“Thank you,” the man with the kids said. “Thank you. I thought you were dead.”
“The others are,” I said.
He hesitated. “There was no way to tell the attack would come there,” he said slowly. There’s a question in his voice, just a hint of one.
And I understood he was asking, almost, why we didn’t prevent the ambush.
“If they hadn’t killed Martin, we would have done okay,” I said. I’d thought about it plenty. “Now I got to get you to Corbin. That was our contract.”
“How’s your head?” he asked. He was eyeing me dubiously, so I knew I didn’t look good.
“Better. We need to move out of here.”
“Our daughter?” his wife asked, moving up behind him. It took me a minute to think what she was talking about. Oh, yeah. The back-shot girl.
“Died instantly,” I said.
Incredibly, she asked, “Did you bury her?”
I had to wait a moment before I answered. “Not having a shovel, and wanting to save the living, I didn’t.”
I could tell this was crushing news to her but that she understood what I was saying.
“Thanks for coming after us,” the husband said. “My name is Daniel, and this is Jerusha.”
Farming names. “I’m Lizbeth,” I said. “Lizbeth Rose.” Their two remaining kids came up, a teenage girl about thirteen, another boy about eleven. The older one was named Martha, the younger one Jonathan. They were exhausted and gray with shock, but the girl had some spark in her.
“We need to be moving out,” I said again. “You all got to search the bodies.” They flinched and opened their mouths to protest. “We need all the food and water they got, and I claim their firearms,” I said. “I might need ’em before we get to Corbin.”
They stood there stiffly, looking at me like I spoke Greek. “Go!” I said. They scattered to do as I’d bid them.
Next, I made myself go over to the other family, forming a little huddle on the ground. The raped woman and her husband had been joined by three young ones: a girl about ten, a boy about eight, a girl about six. The baby had been theirs.
“Listen to me,” I said, and they turned their faces to me, almost relieved to be distracted from the woman’s distress. “We must leave now. I made a lot of noise, and someone may have heard. Someone along the lines of these men.” I nodded my head toward the corpses. “So we need to gather up our stuff and walk out of here.”
The woman was the sticking point. If she could rally, they would do what I said. She had to pull herself together. She’d lost her baby in the past two days. She’d just been raped in front of her husband and children. But.
I went to a knee in front of her, wondering if I’d ever be able to get up. “With a lot of respect for what you been through . . .” I paused, and her husband said, “This is Sheba. I’m Matthew.”
God Almighty. “Sheba, just right now, you got to get yourself together and we got to get this group away from this spot. I’m Lizbeth Rose, and I’m going to get you to Corbin to your new home. No one there will know, and you can start off clean and new.”
That was a shot in the dark that paid off. Sheba took some deep, shuddering breaths, and then allowed her husband Matthew to lift her to her feet. She had fixed her garments. Her face was bruised, one eye almost shut. Matthew was pretty beaten up too. Their kids were all wide-eyed with shock. They looked better when their mom got up and quit crying, though.
Not as fast as I would wish, but sooner than I’d feared, we stripped the bodies and the campsite of everything useful that we could carry. They’d been too damn poor to even have horses, which had enabled me to catch up with them, sure, but it would have been wonderful to have a pack animal. The two youngest kids could have ridden it.
We got a working rifle, Galilee’s rifle, my jackhammer, and a good pistol off the bandits. I was so glad to retrieve the jackhammer I almost cried, and I felt like myself once more when the holder was slung on my back. The families were able to collect a lot of their stuff again, but looking at the bulk of the bundles and their weight, I knew we couldn’t take it with us.
“We got to move out of this campsite, and then we got to build a cache,” I told the adults. “We can’t carry you all’s clothing and so on with us. We got to travel light and fast. When you get to Corbin, you can come back with a large party and retrieve your things.”
The adults saw the sense of that.
