Ash & Flame: Season One (16 page)

Every step hurt, every footfall brought a tremble to his lip, but he kept moving, one step after another. He focused on that. Just take a step, then worry about the next one.

He focused on his feet, and the pain dimmed, always there, but fading like the sunlight. Move, concentrate on that step, and everything else fell into place, pain or not. Everything hurt, so what was one more step?

Until he stepped into a watery footprint much too large. He stopped and lifted his foot. Blood had spattered over the mud, and channels had been dug through the muck, slick and wiry like someone had been flopping under the rain.

Or fighting.

The rain lessened, revealing the corner of the squat building, where others had stood watch. Now it stood empty, barren, no one standing vigil, watching over the compound. He didn’t know where they had gone, wasn’t sure he wanted to find out.

He heard it then. “Hey.”

Ren whipped around, wincing, searching for the source of the voice.

“Hey. Ren.” Little more than a grunted whisper.

He scanned the ground for the voice, and spotted a lump a dozen feet off. A hand waved meekly at him, the fingers trembling.
Oh, no
.

A corner of Rachel’s lips curled up as Ren crouched beside her, but a shudder shook her, and her attempted smile shifted into a hissing grimace. Her other hand pressed against her side, a dark stain spreading down her wet shirt.

Ren put a hand on her shoulder, and lifted her bloody hand. It didn’t look good. He swallowed and ripped off a section from the bottom of his shirt. “You’re gonna be fine.” He pressed the cloth to the seeping wound, and put her hand back down on top of it. “Hold that there, okay?”

“S-Sorry…” Rachel’s eyelids fluttered closed. “They t-took your k-kid.”

“Where’d they go?” Ren asked. He shook her gently by the shoulder. “Rachel? Rachel!”

Her arm fell into the puddle that surrounded her. Her hand shifted, a finger pointing out, towards the north, and the dark silhouette of the trees in the distance. Her breathing slowed, and her other arm slumped forward, her hand sliding off the bloody rag.

Ren cursed, and pressed on the wound himself. He turned and screamed for help, his lungs burning. Emma needed him, but so did Rachel right now. He wouldn’t leave her, not like this.

He held his hand over the bloody rag, his other hand moving towards her neck. She was alive, her pulse weak but steady.

His fingers brushed her necklace, a spark running down his hand, and he looked up, checking to see if anyone was coming.

He reached down, his fingers trembling as his eyes caught the pendant lying against her skin.

▪▪▪

Kevin heard the cries, the shouts for help echoing throughout the compound. He flung away the body of the cannibal, the Ashen man’s burnt flesh still steaming.
Lahat
sizzled and hissed in his grip, blue flames surging along the blade.

The other invaders had fallen back, slipping away under the cover of the fog, darting into the trees. Gunfire rattled off in spurts, tailing off as the remaining Ashen ran.

He saw painted skin, caught flashes of bared, yellowed teeth, crude weapons glinting as the heavy clouds lifted, patches of the late afternoon light shining through. Bodies lay scattered in the mud, a couple still moving, reaching out for help as if it would come. As if they deserved it.

Kevin wasn’t the miracle they were seeking. Especially seeing faces he recognized, their dead eyes glazed over, staring into nothingness. People he’d helped here in Haven, who’d given him their trust.

No, any of the damned Ashen that looked at him would get a different sort of help.

It felt like a thousand cuts marked him, blood-lined wounds running across his arms. His ribs ached, and he knew once he took his shirt off he’d find several bruises.

He’d worry about them later. He ran past the trucks, stepping over more bodies, and he paused when he saw her. Releasing his hold on
Lahat
, Kevin couldn’t help the sigh of relief as he moved towards her.

Sam
.

She stood by herself in the open field west of the trucks and their debris, her head down, her shoulders sagging. The bodies of Ashen lay clumped together around her feet, a half-dozen more strewn in the mud nearby.

Kevin slowed as he neared her. He reached out uncertainly with a hand. “Sam, you okay?”

Sam turned towards him. Tears streamed down her dirty cheeks. She looked down at the palms of her hands, dried blood crusting her fingers. “I…I don’t…I wanted to die.”

She smiled, or tried to, her hands flying up to cover her face as she broke instead into a quiet, shaking sob.

“Shh, now, Sam.” Kevin wrapped his arms around her, and she cried against his chest, her shoulders heaving. “Shhh. It’s okay…”

He held her, consoling her as best he could, but after a minute he stopped talking. The silence was probably more eloquent. And it kept him from yelling at her, shaking her by the shoulders for taking such a stupid risk.

“Kev!” A gruff voice shouted from behind him.

Kevin turned his head and motioned with his head at the man that approached. “Anderson. We okay?”

Chuck Anderson looked ragged, his green fatigues ripped at one shoulder, blood and mud streaked over the front. A sharp, thin cut ran across his cheek, the skin around it red and swollen. He hadn’t cut his hair in years, and his black and gray mane ran down past his shoulders, his gray beard tied into a knot at his chin, braided hair dangling loosely.

“Okay, but just,” Anderson said with a curt nod. “Lost a few, but the bastards are running back to wherever they came from.”

His brow rose as Kevin let go of Sam. She stepped away, sniffed and rubbed her eyes.

Kevin shook his head slightly.
Don’t ask
. “All the posts check in?”

“All of ‘em except for Evie. She’s on riverside.”

