Blood Winter

by Diana Pharaoh Francis

  Alexander nodded. He had come to the same conclusion. “I wish this damned snow would stop,” he said.

  “No, you don’t,” Thor said. “Snow works more for us than against us. The enemy can’t see us or smell us. They’re likely hunkered down and don’t think we’ll come for them until this lets up.”

  It made sense.

  “So where would they go?” Thor mused.

  “If it were me, I would head for somewhere quiet. A house, maybe. A lot of them are deserted, but with two armed and trained men, they could take someplace where people were living. They could get information, dry clothes, and whatever else they needed.”

  Thor nodded. “So which house?”

  “There is not much on this side of Reserve for a while, but across the street behind the businesses is a big neighborhood. That is the most likely place.”

  They crossed Reserve near a gutted jewelry store. Its windows were broken out, and a lot of its wood had been peeled away before someone set fire to it. Now it was just a shell. Alexander could smell cooking meat, and his mouth watered. He reached into his vest pocket and took out a power bar. He tore it open and ate it, then two more in quick succession. That was all he had. Max had eaten the rest. Thor followed suit. Slogging through the snow on the golf course had taken a lot of energy out of both of them.

  The neighborhood was a long triangular wedge between Reserve Street and the mall. The two Blades started at the closest point and methodically zigzagged along the streets, looking for the blood trail or some other sign that the Horngate group was nearby.

  “Wait,” Alexander said, putting a hand up. It was the faintest whiff of the two soldiers. Faint, but he had no doubts. “This way.”

  He followed the scent for a block along the street. He turned through a yard and tripped. He turned his fall into a roll.

  “Tree stump,” Thor said in a low voice. “Cut recently.”

  “Easy firewood,” Alexander said, turning back to find the scent trail. He did not bother brushing himself off. The snow stuck to him, lending him camouflage in the ghost night.

  They passed between two houses. On the other side was the one they were looking for. It was neatly tucked away, with a long driveway leading out to the road. A large yard surrounded it on three sides, giving it an air of privacy. Smoke came from its chimney, and with it the delicious scent of cooking meat.

  “Do we knock?” Thor asked.

  “It is probably a good way to get shot,” Alexander said. “I would rather go in quietly. Check the perimeter, and see if you can find a good way inside.”

  Thor went left, and Alexander went right. There was a porch along the front of the house, but all of the windows on the bottom floor were covered with corrugated steel. Another piece had been hung over the front door as extra protection. Alexander continued around to the back. There was a deck on the upper floor. Thor stood beneath it.

  “The place is sealed tight. Best chance is up there. It’s at the back of the house. They might not hear us breaking the lock.”

  The little house backed up on a two-story duplex. The place looked deserted. Alexander climbed up to the second floor across from the deck and jumped over. The heavy blanket of snow on the deck muffled his landing. A moment later, Thor joined him.

  A corrugated-steel door covered the sliding glass doors. There was no latch on the outside, and the metal door was fastened tightly. Even the hinges were inside, out of reach. There was no room for so much as a fingertip between the wall of the house and the steel.

  “Right about now, it would be handy to have Max here. She could use that lockpicking voodoo of hers and just walk on in, no fuss, no muss,” Thor mused.

  Alexander knew his friend said it to needle him. It worked. He might not feel emotionally connected with her anymore, but he was worried. Where was she? Had she gotten herself captured yet?

  “I guess we will have to do it the old-fashioned way,” Alexander said to Thor.

  “Which would be?”

  “Brute strength and ingenuity.” He took out a knife and wedged the tip under the steel. He hammered the pommel with the palm of his hand, driving it under with a screech of metal that made him wince. He did the same lower down, giving them two levers to pry open the door.

  “Careful not to break the knives,” he cautioned as Thor readied himself to pull up on the two hilts. “We only need enough room to get a grip underneath.”