We managed to haul their gear a mile away, by which time it was late in the afternoon and we had to stop. Everyone was exhausted. Including me, sadly. There was not a lot of cover around. The vegetation was low. We couldn’t take the time to dig, and I doubted we had the energy. Casting around, I found a hull of an old wagon. The wood was almost hollow, and the metal was mostly rust. Probably abandoned during the resettlement of forty years ago. It was resting mostly on one corner, that wheel being off. We piled their stuff in the space below it, disturbing the ground around it as little as possible.
“Best we can do,” I said, and Daniel and Jerusha nodded. We made camp a little distance away. The night was just warm enough that we didn’t need fires for heat; while it was still light, I let them make a cooking fire to heat food and water. After that, we put the fire out. Letting the smoke rise up during the day was better than having the flames acting as a beacon in darkness.
There was a trickle of a stream nearby, and after the food was eaten—which did everyone good—Jerusha and Sheba took the kids to the trickle and cleaned them up. Sheba stayed behind, to do some private scrubbing. I kept an eye out until she returned. If she was going to break down, it might be while she was alone. But back she came, though she looked like death. She was hanging on by a fingernail, but she was hanging.
I sat alone, staring ahead of me, calculating our odds. Assuming no one had noticed the smoke and become curious enough to find out who was responsible, there were other dangers. I was mostly worried about wild dogs. When everything had crumbled and people had died all over from lack of food or the fact that they weren’t strong enough to fight off illness, dogs had thrived, especially the bigger breeds, since the smaller ones tended to get picked off by the larger. Mom had said there were all different kinds at first. Now they all looked the same, mean and yellow. There were packs of varying sizes wandering throughout Texoma and New America as far north as the colonies of Canada.
Dogs and bandits.
When the exhausted party had settled down—the little ones were already asleep—I chose Matthew to take first watch. “I’ll take second,” I said. Matthew looked surprised for a moment—maybe he’d expected me to stay up all night? But he nodded.
I stretched out with one of the bandits’ raggedy blankets under my head. And I fell into a pit of sleep instantly.
When Matthew shook my shoulder some hours later, it was all I could do to sit upright. It was chilly, and I unfolded the blanket and put it about my shoulders. The farmer lay down beside his wife and closed his eyes, and then I was alone with my thoughts. I tried to put them to good use. Now that I had found these folks alive, I was bound to get them to Corbin.
This wasn’t a streak of nobility, you understand? It was a reputation thing. The Tarken Gang had always delivered, always. That was why we charged a little more. We would never leave a cargo unless we were all dead. And I was left alive.
I’d have to spare some time the next day to clean and evaluate the weapons. I was calculating how much farther we had to go, how fast the party could move, how to divide the remaining food. It was hard to get my head to work, but I got a little ways forward with the planning.
The girl Martha came to sit by me, her blanket wrapped around her shoulders.
“Can you not sleep?” she whispered.
“I did. Now I’m on watch.”
“What you watching against? You killed them all.”
“They ain’t the only thing out here to fear, Martha.” I hated to break the news to her.
“What else?” she b
reathed.
Had she been raised in a bubble? “Wild dogs,” I said. “More bandits.”
“More. Like them.” This was a very dark revelation to Martha. Had she imagined she’d encountered the only bandits between Mexias and Corbin?
“Maybe worse.” I’d heard of cannibalism among these groups. If you didn’t have anything to trade or land to grow stuff on, food could be hard to come by. The dogs took care of a lot of the game. Some people ate the dogs. My head hurt.
“Are you all right?” Martha asked, which was the last thing I expected.
“Yeah,” I said. “You?”
“You killed a lot of men today,” she said. “Didn’t know if that would bother you or not.”
I tried not to snort. “That comes with the job,” I said.
“Can you teach me to shoot?”
“That’s a big task,” I said. “And a lot of shooting draws attention, makes noise. We want to keep moving fast as possible, quiet as possible. Plus, I don’t have enough ammo.”
She seemed to see the sense in that. “They all deserve killing,” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “Go back to sleep, Martha.”
