by Bec McMaster
The Yamaha was his sole relic of the past, and most of it was patched and recrafted. The tires came from the factories down south where rubber trees were found, and there were men here in the wastelands who could craft steel and aluminum, others who'd managed to rig up solar panels, which were worth their weight in gold here out in the Wastelands. People made do. They had to. Any man could own a dozen trades.
Noise and raised voices spilled out into the courtyard behind the public house where he'd taken rooms, but it wasn't his business. Time to move on. He'd shaved his face and cropped his hair, then packed up his stuff, making sure he still had the doll that the little girl he’d spent three years raising as his own once gave him.
He’d lost Lily along with everyone else, and while the ache of that had dulled, it never truly went away.
The only thing he had left in his life was one last quest: to find Johnny Colton, the warg who'd helped turn him into a monster, and bury him so deep nobody ever found the body.
Adam slung a leg over the bike, flipped the choke out, and then stiffened.
Blood. He could smell blood.
That caught his attention. The warg shifted inside him, as if pushing against his skin.
Following the scent, Adam found himself back in front of the bar. He couldn't see Mia, but several jeeps idled in the street, and people were streaming from every other business in town to discover what was going on.
A huge man with a barrel for a chest and blood soaking his sleeve stepped up onto the porch of Mia's saloon, where he could see the crowd. "As you all know by now, a band of about forty reivers hit my ranch this morning and took half my womenfolk and some of the kids. They'll be headed south, where they can sell them at the border towns, and we all know what happens then.
"I've been a part of this town for near on fifty years. I've sacrificed my own blood and sweat to build Salvation Creek, and now I'm standing here asking you folk to lend me your blood and sweat back. They've got a four-hour start on me, but I'm plannin' on gathering some men and going after them. I can't pay you. I don't know if you'll come back. But I need to know... are there any here that will ride with me?"
Several hands shot into the air, but it was clear from the look on the man's face that he'd expected more. Silence became almost thick, and then one hand started to lower, then another.
"Jenny," the man said, looking at someone in the crowd. "Please. They've got Helen, and all the rest of the girls, including my two."
A hard-looking woman in front pursed her lips together. She was short and slim, with gray in her dark hair and dark skin the color of tea-stained paper, but she didn't look scared. More thoughtful. "I can shoot, Ethan, but hell... what are we meant to do against forty reivers? And by the look of that arm, you ain't gonna be much help. Nor half your men."
"I'll go," a female voice called out, and then Mia stepped up beside the man. "That's my sister they've got. That's your niece too, Jen." She looked out over the crowd. "I see a lot of faces here that know those girls, or share some blood with them. What are you all going to do next time, when it's your girls you're crying over? Thwaites is right. We need to stick together."
Mia. That made him stand up straight. He looked around. People lowered their eyes, muttering under their breath. He couldn't stand to see her there alone.
"And what if they come back when everyone's gone?" another woman called. "What about those of us left behind? I'm sorry, Mia, but we've got children here. We need to protect the town."
More voices rose up, a sudden chorus of arguments.
"They won't come back," someone called. "We've got the General on our side."
"The General don't give a shit about us out past the Divide," someone else yelled. "He only rides through when he's got reason to."
"What if they come back—"
"And what if they don't?" someone else called. "How do you look your daughter in the eye, Crane, when you let her best friend get taken off into slavery?"
It was chaos. Adam could almost taste the anger and fear in the air, and the vein in his temple throbbed as his heart started beating a little faster. He could feel the icy cold burn of the amulet against his chest as his inner predator sat up and took notice of all the weakness in the air.
In that moment he was stepping back years into the past, where he'd been forced to step forward and gather together the small tribe of settlers who were being hit hard by wargs in the Wastelands. Those people helped him form the fortified town of Absolution, but they'd needed a push to get there. And while he'd never wanted to put himself forward as a leader—not with his secret—he couldn't leave them there alone. Just as he couldn't keep quiet now.
