by Nora Roberts
“She meant to. She’ll hold what she took.”
“I know it. I have issues with her apart from this, but I believe in her, absolutely.”
“I know that as well. You’re a credit to your blood, Duncan.”
“Wow.” Sincerely surprised, Duncan searched for words. “That calls for another drink.”
With a laugh, Mallick poured them both more wine.
“I’ll build this place into a stronghold, and from here, we’ll expand the West. Tell her … Shit, I don’t know what I want to tell her.”
“You will, when you see her again.”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” Right now, he thought, he had to focus everything on making that stronghold, feeding, clothing, drilling the troops who’d hold it.
“What I do know?” Duncan said with a shrug. “Unexpected development—I’m going to miss you.”
“And I, also unexpected, you.”
Mallick lifted his cup. “To the light, and to the unexpected.”
Duncan tapped his cup to Mallick’s again, and drank.
* * *
Fallon stayed in Arlington for two weeks, helping to organize and arrange housing, training, overseeing the transfer of prisoners, and working to relocate any former slaves and captured magickals who chose to leave.
As more opted to remain—to live, work, train there—she supervised the redistribution of supplies and furnishings within the base.
Volunteers cleared the houses in the outlying neighborhood of the remains of the dead, banished rats, cleaned, repaired.
She used Katie’s blueprint from New Hope for assigning jobs—skills, experience, or interest in gaining both—for creating volunteer sign-ups.
The attack came on the dawn of the third day after her broadcast. Prepared for it, forces who now called themselves Light for Life repelled the PWs in under an hour. It had been, in Fallon’s estimation, more an angry, arrogant barrage than a structured attack.
There would be others, but at the end of two weeks, she trusted Colin and his troops to defend the base and any who settled on its outskirts.
She stood with him by the white memorial stone she’d placed. She’d shaped it like a tower to symbolize a rising, and with her light, had carved the names of everyone who’d given their life to take this ground.
Below the names, she’d etched the fivefold symbol, and had added LIGHT FOR LIFE.
Already someone had planted flowers at its base, and they bloomed as white as the stone.
“Mallick will be on and off base for the next couple weeks. You know how to send for him or for me if you need to. And I need those weekly reports, detailed.”
“We’ve been over it, Fallon. Detailed weekly reports. Anything unusual or noteworthy that comes out of scouting missions, you hear asap.”
“They’ll attack again. The PWs, and very likely government or military out of D.C. Watch the skies, Colin.”
She let out a breath. She had to trust he was ready. She’d already sent Taibhse and Faol Ban back to New Hope. Now it was time for her to join them.
So she turned to him. “Listen to Mallick. Learn from him. You’re in command—but you’re not president.”
He grinned at her. “I like fighting better than politics.”
“Clearly, but don’t forget the politics. Train them hard, Colin.”
She looked around the base, at the soldiers and recruits on the training grounds, the volunteers working the gardens, tending the livestock. Laughter filtered out of the house they’d outfitted as a school, and the scent of fresh bread wafted out of another they’d designated as a base kitchen.
More than a base, already more, she thought. A community in the making.
“Train them hard,” she repeated. “Within the year, we take D.C.”
“We’ll be ready.”
She turned to him, hugged him hard. “Keep them safe,” she said, then swung onto Laoch. “You’re still at least a little bit of a jerk, but I love you anyway.”
“Same goes.”
Laoch spread his wings. She flew up over Arlington, circled once, then soared toward New Hope.
She wanted the flight rather than the flash, and used it to make maps in her head of the land below. Too many roads not yet cleared or in impassable disrepair. What had been cities, what they’d called suburbs, developments of houses, centers for shopping remained largely deserted. The land itself had taken over in the two decades since the Doom so grasses grew thick and high, trees spread like weeds. Over them, through them, wildlife roamed in herds and packs, and she imagined the rivers and streams below busy with fish and waterfowl.
