“What are those?”
Carver shrugged. “Books that tell about places and show what they look like.”
“What’s a state?” Ellie asked.
“Sections of a country,” Carver said.
“And a country?”
Bobby had moved up alongside Carver, slowing down from the quick pace that had kept him at Wyatt’s side most of the day. Sam had been lagging behind, watching their backs, but had caught up to join the discussion.
“That’s the whole mass of land we’re on, right?” Bobby said.
“It’s a group of people who all live under the same rulers,” Carver said. “This one was called the United States of America, and it included fifty individual states.”
“That’s pretty big, isn’t it?” Dylan asked.
“Much bigger than a single city like we have now,” Bobby agreed.
“No wonder the war started,” Ellie said. “Who could govern that many people and keep them under control?”
“They must have been somewhat successful,” Carver said. “This country existed for more than three hundred years.”
Everyone seemed reasonably impressed with that because no one said anything for a long few minutes. Sam was the one to finally speak.
“How long ago was the war?” he asked.
Carver shrugged. “They stopped writing books when the war started.”
“What makes you think the war has ended?” Wyatt suddenly asked.
They all looked at him. He was still walking with his body pointed forward, his step just as quick and determined as it had been since they separated from the others. But there was a certain slump to his shoulders that indicated, to Dylan at least, that he had been paying attention to everything they had been discussing.
“When did it start?” Sam called out to him.
Wyatt didn’t answer.
“I heard someone say once that it wasn’t more than forty years ago,” Bobby said.
“I know someone who swore he was a kid when it started,” Carver added. “So it couldn’t have been more than, maybe, thirty years ago.”
Dylan and Sam exchanged glances. “We were taught that it began more than two hundred years ago,” Sam said. Dylan nodded and saw out of the corner of her eye that Ellie was doing the same.
“Genero is just a factory of lies,” Wyatt said.
Dylan wanted to argue, but after everything she had begun to learn about herself, she knew it would be a lie to do so. Genero was not what she thought it was. It wasn’t the happy city that was built out of love by two sisters who had survived the unimaginable to save their fellow sisters and their children.
But Ellie didn’t know that.
“Genero is not a factory of lies,” she said. “It’s a good place where good people are trying to rebuild our society.”
“Genero was built to create abominations,” Wyatt said.
His words seemed to reverberate through his followers.
Carver was the first to react. “Hey, that’s a little cold,” he said.
And then Sam. “Really, Wyatt—”
But it was Ellie who surprised everyone.
She pushed through the group, moving even big Bobby out of her way as she marched up behind Wyatt and grabbed his shirt, yanking it until he turned slightly, a look of surprise briefly visible in his dark blue eyes.
“Take that back!” she cried.
“Ellie—”
She slammed a fist against his chest. “Genero is a place of love, a place where girls are raised to be nurturers, to be historians, and to spread the word of love that the sisters began. We are not abominations!”
She didn’t wait for him to respond. She slammed her fist against his chest again, pushing so hard against him that he stumbled back slightly. Sam, who had moved up behind Ellie the moment he saw where she was going, wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her away.
“Ellie, I didn’t mean anything by it,” Wyatt said.
“Then why would you say something like that?”
His eyes moved over her face, then to Sam’s, and, finally, to Dylan’s. His gaze lingered there, fanning the flames of Ellie’s anger.
“It’s not all of us,” she said. “Not everyone from Genero is like her.”
Carver and Bobby were looking at Dylan now, too.
Dylan shifted slightly. “You don’t understand,” she began to say, but Ellie just laughed.
“It’s because of you we’re out here,” she said. “Those Redcoats were after you.”
Dylan inclined her head.
“And the gargoyle that attacked us that day.” Ellie gestured toward the sky. “Sam and I didn’t have any trouble with them until we joined you.”
“She saved our lives,” Sam said.
“Wyatt saved our lives.”
Carver and Bobby looked like they were watching some sort of volleying sport as they swiveled their heads from Ellie to Dylan. They had no idea what Ellie was talking about, but it was clear they were fascinated just the same. But Dylan was done.
She started walking again, aware that everyone was watching, but no one followed.
“You’re going to get us all killed!” Ellie cried as Dylan walked passed her.
“That’s enough,” Wyatt said. His tone was low, quiet, but the command in it was unmistakable.
They continued to walk for several hours after that. No one really talked for a while, not even Carver. But, slowly, one at a time, they began to chatter again as though nothing had happened. Even Ellie was chattering away at the back of the pack, walking between Bobby and Sam and conversing about the wildlife they were beginning to see, the vegetation that was beginning to appear. They were leaving the desert, everyone could see it. But that meant they were walking into a landscape they were not familiar with, filled with dangers they were not accustomed to.