He stepped up on the porch next to Mia and Thwaites. "That's enough," he said, and though he didn't raise his voice much, it carried, and people began to settle down, turning curious eyes on the newcomer.
They might not know him, but people understood an air of authority. They recognized strength when they saw it, and Adam had long grown used to commanding respect from people.
"A lot of you don't know me, and I don't know a lot of you, but you can't allow this to stand. You can't afford to look weak. The reivers have never hit you this far east, but I grew up in the north. I've spent most of my life hunting these bastards and fighting them off. In the north, we have walls and guns and we look at you down here and call you the 'soft-landers.' Maybe we're not the only ones who think that? Most reivers prefer to raid the Wastelands for the scarcity of the Confederacy enforcers, but it's getting harder to take the settlements up there. Their slave routes are drying up. If they start getting a taste for how easy it is to come a little further out of their way, then do you think this will be the only attack you bear?"
Silence lingered, but he saw several people shifting, not liking what a stranger had to say.
"I want you to look at your daughters gathered here today, or maybe your sons too, for the slavers like some big strapping boys to work their fields and their factories. I want you to think about what happens if the reivers come back, or heaven forbid, get a taste of the softer times here." He looked around, daring any man to meet his eyes.
"Easy for you to say. Who are you to tell us what to do?"
"I'm the man who's going to ride with your rancher here and get those women back. I'm the man who's going to tell you what you need to do to keep the reivers off your back." He let a faint smile show. "I'm the man who hunts these scum for a living, and I enjoy it. I'm good at it. Same as your own boy here, Sinclair, is good at it." He turned and met the other bounty hunter's eyes. "Is there anything I've said here that you don't agree with?"
Sinclair tipped his chin back. "No," he called. "I've been north. I've seen their walls at the settlements up there. I've seen how the reivers are getting more desperate by the day, and I've killed 'em too." He had the kind of cocky grin that the crowd ate up, but Adam could smell his sweat. "Reivers are scavengers, they're not even really predators. Why'd they sneak in at dawn? I'll tell you why. They've got rusted out guns, and piecemeal body armor sewn together out of scrap wheel hubs. They needed surprise on their side. Hell, maybe they got the numbers, but we've got something they don't have." His voice grew louder, and he thumped his chest. "We've got men, good men. We've got women"—he tilted his head toward the one they'd called Jenny—"who can shoot the eye out of a squirrel a hundred yards away. Our guns are good, our bullets are hard, and most of all, we've got a righteous kind of wrath to spare." His voice lowered, but it was no less powerful. "Reivers are cowards. We hit 'em with everything we've got and they'll run. They won't stand together. It's every man for himself out there, but if we ride as one, then we'll scare the ever-living daylights out of them."
It might take a little more than that, but Adam kept his opinion to himself.
With a flourish, Sinclair handed the floor back to Adam.
"Do you know what the strength of the northern settlements is?" he called. "We live together, we work together. One settlement gets hit and
the others send relief troops their way. You want to protect your town? Then you need to get the other settlers hereabouts to work with you. You find a common building." He gestured toward the town hall behind them. "Something strong and easy to fortify. Gather enough food and water to last you a few weeks, until we return. Work together. Watch each other's backs. Have men on guard at every hour of the day with guns. Work out a roster. Radio in to the nearby towns and get them on alert, watching for reivers."
"But what about our houses?" an older woman called, nursing a kid on her hip.
He stared her straight in the eye. "I've seen a house rebuilt. I ain't ever seen someone put a person back together though, once they're full of holes. Take care of yourselves, then worry about your... replaceables." He gave the word the respect it deserved.
He had them.
Turning to Thwaites, he nodded. "All yours."
"We can't pay you much," the man said. "Or we can't promise you'll get anything if we return. There may not be much left."
"I don't do this for the money," Adam replied. He met Mia's eyes then. She looked shocked, but also curious. "I do this because it's my map and compass, as someone once said to me."