With their mad mission to eradicate magickals, to enslave, the Purity Warriors had done little to nothing to tend the land, to build. Raiders raided, and left destruction in their wake. What government there was seemed focused on rule, and the battles in the major cities, and still, she knew, on their work to contain and restrain those with powers they refused to understand.
She wouldn’t make the same mistakes, and wouldn’t aim her focus so narrowly.
She veered west, studied the hills, the forests, waterways, fallow, overgrown fields, and the buildings—houses, vast shopping areas, and service centers.
Twice she took Laoch down for a closer look when she saw signs someone had settled. A broken trail, a few houses in good repair, a cow in a pen.
She marked the locations in her mind, continued home.
When she landed, Ethan gave a shout, and with Max, his closest companion, and a pack of dogs, raced over from the farm.
Under a tattered, faded ball cap, Ethan’s hair was damp with sweat. Both boys smelled of horses and dogs and dirt. Max, gangly like his father, waded through the dogs to lay a hand on Laoch’s neck.
“We were watching for you,” Ethan told her. “Mom said you’d be back today.”
“We’ve been helping Dad and Simon with the haying.” Max gestured out to the field and the oft-repaired baler. “But they said we could come when we saw you up there. Your mom made cherry pies, and mine’s going to pick sweet corn.”
“We’re going to have a cookout.” Already Ethan hefted her saddlebags. “Because you’re back.”
“Sweet corn and cherry pies?” Fallon dismounted. “When do we eat?”
Because nothing pleased them more, she turned Laoch over to them. They’d cool him down, groom him like a king.
She hauled her bags in through the kitchen.
Pies with glossy cherry filling, bold red through the golden latticework crusts, bread, fresh and scenting the air, wrapped in cloth on the counter. Wildflowers in a jug, peaches ripening in a bowl, potted herbs thriving on the windowsill.
After the battle and the blood, the work and the worry, here was home.
And here, she realized, was what she needed to bring to the world as much as peace.
She dumped her bags—they could wait. Now she opened the fridge, found another jug. And grateful, filled a glass with her mother’s lemonade to wash away the heat and thirst of the journey.
Travis came in, nearly as sweaty as Ethan.
“Saw you coming in.” He grabbed another glass. “Had to finish something up, but I wanted to come by. Is everything okay with Colin, with Arlington?”
“He’s good. The base is secure.”
“Haven’t had a chance to talk to you really.” He glugged down lemonade. “We’ve made good use of some of the stuff you sent back—got a couple houses furnished and supplied already. The mayor and council and committees are working to help the people who wanted to come here settle in.”
He grabbed a peach—just underripe as he preferred. “We had the funerals last week. It was rough.”
“I should’ve been here.”
“Everyone knew why you weren’t. We’re going to have a memorial. The council voted on it, since we always have the annual on the morning of the Fourth, but we’re going to hold one for the placing of the stars. Now that you’re back.”
“It’s good. It’s rig
ht.”
“The last of the wounded were discharged a couple days ago. Most are already back in training. It was rough,” he repeated, talking quickly through it as he bit into the peach. “But taking three bases—and, Jesus, Arlington—then your broadcast after?”
With a satisfied head shake, Travis gestured with the peach. “Arlys printed it out, word for word, and posted it. Anyway, the mood around here is strong. In the last week, we’ve gotten fourteen more recruits from the outside. Mick just sent word they’ve pulled in eighteen. Eighteen.”
“Duncan?”
“He’s pretty remote, but Tonia told me—and she’s going to meet up with you as soon as she can get away—he had seven last count. And one’s a doctor, or was a—what’s it—intern when the Doom hit.”
“That’s good news, and we’ll need to go over all this. But now—”
“Here it comes.” He held up his hands, one holding the half-eaten peach. “First, we were a little busy dealing with the deserters, and keeping the wounded and medicals from getting overrun.”
“Which is why you should have let me know.”
