by Gwen Cole
“Shoot me then.” I stare at him hard. “Because that’s what it’s going to take to keep me here, you fucking bastard.”
“You can try. But they’ll be here soon, so you don’t have long.”
I don’t know who he’s talking about, but I can guess. He’s going to sell me to them.
With him between me and the door, that leaves the window behind me. It might be stupid, but I don’t think I can fight him to the door. I’ve never punched anyone in my life, and this man looks like he’s been through hell and back.
Before he has the chance to come around the table, I grab my chair from the floor and throw it through the window. I jump after it seconds later, pieces of glass still falling, and somehow I’m able to land on my feet, saving my hands and arms from being cut. The wind and dust slice through my hair and my legs are already moving. I turn at the corner of the cabin and see Jack inside the pen. He’s standing straight, alert, knowing something is wrong.
A few more yards and I’ll be free from this place. I’ll find Kev and then Finn, and everything will be the way it was again.
Something moves out of my periphery, but I don’t respond fast enough. It hits the back of my legs, taking my feet out from under me, too fast to break my fall. My back hits the ground hard, taking my breath.
I blink, staring at the gray sky, counting the seconds until I breathe again. Air slowly enters my lungs, making me cough.
Levi presses the barrel of his gun to my chest, standing over me so I see nothing but him.
It triggers something, and I remember the lessons Mom taught Finn and me when we were old enough to handle a gun. We were miles away from Stonewall, shooting targets and learning how to load and clean our weapons. Before we were born—before the sky turned gray and the trees started dying—Mom never owned a gun. She said she never had use for one.
Now I understand she was teaching us how to live in the world that is now ours, and I realize how lucky I am to have had a mother like her.
In one quick motion, I swipe my arm up, my forearm hitting the underside of the barrel. Levi’s eyes aren’t on the gun, but mine are. As it flips in the air, I sit up, and when the butt of the gun is within reach, I catch it with my finger already on the trigger and the butt pressing into my shoulder.
Levi stands there with his eyes wide, surprised by what just happened.
“If you don’t want to die, you’re going to step away from me right now,” I tell him.
He holds up his hands—more mockingly than serious—but steps away all the same.
“No need to be rash ’bout—”
“I have every right to be rash,” I cut him off, standing and not lowering the gun. “Now, you’re going to go back inside and stay there until I’ve left. You got that?”
“Every word,” he says, smiling.
The moment he shuts the door, I run to the shed and grab only the things I need. I strap a saddle on Jack, making sure there’s feed in the saddlebags, and just to spite him, I steal a hat hanging near the door—wide-brimmed and black—something I usually don’t wear but nothing about this is anything typical for me. I slip the shotgun into its saddle holster, not letting it out of my sight.
Jack will barely stand still long enough for me to get on. Once my leg is over, we’re gone and I don’t look back.
7.
Seph
We ride into the night, right up to the point where I don’t think I can stay conscious any longer.
They haven’t given me anything to drink. The gash along my back aches with every movement of the horse. My shoulders are stiff from being forced to stay in the same position for hours.
But as I’m beginning to shut my eyes, Hatch calls out instructions to make camp for the night. He shouts for a couple to scout the area, and the rest unsaddle the horses and set up small tents.
They’re effective for such a small group.
The man who’d been leading my horse dismounts as Hatch rides over to us. Hatch spares me a glance before giving orders. “Take him to Marshall. I don’t want him dying of infection before we get there.”
Hatch starts to turn before thinking of something else. “And Jones?”
“Yes, sir?”
“Make sure he gets something to eat, too.”
I watch Hatch ride away while Jones unties the rope looped through my handcuffs that had been keeping me tethered to the saddle.
I don’t understand that man. His eyes are unyielding and cold, and yet he cares if my stomach is full? It doesn’t make any sense.
Jones drags me off the horse, and I have to clench my teeth to keep from crying out. It’s like my back is being split in two. I can’t walk right at first. My legs are numb and stiff. With night surrounding us, everyone wears heavy coats to ward off the cold. I can do nothing but envy them.
On the other side of camp, I see the flicker of a fire. A warmth I haven’t felt for a long time. In the Wild, you don’t start a fire unless you want to risk someone finding you, or you’re stupid. Jones leads me to a guy probably a little older than me who is unsaddling his horse. His skin is a few shades darker than Hatch’s and he’s the only one who doesn’t wear a hat. Jones motions me to stop and walks forward a few steps, muttering words I cannot hear.
“Tell Hatch I’ll take care of it,” the guy—Marshall—says, his voice is deeper than I expected.
Jones leaves me standing there in the wind. They know I don’t have the strength to run away. I’m almost swaying on my feet as it is.
I think of pirates again, wondering if this is what it felt like to walk the gangplank. Alone, with nobody to save you and nowhere to run.
I got close to the ocean once, but a large gang on the East Coast controls all the land and wouldn’t let anyone through. It was the same with the west. That’s when I started south. Maybe they’re like me—wanting to see the ships of the past that may still be out there. Somewhere. Or maybe the ocean is gone, too, and they’re not hiding anything.