“All right. Lizbeth.” We were big buddies now. Bonded.
In truth, in the days that followed it helped to have an ally. Martha was quick to do what I said, always listening. She helped get the little kids going, kept herding them. The woman Sheba tried to keep the younger ones in line, but she had moments when I could tell from the bleak, blank look on her face that she was back getting raped again in her head. Her husband wasn’t much help in that respect. He treated her like a lunatic who was liable to be set off by any wrong word.
With this uncertain crew, I started the final leg of the trip to Corbin. Walking, it took a week, what with the kids and having to forage for water. One of the confiscated rifles turned out to be in good shape and fine for shooting small game. I brought down some rabbits along the way so we had some meat. Though I regretted the way gunshots carried over the rolling terrain, I knew they had to have meat to keep going. So did I.
At first all of them but Martha were pretty nervous around me, which suited me just fine, but in a day that had vanished. Dammit.
They all talked to me about what had happened to them and how the bandits had mistreated them, and praised me to the skies for doing what I was supposed to do. They didn’t ask anything about Tarken, Martin, or Galilee.
At first, I had occasional problems with the men, Daniel and Matthew. They were feeling small and ineffectual because they hadn’t been able to save their families. So they threw their weight around. Finally I took them aside and told them they had bigger dicks than I did, which shocked them, and I also told them that they were going to lead the hell out of their families when we got to Corbin. But right now, I had to be the big dog. They both knew how to shoot, because they had to kill marauding animals on the farm, and I gave each of them a rifle; one of them got the use of Galilee’s and one of them got the bandit’s hunting rifle, but I told ’em I’d need ’em back at the end of the road.
They didn’t sulk so much after that. The wives were cautious around me, but I didn’t care as long as they cooperated. They were used to obedience, though Jerusha had a will of her own.
In the weird way of children, having watched me shoot four men the kids decided they were fond of me, after a day of uncertainty. At first, their shrill voices were like fingernails in my brain, but as my head got better I became used to it. “Lizbeth! Look at this!” Or “Lizbeth! Can I carry your gun?” Martha followed me like a shadow, to the point where Jerusha was obviously concerned about my bad influence on the girl. It was strange to realize I was closer in age to Martha than to anyone else in the group.
We travelled during the day. The bandits had taken the party east, so I had to cast around for the trail Tarken and Martin had picked out some years before, but I found it. We had to correct—go west and then due north.
My little party was in a barren area, uninhabited. Crossing this no-man’s-land was like walking through a time machine. Evidence of the past lay all around us, from rusting cars to derelict homes that had once been farms, to lonely graveyards and desolate towns. Every now and then we saw a skeleton from the last war (which Mom said was not a true real war, but really a big skirmish) fought over this land.
I tried not to let my vigilance wane. It helped that this landscape creeped everyone out, and the adults and older children were always looking side to side. But for three days, our biggest problem was snakes. On the fourth day, we had a worse one.
As we passed through an old abandoned settlement—a faded sign said it had been Rolling Hill—the dogs attacked. They’d been taking shelter in a teetering building, which at least offered protection from the constant wind. Thanks to that wind, they didn’t smell us until we were on them. We had no warning.
They swarmed out of the door, maybe ten of them, all good sized and lean with hunger. Martha, who was closest, went down immediately. The jackhammer would have taken out the girl as well from where I stood, so I fired at the lead dog and took him down and then leaped on the dog biting the girl and clenched my hands together under its jaw. It let go of Martha, twisted around in my grip and snapped at my face. I had to let go with one hand to pull out my knife, and I stabbed it in the neck. The animal collapsed right away, and I knelt beside it and swiveled my head, looking for more trouble. I’d heard the other rifles speak. Three other dogs were down and the rest had run. The younger kids were safe but screaming. Sheba and Jerusha were white as sheets. Jerusha dashed over to check on her daughter. I got up and wiped off my knife and my hand.
