by Jordan Rivet
“Well, we made it.” She laughed. “Do I look as bad as you?”
“Worse. You look like you’re wearing thigh-high boots.”
He was right. Black mud covered her legs and dripped off them onto the rock. Esther tried to scrape some of it off, but it was very sticky. It smelled every bit as bad as the water had.
“Welcome to land,” David said.
“Are you guys okay?” Cody called. He and Simon were still where they had left them in the motorboat. A jagged path through the scum on the water between them and the shore marked where Esther and David had been swimming.
“We’re fine,” Esther shouted. “Um, I don’t think you should come over this way.”
“Agreed,” Simon said. “We’ll head back downriver and see if we can find somewhere to disembark. Wait for us.”
“Be careful,” Esther said.
Her father saluted, and then he took up an oar and helped Cody push away from the riverbank before they started up the motor.
“I’d give up the Lucinda for a shower right about now,” David said.
“Tell me about it. I miss the ocean.”
“Me too, actually. Isn’t it weird?”
“That the second we’re away from something all we want to do is get back to it?” Esther said. She scraped at the mud on her legs.
“Yes,” David said. “I feel a little land sick. Do you think that was a concept before people started living at sea?”
“No idea, but it’s probably because of the mud, not the land. What is this stuff?” She lifted a glob of the green scum closer to her face. It seemed to be made of minuscule webs.
“It’s disgusting. That’s what it is.”
Esther and David scraped off as much of the mud and scum as they could. It left a greenish-brown tinge on their skin as it dried. Esther felt like she was wearing a tight layer of plastic.
They had come ashore about a hundred yards from where the ground sloped upward beside the dam. The trees grew thick here. Insects buzzed around them, some settling on their arms. Esther slapped at them and pulled her boots back on over her mud-stained feet. She stood up.
“Let’s see if we can find a path up the hillside while we wait for the others.”
“Good idea.”
They tramped through more mud to get from their rock to the cover of the trees, but it was thickly packed, and they only sank a few inches. Esther’s feet felt heavy. It was warm in the trees, and soon sweat ran in brownish-green lines down both of their faces.
The insects weren’t quite as bad here, but it was slow going. Tangled roots rose up to trip them, and some places were impassable due to huge thorny bushes.
“Let’s not get too far from the shore,” David said as they wove through the undergrowth.
“We’ll have to head up there anyway to find that Elder guy.” Esther pushed through another thicket of bushes, the branches scraping along her arms. She looked back at David and couldn’t help laughing. “We’re a mess. Great first impression we’ll make on these Lake People.”
A couple of yards further on, she stumbled through another thicket and found herself on a narrow stone pathway. The trail wound away from them, but it was definitely going uphill. The path was quiet, and the trees hanging low over the flagstones cast long shadows.
David followed her out. He bent to brush the leaves and mud flakes from his trousers.
“Excellent. Shall we take a breather and then head back to meet your dad?”
“You’re not going anywhere,” said a stranger’s voice.
Three men stepped around the bend in the pathway and leveled shotgun barrels straight at them.
Chapter 18—Lake Aguamilpa
THE MEN WORE MOTTLED-GREEN and brown clothing, making them blend in with the jungle behind them. The one in the middle had a faded baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. A huge brown beard covered much of his chest. He cocked his shotgun with a loud clack.
“You the ones who came in on the boat?” he said.
“Yes, sir,” David said, straightening slowly. “My name is David Elliot Hawthorne. I’m the captain of the Lucinda. It’s a pleasure to—”
“Where are the others?”
“They took our boat downriver to find a better landing point,” David said. “As you can see, we had a bit of difficulty with the mud bank.” He smiled ingratiatingly, but it had no effect on the man with the shotgun.
“How many?”
“There are four of us including myself. My companion is Miss Esther Harris.”
“Hi,” Esther said cautiously.
