by KM Fortune
CHAPTER 4
THE NEXT MORNING BEGAN a whirlwind of festivities. Cedar and Willow were both led away to separate tents to be dressed and prepared for their special ceremony. Lance, the highest chief among them, would serve as their minister and he too went into a special tent to prepare. The people from the rest of the clans were assigned individual tasks. Some were sent out to search the frozen ground for pretty stones to line the wedding aisle. Others, including Blaze, were sent out to gather more wood for the post-ceremony bonfire. He ran along with the other boys, trying not to muss his wetted down red hair or dirty his worn and patched, but recently washed clothing. He helped drag fallen branches through the snow to the fire site. The pile was already quite large and would later be the center of music and dancing until dawn. Blaze could hardly wait and hoped he would be allowed this once to stay up and enjoy everything until late into the night.
Musicians from all the clans began to form up in the ceremonial wedding grove, tuning their menagerie of instruments and chatting amongst themselves. Women of all ages and from all the tribes began to work their mastery over a half-dozen fires in the central cooking area in preparation for the huge wedding feast. Already the air was filled with the scent of wild herbs simmering and venison roasting. Blaze’s mouth watered as he thought about the stuffed grouse and sweet yams he was sure would be served. They were his favorite.
Blaze pulled another branch to the bonfire and then ran back to the tent where he knew his brother was getting ready. He knocked on a tent pole near the entry flap. “Come in,” Cedar called, and Blaze entered. His brother sat on a stool in front of a small piece of broken mirror and smoothed his short beard. He smiled when he saw it was Blaze. “What are you up to, little brother?” he asked. Blaze laughed and pulled a surprise from his trouser pocket, being careful not to smash it. It was a wild desert rose of pale pink. Cedar looked surprised when he saw it. “Where did you find that?” he asked, reaching out to take the small flower Blaze offered him. He held it to his face to sniff its scent before examining it carefully. "It's so perfect, and I’ve never seen one around this camp.”
Blaze grinned. “It was just luck. I was pulling down branches to take back to the bonfire pit when I found the rose tangled on a vine in with the wood. Guess the earth wanted to give you a gift too,” Blaze said. Cedar laughed and tucked the small rose’s stem through the top button of his coat.
“Well, it’s perfect, Blaze. Thank you,” he said.
Blaze threw his arms around his brother and hugged him tightly. Cedar hugged him back, and they held the embrace for a moment. "I wish mother were here to see you and Willow get married,” Blaze whispered into Cedar’s chest.
“So do I,” he said with a touch of sadness. “She always loved weddings more than any other celebration.” The two were quiet for a moment remembering their mother. The Coughing Sickness had taken her in the darkest part of the winter just passed, and Blaze missed her deeply. His eyes fell on the wild rose.
“Maybe she sent the rose,” he said with a small choke in his voice. Cedar gave him another squeeze and then pulled back. He looked at the flower and then at Blaze before nodding.
“Perhaps," he murmured. "Perhaps."
THE CEREMONY WAS AN honored tradition. All of the clans from near and far who were able had come to pay witness, gathered in the nomad’s ritual wedding grove. Men, women, and children stood along the aisle to watch the groom and then the bride pass. The musicians nearby played soft music while Cedar and Willow made their way to the end of the grove and stood in front of an altar shaped from black stone. After a moment, the head chief waved his hands signaling for quiet and began to speak.
“I have seen color pictures in books from the time Before of weddings. They were held in large, fancy buildings and everyone wore elaborate outfits,” Lance said to Cedar and Willow and the crowd behind them. “But even with all the grandeur, history has shown us those unions were not prosperous. Gold cannot buy a devoted husband or an honest wife or a full womb. To have this, you must first begin with respect, honor, and, of course, love.” People in the crowd made affirmative noises. Lance smiled. “And here before me I do find two young people with all of these qualities. Two individuals who are very much in love.” Willow and Cedar both blushed a little. There were a few giggles from the younger girls in the crowd.