Martha was bit pretty bad on the shoulder. Her mom took charge of her and poured whisky (hadn’t known Jerusha had any) over her wound after letting it bleed a bit to get the germs out. The girl was covered in blood, her own and the dog’s. There was an old well in the town that still had water; needed boiling, but after that we were able to use it. Martha was in pain.
“Why not give her a shot of the whisky?” I suggest to Jerusha, very quietly. She looked a bit shocked, but she nodded, so Martha had what I guess was her first liquor. She gasped and her eyes watered, but after two swigs she relaxed perceptibly and Jerusha was able to bandage her shoulder.
It was hard for me to tax my brain into telling me what we should do next. We could shelter in one of the ramshackle buildings for the night, which would mean if the pack tried again, we’d be guarded from a few directions. We could leave the town and try to make it a little farther, in which case if the pack returned to their haunts, we’d be gone. In the end, Martha’s condition made the decision. We stayed in the old hardware store, which didn’t have a roof, so we could light a fire. We ate roast dogs. It’s not good meat, but it was fresh, and I think Martha kind of enjoyed the idea.
We made Corbin at sunup on the seventh day.
Matthew and Daniel, I had learned, were brothers, and they had another brother in Corbin, a guy named Jeremiah. As it turned out, Jeremiah had given up hope a few days before, but he’d lingered in Corbin in case there was a telegram or letter to let him know what had happened to his kin. He was overjoyed to see his brothers and their families. Jeremiah, a wealthy widower, was the one who’d put up the money for their transport.
“I’d like to shake Tarken’s hand,” he said, after the greeting and screeching and hugging was over.
“I hope you have to wait a long time to do that,” I said, and after a moment he got it.
“What will you do?” he asked me.
“Go back to Mexias,” I said. “See what other gang I can join up with.”
“You could stay here,” he said. “Get a job that isn’t so dangerous.” I could tell from the way he looked at me that he was wondering if I’d make a good farm wife. Maybe for him.
“I got family in Mexias,” I said. “I’ll be getting on back.” I gave him a small smile to soften my words, thanked him for his patronage, and went to sit under a tree. Jerusha and Sh
eba came over to give me hugs, and Martha wrapped her skinny arms around me, though she winced as she did so.
“I don’t want you to leave,” she said against my chest. “I want to be a gunnie like you someday.”
“Bite your tongue,” I said. “Stay here and be happy.”
When I could tell the families were all so involved in reuniting, other relatives having arrived to rejoice, I was able to get away quiet. I did not want any long goodbye with the other kids, and I hoped I never saw them again. For their sakes, if nothing else.
Jeremiah had completed his payment in cash, so I had to be extra careful on my way back to Mexias, for all the people of Corbin knew I’d left with money. One man followed. He came to the end he deserved.
After that, all I encountered were snakes and a glimpse of a pack of dogs two hills away. I saw an Indian woman with a basket on her back, and we passed each other at a safe distance.
Though I was laden down with all the stuff we’d taken off the bandits (six water bottles, the two rifles—one Galilee’s, two pistols, a newish pair of boots too big for me but worth money) and my pouch of money and my jackhammer, I still made better time going back than I had with the two families on the way north. After the first few miles, I wished I’d sold all the extra stuff in Corbin; carrying it home was a burden. But I had wanted to get away quick.
By the time I reached Mexias, five days later, I felt better, despite the occasional headache. I still hadn’t seen my face in a mirror, but I was fairly sure I was going to have a scar on my forehead from the knock I’d taken in the wreck; well, add that to the sum total.
I’d stopped at the ambush site. As I’d hoped, it had been discovered. To my relief, the bodies had been removed and the truck had been hauled away too. It no longer blocked the remnants of the road. Someone was using the parts.
That was all good. If the bodies had still been there, now that I’d carried out our mission I’d have had to deal with them, somehow.
Unfettered II: New Tales By Masters of Fantasy Page 44