  A moment later, Alexander was able to slide his fingers beneath the steel. He pulled it back. It was anchored in place by three sliding locks, the kind found in horse stalls. He tugged, and the first one broke away from the wood where it was fastened. He moved his hands down and repeated the process on the next two. The door swung free at last, exposing another door, this one made of wood with insulation stapled to it.

  It did not take much to push it open, the wood splintering away from the lock. Inside was the master bedroom. The bed was mounded with blankets to keep out the cold. Homemade oil lamps in canning jars sat on the nightstands and the dresser. A bathroom connected to the room on one side. The door was closed, but Alexander could smell the stench of waste. No doubt they had to collect it and dump it. Plumbing had failed when the electricity did.

  Thor swung the two panels shut behind them. The inner door wanted to hang open. He hooked his foot around the bench at the foot of the bed and pulled it over to hold it closed.

  Alexander resheathed one of the knives, keeping the other in his hand. The two padded softly out into the hallway. Alexander could smell the five Horngate folks and three others.

  They edged to the top of the stairs. The vantage point showed them the front door and a few feet of tiled hallway off to the right. Thor lifted a questioning brow at Alexander. He understood the question. Try a silent approach down the stairs and hope they were not immediately seen or heard, or jump down into the foyer and go for a blitz attack, hoping they could take out any enemies before they could react?

  Alexander put a finger across his lips and pointed down the stairs. With any luck, the Horngaters had control of the situation. If not, he did not want to get them shot.

  He went down first, testing each step to avoid squeaking. Midway down, he crouched behind the banister. Opposite him was a broad archway into a living room. A fire was roaring in the fireplace, and a number of people were gathered around it. Tris was standing beside Geoff and looking down at someone in an overstuffed chair. Doris was sitting in a corner of the couch. It had been pulled close to the fire. She was wrapped up in a heavy comforter and drinking some sort of soup, by the smell of it.

  Alexander could not see the two soldiers. They were out of sight behind the wall or in another room.

  “Where would this Sterling take them?” Tris was asking. “Please,” she added, her voice choking. Geoff Brewer put an arm around her shoulder. Both stared intently down into the chair.

  A man’s weary voice replied. “I just don’t know. Things have really split apart. It’s been all I can do to keep the kids safe and fed and warm. Please. Don’t hurt them.”

  Tris threw up her hands in exasperation. “I told you. We aren’t here to hurt you or your family. We just need some clothes, a place to warm up, a little food, and some information.”

  Thor crept down to join Alexander.

  “Well?” he whispered, so softly that nobody but Alexander might hear him.

  Alexander jerked his head and went to the bottom of the stairs, crossing to stand just outside the door. He crouched down and peered into the room. One of the soldiers was within. He looked to be in his mid-thirties, with short copper-colored hair and a ruddy face. He was standing by a window, the interior wood-and-insulation door wide open. He alternated between watching the group by the fire and looking outside through a peephole drilled into the steel. He held a .45 at the ready.

  Alexander looked over his shoulder at Thor. He held up one finger and pointed through the wall at the window.

  Thor’s brows went up in a silent question. W
here’s the other one?

  Alexander shrugged, then straightened. There was no point wasting any more time. The two soldiers were on Horngate’s side. Hopefully they would not shoot first and ask questions later.

  Alexander edged to the doorway and knocked on the wall. Everyone jerked and stared. The soldier at the window brought his gun level, sighting in on Alexander’s chest. Thor stepped around him to fill up the rest of the doorway.

  “It’s okay, Liam,” Tris said, staring at the two Blades with a combination of relief and nervousness. “They belong to us. The dark one is Alexander, and the other is Thor,” she said. “They are Shadowblades like Max.”

  The soldier came forward, extending a hand. “Name’s Liam.”

  The two Blades shook.

  “Max mentioned you,” Alexander said.

  “Is she here, too?” Tris asked, trying to see behind them.

  Alexander shook his head. “No.”