A little before dark, they came to a small ruin. Contrary to Carver’s earlier assertion, there was no sign announcing the name of this ruin. It was simply a collection of buildings that paralleled a straight, asphalt-covered road. Wyatt instructed the boys to search the buildings for wanderers who might pose a threat, while Ellie and Dylan were to wait. Dylan ignored the order and went into a building with two strange boxes out front, long, narrow boxes with numbered displays at the top. Inside the building were rows and rows of shelves. Some had been knocked down, but others still stood. They were empty. And along the back wall was a set of compartments with glass doors, most of the glass broken and scattered across the floor. As Dylan made her way around that side of the building, the crunching of the glass under her shoes reverberated against the walls.
She was crossing toward the long, low shelf at the front of the room, the thing Wyatt had called a counter in the previous ruin, when a door suddenly opened.
“Who are you? What do you want?”
Dylan spun around, holding her hands up to show she had no weapon. At the door was a man much older than Davida and Jimmy. His hair was colorless, his eyes dark, but covered with some sort of film. He clearly could not see her. His eyes moved wildly from side to side, his head cocked slightly as though to help him hear the noises around him better. In his hands was a long stick, thick and round, as though it had been made rather than scavenged from a tree. He gripped it tightly in two hands that were swollen and deformed, not unlike the way Lily’s hands had been when Dylan first met her.
“I don’t mean you harm,” she said.
The man swung the stick in the direction of Dylan’s voice, but she easily stepped out of the way.
“This is my place,” he said. “You move on.”
“We only want shelter for the night.”
“We?” He swung the stick again, as though trying to find her silent companions. “How many?”
“Six,” Dylan said. “We come from Viti.”
The man appeared to grow paler, his hands gripping the stick even tighter than before. “I don’t want trouble,” the man said. “I have kept to myself for many year
s here. I have never done anything against the leaders.”
“We don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then why did you come here?”
She didn’t know why she did it. It was probably not the smartest thing to do. But Dylan felt compelled to touch this man. She stepped forward, careful not to make too much noise so that he could not move out of her reach. And then she grabbed his wrist, wrapped both her hands around it and closed her eyes, dropping her mental wall.
Her mind was flooded with images. She saw a small child, a girl, dancing around this room many years ago, before the war destroyed the area. She was wearing a pretty little dress with great big ruffles underneath. There was sunshine flowing through the windows behind her, the light making little discs on the edge of the dress sparkle. She was laughing, the sound like the twitter of a bird in the early morning.
The image changed. The girl was no longer laughing. War had come to their city.
Dylan’s hand shook as she saw one image after another, saw a world she did not know, but for which she grieved because this man grieved. She saw heartache, she saw pain, she saw darkness. She saw things she could never begin to describe, atrocities that never should have happened to anyone, but had. And could again.
Tears were running in big, sorrowful drops when she let go of him.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
The man’s hands were shaking. He did not say anything. He simply stepped back and disappeared behind the door.
Chapter 9
Wyatt and the others chose a building on the other end of the street for shelter. Dylan helped build a fire, but then she made a pallet on the floor in a distant corner of the big, cavernous room. She wanted to be alone.
Her thoughts were a whirlwind as she tried to consolidate everything she knew. The images that man had shown her with his thoughts had left her with this sense of uneasiness in the pit of her stomach. The idea of food made her nauseous. She couldn’t imagine ever eating again. That’s why she turned her nose up when Sam came over with a leg of meat from a bird Wyatt had killed for their dinner.
“You need to eat,” Sam said.
Dylan just shook her head and curled up on her blankets. Sam hesitated, but finally walked away.
She didn’t think she could sleep. Each time she closed her eyes, she saw that man’s child in a pool of blood, her body viciously torn to pieces. But it wasn’t that child’s face she saw each time she closed her eyes. First, it was Davida. And then it was Donna. Eventually, however, it became Ellie, and then Sam, and, finally, Wyatt.
She would bring that to them. And there was no way around it.
Sleep did come, surprisingly. She was only vaguely aware of it. She did not dream this time, not even the pleasant dreams that normally came after a long day of walking. Her sleep was too deep for dreaming. Until, of course, Stiles broke through with his warning.
Gargoyles, Dylan. Wake up.
It was like an alarm clock. Or a splash of cold water on her face.
Dylan sat up immediately.
She didn’t hear anything at first. Just the deep breathing of the other people in the room, each sleeping just as soundly as she had been. Only Wyatt was awake, standing in a distant doorway, watching over his sleeping followers like a guardian angel.
Dylan closed her eyes and concentrated on Stiles. Where?
Close. Just a few miles away.
She climbed to her feet and carefully made her way across the room. Wyatt turned in her direction before she had moved more than a few steps. He didn’t speak, but she could feel the caution in his gaze.
“What?” he asked when she finally reached him.
“Gargoyles.”
“Where?”
“A few miles out.”
Wyatt studied her face for a second before he nodded. “Wake them,” he said, gesturing into the room. “I’ll go see if I can distract them.”
“No, Wyatt…” she began, but he was gone before the words were even out of her mouth.
She went to Sam, shaking his shoulder as she crouched down beside him. He opened his eyes, sleep leaving them the moment he saw her. He sat up. “What?”
“Gargoyles,” she said.
He nodded, his gaze moving around the room. “Where’s Wyatt?”
“He went out to distract them.”