She watched the other two men, who both wore camouflage clothes like their leader and had beards, one brown and one black. The man with the black beard had his hair pulled back in a long ponytail. He looked Esther up and down, and his mouth lifted in a half smile. She couldn’t decide if it was friendly or not.
“We told our companions we’d meet them back by the river,” David said. “Mr. . . . ?”
“Name’s Thompson.”
“Mr. Thompson, we’d better fetch them before we head up to the lake,” David said.
Thompson shook his head. He kept his shotgun cocked and pointed at them.
“You wait here,” he said. “We’ll get your friends. Watch them, Bole.”
The man with the ponytail nodded. “I got it.”
Thompson and his brown-bearded companion walked slowly past Esther and David, keeping their eyes on them at all times, then strode down the pathway and out of sight.
Bole lifted his shotgun onto his shoulder and held out a hand.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “Thompson takes his job real serious, and Jones has the personality of a mud hut. Name’s Adam Bole. You can call me Bole. Everyone does.”
“Hawthorne,” David said, shaking his hand.
“Hawthorne and Harris,” Bole said. “You guys from downriver?”
“We’re from the sea,” Esther said.
“What now? You live on a ship?”
“Yeah,” Esther said. “This is our first time coming inland.”
“No kiddin’. What kind?”
“A cruise ship,” Esther said slowly, not sure how much she should reveal. “We came upriver on a smaller vessel.”
“So what’s the deal here, Bole?” David said. “Why the hostility from Thompson?”
“We gotta be careful. You’re not the first strangers we’ve met.”
“There are others living around here?”
“Naw. It’s mostly nomads that cause trouble.” Bole took some kind of jerky out of his pocket and started chewing on it. “We try and keep them away, but I don’t reckon you’re a danger to us if you announced yourselves on the way in. Thompson just wants to be thorough.”
“Understood,” David said. “What can you tell us about the lake?”
“You’ll see ’er soon enough.” Bole spit on the ground. “The Lake is our Promised Land, we like to say.”
“You traveled here after the disaster?”
“Yeah. We came all the way down from the Old States. Me and my kid sister were livin’ in the Rockies for a while, but it got too damn cold, and we decided to travel south.” Bole scratched a finger through his beard.
Esther guessed that he was about David’s age, around thirty. His eyes were dark brown, and he had a pattern of fine freckles on his cheeks. “So, you two married or what?”
“No,” Esther said. “Not married.”
“But we’re together,” David said, a note of ferocity in his voice.
“Right.” That half smile flitted across Bole’s face again.
Footsteps on the path announced the return of the others. Bole lifted the shotgun down from his shoulder and pointed it at Esther and David again just before his companions arrived.
Thompson and Jones had found Cody and Esther’s father. Simon handed David’s glasses to him. After a terse round of introductions, Thompson gestured up the path.
“You four go first so we can keep an eye on you. We
’ll take you to the Dentist.”
The group from the Lucinda walked ahead. Esther was well aware of the shotguns still pointed at their backs. She fell in beside her father.
“How did it go with the boat?”
“We found a spot further downriver where a big rock juts out into the water. We were able to come alongside it so we wouldn’t have to slog through the mud. These gentlemen found us as we were getting the boat tied up.”
“The rock is right by the path,” Cody said. “This is a good trail, by the way,” he said, turning to the lake men. “Did you build it?”
“It was here before,” Bole said, striding forward to walk on Esther’s other side. “We keep it clear enough. You two took the hard way through the mud.”
“Your friend Thompson has been less than forthcoming about the Dentist,” Simon said. “What can you tell us about him?”
“He’s our leader.” Bole scratched at his beard. “The story is the Lord came to him in a dream and promised to lead him through the desert and the jungle to a lake of fish and plenty.”
“A dream?” Esther said.
“That’s the story. I wasn’t with him back then,” Bole said. “I met the Dentist’s people in southern Arizona. My sister and I were holed up in an old prison town, just two lost teenage kids. They took us in. The Dentist’s a little eccentric, but he was right about the lake. Plenty of fish.”