“Busy,” he repeated, “and pretty much under control. Plus, in the thick of it?” On a shrug, he bit into the peach again, the underripe fruit snapping crisp as an apple. “Mom was like—wow, just wow. I’ve never seen her in full battle mode, you know? The thing was, she had Dad out, like in a trance so she could treat the bullet wound. These PWs break through the lines to try to get to the mobiles and escape, and Mom’s zap! Zap, pow!”
To demonstrate, he jabbed one fist, then the other. “Seriously, she took out three of them before you could fucking blink. And I’ve gotta say, Rachel’s no slouch. Grabs a scalpel with one hand, smashes this dude with an elbow, then slices him open. Then Hannah?”
He tossed the peach pit in the kitchen composter, turned to rinse off his hands. “You know, I’ve worked with her on combat training, self-defense. Let’s just say it hasn’t been her strength, right? She was moving from one mobile to the other when they hit us, and I’m yelling at her to get inside, barricade herself and the wounded. But she swings right around. Pow, pow, wham, bam. Man, she is fierce when she’s cornered. A ball-kicker. A fierce ball-kicker.”
“Hannah?” Fallon sincerely couldn’t imagine her loving, openhearted friend kicking balls.
“You bet your ass. It couldn’t have taken us more than a minute, two tops, to subdue them. Hannah’s bleeding a little—the guy whose balls are probably still bruised managed to punch her in the face. So Jonah and I are securing the deserters, and Mom tells me not to let you know, not then. Rachel’s checking out Hannah, and seconds that. Hannah chimes in, all cheerful, how we’re all fine, and not to distract you, and Jonah says the same. Mom gives me that look. You know, the one that says don’t screw with me, and goes back to fixing Dad up.
“I was outvoted, and they were right.”
“Maybe.” Because with words and gestures, Travis had taken her into the thick of it, she understood the decision. She leaned back against the counter. “Maybe, but the enemy shouldn’t have broken through, and that’s a weakness we’ll fix.”
“They were scared shitless, Fallon. Every one of them. Even if I couldn’t see it, and I could, I could feel it. And hey, we won. I gotta get back, but welcome home. Big feast tonight.”
He eyed the pies.
“Don’t even think about it.”
“Too late, but I’m not stupid enough to risk the mighty wrath of Mom.”
He opened the door, turned back. “But if we’d needed you, even the mighty wrath of Mom wouldn’t have stopped me from calling you.”
Satisfied with that, she washed out her glass—and his—then took her bags to her room to unpack.
* * *
When Lana came home, carrying supplies, Fallon hopped up from the kitchen counter where she’d set up to draw her new maps.
“My baby.”
Before Fallon could take the cloth bags, Lana set them down, enfolded her.
“I’d hoped to be back before you got here, but Rachel needed some help in the clinic.”
“What happened?”
“No, no, nothing like that.” Lana eased back, cupped Fallon’s face to study it. “School’s starting soon, and they’re doing wellness checks. And she wanted to show me some changes they’ve made in the plans for the expansion. Sit while I put these things away and tell me how your brother is.”
“You sit while I put them away.”
Fallon nudged her mother to a counter stool, found olives from the Tropics, oil from the press her father had helped build, peppercorns, coffee beans, a bag of salt.
“Colin’s in his element,” she began. “The troops respect him, which is vital, but they also like him. We turned that fucking palace—” She caught herself, winced. “Sorry.”
“I think we’re beyond me scolding you over language.”
Still, Fallon thought. “That palace of an HQ? We cleared out the unnecessary.”
“And much of it’s been put to use here and elsewhere.”
“It had seven bedrooms, and other rooms that we turned into bedrooms. We’ve got troops housed there. Mallick will have a room there, one with a kind of parlor for his workshop. Colin has a room to himself, it’s the smallest of them. It works. We set up other barracks, and civilian housing.”
She went through the broad details as she put away the supplies, then sat.
Impressed, approving, Lana nodded. “You’re combining the templates from New Hope and our own cooperative back home.”