Lance reached out and took one of each of their hands, bringing them together to hold in his grasp. “In front of all your Brothers and Sisters, I declare this love a union. Let neither man nor beast come between you and let this bond be for life.” A cheer began to rise from the group. Lance had to shout his last few sentences to be heard over the clapping and stomping crowd. “Now may you bring many strong babies into the world! Go forth and forever be as one!” Willow and Cedar turned together on the aisle, hands still clasped and smiling, and made their way back between the rows of rejoicing onlookers. The musicians started up a lively tune, and the crowd threw leaves and wildflower petals as the young couple passed. Blaze remembered it all with vivid clarity. The sweet, perfect moment just before the first gunshots were heard.
From the snow-capped rocky ledges around the wedding grove, dozens of Patrols stepped out of hiding and began to fire automatic rifles into the tightly massed crowd. Cheers of joy for the marriage quickly became screams of fear and pain. People scattered and tried to run, but there was nowhere to go. The Patrols had crept up during the ceremony and surrounded the group. They had taken elevated positions on the rocks and hills around the small valley which made up the beautiful grove and then began firing at will, raking their spray of bullets over the throngs of people, and cutting them down like blades of grass. Blaze stood frozen in place, watching in horror as one gunner with an especially large machine gun, crouched on a ledge not ten feet above him and sent burst after burst of bullets into the band of musicians. The men in front of him were torn apart by the large caliber rounds, and their handmade or repaired musical instruments disintegrated in the hail of lead.
Panicked, Blaze yelled for Cedar. He scanned the grove and then saw him. Cedar, embracing Willow to try and shield her as well as pull her along, was struck in the shoulder. The pull of the impact yanked him from Willow's side, and before he could recover, a burst of rifle bullets pounded into his chest and sent him reeling backward into a growing pile of bodies. Blaze screamed while Willow, still unharmed, ran to Cedar and knelt down beside him. She took his head in her lap and wept as he stared up at her and whispered through bloody lips, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Blaze felt hot tears streaming down his face. He started to run to Cedar and Willow when bullets filled the air all around him. Diving behind a small boulder, he took cover at the base of the rock wall where the gunner still rang out its deadly fire from above and from where the main thrust of the attack seemed to be coming. The sound of the guns was deafening, and the air around Blaze was clogged with gun smoke and dust, making it almost impossible to breathe, but Blaze was too afraid to move. Above the sounds of the shooting and screams of the dying, Blaze heard shouting, loud and authoritative, and for a moment thought it was Lance coming to help him, but then he could hear the words more clearly.
“Cease fire!” the voice yelled. “Cease fire!” Slowly the shooting trickled off. It grew quiet, with only the cries and moaning of the wounded in the air. The man giving the order to cease-fire appeared in the grove and looked around. He wore black and gray urban combat fatigues and had a long sword on his hip. A large gold cross hung from his neck on a chain and stars adorned his shoulders, marking him as some sort of leader. With a wave of his hand, he called his troops down from their perches among the rocks.
“Let’s go. Affix bayonets. I don’t want to use any more bullets on these Waste People,” he ordered, pulling his sword from its scabbard. He held the deadly weapon high in the air and Blaze could see the evil satisfaction over catching the nomads off guard on his face. “Remember,” he said loud enough for all his troops to hear. “We want t
he females alive. Everything else, kill it. In the name of The Creator and with righteousness on our side, go forward and free the world of these sinners.” The Patrols moved through the crowd and began.
CHAPTER 5
BLAZE TREMBLED WITH fear. As he watched, the Patrols pushed through the fallen mass of bodies and sorted them. They stabbed anything which appeared male and was breathing. Even the babies and small children, weeping and calling for their mothers, were either carried away if they were female or slain without mercy if they were male. The soldiers were meticulous, stopping to check everyone, yanking the women who were alive to their feet by their hair and dragging them kicking and fighting to a large military truck which had been backed up into the grove. There the women were quickly stripped naked and attached to a shackle on a long chain before being lifted and shoved into the truck. When any woman fought back, she was struck with rifle butts or punched with fists until she submitted or fell unconscious.
