Winterbay

by J. Barton Mitchell

  It was going to be close.

  Holt reached and burst through the tree line with a sigh of relief. With the tree canopy above, he was safe, at least from—

  Holt groaned as the yellow skull hit him from behind, tackled him to the ground. He tried to roll over, but the boy grabbed his hair, shoved his face into the dirt.

  “You cost me my whole crew!” the boy shouted. “You know what that means?” Holt did know. It meant the Menagerie would hang the kid on sight, but right then he was too preoccupied to answer. The pirate pounded Holt’s face into the dirt over and over, and he struggled to get loose, but the boy’s grip was too strong.

  Something growled behind them. The yellow skull gasped as a big blue gray shape rammed into him.

  Holt rolled onto his back, saw the yellow skull wrestling with a large cattle dog, its mouth clamped down firmly onto the boy’s arm, its eyes intense slits. It growled angrily as it tried to chew the kid’s appendage off. The boy yelled in pain and shock.

  Max. One of the few things Holt ever counted on.

  Holt leapt for the yellow skull. Max was tough, but he wasn’t a pit bull. The kid would get him off eventually; it wasn’t a fight the dog could win.

  Holt punched the yellow skull hard. Max let the pirate loose, barking furiously.

  The two kids grappled, but it wasn’t a school yard fight—it was life or death, and they knew it.

  They rolled through the dirt, and the yellow skull maneuvered on top of Holt again. His hands circled Holt’s throat, started to squeeze.

  But Holt had seen it coming, got his feet underneath the boy when they rolled over. He kicked outward with everything he had … and the pirate went flying.

  The yellow skull hit the ground and rolled right out of the tree line and back into the open field beyond.

  Max barked after him, but Holt grabbed the dog and held him in place, staring at the open air beyond the trees with trepidation.

  The yellow skull looked up in a daze. Then his eyes widened as he realized he was no longer concealed by the trees. The two looked at each other. Holt almost felt sorry for him.

  Almost.

  The grapling claw flashed down from the sky, pinned the pirate to the ground. Then he yelled as it ripped him upward out of sight, back into the deadly blue sky.

  It was over. Holt let Max go. The dog brushed against him affectionately, licked his face. Holt smiled, tried to push Max off him, but it wasn’t the easiest task. His fur was a mixture of gray and blue with spots of black, and under it rippled muscles made strong by years of carrying packs full of salvage … and chasing the occasional rabbit. Max was considered only a medium-sized dog, but Holt had seen him readily take on creatures and kids three times his size without any hesitation.

  “Thanks, pal,” Holt said, scratching the dog’s ears. “Another one I owe you.”

  Holt found his pack and weapons where he’d left them, loaded up, made ready to move. He whistled three short notes. At the signal, Max bounded off into the trees ahead of him to scout.

  Before he left, Holt looked to where the last Menagerie kid had been. Other than the scarred ground where the Vulture claw had punctured it, there was no indication anyone had ever been there at all. Here one moment. Gone the next.

  Just like everyone else …

  Holt set off through the trees, following Max’s trail.

  2. SCARS

  Holt crouched in front of what was left of the cargo train, absently twisting the thick, black fiber bracelet he always wore on his left wrist. The train had careened off its tracks years ago, and tore a swath of destruction through the ground on either side. Most of the cars were rusting pieces of jagged metal now, overgrown with grass and weeds, stretching for more than half a mile. Some of them were still in one piece, and, even more shocking, one or two were still on the track itself.

  Next to it lay the wrecks of military vehicles—jeeps, Hummers, an APC or two—all in a similar state of disrepair, most so broken down, they were unrecognizable. And lying next to the vehicles were dozens and dozens of skeletons, some still wearing the tatters of what looked like army uniforms.

  As Holt took it all in, he put the pieces together in his head.

  An army train. Probably running equipment to Fort Dearborn. And they had hit it. Within the first hour or two, he guessed, before the Tone went active.

  There was something else, though. Something you rarely saw, then or now: a hulking, charred piece of machinery in a clearing on the far side of the tracks, crumpled where it had fallen and burned years ago. Looking at it from this distance, even in its destroyed state, it was very clear that it had never been anything of this Earth.

  It was an Assembly combat walker. One of the big ones from the looks of it, a Spider.

  Whoever was on the train that night, they managed to take one of those things with them. Judging by the skeletons tossed around the area, Holt doubted it was much of a consolation to them now. But it was something, nonetheless.…

  Holt hated places like this. They were scars. Scars on the planet’s surface, and the world was littered with them now. He hated them for the memories they brought back, the old images they forced him to see again.

  Images of her.

  If he didn’t have to be here, he wouldn’t. But he did.

  Max lay next to him on his back, blissfully chewing on a big bone that probably came from one of the unfortunates scattered about the battle-ground. As happy as the dog was, something about it just wasn’t right.

  “Max, come on.” Holt tried to pull the leg bone loose from the dog’s jaws, but Max scampered off before Holt could grab it.

  Holt shook his head, looked back to the tracks on the ground.

  They were everywhere, tracks from dozens of people, dating back years. Finding the specific ones he was looking for wasn’t impossible— there were ways to separate old tracks from new—it just took time. And a good eye. For instance, he could eliminate about half of them right away, based on their size. Most of them were too big. The one he was after had small feet and wasn’t wearing boots.

  It took him a moment, but he found the shoe prints he was looking for. After almost a week tracking them, he recognized them instantly. They moved off to the north, sidestepping the site altogether. They hadn’t even bothered searching the area for useful salvage. Holt didn’t blame the person: there likely wasn’t anything here worth risking tetanus for. Whatever used to be here of value was long gone now.

