Adrianna just smiles though. I don’t think she picked up on my malice. “I could spare a few more pills,” she says and it sticks a knife of guilt into my gut. “I’ll have to check what I have when we stop again.”
I throw a wary look at the nearby fae who keep close to us, but they don’t seem to be all that interested in what we’re saying.
“I could prescribe cannabis,” says Hassan with a sly smile on his lips.
I throw him a startled look. “You have weed?” My tone is as bewildered as my face. He doesn’t look the type.
Hassan side-eyes my way, that smile still dancing on his furry lips. “I picked some up in Iraq before… Well, before them—” He throws a glare around the fae guarding us.
Luckily, they don’t seem all that interested in our quiet chat. Their faces wear a liveliness as they look up at the town we’re advancing on, like it’s Christmas morning and they just can’t wait to tear apart their presents.
My heart twists at the thought of what they’ll do up there when we arrive. Of who they might corner and kill, capture and torture, of our beautiful old towns that wear the faces of history and that they’ll burn to ash and soot.
We’re almost at the top of the hill. The slope is losing its steepness, and the fae are growing dangerously excited. I wonder if they’ll break under the excitement and turn on us before we even reach the town.
“Managed to stash some in my pocket,” Hassan says, and it takes me a moment to realise he’s still talking about the weed. “Don’t worry,” he adds at my bewildered expression, and he wears a wide grin. “I’m a doctor—consider it a prescription.”
“Are you really?”
That I’m much more interested in than weed. Not my thing. I mean, I’m no prude that hasn’t experimented with a few things here and there, but alcohol was always my drug of choice. Weed—the few times I tried it—made me anxious and paranoid like a madman.
“A cardiologist,” he tells me.
I study him under this new light of doctorship. Maybe it’s the tattered clothes that he ripped to bind my head wound, or the bruises on his face, or even the greying hairs he wears like skunk-streaks, but he just doesn’t look the sort. It could be the overgrown beard.
“What were the pills she gave me, then?” I jerk my head at Adrianna who pretends to look affronted. But she quickly breaks out into a grin and I have the daunting feeling she’s the bubbly type. Not that in these circumstances I can be picky about my company at the end of the world.
“Just codeine,” he says with a laugh. “Not strong enough to let you walk on this ankle. When we make camp, I’ll have a proper look at it. I didn’t get the chance to observe your injuries properly before.”
Adrianna adds, “Hard to focus on much when they get like that.” She cuts her gaze to a nearby dark-haired fae who guards us. But I can tell it was a risky move, because she quickly chances the topic and pretends to have never looked his way at all; “What did you do before all this?”
Ugh, that question. Not my favourite. Mainly because I didn’t do a whole lot other than spend my inheritance for a trip around the world with my girlfriend (RIP), and party my way through Europe.
“I just finished uni,” I lie.
It’s a fib I’ve told many times over and never been caught out on. As soon as I elaborate and go into the details of my media degree, no one seems to care about the embellished details I offer. I can thank my high school subject for the inspiration.
“I was travelling before looking for work,” I add, just to give my lie that extra layer of authenticity.
It satisfies them, and Adrianna starts to wander her interest around the hilly road we hike up. We’re reaching the tip when she sucks in a sharp sound, then points to the little barn a few metres ahead.
I trace her aim to the barn where, on the fence, is perched a fat orange cat. A cat that looks more than well-fed.
I wonder what he eats, how he survives in the dark world. But then it hits me; cats see well in the dark. Better than we do, and we’ve been surviving more than most.
“Wonder how many of his nine lives he’s used up,” murmurs Adrianna.
I know she’s just trying to bring a light-hearted comment into our depressing existence, but it rubs me the wrong way. I want to think of the cat as being forever free and that it’ll live a long, prosperous life, not that it’s struggling to survive like we are, faced with death too often.
Snubbing her comment, I watch the cat as it spots us coming up the hill. Its hairs rise on the back of its neck and a low, gurgling growl rumbles through it before it dashes off into the darkness.
