by Jon Cronshaw
“Perhaps,” says Abel. “I just wish I could have saved him too.”
Jacob nods. “Not everyone can be saved.”
ABEL LOOKS DOWN AT Pip’s body resting on the floor as he stuffs the last of his clothes into his backpack. There’s a knock at the door. “Come in.”
Sal leans in, offering a warm smile. “You did what you set out to do, Abel. We’re very proud of you.”
“You’re going to look after those kids, aren’t you? I need you to take care of them, teach them right.”
Sal steps over Pip’s body and places a hand on Abel’s arm. “We’ll help them to be free from plez and point them in the way of the Lord.”
Abel shakes his head. “Just teach them to read and to do right — for me.”
“Like it or not, I know you are doing God’s work. If you lead them here, you lead them here for a reason.”
“Please, Sal. If the kids want to be into this God stuff, let them. But don’t put it on them. They’ve been through more than you could understand. Just show them kindness and let them trust you. Don’t make it about God.”
Sal tilts her head, looking deep into Abel’s eyes. “Okay,” she whispers. “They’ll have a home here, and we’ll do all we can to help them.”
“Thanks, Sal.”
She looks down at Pip, running a hand along one of her dreadlocks. “Would you like us to bury her?”
Abel takes in a deep breath and licks the dryness from his bottom lip. “I’ll take her with me. Not sure what I want to do yet.”
Sal leans forward and embraces him with a long hug. He feels her warmth against his chest, her breath against his ear. She kisses his cheek and pulls away. “You take care. You’ve had sadness, but you’ve also seen first-hand that there can be hope. Take hope with you on your travels. Do right.”
Abel nods and lifts Pip’s body under an arm. “I will.”
30. Ashes
ABEL HEADS EAST ALONG the highway, Pip’s body draping stiff over his shoulders. He takes a right and heads towards the place where the wizard discovered the quad bike. The trees lining the road stand in a silent vigil, the air still around him.
When he reaches the edge of the old town and the lawnmower shop comes into view, he looks around and raises his hands. “Hey,” he calls out. “Little girl?”
There's no sign of anyone, so he moves deeper into the town. Scanning across the tops of buildings, his gaze sweeps across broken windows and alleyways, searching for movement.
He walks around the bloated corpses of the man and woman from the Family, their bodies swarming with flies and stripped of clothes.
“Little girl?” He looks around again and lowers Pip’s body to the ground. He takes off his backpack and pulls out a blanket and a couple of food tins. “This is for you. I wanted to say thank you.”
He looks around again and pulls on his backpack. “Little girl?”
Heaving Pip’s deadweight back onto his shoulders, he turns and walks back the way he came.
A minute later, a strange high-pitched clicking echoes around the buildings behind him. The girl emerges from behind a wall, riding a pushbike with colourful tassels hanging from the handlebars, a rifle hung over her bony shoulders.
She skids to a halt and gets off the bike. Her blonde hair hangs lank and greasy. She meets Abel’s gaze with sunken eyes. Gathering the blanket and food, she drops the items into a pink basket above the front wheel and waves at Abel. He returns the wave and continues on the road towards the highway.
LATE THE NEXT MORNING, Abel spots the piece of tattered red material hanging from a tree, fluttering against the breeze. He wheezes with exhaustion at Pip’s weight on his shoulders.
He carries her off the highway, pushing through the trees and bushes, searching for several minutes, until he sees the garage.
He opens the shutters and finds it exactly how he'd left it. He carries Pip over to her bed in the corner and lays her down.
He’s trembling and gasping. He crouches next to her and pours some water into his mouth, sighing. “What we going to do, girl?” he whispers.
He strokes behind her head and frowns at the jerky spasms spreading across his arms. “You stay there, girl,” he mutters.
He gets up and steps outside. With a tight chest, he stares at the sky. Thin brown clouds swirl above. He looks back into the gloom of the garage.