  Something in the way he said it made her frown. She stared hard at him. She did not look that much like Max, except for that tough-as-nails attitude. Her hair was long, the gold-blond strands graying. She wore it in a braid down her back. She was in her forties now; her slender body had turned soft around the middle, and her dark eyes were bracketed with crow’s feet.

  “Have you found Kyle and the kids?” she asked.

  Alexander shook his head. “Not yet.”

  She scowled. “Then what are you doing here?”

  “Finding you,” he said mildly, his gaze skewering her. “It seems Max had some concerns about your safety.”

  She flushed. “I wasn’t going to sit on my hands waiting. That bastard is going to kill them. He said he would torture them. We all saw what he was capable of.”

  Alexander did not answer. His gaze darted behind her, where another door had swung quietly open. The man standing there could only be Bambi. His black hair was cut short, and stubble darkened his jaw. His gray eyes were flat as they flicked across the scene. His .45 was half raised.

  “What’s going on?” he asked Liam.

  “Max sent some company,” came the gravelly reply.

  Bambi lowered his gun. “So the blood trail worked.”

  Thor nodded. “Thanks for that. We would’ve wasted a lot more time without it.” He looked at Tris, who flushed again.

  “What now?” Geoff asked. He still had his arm around Tris.

  “Now we have to get you safe and then get back to finding your kids.”

  Doris Lydman made a sniffling sound, then swallowed, and when she spoke, her voice was surprisingly strong and stubborn. “We aren’t going back. We’re going to keep looking until we find them.”

  Alexander left the doorway and went to stand beside the couch. “You are not equipped to deal with what you will find,” he told them all flatly. “You are a handicap to us. If we have to worry about you, we will not be able to do all that we could to find your kids.”

  “Should listen to him,” said the man in the chair. “Benjamin Sterling is bad news.”

  Alexander examined him. He looked to be around fifty years old. A bald spot formed a small island in his shaggy brown hair. He had a thick beard, and his hands were scabbed and scarred. He was well used to using them.

  “What do you know about him?” Alexander asked. “And what do we call you?”

  “Name’s Powell,” he said, shoving to his feet. He went to stare down at the fire, one hand on the mantel, the other fisting at his side. His throat worked, and after a few moments, he spoke.

  “They’re a cult, plain and simple. They showed up about the time the electricity failed. One day they didn’t exist, and the next it seemed they were everywhere. Benjamin Sterling claimed to be the hand of God. He was going around healing people and telling them he was the only way to find salvation. A lot of people believed him. And why not? He didn’t give ’em much of a choice. Follow him, and get food, shelter, clothes, and a key to heaven. Don’t, and he might just kill you or take everything you’ve got.”

  “But you didn’t join.”

  He laughed without humor. “Not me. I don’t cotton to herd thinking. I figure I’ll find my own way into heaven or hell without any help from some slick preacher. If either one even exists.” He grimaced. “Mind you, my wife had other ideas. She was too scared to stick it out here with me. Couldn’t convince her we could make it, either. She tried taking the kids, but they—”

  He broke off, glancing at Bambi, who remained in the doorway. The soldier nodded assurance. The older man turned to look at Alexander.

  “My kids had more faith in me. In us. I told Christina she could go, and fine, but if she tried to get them to come back and take us, we’d disappear, and she’d never see us again. She loves us. She’s just scared, like I said. So she left, and them Standers haven’t been back. For now.”

  He straightened, turning his back on the fire to continue his story. “I made sure this house was as tight as I could make it. I laid in a supply of wood, and I’ve been out hunting and putting away all the meat I can for winter. I’ve got some canned vegetables and beans and the like, and I’ve been scavenging what I can from houses, but most of them are picked over. I don’t have much, but we should get through winter, and after that, maybe we’ll head somewhere warmer, where we can grow things, and where we won’t have to deal with them Standers.