I watch it go, wishing it all the best in the world.
No one talks after that. We’re coming over the hill and spilling into the main street of the town now. Silence secures its grip on us. All that can be heard is the soft, practised footsteps of the quiet army. They are sure-footed, experienced beyond anything we’ve ever had in our world.
They are natural-born killers.
And they are marching on this stunning, renaissance town with only one thing on their mind—destruction.
The street we take is empty. I’ve been to many abandoned places since this all started, but never with fire-light guiding the way. The orange glow casts a haunting atmosphere to the town’s street. The light reflects off dusty, shuttered windows, and catches in the abandoned cars littering the street at odd angles. This town was evacuated in a hurry.
A breeze brings a chilled air to us. It carries with it the remnants of the evacuation. Pamphlets and face masks roll down the street aimlessly. Eternal pollution we’ve left behind in our panic.
The guards move in tighter, until we’re all crammed together in a small space, and forced to follow the river of fae invading the town. They keep their cool, despite the excitement sparking off them. Every single one of them is aching to pillage, but they hold their lust for destruction and blood for now.
I think back to when they invaded the village. They waited until they were in the middle of the village before they spread out and attacked and burned and raided. I wonder if they will have the same strategy this time, but just as I think, there’s a sudden blast that shatters the air, and I duck instinctively.
Gunfire.
I drop to the floor. Bodies fall all around me. All of the humans flatten to the cobblestone ground and shield their heads with their arms. It doesn’t stop the gunfire, though.
It blasts all around us, from open windows and hidden alleyways.
The dark fae release a united battle cry that carries in the wind and shudders the entire town. The joy in the sound is vibrant. I can almost hear it in the cry; finally—a good fight. A challenge.
I tremble on the ground, my body rolled into a tense ball, and listen to the song of swords being drawn and bullets zinging off shields. The smacks of running footsteps pound against the ground all around. I peer over my arms that barricade my head, and see that most of our guards are gone—rushing, to join the fight.
The dark fae are everywhere, spread throughout the street, scaling walls to open windows and blazing through the alleys. I count at least a dozen humans trying to hold off the fae from windows and shadowy corners in the street. Who knows how many more there are, hidden away, or fleeing the town?
The onslaught of gunfire slowly fades to a spit of bullets. They must be reloading. And that pause is all that the fae need to win over the battle.
From the ground, I watch them jump through windows and storm through buildings and alleyways. Screams follow almost instantly. Men’s screams, women’s screams. I’m grateful I don’t hear children.
The sound of battle carries all the way up the street to where the fae are leading the fight. I push up from the ground, now that the gunfire has stopped, and look as far as the fire-torches allow. I watch fire-torches be thrown through the air and disappear through windows, seeing the ignition of deadly fires.
Ahead, in the midst of the flames, sits the leader on his hairle
ss, bony-looking steed, a horse that makes me think of those belonging to the horsemen of the apocalypse. The irony isn’t lost on me.
He sits tall and proud. The black diadem winks an inky colour in the rising firelight. He watches over his fae as they bring down another town. This isn’t the first town they are set to destroy, and it won’t be the last. I wonder how long they have been doing this for. Since the start of the darkness, or after the virus spread throughout the world?
The gunfire picks up again. Blasts penetrate the air, but this time it’s scattered. The sound of desperate people trying to salvage a losing battle. It’s a dreadful song, a soundtrack to the end of days, the last of our fight being snuffed out by sword-wielding monsters.
I look around the street as humans spill out of the houses. I see a man jump from a two-story window. He doesn’t get back up, not before two fae move in on him, wearing devilish grins, and raise their swords. Blood spatters through the air like a horror film and I cringe.
Most of our guards have abandoned post to join the bloody battle that’s taken to the streets. Humans frantically try to reload their weapons. The fae are faster. Inhumanly fast. They move in blurs, standing a metre away one moment, then in the next, they’re bringing down swords on screaming people. Too many heads roll, too much blood spills over the cobblestones.