Pushing his way back through the trees, he moves to the highway, snapping branches from the dead pines. He looks east towards the city, following the highway as it descends in a gentle slope beneath the shimmering black waters. He scans across the miles of buildings, turning to the south as black smoke ascends in thin streams to the sky.
Shaking his head, he returns to the garage and drops the wood next to the pile of ashes. “Home,” he says.
THE END
Author’s note
Thank you. I can’t express how much it means to me that not only have you taken a chance on my book, you’ve also made it to the end. And now here you are, reading this.
I love stories. When I was a boy, even though we didn’t have a lot of money, my mum used to read to me every night. Stories like C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Ted Hughes’s The Iron Man, and Roald Dahl’s The Witches have stuck with me to this day. When a good story resonates, it’s a powerful thing.
Sadly, I’m unable to read print books anymore due to visual impairment, but I am still able to listen to audiobooks. For me, nothing beats losing myself in another person’s world, getting a glimpse into an author’s imagination. But more than anything, I love great characters.
When an author writes a great character, it’s like getting to know a new friend — I’m with them all the way. Whether it’s the father in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, where every decision could mean the difference between life or death, a hapless buffoon like Ignatius J. Reilly from John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, or Kurt Vonnegut’s Kilgore Trout, when I engage with a great character, they stick with me for life.
I’ve read a lot of post-apocalyptic fiction over the years, and what drew me to the genre was the idea that in even after civilisation has collapsed, there is still hope, there is still the triumph of the human spirit. I wanted to write a world where even though terrible things happen, there is still room for kindness and compassion.
Over the past few years, I’ve been reading a lot of science fiction and fantasy, and a lot of what I’ve read and enjoyed as no doubt filtered into my Wasteland series. I originally came up with the idea for Wizard of the Wasteland as a short story that came to me in a dream (sounds cliché doesn’t it?).
Now I’m at a point where I know there will be at least three books in the series, all of them playing with character types you’d find in fantasy fiction — wizards, knights, kings, clerics, etc. I’ve had a lot of fun writing in this grim world, and I’ve come to really love my Abel character.
I wanted a character with a past and a worldview that might not sit well with some readers — he was a drug addict, he’s an atheist. But he doesn’t kill and he wants to be a good person. He loves stories and daydreams, but he’s also a survivor who will risk everything when he has to.
What I’ve learned from writing this book is that there’s a fantastic community of authors and readers out there who offer support and go out of their way to be helpful. I’ve been overwhelmed by how helpful strangers have been in shaping my book, offering advice, and making it a story I can be proud of.
Please, if you enjoyed this book, please take a moment to leave a rating on Amazon. Your kind words and encouragement keep me motivated and focused on writing the next story.
Want to comment on your favourite scene or event in the novel, or share your drawings of Mister Fluffy?
Please join me on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/joncronshawauthor.
Want to know when the next book is out and receive the occasional free short story? Join the email list here: http://tinyurl.com/joncronshawemaillist.
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Thank you.
Jon Cronshaw, June 2017.
Knight of the Wasteland
1. Burial
Abel cradles Pip, rocking back and forth, whispering to himself as she lies dead in his arms.
With an arched back, he sighs and lifts her stiff body into the hull of his rowing boat. Layers of blue and white chipped paint cover its surface, grimy ropes securing it to a grass-stained trailer, no more than a metal frame and a pair of rubber wheels. He climbs up into the boat and sits on the single seat. A pair of oars, kept in place by rusted pivots, rests on either side of him.
He looks down at the dog and reaches into his leather jacket for his pistol. He turns it in his hand. Thin grey ripples glide along its barrel. He opens the cylinder and takes out the bullet. A tight, shuddering breath catches in his throat. He inspects the bullet for a long moment, takes in its shape, its potential, and sighs. Blowing on it, he places it back, and clicks the cylinder shut, hands shaking. His eyes stare back at him in the reflection along the barrel, cold and distant.
