty gurgle that suspiciously resembled a growl. If it was an animal, it might mean they were close to the end of Gemini’s blast zone. It also meant dinner, even if it did sound like a truck engine on the other side of the wall. Get ready, ladies. Chef Dillon is about to serve up some black bear tartare.

  With his sword raised to his shoulder, he inched his way across the front porch of the church. The narrow windows were too cloudy to see through. He got to the door and took a deep breath, then swung himself inside, his sword ready to strike.

  The church was empty. Rows of dusty, snow-covered benches lined both sides of the room. Above them on the left was a balcony with a pipe organ. On the balcony to the right, a pair of orange eyes stared down at him.

  “Jesus shit!”

  Shadow stood tall. She jumped down to the lower level, landing hard enough to crack the wood floor beneath. The scaly skin on her head and arms caught what little light came through the windows, barely separating her from the darkness. Her breaths stopped and started, stuttering as she towered over him, checking him over as though he might have something crawling on him trying to kill him.

  “Hey, girl,” he said, dodging her probing claws. “You almost gave me a heart attack. What are you doing here? Too bored back on Elos?”

  She bent down to sniff him, gently nudging his shoulder. Across her chest were the claw marks left by Talus back on Galan’s world. The wounds were ragged and black, oozing a thick pus. Each time her chest rose, he heard the labored, clipped sound of her lungs taking in air. This isn’t right, he thought as he reached out to touch the wounds. They should have healed by now.