I can’t watch anymore.
But one of the other human-captives realises we’re not so well guarded. A young boy, maybe in his late teens, pushes up from the ground. I catch his gaze before he wildly looks around. I watch him reach for an older man (his dad, it looks like) and shake his shoulder. They murmur to each other, voices too low to hear, too soft to carry on the winds, and then they are on their feet.
My eyes widen as I watch them go. They bolt out of reach of the guards and run into the battle raging all around us. I watch them dodge fresh corpses on the ground, then duck behind an abandoned car to avoid the throwing knives spiralling their way. The blades sink into the hood of a car.
The guards are in pursuit instantly. They chase them through the streets spearing off from us, and that leaves us captives with only two guards. This is it—
This is my chance.
I don’t think for a second before I jump to my feet. I make to lunge over Adrianna’s shivering body, but I come tumbling down in a blink.
Someone has grabbed my ankle.
Twisting around onto my back, I seethe at the one who stopped me from running—Hassan. But his paled face wears a look of shock that startles me to silence.
He shakes his head, eyes wider than plates, and mouths one word; No. He doesn’t let me run. And my chance is gone before I can regain my balance and try again. The two guards return, dragging the runners alongside them.
I flinch as the guards throw down the men to the ground. One draws what looks like a black rubber sword from his holster belt. But I quickly realise it’s some sort of whip-baton hybrid.
The guards beat them bloody.
Pools of crimson spread over the cobblestone. I scurry back to avoid the mess touching my boots. I can’t bring myself to look at the two as they’re beaten to the brink of unconsciousness, so I turn away and stare at Adrianna instead. But then, I realise some of the blood is coming from her.
Startled, I grab her by the shoulders and shove her onto her back. Staring up at me with watery eyes, Adrianna clutches her chest too tightly, and a spill of blood seeps out from the wound she’s hiding.
“Hassan!” I strike out at the doctor whose attention has turned onto the beaten men in the middle of our captive group. He blinks then turns to look at me. It takes him a split second to realise that Adrianna has been hit by a stray bullet, then he’s shoving me back from her and pulling her hands away from the wound.
I look down at my body.
My cardigan was lost to the village when I had to show the leader my freckles. I left it behind in the alley. Now, I’m dressed in only a pair of leggings and a tank top. Not enough fabric to rip off a make-shift bandage for Adrianna.
I turn to the closet person, tucked at the feet of a watchful guard (they are all watching us closely now, not at all distracted by the battle raging through the town). I grab for her, but she hits my hand away.
“I need that,” I spit at her and try to wrench the scarf from her neck. She wrestles me for it. It’s a short fight after I jerk my head forward and connect right on her nose. Might have broken it, but I’ll worry about that—and my new head wound—later.
I rush back to Adrianna’s side and hand the scarf over to Hassan. He takes it wordlessly. Already, he has her t-shirt torn open right down to her belly button. Lucky her, she’s wearing a bra.
The wound is, in a word, nasty. The skin is torn just above her breastbone, tucked under her collarbone (that I’m sure must be shattered), and it’s a faucet for near-black blood.
Hassan drops the scarf on her belly, then reaches for his pocket. From it, he draws out a pair of tweezers. I think it’s an odd thing for someone to carry in days like these, but then again, he’s a doctor. A doctor without a bag to carry supplies. He carries as much as he can in his pockets, then.
Adrianna’s bloody hands reach out for mine.
I arch my brow, frozen for a moment. Surprise makes me as still as the air in a summer’s night. But then, I hesitantly take her hands in mine, and tension leaves her like a ribbon unravelling. She squeezes my hands, firmly.
“You’re going to be ok,” I tell her, because it’s what you’re supposed to say when someone is bleeding out.
She twists her head as she tries to get a good look at the two beaten runners. She gives up, then looks up at me. “What happened?”
I think she’s trying to distract herself.
I shake my head. “They ran,” I tell her, but I’m cut off as she gives a sharp wince.