Thick concrete walls stand silent around him. A cracked window, held from shattering by rusted wire mesh, lets in a dull trickle of light. In the corner to his right lie the remains of a recent fire, blackened wood and grey ash. A pile of grey pine branches rests next to it.
The roof above the fire gapes half-collapsed, revealing the last flickers of sunset. A bundle of blankets lies along the right-hand wall, crumpled in a heap on top of his bedroll. A glimmer of light catches the corner of his shopping trolley and disappears. The garage’s steel shutters hang open behind him.
Abel turns and looks down at Pip’s body, shaking his head at her wiry legs and brindle fur. He looks outside. Grey clouds blot out the sky. The pines across the way lean gaunt and lifeless, thin twiggy things, the same grey as the sky. The other trees loom green and wild, their branches twisting and spreading along the ground, climbing the sides of his garage and obscuring it from the highway beyond.
The smell of damp fur and moss hangs in the air. He removes his tattered baseball cap and runs his fingers over his matted hair. A tremble courses along his spine. He considers his pistol again, bouncing it in his hands for several minutes before placing it back in his jacket. Getting to his feet, he steps out of the boat, and reaches into his trolley — a cage on wheels — filled with odds and ends. He leans in, pulling out a plastic sheet, green and stained with brown and grey patches. Dust slides from its surface. He unfolds it and drapes it over the boat, covering Pip’s body, protecting her from the approaching night.
He pulls down the steel shutters — a hollow rattle followed by a crash as steel meets concrete. He flinches at the noise, his head tired and body sore.
Squinting in the dim light, he goes over to his bedroll and shuffles beneath blankets and old coats. He stretches out and lies on his back for a long time, staring through the hole in the roof at the emerging stars. Wisps of thick clouds eddy across the half-moon as the night grows darker and the clouds drift away.
Unable to sleep, he lets out a sharp breath and gets up. Stepping over to the boat, he pulls the plastic sheet aside and looks down at Pip.
She is still dead.
He strokes her fur, feeling her ribs beneath his fingers. “You feel wrong,” he whispers.
Chewing his bottom lip, he climbs up and sits in the boat, resting a hand against her cold body. His other hand wanders to his pistol again. He grips the handle and shivers at the cold air against his chest. Shaking his head, he gets down from the boat and crawls back onto the bedroll. He smells must, dirt, and the dog. Something crawls nearby, tiny, clicking.
“Damn it,” he mutters through gritted teeth.
COLD DAMPNESS FILLS the air when the sun rises above the horizon, sending flashes of light across the floodwaters to the east. Abel gathers enough twigs to start a fire and looks at Pip’s stiff body, his lip twitching. He gropes through his trolley and pulls out a tin of something. Rust lingers around its edges. He pierces the tin with the tip of his hunting knife and works it around the lip, levering it open. “Damn beans,” he spits.
He sniffs at the tin, wrinkling his nose at the smell of rust and bean juice. Sighing, he places the tin on the fire, watching as the flames rise around it. He turns and steps outside.
Approaching a dead tree, Abel unfastens his combat trousers, and relieves himself against the trunk. He looks downhill towards the water, towards the city, and lets out another sigh before heading back inside.
The fire spits and crackles against the damp twigs when it finally takes. A trail of thick grey smoke rises up in splutters through the hole in the roof. He rubs his hands against the fire’s warmth. The beans bubble in the tin. He wraps his hands with a cloth from the trolley, snatches the tin from the flames, and lays it on the concrete to cool. He gets up and retrieves a teaspoon from his backpack.
He yawns and eats, smiling slightly as the beans fill his belly and warm him from within. He reaches for his water bottle, buried deep in his backpack, its black enamel surface chipped to expose the metal beneath. Kneeling, he unscrews the cap with trembling fingers and takes a swig, the water still cool and refreshing. He rubs the spoon on a filthy rag, rinses it with water, and then gets up and slides it into the trolley between a pile of books and a coil of rope.