Thwaites stared at him for a long moment. "It'll get harder before it gets easier, son."
He couldn't remember the last time someone had called him “son.” Adam just smiled. "I've been to 'hard' before. It's not a place I enjoy, but it's a place I know well."
Four
"WANNA HAND?"
Mia crouched in front of the small fire she was trying to light with her flint. She knew who it was. She just wasn't entirely certain she wanted company. "No. I'm fine."
McClain dumped an armful of small sticks and twigs at her feet. Mia kept striking the flint, waiting for a spark to feed. One latched on to her tinder and she scrambled to her hands and knees and blew on it, until she had a nice flame glowing there. The task was simple, and it kept her mind busy.
McClain had spent most of the day scouting ahead, whilst she rode in Thwaites’s jeep. It was hard travel over barren plains and rocky gravel, and sometimes she had to wonder if McClain was just seeing things when he said there were tracks. Even Jake looked hard at the ground and chewed on his lip, though he didn't disagree.
"How far ahead do you think they are?" Mia asked, staring into the flames. Night meant that they had to stop, but night also meant the reivers would be making camp, and that meant they'd want to celebrate what they'd captured.
Don't think about that. Mia snapped a twig in half and fed it into the flames. Ever since she lost the baby, Sage had been prone to bouts of moodiness and depression. The simple fact of the matter was that Mia feared for her baby sister's state of mind, and she'd give anything to trade places with her right now.
"About four hours still," he replied. "We lost a lot of time getting supplies and making sure Thwaites and his men were ready to ride out, but we're moving faster than they are. Here." He broke a piece of hardtack and handed it to her.
Mia shook her head. "I'm not hungry."
"You need to keep your strength up," he replied.
"I feel sick," she shot back, sinking both her hands into her hair. "I couldn't possibly eat. What about my sister? Do you think she's eating right now? Or do you think...." She couldn't say the words.
Putting the hardtack away, McClain hauled a stump closer to her and sat beside her. "Mia, if you start thinking about the what-ifs and the could-bes, then you might as well turn back now. Stick to the facts. Face them as they come at you. Focus on the plan."
"She's my baby sister," she whispered. "She's strong, but she's always had that softer side I could never manage. What if they break her?"
"You might be surprised." The fire crackled as he fed it. "People sometimes find a kind of strength in hard situations that you'd never believe they owned. Maybe she's never had to be fearless, because you were there beside her? Or maybe she knows that her sister would shift hell and high water to get her back? Maybe that's her strength, right now, knowing that you're coming for her."
That gave her some hope. If there was one thing that Sage would believe in, it was that her sister would come for her. And her husband, Mia had to reluctantly admit. "I'm scared."
"I know you are. I would be too, if that was my sister out there."
Mia glanced toward him. "You have a sister?"
"Baby sister," he said, "though she'd take affront at that. So I can guess at how you're feeling. There's five years between me and Eden. She's always been mine to protect, but it's as though she grew up when I blinked, and it took me far too long to realize that." His smile faded. "It's not easy to let them be grown-ups, but I kind of figure she's twenty-nine now, with her own life and her own destiny. Hell, she's a doctor who's patched me up more times than I can tell, so maybe she's been the one looking after me? It's not easy to admit that though, especially when you're the type of man who likes to protect. I've been told I'm... overbearing."
"And who told you that? Your sister?" There was something in his voice though, that hinted at the answer.
"No." He met her gaze. "There was a woman. Once."
Mia looked back into the flames. He'd spent a month drowning himself in her bar. In that time he'd flirted with her, butted heads with her, and outright driven her crazy. There'd never been a promise of more though, even if his words sent an odd twinge through her. "What happened? To the woman?"
McClain sighed. "She fell in love with the man who was once my best friend."
"He took her from you?"