Her hands tighten around mine as Hassan digs through her wound with the tweezers. My face twists with unease. Though I try not to look, I can see the wound and tweezers in my peripheral. And it wouldn’t do to close my eyes and turn away, not with Adrianna looking to me for strength.
Why me, I don’t know. Maybe because I’m closest to her, or she thinks we are friends now after only some short conversations. Does that make us friends in this new, dark world?
All I know for sure is, I can’t show her how weak I am right now. If I was in her position, holding someone’s hand and seeing strength in their face would mean the difference between hope and despair.
Fleetingly, I’m reminded of Olaf and how I stayed with him until the end. Granted, he was different because he was my first co-survivor. And I think we did become friends, despite our language barrier.
But the problem with Olaf was that I cared in the end. And I was sad when he died. If I let myself get close to other survivors now, I’ll just feel pain all over again when they die. And we all will.
It’s inevitable.
Hassan cuts into my thoughts; “Got it.” He throws the small bullet away. It clatters to the ground and rolls into the pool of blood coming from the beaten, unmoving men left unconscious. Guess that’s what happens when you run away from the fae.
Hassan whips the scarf into his hands, then straightens it out with nimble fingers. He pads the wound with a sanitary pad taken from his pocket (I seriously want to raid his pockets and see what else he has in him), then binds the wound with the scarf.
“Nicole is going to kill me for getting blood on her scarf,” Adrianna groans, and I manage a small smile at her spirit. I think I was right when I suspected Adrianna to be the bubbly type.
Once finished, Hassan wipes the blood from his hands by running them along his jeans, and finds his gaze landing on the beaten pair in the middle of the group. His face turns grim.
Adrianna doesn’t let go of my hands, but her grip loosens. She lies there on the ground, letting her eyes close, as she tries to regain some of her strength. It won’t be long before we’re on the move again.
The humans who had fought befo
re are all down now. Corpses litter the road like those face masks and pamphlets left behind in the evacuation. Blood runs through the street like a red river. My leggings are coated in blood, there’s some in my hair and on my chin. I ache for the days of showers and baths—anything to get this gunk off of me.
I turn to Hassan and see that he’s still staring at the beaten pair. As I study their faces, it’s clear that I was right, that they are father and son. They wear the same copper manes and weak chins. Even their freckles are similar, though on opposite cheeks. The more I study them, the better I see the freckles—and that they are three, in a crooked line. This sends cold chills down my spine.
“I can’t help them.” Hassan is staring at me, a solemn expression etched onto his face. “No one can help them now.”
He misreads my stunned look—he thinks I’m shocked by the beaten pair, not the freckles on their cheeks that are identical to the ones I wear on my body.
I shake off my shock and frown at Hassan. “Why can’t you help them?”
“They ran,” he says with a severe look at me, and I remember how he grabbed my ankle to stop me from escaping. He’s telling me more with that look than he can say with his words. “They’re beyond help now,” he adds.
To show that I understand, I give a brisk nod, then look down at Adrianna. She looks so peaceful with her eyes closed and her breathing turned soft and steady. She’s not asleep, but she relaxes as Hassan digs out the bottle of codeine from her jean-pocket, then pushes two into her parted mouth.
She swallows them without the aid of water. An expert swallow that tells me she might be used to downing pills—maybe she uses them to numb the pain of the mind, the pain that haunts us all in this new world.
The screams of the beaten pair have silenced. The cries of battle have been snuffed out. And all that’s left are the crackles and roars the fires as the dark fae drag their fire-torches through the town.
Soon, the guards are pushing for us to move. They kick our sides and poke us with the tips of their swords. Hassan and I help Adrianna up. But with my bad ankle and her shot shoulder, neither of us can support each other. Hassan walks between us at a steady pace (thankfully, the fae aren’t moving too fast for us, since they have to sweep through the entire town and all its buildings), ready to catch us if either of us should cave under the exhaustion. But I keep on limping beside him, and Adrianna pushes through the pain and dizzying blood loss.
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