The path had begun to wind upward. Wide, flat stones set into the hillside made their passage easier. Thompson still scowled at them, and Jones seemed almost as tense, but Bole chatted freely. He sauntered along beside Esther and offered her some of his jerky. She caught David shooting him a dark look and fought a smile.
The air felt clearer the further up they climbed. Some of the paving stones were broken, but this part of the trail was well maintained compared to the shadowy section below. Before long, the trees began to thin and the ground leveled out.
They reached the final turn in the path. Bole strode ahead, jostling David as he passed. He threw his arms wide and said, “Welcome to Lake Aguamilpa!”
They rounded the bend, and the lake stretched before them, a deep crystal blue. The sun flashed off its glassy surface. The lake was large, its tree-covered banks just visible on the distant shore. Hills surrounded the lake like wide, green arms. The top of the dam was on their left now, a razor line compared to the fluid contours of the other shores.
Esther was relieved to see water again. A handful of boats buzzed about on the lake, small things busy fishing. The sight gave her a pang of homesickness. She had a strong urge to run down to the lake and submerge her entire body, or simply float on her back and look at the unobstructed sky.
“Hurry up,” Thompson barked. “The Dentist is waiting.”
The stone path continued along the edge of the lake for about a hundred feet. They reached a fork where the left-hand path led down to a simple wooden dock and the right one twisted back into the trees. They took the right fork.
Bole returned to Esther’s side. “When you meet the Dentist,” he said quietly, “you got to keep in mind that he’s the supreme authority around here. You don’t want to be on his bad side.”
“Why? What will he do?”
“Just take it as free advice, Harris,” Bole said. “You don’t want to meet an angry Dentist.”
“Sure, thanks.”
The path opened up into a road and they entered a large camp—or a small town, if you were being generous. Cabins lined the road on either side. Many had porches hung with nets. A group of women sat on one of the porches, working on something with their hands. They stopped to watch the strangers pass.
They made their way further into the town. A warm breeze blew dust around their ankles. A man, bearded like their three escorts, trudged across their path carrying a bushel of reeds on his back. Children played in the dirt in the shade of one of the cabins. They too stopped to stare as their group walked up the street.
“Glad to see everyone’s so friendly,” Cody muttered to Esther.
They reached a square, where another dirt road crossed their path. One side led off to the woods and the other wound down toward the lake, which was visible through a line of scrubby trees by the water.
“I’m off,” Bole said. “Got things to do before the roast tonight. You’ll be invited of course. Maybe I’ll catch you for a dance.”
Esther looked up, startled, but he had already turned to stride away in the direction of the lake. His shotgun was slung across his back now, his long, sleek ponytail tangled in the strap. Thompson cleared his throat and gestured impatiently for Esther to keep walking.
They crossed the square and passed a dozen more houses, some with gardens visible behind them. Up ahead a larger building loomed beside the street. Like the cabins, it was made of wood and it had a rustic appearance, like a hunting lodge. A wide porch wrapped all the way around it and out of sight. A tall wooden cross rose from the top like a mast.
Thompson nudged them forward with his shotgun. They walked straight to this building and up the five steps to the porch. Thompson removed his cap and rapped on the double doors. On them was carved a huge volcano. Fire and smoke sprayed out of its conical shape, and tiny wooden figures fled before it.
They waited, standing awkwardly in a group with Jones still looming at their backs.
The doors swung open, revealing a wiry woman in the entryway. She had white hair and deep wrinkles in her round face, and she wore a robe as white as sea foam.
“Welcome to the home of the blessed Dentist,” she intoned.
“These are the people from the boat,” Thompson said.
“I am Alderflower. Come with me to bring your supplications before the Dentist.”