Marshall slips the bridle from his horse before giving me his attention. The animal moves off and nibbles at the dirt, probably hoping to find something more. It’s like they can’t help their instincts.
“Follow me,” he says. “I can’t do this in the dark.”
I’m reluctant to move away from the horse, wondering how far I could ride before they catch me.
“There’s no point in trying,” Marshall says behind me. “They only ride for us, except when we tell them otherwise.”
I turn and say, “You seem sure about that.”
Marshall studies me until a smile breaks out. “Whatever you say, cowboy.”
He takes my elbow and leads me through the small camp toward the fire. Most of the one-man tents are already set up. I’ve never seen such an organized group. No orders have to be shouted because everyone already knows their place, and nobody argues about menial things. Such an odd gang.
I don’t see Hatch anywhere, and for that I’m glad.
The moment I feel the warmth of the fire, my fingers yearn to reach closer. I never risk starting a flame at night, and I never have the tinder to do so. Somehow I’m not surprised they do. Wherever their jackets and horses come from, I’m sure they have no problem getting wood either.
Marshall pushes me down on a rock so only half of me faces the fire. There’s a man cooking a large pot of stew over the flames, and my stomach betrays my hunger. I watch him cook while Marshall reopens the wound by pulling my shirt away where the blood has dried to it and started to scab. I can only clench my teeth and pray it doesn’t last long.
In the end, he has to cut away my shirt—not like it was worth saving after what it went through anyway.
The fire is the only warmth I have now. The thin cloth I called a shirt never brought much, but now that it’s gone and my skin is feeling every touch of cold, I wish I was still wearing it.
“I know it might not seem like much,” Marshall says behind me, “but you’re lucky that you lived through today. Durk has
a killing streak we’ve been trying to stop for quite some time now.”
After a little while, I say, “I know I am.” The truth is, I’m lucky to live through every day.
He starts cleaning the wound but it doesn’t hurt as much as before. Maybe my skin is so numb, I can no longer feel.
After dishing out dinner to everyone else, the cook puts a bowl in my hands. Eating with cuffs on is difficult, but I’m too hungry to care.
Nearby, a couple of men laugh. I look up to see them staring.
“He’s like a little wolf that has to wait for his mother to give him food.” They laugh again and the man who spoke comes closer. “How does that taste, little wolf?”
“And I’m assuming you have experience in that?” I ask.
“In what?”
“Your mother feeding you because you never learned how to feed yourself.”
Before he can move to hit me, Marshall mutters, “Leave the kid alone, Jeremiah.”
Marshall doesn’t seem the type to give orders, but Jeremiah listens nonetheless. He retreats, still facing me.
“It seems the little wolf has a bite,” he says.
Someone behind him laughs and they ignore me again, enjoying the last of their food.
Once Marshall is finished cleaning the wound, the bowl of water and once-white cloth are now red. He pushes them aside and I tense, knowing the stitches will come next. I’ve had to stitch myself up plenty of times and know how it’ll feel.
“You can relax,” Marshall says, a smile in his voice. “I’m going to use something I’ve made myself. I haven’t had the chance to use it on anything this big before, so I’d like to see how it does.”
“What is it?”
He hesitates. “It’s a type of healing paste I started to make a couple years ago. My father first had the idea but couldn’t finish it before he died.”
“And it works?”
“It does on small wounds …” He’s more meticulous than anyone I’ve met and makes sure every inch of the gash along my back is covered. After storing the salve safely away, he tips over the bowl of bloodied water and the dry earth soaks it up in a matter of seconds. Even though it rains regularly, the ground can’t hold any moisture without the roots of plants or trees.
There is nothing but the wind and dirt and whoever is left to bear it.
Marshall leaves me by the fire under the watch of the man who is now cleaning the bowls he served a short while ago. When he returns with a shirt, he tells me to get up and releases my wrists so I can slip it over my head. It’s a long-sleeved, white henley, the top two buttons missing. It smells like smoke and horse, but it’s warmer than what I had.
At the sound of Hatch’s voice, I look up to see him coming toward me, flanked by two of his men. One of them grabs me and cuffs my hands behind my back, not caring to be gentle.
Hatch stares and I stare back.
“I used to know a man,” Hatch says, “who had a saying that I’ll never forgot. ‘Only the strong will survive this world from beginning to end.’ Some say he was a crazy old man, but others thought of him as a prophet—those who thought he knew when the skies would clear and the stars would return. You know what I think?”
I say nothing.
“I think he was trying to warn the weak they needed to be culled before the world could be reborn. But I don’t decide who is weak and who is strong. The world does.”
Hatch turns away and his men push me forward to follow him. They flank me through the camp. On the way, I see Jeremiah and his friends, and when he yells, I can barely make out the words.
“Good luck, little wolf!”
Four words. That’s all.
They march me out of camp and keep going until I see a half buried skeleton frame of a car. They push me down in front of it so my back is pressed against it, the cold seeping through my shirt.
