The three of them picked up their pace as they approached the cabin. The sheer size of the logs that made up the building were incredible. Lacquered and intricately carved nature scenes and vines, impressive designs and patterns. The place looked so misplaced in this world, they didn’t even believe it was actually there. They stood at the bottom of a set of stone steps leading up to the front porch and those double doors they saw from their approach. Now closer, they were even greater in size and detail. Each one had a curved metal handle that twisted elegantly around itself. There was a door knocker on each in the shape of a horse’s head with a wreath of grapevines in its mouth. Above that, sat small gated windows of rippled glass. They were broken from their trance when the man who rode the black horse, Nicky, simply opened them and walked in.
“Let’s go. Up,” Mac said to them as she adjusted her pack on her shoulders, and waved her hand towards the door.
They climbed the stairs, tunnel visioned on the door.
“Well, if it ain’t Evie Mac,” said a gruff voice from off to the side of the porch, shadowed by the over hang of the balcony above. “What fresh bullshit have you brought to my doorstep today?” he asked in a heavy drawl.
The three of their heads whipped to the side. There sat an old, broad shouldered man in a worn leather jacket, work boots, and faded blue jeans. A large pair of black sunglasses covered his eyes, and he rocked in an oversized and rustic porch chair.
“I told you! She’s not dead, old man,” Wyatt said as he walked over to him, patting him on the back, then went and leaned against the outside of the house behind him.
“Well, look at that.” The old man feigned surprise and interest. “Aren’t we lucky? I hope you’re not here to drop more bodies into our camp here. The first time was your last time. I made that clear even with the extenuating circumstances. No more mouths to feed.”
“We’re not here to stay. None of us. Just here to drop some things off. Maybe talk some things over,” she said, dropping her pack off her shoulders with a thud in front of him.
“Talk ain’t cheap, little girl.” He tilted his head in her direction.
“I know. I know, Brooks,” she said and began to rummage in her pack. She pulled out a thick plastic pouch, once clear, but now opaque with age and use. It was filled with clumps of something indiscernible until she pulled back the packing tape holding it closed and opened it. The skunky scent wafted out to meet all of their noses. “I hope this will pay my way, at least this time.”
The old man reached out for the bag, and she placed it in his hands. He plunged a fist in, and plucked out a good sized fuzzy, yellow-green dried nugget. He gave it a gentle squeeze. Then he raised and lowered the bag in his hands, testing the weight.
“That’ll do,” he said as he reached in the pocket of his creased, tobacco brown jacket, and pulled out a pipe made from a deer antler.
“Grandpa, let me help with that,” Wyatt said, quickly moving over to him with sudden interest.
“Wyatt, you get your damn hands off my stash. I can pack my own damn pipe, you hear me, boy,” Brooks scolded.
Wyatt looked down with a pout, and Rae rolled her eyes at him. Mac smirked to herself.
“You know the deal. Let me see,” Mac said as she zipped her pack back up.
The old man huffed, but slowly slid the sunglasses off his face. Both of his eyes were watery and searching, clouded over with a bluish smoke-like layer. She knelt in front of him, and carefully looked into his eyes.
“Can you see this?” she asked, holding her middle finger out directly in front of him.
He let out a deep belly laugh that made his shoulders rise up and down. “Girl I swear, I got a boot for your ass, I’m telling ya.”
He started to break the clump up into tiny pieces, gently placing them down into the bowl of his carved bone pipe. Mac stood up, taking the bag off his lap.
“Now keep this close by, and closed up tight,” she said, rolling the bag closed and jamming it into his jacket pocket. “And house rules: only smoke it outside.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he said, placing the pipe between his lips, and patting down his person for a light.
“I got it, Grandpa,” Wyatt said and rushed to him with a box of matches. “If you don’t mind though, it’s much easier if I light it for you.”
“Boy, just take your toke, and get the hell out of here,” Brooks snapped.
“Yup, no problem,” Wyatt took the pipe from him, and packed down the bud in the bowl. He lit a match and began puffing until the red heat on the plant caught and rolled across, and down into it. “That’ll do it,” he said as he coughed out a great puff of smoke.
“Give me the damn pipe!” Brooks yelled, and Wyatt snuck one more quick drag before handing the pipe back to him. “Now all of you, get the hell out of here, and leave me alone!”
Wyatt hesitated, and Rae went over to him, pulling on his arm. “Let’s go, you have watch tonight.”
Just as he was about to protest with some excuse to stay, Mac held up a large clump she had taken from the bag when she packed it up for the old man.
“You got it, Grandpa.” Wyatt said with a big grin on his face snatching it from her, and laid a big, smacking kiss on Mac’s cheek. She gave him an unamused looked, and he walked off with a little hop in his step, back down the stairs towards the barn. Rae followed him.
“Great. Thanks for that,” she said to Mac sarcastically, but with a smile as she walked off, following behind him.
Mac walked back towards the front door where Cara, Jack, and Charlie stood. The door suddenly opened, and the black haired young man stepped out.