“I know how they work, and that they work. We need those fortified structures in locations like Arlington especially for training and to keep people safe. When Mallick gets back there—”
“He’s not there now?”
“I asked him to help Mick for a few days, then visit our other bases before he comes here, briefs me. Then he’ll go to Arlington. Colin’s solid, Mom.”
“I know it. I do. But I think he could use some of Mallick’s discipline and worldview.”
“Trust me, he’ll get it.”
“I resented him so much when he took you away. And now I’m depending on him to help another of my children. Life is damn twisty and strange.”
“I need him with Colin, but I need his perspective on our other bases, and future ones.”
Lana looked down at the maps in progress. “You’ve picked locations for others.”
“For bases, for fortifications, for communities they can protect—and who will have to protect themselves. Once Duncan has the Utah base fully secured and running, we’ll need to expand there. The same for Mick in the South. And from here to Arlington.”
Fallon traced a finger over the map. “There’re so many untapped resources, so much land that should be cultivated and put to use. Too many roads, and a lot of them useless. Buildings that need to be dismantled for supplies so we can build those bases and communities. Too many people still hunted and hiding. We need to rally them.”
“You’ve made a good start on that.”
“Not enough.” Fallon pushed up to pace. “Not nearly. I need to double our fighting troops, at least double them to take D.C. I need to—”
She stopped herself, turned back. “We don’t need to get into all this now. I just got home. Let me tell you how it felt to walk into this room and see pies on the counter, fresh bread and lemonade, flowers.”
She walked back, took Lana’s hands. “It reminded me it’s not all battles and wars and beating back the dark. Because there are places like this where the dark is beaten back. Where people live, and kids go to school, and neighbors have cookouts. I need to remember that. I need you to remind me of that when I forget why I took the sword from the fire. Sometimes I’m afraid I’ll forget.”
“No, you won’t. But sometimes I worry you’ll forget if you don’t give yourself a life, if you don’t eat the pie, dance to the music, laugh with friends, and, God, make love with a man you care for, you’ll forget what it means to
live. Just live, Fallon.”
Fallon brought her mother’s hand to her cheek. “I could probably choke down some pie now.”
Lana’s bluebell eyes danced with amusement. “That was tricky of you.”
“Did it work?”
“Put on the kettle for tea,” Lana decided. “We’ll both have pie.”
Later, she feasted with neighbors, laughed with friends, danced to the music. And just lived.
* * *
The next day, she visited everyone who’d lost someone in the battle of Arlington. Their grief tore through her even as their strength humbled her. These, too, she knew, she must remember. The day would come when there would be too many lost for her to visit all, to console.
She attended the memorial for the fallen, didn’t hide her tears. When she watched Flynn hang Lupa’s star, she wondered her heart didn’t break to pieces.
When he asked, she walked with him into the woods, wandered with him in the quiet with Faol Ban hunting in the shadows, with Taibhse sweeping through the trees.
“I wanted to tell you,” Flynn began, “I thought about leaving, maybe going out to Utah with Duncan. Somewhere so different I wouldn’t see Lupa in every turn of a trail.”
“Wherever you want to go—”
“I’m here,” he said simply. “This is my place. Max, your mother, Eddie, Poe, Kim, they helped bring me and mine here. Helped make this place. It’s my place. I had no family left, and made family, then they gave me family and this home. I waited for you, and I’ll fight for you. But … part of me died with him. You understand.”
She watched her wolf slide through the shadows like white smoke, felt his heartbeat, knew his spirit. “Yes, I do.”
“Your mother gave Lupa these last years. Kept him alive, vital, when his time had come and gone. I’ll always be grateful. He died to save me. I’ll use the life he saved to fight. Give me a mission.”
Was it fate, she thought, that laid that request at her feet?
“Pick a dozen, not only skilled in battle but who understand what’s needed to form a secure community. You’ll need to scavenge and scout and recruit along the way. Just the way you did twenty years ago on your way to New Hope.”