In the end, there were over a hundred bodies strewn about dead in the Wedding Grove. The bullets killed many initially, but the Patrols were quickly taking care of the rest. Blaze knew it would not be long until the men worked their way to the front of the grove and found him kneeling in the shadows behind the rock. Looking around in panic, Blaze saw Willow across the clearing. She was weeping over Cedar’s lifeless body. A sob caught in Blaze’s throat. My brother, my big brother, he can’t be dead, he thought. Yet in his twelve-year old’s heart, on the verge of being a man among the nomads, he knew it was true. A rage suddenly filled him, pushing away the fear and sadness. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as soldiers relentlessly made their way toward Willow as well as his own hiding spot. Blaze realized both of them had to move, or he would be killed, and for Willow, something unimaginably worse. Having courage, at last, Blaze darted from his hiding place and ran to where Willow sat in the snow. He froze at her side when he looked down and saw why she was crying.
Cedar was still alive, although blood seeped from between his lips and his eyes were glassy with pain. Willow’s gentle hands, red from the blood of her husband’s wounds, caressed his face and hummed him a sweet lullaby between her sobs. She had not looked up when Blaze approached as if blind to the chaos around them. Hot, angry tears spilled over onto Blaze’s own cheeks as he looked at Cedar, his patient and wise older brother. For a moment Blaze did not know if he could go on and the idea of simply putting his head down beside the man he cherished and sleeping until the bayonet took him was tempting. Then a scream pierced the air behind him, and Blaze looked back to see another of the women of his people being dragged away toward the truck. The soldier pulled her along mercilessly to a fate Blaze could not even imagine. Rumors of the horrors which befell women in the Great Cave were whispered among the nomads, but no one knew for certain. All they knew for sure was people did not come back from inside the mountain.
For him, he knew death would be quick. He was a boy, but not for Willow. He looked down at his brother again and realized, for Cedar’s sake, he could not let the Patrols take her. Blaze, suddenly no longer a boy, but now a man born from the horror of the moment, grabbed Willow’s shoulders and forced her to look away from Cedar and into his eyes instead. “We need to go!” he yelled into her face. Willow shook her head and tried to pull away to turn back to her dying husband. They struggled for a moment, Blaze begging her to listen to him and Willow not wanting to hear him. Finally, from where he lay on the ground, Cedar whispered something, and the two stopped to listen. Willow whispered back,
“What is it, my darling?” she asked as if still unaware of the mayhem around them.
Cedar closed his eyes and Blaze knew he was gathering his strength to speak again. “Go,” he finally said. “Don’t let them catch you.” Willow shook her head wanting to refuse, but Cedar nodded back at her. “Yes, you must. The clan needs you now more than ever.” Then he closed his eyes and was still. Willow let out a cry of despair. Blaze felt as if his heart was breaking, but he grabbed her arm and pulled, trying to lift her to her feet.
“He’s right. We have to run. So we can survive and maybe someday find a way to fight back for what has happened here today. He would want that.” Willow looked at Blaze as if only now realizing he was there beside her. A look of understanding crossed her face and Blaze watched as the woman’s beautiful blue eyes changed to hard flint of cold gray.
“Yes,” she agreed, standing and finally taking in all which was going on around her. She gave a last long look down at Cedar where he laid still in the snow, now stained red from his blood. “I will live. For us,” she said to his still body. “And somehow, someday, I will make them pay for this.” Blaze pulled Willow’s arm again, and reluctantly she followed his lead back toward the end of the grove. He remembered, from hunting for branches for the bonfire, there was a narrow path which led out between the rocks. Willow paused at the exit for a moment and looked back at the destruction of the Wedding Grove and the inhumanity of the Patrols. Blaze turned when he felt her body shaking and saw her face. Rage filled it and a hardness mixed with her beauty. “Monsters,” she whispered and suddenly appeared ready to pick up any large stone or sharp stick to charge into battle with. Blaze tugged at her.
“Not today. We’d lose today,” he said.