“Alright, come in. The boss is already mad at you, so tread lightly,” he said with a small smile creeping into his handsome face.
“Thanks for the warning,” Mac said as she brushed past him and into the house.
The young man stood there and motioned for the rest of the group to go on inside too. The three of them tentatively stepped in. Nic followed, and closed the door behind them.
The place was even more impressive and beautiful on the inside. The rich wood covered every inch of the interior, and it all was more gorgeous and ornate than the next. They were standing in a large landing to the side of a massive staircase that had a subtle curve to it, making you almost feel dizzy. Out in front of them was a huge living area. Three large leather couches with plum and merlot colored cashmere blankets laid on their backs. They sat in a bracket formation around a six foot wide, five foot high fireplace, crackling with a normal sized fire that looked minuscule within the gaping space. In the middle was a coffee table with a marble top, and dark wooden legs carved into bears made to look like they were holding it up. The light from the wall of windows leading out to the balcony up the steps, lit the entire room with warm sunlight. To the side of the living area was a large kitchen, connected to a dining room with a rustic and an expensive looking wooden table that could easily fit twenty people, though there seemed to only be twelve chairs.
The space between the cooking and dining area was separated by a short hallway with a door on each side, and a set of double doors at its end. In the middle of the wall shared by the living room and kitchen was a heavy looking glass door framed in rout iron leading out to another porch, that seemed to wrap around the side of the house.
They looked up to see that the living room went straight up to the twenty foot ceiling, centered with a large fan. The other side had a walk way that connected to the stairs at the front. Four doors sat evenly across it. A hallway sliced the space right down the middle with more doors dotting the way to the back of the house. At the end, which they could barely make out from there, was what looked to just be an open room. Large windows finished off the back wall again.
“You’re late,” a voice said from deep in the house. It was calm, but strong, and it sent shivers down their spines, though Mac and Nicky seemed unfazed.
“I know. It couldn’t be helped,” Mac said swallowing hard.
“Nico,” she said, eyes flashing over to him. ”Grab some water for our guests. They must be thirsty.”
He nodded his head to her, and set off to the kitchen. Reaching high above the sink, he pulled four glasses out from a cabinet.
“Come here,” she ordered Mac, pointing a finger to a spot right in front of her.
Nico had frozen in place holding the cups to his chest, staring at the scene before them. Mac gently placed her pack against the wall by the door, and began walking to her. She stopped right at the spot the woman pointed at and looked her in the eye. The woman searched her face, the spot between her eyes slightly bunched together. Then she looked her up and down. She raised her hands and placed each softly on Mac’s cheeks.
“Are you alright?”
“Yeah,” she said, giving a meek smile. “I just had to rest for a bit, so I could make it back no problem.”
The woman gave her a loving smile, and kissed her on the top of her head. Then she hauled off and smacked her on the shoulder.
“Ow,” Mac scrunched up her face, sinking her head into her neck, and putting her hands up in surrender. Her expression was like a teenager being scolded as the woman went off on her, speaking in some foreign language other than English, hands flailing all over.
“Alright, Mom! Jeez,” Nico said, breaking out of his trance, and bringing the glasses over to the large table.
“Hey! She was supposed to be here a month ago!”
Now that she was speaking in full sentences, an Italian accent was easily detected.
“A year off my life, I swear!” she crossed herself, and said a prayer as she walked into the kitchen mumbling something, occasionally looking up to the heavens. She walked back over to the table with a wine glass, and a bottle of wine. She sat down at the head of the table, and poured herself a large portion. She looked up at the three strangers still just standing a few feet from the door.
“Sit!” she commanded, waving a hand at them.
The three of them scrambled over, and sat in three consecutive chairs leaving the two closest to the woman open.
Nico slid a glass across the table to each of them as Mac sat next to her, but on the other side from them. He grabbed a pitcher from the counter, and poured some water into each glass. They drank it without hesitation, and even though it was room temperature, it tasted amazing.
“So,” she said, taking a sip of the red wine. “Let’s hear it then.”
They all looked to Mac who furrowed her brow a bit in confusion.
“You are not one to bring a group of strangers to our home, Evie. I want to know why.”
She took a breath. “Alright. They’re from another group. A school. It was suppose to be a school. I helped them. They helped me. But they need more help than I can give them.”
Cara, Charlie, and Jack lowered their eyes. Listening to it seemed like a fitting punishment for how they ended up here in the first place with her.
“There’s about thirty of them,” Mac said.
“Twenty-Seven, now,” Charlie interrupted, and then looked away when the woman turned to him.
“Some kids. They have power. Everything. Solar for it all.”
The woman raised an eyebrow.
“But they’re running out of food. It’s been sheer, damn luck they’ve made it this far, honestly.” Mac shook her head in disbelief.
The woman cleared her throat, spinning her wine glass slowly on the table. “I know you’re not asking me to give something for nothing, Evie, but so far, they don’t sound like a good trade option.”