  From the far distance came an unsettling sound. A deep, concussive booming that echoed through the trees around him. Seconds later, two more booms, echoing and fading in the same way.

  Holt looked up. He knew what the sounds were. Explosions. Large ones. Probably two or three miles away, to the northeast.

  More sounds filtered through the trees, different from the first, more like staccato thunder.

  Plasma cannon, the big ones. The Assembly was nearby and they were riled up. But over what? Whatever it was, it was probably better not to get caught outside the tree line.

  Holt stood up to leave, and as he did, he noticed the train cars again.

  Two of the ones that were somehow still standing were only a few yards away. He frowned as he studied them—there was probably nothing worthwhile there … but you never knew. Even if there were no supplies, the metal itself could be valuable if it wasn’t rusted through.

  Survival factored into every decision Holt made. It was what he lived by, and it meant many things. One of them was to figure out what was of value. If you had things of value, you could survive.

  By Holt’s logic, survival said that he had to at least investigate the train cars.

  He moved for the closest one, its door yawning open. Max stepped into line next to him, the trophy bone still in his mouth.

  Holt peered inside the first train car. It was just as empty as he expected, nothing but rotting wood and rusting metal. He moved to the next one. Its big door was only open a crack, preventing him from seeing in
side.

  Holt grabbed the edge of the door and pulled. It didn’t budge. He cursed under his breath, pulled again, harder this time. It slid a little, but not much. He yanked it hard over and over, trying to force it. Slowly, it began sliding open.

  From inside came a noise. It sounded like the shifting of someone moving. Below Holt, Max dropped the bone as his hackles raised. A low growl rumbled from his throat.

  Holt stepped back from the train door, drawing the rifle from his back in a smooth, practiced gesture. The gun used to be a SIG716, the same kind his father used, but Holt had modified and updated it extensively. The wooden grip and stock were worn smooth with regular use.

  He readied himself, quieted Max with a look … then spun around the side of the door, aiming into the gap he’d managed to open.

  Holt instantly jumped as he saw a solitary figure standing in the doorway. It made him flinch so bad, he almost pulled the trigger.

  The figure didn’t react or move in any way, just stood stoically in place.

  “Geez,” Holt said, keeping the rifle trained on the shadow in the door. His heart felt like a drum in his chest. “Almost got yourself killed, you know that?” The figure made no response. Holt studied him closer. “Hey, anybody home? You hurt?” Still nothing.

  The sunlight behind Holt revealed that the figure was a boy, about Holt’s age. He was alive and real, not something hung from the ceiling as a decoy. But something was way wrong with the kid. He seemed to be sleepwalking or in a daze.

  Holt could guess what it was, he looked about the right age. Holt drew a flashlight from his belt, flipped it on, aimed it up at the kid. When the light hit his eyes, the boy didn’t react.

  But Holt did. As he expected, the boy’s eyes were a solid black. The snaking tendrils of color he had seen in the Menagerie pirates earlier had filled in this boy’s eyes completely.

  It was the Tone. The boy had finally lost his battle with it and Succumbed. He was now under Assembly control. Someone had probably sealed him up inside the train car, either out of a sense of kindness or a desire to deny the Assembly one more human adult for their growing collection.

  When a survivor finally Succumbed, he began a long, slow, zombie-like walk to the nearest Presidium, the massive Assembly base ships that had come roaring out of the sky eight years ago, impaling themselves into the hearts of the world’s great cities like daggers.

  What happened (or was happening) to the majority of the human population inside the Presidiums, no one knew.…

  And it was something Holt likely never would know. But even though he was immune to the Tone’s call, he definitely had experienced its effects.

  He stared up at the Succumbed boy with bitterness. A tingling of sadness began to surface from the usual place, the place where he had buried it long ago.

  Holt felt it rising, wanted no part of it, pushed it back down again. Angrily, he stepped away from train car’s door. After a moment, the boy inside hopped down of his own volition. His black gaze stared blindly forward, not even noticing Holt or his dog.

  Max whined at the boy, unsure whether he was a threat or a harmless drone. To be honest, Holt wasn’t sure either, when you came right down to it. He petted the dog comfortingly, held him back.

  The two watched as the boy slowly turned and began walking to the northeast, compelled by some unknown force toward what remained of Chicago … and the dark Presidium ship that waited there.

  Holt watched him until he became a small silhouette on the horizon. The sight haunted him. He remembered that walk, knew if he closed his eyes he would see her walking that same way all over again.

  So Holt kept his eyes open. He grimaced, forced himself to look away. “Come on, pal.”

  Max barked, grabbed his bone again, and followed him back to the tracks. He found the ones he was looking for again, heading north, back into the trees.

  Holt and Max quickly set off into the forest, following the trail.

  From the distance came more booming, more staccato drumbeats. They sounded closer now.

  Also by J. Barton Mitchell

  Midnight City

  The Severed Tower

  About the Author

  J. BARTON MITCHELL is a creator and writer of speculative fiction living in Los Angeles. This is his second novel.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  WINTERBAY. Copyright © 2013 by J. Barton Mitchell. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.stmartins.com

  Cover design by Lisa Marie Pompilio

  Cover photograph by Shutterstock.com

  e-ISBN 9781466850514

  December 2013

  Follow Mira Toombs’s adventures in the

  CONQUERED EARTH novels

  By J. Barton Mitchell

  BOOK 1: MIDNIGHT CITY

  BOOK 2: THE SEVERED TOWER

  And don’t miss the third book in the series, available 2014.

  www.stmartins.com

  St. Martin’s Griffin