That’s when I start fighting them, knowing what they intend to do.
I try kicking and throwing my weight against them, but nothing works. Their hands hold me to the car, so tight that the gash along my back stings. But neither of them makes a move against me. They re-cuff my hands around it, and when I lunge forward in one last attempt, metal clangs on metal and the cuffs bite into my wrists.
“What is this?” I ask. “You patch me up, feed me, and then leave me out here?”
All Hatch says is, “It’s up to you to live to see morning.” He turns away, followed by his men.
“You can’t leave me here!”
But he does, and nothing I say will bring him back. I can only see a speck of the campfire I sat next to minutes earlier. Little did I know it was the last time I’d feel warmth tonight.
I tuck my legs into my chest, my body already shaking with cold.
I’ll survive if the temperature doesn’t drop as it did last night. I’ll survive if the wolves don’t come out. I’ll survive if I keep myself awake until dawn.
And if I survive, I will no longer give in so easily.
8.
Avery
It’s midmorning when I realize I’m being tracked.
After I left Levi’s, I didn’t stop until nightfall. I was afraid he would send them to find me, and even though I had no clue as to which direction Kev was in, I went north anyway, hoping to find an old road with signs or some sort of trail to follow.
Now I’m still lost and am being followed by a band of riders who are slowly gaining on me. They’re riding fast, no care for the horses under them, so I have no choice but to continue.
We come into a stretch of lowlands with sharp hills and blackened trees that would have stood tall years ago. I stop Jack at a small river to let him drink, wishing I didn’t have to push him so hard. But at this point, it’s all I can do. His ears turn back and he lifts his head, hearing them when I can’t. There are too many low ridges for me to see them. My heart won’t stop pounding. My second day in the Wild and I’m already in a worse position than yesterday. I don’t want to think about what I’ll face tomorrow.
The wind picks up and I tie my bandana around my mouth and nose. If it gets worse than this, I’m going to have to stop for Jack’s sake and find shelter.
After another twenty minutes of hard riding, I come across a dirt road that seems to have been used recently. I look both ways, wondering if either way leads to Kev. Jack won’t stay still, nervous about those who follow us, and when I glance back the way we came, I know why. They’re here. About a half-dozen riders come around the ridge, bandanas around their faces and guns in their hands.
Jack backs away as they come onto the road, just as grateful as I am they aren’t surrounding us yet. But even though the road behind us is clear, I’m not sure we can outrun them any longer. They will run their horses into the ground before letting us go.
One of the riders breaks off from the group and approaches me, his horse lathered and breathing heavily. I pull my bandana away, but he doesn’t return the favor. His eyes are dark under his hat, and there’s no way to tell how old he is. Though their guns aren’t pointed at me right now, they could be at any moment. If these men are anything like Levi, I have to trust my instincts.
“Come with us without any trouble,” he says, “and we won’t do you any harm.”
Does he really expect me to believe that?
“Hello to you, too,” I tell him. “It’s not like we’ve met before. You’ve only been following me for half a day.”
“Is that supposed to be funny?”
“Are you supposed to be dumb?”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, I assume you’re dumb if you think I would go with you without a fight.”
He finally pulls down his bandana, showing me a smile with a straight set of teeth surrounded by a scruff of a beard. “I knew there was a reason Levi sent us after you.” The man kicks his horse forward and I tense, holding the reins so tight my fingers go numb. As he circles me, he says, “It seems this was all worth it after all, and you did give us quite a little run fo
r it, didn’t you? There’s only been a few times in my life when I’ve have to ride this far for one person.”
He’s joins the rest of his gang and Jack dances under me again, wanting to run. “So, are you going to make this hard for us?”
I fight to keep my voice strong. “It sure as hell isn’t going to be easy.”
“The hard way then.” He nods and holds up a hand, then flicks two fingers in my direction.
A rifle is pointed at me, and not two seconds pass before a gunshot echoes in my ears and my heart beats so fast it almost stops.
But I’m not the one who’s been shot. The man with the rifle doubles over and falls off his horse, blood already staining the dirt beneath him. All I hear is shouting and something ringing in my ears, but when I look up, the gang is riding away faster than they arrived. Dust rises and makes a trail after them, and for a moment I wonder if I should follow. Whoever is coming up behind me must be worse.
I swallow hard, finding my mouth dry, and turn Jack around only to find the Lawmen coming toward me. My first thought is to run—that they finally caught up with me and are going to take me as they did Finn—but I remind myself these probably aren’t the same men, and they may know nothing of me or what happened back home.
As they come nearer, I think of lies I can tell them. They can’t find out where I’m from or what I’m doing this far from a town or they will take me. I have no doubt.
I count about ten riders in all, and four of them pass me riding hard, following the gang in the opposite direction. I hold Jack in place, still trying to calm him from everything happening at once.
“Are you all right?”
I turn to the voice—a man with a trimmed beard and dark hat. He wears a white band around his arm like the rest of them.
“I think so.” I loosen my hands around the reins, letting the blood flow through them again. “They’ve been following me for the better half of the day.”