Mac looked to Jack, and gave him a nod. He looked around, not sure what he was suppose to do, then Cara yanked at the back pack he was still wearing.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, then he took it off and slid it across the table to her.
Nico came and sat next to his mother on the other side of the table, opposite Evie. She pulled the bat from where it stuck out at the top of the zipper and laid it on the table. She unzipped the rest and paused.
“What I brought isn’t much, but it will, at the very least, pay for your time hearing me out, and what you will give us while we’re here. Also to show you what you could have… if you wanted it.” She pulled out the canister of oats, then the clothes, the medicine and toiletries, the baseball which rolled a bit on the surface of the table, then she held a jar of applesauce in her hand, and the bag of dried rings. “They have a few apple trees. Enough to yield them goods to last through season to season. But that’s pretty much it. Their garden’s shoddy, but they have some land. I saw some berry bushes around their perimeter, though they don’t seem to know about them. Their only protein source is going to be what they can hunt, which they just started to do, with not much success. But they have water. Fresh, running water.”
The woman settled back into her chair a little bit, resting her glass on her knee and watched it as she swirled the liquid inside.
“Apples and water, that’s really what you’re coming here with?”
“I know, but they also have fresh clothes, lots of room, and a nurse.”
She took a deep breath. “How far away is it?”
“On horseback, no problems? I’d say maybe two hours by road. Three if you’d go through the woods,” she paused and saw she might be losing the woman. “They have cars. If you’re willing to open the gate again. They could make it in probably twenty minutes if all went well.”
“When does it ever go well?” she asked hypothetically. “No cars,” she said without hesitation. “We’re not going to bring that kind of attention here.”
“Understood, and I figured. I just wanted you to know the options.”
“This seems like a lot of exposure for little return,” she said as she cocked her head to Evie. “Why have you chosen to fight this battle for them?”
Evie sat there, taking a moment. Breathing calm and steady, then answered. “They are good ones. They’ve taken care of each other, and especially the children. Most of whom are orphans. They’re even still teaching them. They took care of me.”
The woman looked at her thoughtfully searching her face, “Children…”
“Mm-hmm,” Evie said. Her eyes flicked down quickly to the table, then back up to the woman’s face.
She took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. “What are you asking for then?”
“Chickens. A few. Not many. Egg yielding. A couple sprouted potatoes. A few seeds, that you could spare. Honestly, mostly the experience you have, the knowledge here. They need to know the best way to take advantage of their land, and how to take care of their crops,” she reached into her pants pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. She opened it, and place it out in front of the woman, next to her wine glass. “This is their layout.” She slid her hand over the roughly drawn grounds of The Block to smooth it flat.
The woman examined it. Nico craned his head over to see it as well. He looked up at Evie as she was talking over some points on the crude map. His eyes searched all over her face, then rested there. Feeling his eyes on her she looked up at him, and he quickly looked back at the map, clearing his throat.
“So what are we looking at here?” he asked, pointing to the side of the building. “Could this become a corn field or wheat field?”
“I checked it out. Didn’t seem overly rocky or anything. I’m pretty sure it was suppose to become a parking lot, so it’s already pretty flat. Good sun and drainage,” she answered him, though he didn’t look away from the map
.
A few moments passed in contemplative silence from the three at the head of the table. The other three sat there uncomfortably, as strangers discussed their future survival, sipping occasionally from their water glasses. Every now and again Charlie would fidget to say something, but stop himself. He’d catch Jack and Cara’s eye, and that’d keep his mouth shut.
“Well, Evie. This is obviously a bit more into Wyatt’s department, some of the farmers here, as well,” she paused, then looked up at Nico. He gave her a serious look, his rich brown eyes the same as hers; their olive skin matching too. She patted his cheek, drained her wine glass, and started pouring another. “Alright. Go and talk to them about this place’s chances, and we’ll go from there. I’m going to need more than apples and water by the way.” She raised her glass up to her in warning as Evie rose from the table, giving her a slight nod and a small smile.
Just then the side door off by the kitchen opened up, and a little wisp of a young woman came in looking around the house. When she spotted the group she gasped and then smiled, heading over to them.
“Evie! I thought it was you, the way everybody rushed off!” She reached the table, bent down and kissed Nico on the cheek, her hand holding his face lovingly. Then she headed over to Evie and wrapped her thin arms around her.
“So good to have you back,” she said kindly.
“Thanks, Lizzy,” Evie said flatly back at her, her arms kept flat against her sides.
Lizzy looked over to the three strangers on Nico’s side. “Well, hello there,” she said, reaching her arm over the large table, barely making it far enough to meet theirs for a hand shake. “I’m Lizzy,” she told them, looking into each of their eyes.
Though they each shook her hand in turn, they looked at Evie. It all seemed very awkward. Her overt cheeriness, politeness, as well as the strange tension. As she stood there, her hands resting on the back of the chair next to Evie’s, she looked at them, smiling from face to face.
Evangeline, Alone. (Book 1): Evangeline, Alone Page 16