  “I warn you, now, Sterling may call himself the hand of God, but he’s got devil power. He don’t mind killing. If he’s the one that’s got hold of your kids, then I’m sorry for you. I’d put a bullet in my kids before I’d let him take them.”

  Doris gasped, staring.

  “That’s a hell of a thing to say,” Geoff said.

  “It is what it is. I’d call it a mercy killing, and I’d be right. If you didn’t want to know what I thought, you shouldn’t have broke into my house and started asking questions.”

  “But you have a plan to get them, don’t you?” Tris asked Alexander. “Don’t you?”

  Thor snorted and coughed, turning away. Alexander eyed him acidly before answering.

  “Max is going to join the Last Standers,” he said bluntly.

  “She’s going to what?”

  “She is going to join them,” Alexander repeated, once again wondering at his lack of emotion at the risk she was taking. “She figures it is the best way to find Kyle and the kids. When she does, she will haul them out of there.”

  “Nobody escapes from them,” Powell said. “Get yourself a headstone, and forget about her.”

  “You don’t know Max,” Thor growled.

  He glared at Alexander as if waiting for him to respond to Powell’s casual dismissal, but Alexander just shrugged. Max would live or die, and arguing about it made no difference.

  “Do you have some food?” Alexander asked instead. “We could eat.”

  Powell nodded. “This way,” he said, guiding them toward the door where Bambi still stood. He stepped back and let them through. Inside was a dining room. Or it had been. Built into the walls were china cabinets and a hutch. The dining table was gone, and in its place was a pair of twin beds. In them were Powell’s children. He stopped by each bed to check the sleepers and pull the quilts higher over their shoulders, then led the way through another swinging door into the kitchen.

  He had modified it considerably. Where the oven had been was now a woodstove. He’d cut a hole in the wall to vent it. On it was a big pot of stew. Down at the end of the counter, he’d build a brick oven. Several loaves of bread sat on the counter.

  “Don’t have much flour left,” he said. “Had a feeling things weren’t right when the Change started. Went to the grocery store and got everything I could.”

  “We might be able to help you out,” Alexander said.

  Powell sucked his teeth and grabbed a couple of bowls out of the cupboard. “Whatever you’re selling, I probably can’t afford to buy,” he said flatly.

  “Maybe,” Alexander said. “We can talk about it.”

&n
bsp; “That’s what them Standers said. But they weren’t interested in talking. Just taking. Can’t say I see much of a difference between you.”

  “That’s because you don’t know us yet,” Thor said.

  Powell scooped a hearty stew into the bowls. “Stew is what we eat most around here. Kids are getting sick of it.”

  Alexander tasted it. “It is good.”

  He polished it off in a couple of minutes, as did Thor. Wordlessly, Powell filled the bowls again and then a third time.

  “You boys are hungry.”

  “We need a lot of calories to do what we do,” Alexander replied.

  Powell propped his hip against the cabinet, folding his arms. “And just what is that?”

  Thor smiled. It was a dangerous, vicious look. “We kill things. Especially vermin, like the Standers.”

  Powell held his ground, but his fingers dug hard into his arms, maybe to keep them from shaking. “Exactly where are you from?”

  “Place called Horngate,” Alexander said, pointing his spoon in the general direction. “Up in the mountains about twenty or thirty miles from here.”

  “That organic farm with the greenhouses?”

  “Yes, we do that, too.”

  Powell scratched his beard. His fingers were thick and heavy, as if he worked with his hands for a living. “So let me see if I understand this. You’re organic farmers and vermin killers. Do you own the place?”

  Alexander shook his head. “Giselle owns it. She is a witch.”

  Thor coughed hard, setting his bowl down with a clatter. Finally, he straightened, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “You going to live?” Alexander asked.

  “No thanks to you,” Thor said. “You’re just going to announce she’s a witch to everyone you meet now?”

  “Not a lot of point in hiding it anymore,” Alexander said, scraping at his bowl. “The compounders already know. Word is going to spread one way or another.”