Mystified, they followed her deeper into the lodge. The dark, cool entryway smelled of wood and smoke and something sweet that Esther didn’t recognize. The floor was highly polished wood. The lodge felt hushed and formal, and Esther was suddenly keenly aware that she was still covered in dried river slime.
Across the entryway was another set of double doors, which had highly stylized carvings of the lake across their width. Alderflower pushed open the doors and led them through. She seemed to drift like a jellyfish as they followed her white-robed silhouette through the darkened doorway.
Inside was some sort of meeting hall. Benches lined either side of a wide aisle. The poorly lit interior left most of the room in shadow. But at the far end of the aisle a patch of light descended from an opening in the ceiling onto a huge, ornately carved chair.
A man stood up from it as they walked down the aisle. He looked about fifty, a few years younger than Esther’s father. He was handsome in a mature way, with deeply tanned skin and very broad shoulders. He was also one of the tallest men Esther had ever seen, at at least six and a half feet.
“I present our blessed leader, the Dentist,” Alderflower announced. “May the Lord ever speak through him to guide our steps.”
They stopped in front of the dais. The Dentist loomed, arms folded over his broad chest, and regarded them. His eyes were a startling golden hazel, like glistening droplets of petroleum.
“So,” he said after what felt to Esther like the world’s longest pause, his voice resonating in the shadowy space, “you’re the boat people.”
Chapter 19—The Dentist
DAVID STRODE FORWARD TO introduce them, straight backed and proud despite the mud and scum on his clothes.
“My name is David Elliot Hawthorne, and these are my companions, Simon, Esther, and Cody,” he said, adopting his smooth spokesman persona. “We have traveled from the sea, where we lived adrift for nearly seventeen years. We are visiting land-based settlements in search of a home. We seek a new life.”
“What brought you to us?” the Dentist asked in that deep, resonating voice.
He had a natural charisma. His tone was guarded but not unkind. Esther had to remind herself what Emilio had said about the Big Man at the lake. How the Lake People killed ea
ch other when the Big Man said.
“We’re from the cruise ship Catalina,” David said. “I believe one of your followers has been in communication with our ship on the satellite network.”
The Dentist made a quick cutting gesture toward Alderflower. “Leave us,” he said. “You too, Thompson. Jones.”
“Sir,” Thompson said. “Are you sure you want to be alone with—?”
“I will not repeat myself.” The Dentist barely spoke above a whisper, but Thompson and Jones immediately shouldered their weapons and marched back out the double doors. Alderflower had already disappeared into the gloom behind the Dentist’s chair.
The doors slammed shut. The Dentist sat, leaning back with his wide hands on the arms of his massive chair. He studied them without blinking.
“I’m the one who spoke to your ship,” he said after a moment. “I have to protect my people from outside influences. The Elders manage the short-range radio at the dam, but I’m the only one with access to the satellite network.”
Esther frowned. Neal had been talking to the Big Man, the Dentist, all along?
“You’ll know about our database of survivors then,” David said without missing a beat. “You provided your roster to add to the List?”
Careful, Esther thought. She was suddenly very sure she didn’t want the Dentist to know why they were there.
“I’m afraid not. Your man—Neal, is it?—told me about this List. I deemed it too risky to give that sort of information to strangers. Unfortunately, at the time one of my followers also had access to the network. They have been duly punished for exposing our community against my wishes.”
Esther and her father exchanged glances. Punished how?
“Well, we hope our communities won’t remain strangers for long,” David said smoothly. “We compiled the List to help build relationships and connections with other survivors. We mean you no harm.”
“Hmm . . .” the Dentist said, drawing out the sound like a slowly dying engine. “So you say. What’s your endgame?”
“We seek a permanent home,” David said. “Our mission is to experience life on land firsthand and to scout out possible locations for our shipmates to settle. Your town is impressive, based on what we’ve seen so far.” David swept his arms wide, seeming to take in both the lodge and the town beyond its walls. “We may even like to join you, if you’ll have us.”