Willow stood still for a moment longer and then turned from the horror and moved to follow Blaze out of the grove. As they ran toward the exit, a soldier called out.
"Halt!" he ordered and started to move through the mass of dead bodies toward them. Blaze and Willow kept going, still a few feet from being safely past the rocks. Blaze looked back over his shoulder and saw the man raising his rifle to fire. Turning away and preparing to hear a gunshot at any moment, he did not look back again until he heard the soldier curse in surprise. Stopping to see what was happening, Blaze's eyes widened with amazement as Cedar reached up from where he was on the ground and grabbed the man’s ankle. Using the last of his strength, he fought to pull the soldier down beside him. The soldier stumbled, and Cedar brought up a heavy rock with his other hand and used all the power he had left to smash it into the soldier’s kneecap. Even from a distance, Blaze heard the bone crunch, and he watched as the man fell with a scream of pain. Cedar tried to pull himself onto the downed enemy, but he was too weak. He’s alive. I need to help him, Blaze thought starting forward. Before Blaze even took a step, the floundering Patrol brought his rifle up and drove the bayonet into his brother’s throat. Cedar struggled for a moment longer and then fell back. Blaze, uncertain what to do, felt Willow reach for his hand. She squeezed it, pulling him forward, and they ran.
A LOG IN THE HEARTH popped and Blaze was brought back into the present. With eyes hot from unshed tears, he looked around at the crumbling warehouse and saw others in his clan were awake and starting to move about. Rubbing a hand over his face, he let the horrible memories slip away. He knew there was no point in remembering the past. There was no time for it. Survival was all about the here and now.
Slipping out from under the still sleeping little girl, Mouse, Blaze got up and stretched his back. One of the other men came over to him. "Can you help me bring in more wood? I don't want to send any of the others. It's too risky with the Patrols everywhere." Blaze nodded and followed the man toward the door. When they were out of earshot of the group, the man slowed and motioned Blaze aside. "Sorry, but I don't want to worry everyone. Our stockpile of wood is nearly gone. Plus our barrels of water need refilling. We can't stay hidden and do nothing much longer.”
“Show me,” Blaze said and went with the man to where the wood was once piled high. Only a half dozen pieces remained. No one wanted to consider the consequences of living long without a fire. “I’ll talk to Willow. We will just have to risk it.”
"Thank you," the man said, and the two of them gathered up the few bits of firewood left to carry in. As Blaze walked in the door, he saw the small numbers of his people and hoped the days ahead would be gentle on them. In his heart though, he worried. Their
lives were hard enough, and now the Patrols were coming. Blaze shook his head in frustration and wondered if things would ever change for the better.
CHAPTER 6
RAVEN SEIZED THE MOMENT. Jumping into the jeep’s driver’s seat, she slammed the clutch to the floor and cranked the ignition switch. The vehicle hesitated at first, but Raven instinctively pumped the gas pedal, and the jeep's engine roared to life. Without wasting a second to look at where the cat mutant was, she yanked the stick shift into reverse and popped the clutch. With a spin of tires on the sandy gravel embankment, the jeep shot backward. Raven hit the brake, threw the transmission into first gear and turned hard, racing the old vehicle up onto the pavement. Wheeling around, she saw the man-beast standing in the center of the highway. He was forty feet away, and she could see in the weak moonlight he was staring at her. Without hesitation, Raven drove the jeep straight at him. She could barely see where she was going without headlights and she fumbled her hand along the dashboard, hoping to get them to come on.
HECTOR RECOVERED FROM his shock at seeing someone driving his jeep and crouched, waiting to leap over the hood of the oncoming vehicle and onto the driver. The thing raced toward him, but he felt no fear, only rage. How dare someone think they can steal from me, he thought. He would make them pay for it with their life. As he coiled his muscles to spring, the jeep’s right headlight suddenly blazed with bright light and dazzled his eyes. With a hiss, he laid his ears back and squinted. The vehicle kept coming at him, but blinded from the glare, he could not see it.