With a sharp tug, he lifts his backpack, placing it into the boat, next to the dog. He arranges the backpack so it won't tip, rolling his shoulders into the weight.
He turns and stamps out the fire, kicking blackened twigs aside while fanning the smoke away from his eyes. Coughs tear at his throat. He steps over to the boat and pulls on his faded baseball cap, red and tattered. It clings to the top of Abel’s head, flattening his hair, its peak casting a shadow over his eyes.
He yanks the sheet off Pip’s body and looks at her, his lips held tight. A pale tongue droops from her mouth, pink and dry. He folds the sheet and drapes it over the trolley.
Turning back to the boat, he places his water bottle into his backpack. He lifts a harness fashioned from strips of webbing, cloth, and rope from inside the boat and attaches it to the trailer’s front. The trailer makes a dull thud when it drops from the concrete to the sunken ground. Looking around, he pulls down the shutters and wheels the trailer to the edge of the highway.
He glances at a tree to his left, sweeping his eyes along its top branch and then nodding to himself at the strip of faded red cloth — a marker, a sign — hidden in plain sight.
He looks at Pip and swallows.
Fastening the harness around his waist, chest, and shoulders, he leans into the boat's weight and heaves forward, quickly falling into a rhythm as he steps onto the highway’s surface, heading east.
Rusted barriers lean on their sides, and trees push their way through the carcasses of burnt-out cars and rusty trucks. The trailer’s wheels make a soft groan as Abel keeps step. The oars rattle against the seat behind him, clattering when the wheels hit a piece of discarded junk or bounce into a pothole. He coughs away dust and shifts his shoulders against the ache.
The city's smell hits him like a wall of filth. The acrid stench of waste and death and stagnant water make him gag. Rainbows pool across the water as the sun rises higher, brownish-red through the clouds.
A muddy haze fills the air ahead. He pauses and watches the oncoming dust. Frowning, he reaches for a side-pocket of his backpack, fumbling around the buckle, struggling to unfasten it until it finally gives. He unravels a piece of cloth protecting a pair of clear plastic goggles. Scuffs and scratches mark the left lens. Cracks run along its right arm like frozen spider’s webs, brittle and white. A ragged plastic bag flaps against a car door. He hooks the goggles over his ears, the left lens a grey cataract smear.
The water's edge looms closer as the stench gets stronger. The road steepens, worming its way towards the city. Avenues of trees and weeds thin out, revealing a film of dust and slime. The foundations of hundreds of buildings extend downhill to the south. Some are lines of mossy brickwo
rk emerging from the soil; others are little more than shadows, ghosts, faded traces of the time before.
Abel coughs again, this time harder. He stops as his lungs spasm against the thickening air. He turns to the boat and pulls a kerchief from a side-pocket, trying not to look at Pip’s body.
He looks at Pip.
With fumbling hands, he ties the kerchief around the back of his neck, covering his mouth and nose. He takes up the harness's tension and keeps moving.
WHEN ABEL REACHES THE water, he looks along the shore to the north. A scrawny kid kneels at the water's edge, clothes hanging in ragged strips from his body, his black hair stuck to his head in flattened curls.
Abel unfastens his harness, lifts his backpack onto his shoulders, and moves the trailer into a nearby blast crater. He walks over to the kid and holds his hands in an open gesture. “I wouldn't drink that water if I were you, kid.”
The kid turns and starts. He stares at Abel with hollow eyes, watery and rimmed with dark purple lines. Yellow flesh stretches taut across his bony cheeks, his expression fixed to a scowl.
“It's okay, kid.” Abel takes off his goggles and folds them into his pocket. He unties the kerchief, pockets it, and smiles. “I’m Abel.”
The kid doesn't move.
Abel reaches into his bag, retrieves his water bottle, and holds it with an outstretched hand. His other hand hovers over the hunting knife. “Here.” He nods towards the bottle. “Trust me — you do not want to drink anything from that.” He waves the bottle towards the water, slick with oil and algae and strewn with junk.