Sam’s face tightened. Dylan just nodded. “Wake the rest.”
She started to stand, but he grabbed her wrist. “Be careful,” he said.
She laid her hand over his for a long second. There was so much she wanted to say to him in that moment, but she wouldn’t have known where to start. So she just squeezed his hand and pulled away.
Wyatt stood under the shadows of the doorway to the building across the street. Dylan looked up into the sky, but she couldn’t see anything. A breeze passed over her, and she found herself falling backward toward the door she had just stepped through.
Inside.
She glared into the empty air. “They’re coming for me,” she said. “I’m not going to stay in there and lure them to the others.”
There was no response, but there was also no breeze that pushed her back as she started across the street again.
Wyatt didn’t argue with her. But, again, there was no time. The moment she joined him, three gargoyles became visible in the sky above them. They were huge creatures, each resembling something like a marble statue, complete with thick, white skin and long, almost leathery, wings. Each was compact, its body huge and rounded, each with muscles that looked as though they might be capable of lifting one of the tall buildings sitting on this street. They were not the prettiest gargoyles Dylan had ever seen. Most gargoyles were grotesque in some way, their heads misshapen or their bodies disproportionate. These seemed particularly deformed in both body and facial features.
They landed in the street and turned to face Dylan and Wyatt, their wings detracting and disappearing as golden axes appeared in their hands. Wyatt straightened, pushing Dylan behind him even as his samurai sword slipped from its scabbard strapped across his back.
“No matter what happens, you have to stay back.”
“Give me your six shooter.”
“It won’t do you any good against these.”
Dylan laid her hand on his hip. “Let me have it anyway.”
Wyatt groaned, but he slipped it from its holster and handed it back to her. Dylan held it tight against her chest, wishing she had her knife. She wasn’t sure where it was. Back at camp, sitting near the wooden block she had used to cut up a chicken the night before the Redcoat attack, maybe. That was the last time she remembered having it. Stupid thing to do, to lose the only weapon she knew how to use.
“We only want the girl,” one of the gargoyles said in a voice that was ancient, like the creak of rusty metal.
“No,” Wyatt said.
“She is dangerous,” another said. “More dangerous than you and your kind.”
Wyatt’s spine stiffened a little, but he continued to stand his ground. “If you want her, you will have to come through me,” he said.
The gargoyles looked at each other, the sound of their necks moving almost like the grinding of stone on stone. The middle one, the one that had been first to speak, stepped forward and raised his weapon. As he did, Stiles appeared in front of Wyatt and Dylan.
“Hello, Henri.”
The gargoyle studied Stiles closely for a long moment. “Brother,” he said in that same rusty voice. “I heard a rumor you died in Viti.”
“Sorry to disappoint,” Stiles said.
“Get out of the way.”
Stiles lifted his axe, not really in a threatening manner, but just swung it by its handle as though he did not feel threatened. “I can’t let you hurt the girl.”
The other two gargoyles growled, the sound as menacing as anything Dylan had ever heard. The first held up his hand and gestured for the others to be quiet. He stepped forward, moving within a few inches of Stiles’ face so that there could be
no mistaking what he was doing. And to whom.
“We heard that you had switched sides, Brother,” he said, so close to Stiles that even Dylan, a few feet behind him, could smell the stench of his breath. “But I never would have believed it if I wasn’t looking at you right now.”
“I didn’t switch sides. I just changed my opinion of the methods we use.”
“And what is that?”
“This is the future of humanity, Henri,” Stiles said. “This girl and her kind, they are the ones who are going to survive this new world.”
“They are not human.” the one Stiles called Henri spat, the spittle flying all around the doorway where Dylan and Wyatt stood. “We were entrusted with the care and safety of humans, not hybrids.”
“How many humans are really left?” Stiles asked. “What is there left for us to protect?”
“It is not ours to question,” Henri said.
“Maybe it should be.”
Stiles pushed forward, knocking Henri back a few feet. Henri pushed back, his axe raised in front of him as his gaze rested on Stiles. “Don’t make me hurt you, Brother,” he said.
Stiles pushed again. The other two moved forward to help their companion, and the ringing of metal on metal resonated around them. Wyatt turned and pushed Dylan back into the doorway of the building behind them. She stumbled into a room that was long and wide like the room across the street where the others hid. Wyatt pushed her again, encouraging her to run into the depths of the room. There was a staircase in the far corner. Dylan took the first steps two at a time without any further urging from Wyatt.
The stairs went up four flights and ended in another large room. This one was stacked with boxes from one end to the other. Wyatt moved in front, grabbing Dylan’s hand and leading her into another corner, where the boxes made a kind of natural hiding place. They crouched down, snug together, as they had been inside the formation outside their camp.
Dylan wanted to open her mind and find out if the others were safe, but she was afraid to know the answer. They could still hear the ringing of axe on axe, knew there was still a fight taking place in the street below them. But that didn’t mean that one or two of the gargoyles hadn’t left that fight to find another somewhere else.
FREED (Angels and Gargoyles Book 2) Page 4