"No. It's complicated. Luc and I weren't friends toward the end, though that had little to do with Riley." McClain moved slowly, taking over her fire and setting out a small pan and some tins of beans. He set them to broiling, then poured water from his canteen into a pot. "I never had her, Mia. She was never mine, and I didn't even know what really made her tick. I wanted the promise of her. I liked her hard head even though it drove me crazy, but I never really understood her. I asked her once, why him? And do you know what she said?"
"What?"
"She said that he let her stand at his side, while I tried to hide her behind me. He trusted her to guard his back, while I tried to force her to stay out of danger. He let her be who she was, and even though I was attracted to her attitude and personality, a part of me tried to change her." McClain stirred his beans. "Maybe I learned a little bit from her. I'm not going to lie and say that I like the idea of you riding along with us, or the other women—I've always been a bit old-fashioned like that—but I'm not going to stop you. You deserve to be here, and I hope we can stand side by side when this shit with the reivers goes down."
It explained a lot. Mia drew her knees up, watching him over the top of them. "Sometimes you drive me crazy too."
He laughed, though it was never the type of laugh that overtook his face. More like a faint sign of humor that he couldn't stop from escaping.
"And if you tried to stop me," she told him, "you'd end up wearing that fork you're stirring the beans with, in your thigh."
The faintest hint of a smile curled his mouth up. "The strangest thing is that hearing words like that gets me all hot and bothered." Glancing up at her from underneath the brim of his hat, he kept stirring the beans but his focus was 100 percent locked on her.
Mia's breath caught. He had dangerous gray-green eyes, the kind of eyes that always made her want to linger there, staring at him.
"I'm not into that kind of thing," she said primly.
"Me either. I'm starting to think I have a serious weakness for strong-willed women though."
"Even though you want to change them?"
Another smile. "Poor choice of words. Darlin', I wouldn't change a damned thing about you, but if push came to shove I couldn't just stand by and let you walk into danger. I have this idiot complex about taking bullets in the chest for pretty ladies."
Wouldn't change a damned thing about you.... Mia swallowed. He had a way with words sometimes. A blunt kind of
honesty that took her breath. "I guess we'll have to cross that bridge when it comes to it," she replied. "I bet I can shoot more reivers than you can."
"So you know how to work that thing?" He gestured toward the shotgun at her feet.
"My Aunt Jenny can put out a squirrel's eye at a hundred paces. I can shoot the cigarette out from between someone's lips. She taught me how to defend myself, but her eyesight's struggling these days. You wouldn't have wanted to cross Aunt Jenny ten years ago. She rode with the Nomads for a time."
"I don't want to cross your Aunt Jenny now," he replied. "She's still sitting there with your friend, Sinclair, watching my every move. Has been ever since I walked over here."
Mia looked up and squinted in the darkness. He was right. Jake glanced away as if he hadn't been caught looking, but Jenny arched a brow as if to ask her if she knew what she was doing.
Mia shrugged, then looked back down at McClain. He was pouring some of the beans into the pot lid for her. Firelight washed over his tanned face, highlighting the stark line of his cheekbones. He was one hell of a handsome bastard, but she thought his slow manner of moving, almost a kind of careful gentleness, and his brutal sense of honesty were more appealing than his looks.
And, she had to admit, as he handed her a share of the beans, he'd very neatly manipulated her into thinking about something other than her sister.
Mia ate her beans, watching him and brooding. Nobody had ever quite tied her up in knots like this, not even Jake.
And McClain did it without even thinking.
"I'd better take the first watch," he said, putting his makeshift bowl down.
"You're not tired?" Mia asked.
"I can go a few days without sleep, if need be. And not that I doubt your friends but I know what to look out for in the dark. We don't need an ambush."
"You think that would happen?"
"I think that reivers are unpredictable," he replied bluntly. "They're not overly educated, but some of them are cunning. Whoever's leading this band took us straight out over these plains, which leave barely any tracks, instead of making straight for Fort Phoenix. They're heading southeast, which is unusual as there's not much out there. Maybe they'll swing back but I can't guarantee that, so we're forced to follow them and play their game for the meanwhile."