A sick feeling passed through Kevin’s gut. Evie had been stationed on the eastern edge of the compound. The Ashen had hit them on the western flank.
Shit
.

“Okay, I’ll go.” He put a hand on Sam’s shoulder and guided her towards the veteran Blessed. “Anderson, make sure the rest are all accounted for. Need to clean up, repair any damage, ASAP. Got me?”

“Roger that,” Anderson said.

“Sam, you okay to help him?”

The young woman sniffed again and nodded. “Damn right I am.”

“Good. Be back soon.” Kevin left them to it, and moved towards the interior of the compound, nerves jumping at him. He had the uneasy feeling that he knew what he’d find.

The rain still fell as he ran, a drizzle that felt good on Kevin’s skin, the cool water running down his back, down his bare arms. He moved past the two towers, men and women on top of the walkway scanning the fields surrounding the compound. One of them had fallen in the attack, and now lay half-submerged in the mud, the grimy barrel of a rifle peeking out. Kevin averted his gaze from the pool of blood mixing with the muck and stared at the smoking ruin ahead.

Flames belched a dirty smoke from the shack, heat washing from the roof in a murky haze. A hundred things ran through his mind, wondering what he might find when he reached the building. Whether he’d find Ren or Emma there, whether either one of them would be alive. If the Ashen attack had been planned with them in mind, or if they were somehow involved.

Where Ithuriel was right now.

Kevin shook his head, and pushed his legs on, his boots smacking into the wet quagmire. Wasn’t the time for questions he had no answers to.

He paused at the smoking building and took in the ruined shack, the scorched, blackened frame like a leering skull. The ceiling had partially collapsed, timber and plaster lying in a heap of debris over the beds inside. Smoke drifted through the hole, swept away by the rain and breeze, and flames played along the back wall. The wood creaked and crackled, and Kevin knew the whole thing would burn down, rain or not.

There was no way anyone still in there could be alive.

He turned just as a shout for help rang out. Kevin took off towards the sound, his heart racing. He had only run about five strides when he spotted the body, sliced in half, not far from the burning building. He recognized Logan right away, and the smoldering spark of anger began to burn again. He was a good kid, and he’d died for what?

How many had died today? How many had he lost before now, in the past week, the past month? The past year? When all the world burned, how long until all of Haven burned with it?

Kevin tore his eyes from Logan’s remains, and sprinted towards the guard shack, his teeth bared in a snarl.

If Haven was going to burn, he’d show the bastards a fire of his own.

▪▪▪

Emma came to, bouncing, her head swinging, jarring against something. Her clothes were soaked, water running down her neck, dripping from her hair. Her eyes blinked open, her nose brushing against a wet shirt. Someone was carrying her.

She coughed and wiped a hand under her nose, the back of her hand streaked with red. The man carrying her over his shoulder hummed under his breath, and the images replayed in her mind.

The man walking in, pushing her father away. Dad attacking the man, them fighting, rolling on the floor. Fire, flames hissing up the walls. The voices, the whispers in her head. And the one voice, the one that had reached in and tugged at her. The soothing voice that knew her, more than any of the others.
Hurry home. Hurry home, Emma
.

And that woman, Rachel, the one who had fought back. They had cheated her in the end. She would have beat Brad, Emma knew without question. Quicker and faster, her whip an extension of her arm, she was a fighter. Emma’s heart beat faster just thinking about it. She liked fighters.

But her dad, he was hurt and he was alone.

He’d tried to fight back, and what had that got him? She pictured him, lying in that burning room, reaching out for her, blood streaking over his swollen eye.

But he’d tried, even though she knew that he wanted to take her and race away into the shadows and hiding places. But he loved her, so he’d fought anyway. Just like Emma had to.

She reared up, her hands pushing against the man’s shoulder. “Let me down,” she hissed in his ear.

Brad grabbed her by the waist and tried to force her back over his shoulder, but Emma bit at his ear. She clenched her jaw and twisted, and he grunted. He crouched and set her feet on the ground, and Emma gave a last savage twist and let his ear go.

She tried to take off running, but the man’s grip was strong, too strong for her. He grabbed one of her arms and yanked her back towards him, his face inches from hers. She felt a wet trickle on her lip, and struggled against the sudden dizziness.

“Why run, Emma?” he asked, shaking his head, a sad little smile on his face. His ear glowed an angry red, but he showed no sign he’d felt it. “Don’t you want to go home? Don’t you want to see
her
?”

Emma didn’t know where home was, or who he meant by
her
, but there would be no home unless her dad was there with her. This felt all wrong.

“Let me go,” she growled between her teeth, but the words came out as a single word, a reverberating echo in her head.
Abeam
. She didn’t know the word, didn’t recognize it as it spilled from her lips, but somehow she knew it was right. She felt a tug in her head, like something had been pulled free.

Brad’s eyes went wide and his hands pulled back, palms facing her, releasing their hold on Emma.

Emma turned back the way they’d come, and started to run back through the woods. The embankment loomed ahead, just beyond the last of the trees. She grinned, seeing the compound not much farther off, the smoke and the faint outline of buildings. Dad was down there somewhere. She imagined his face, the way the wrinkles in the corners of his eyes shifted when he smiled. Even bloody and beaten, she wanted to see that smile on his face again. Couldn’t wait to see it.

Then something tickled at the back of her mind. Voices barged in, tumbled over themselves, shouting, screaming. She stopped and fell to her knees, tears threatening to spill over her lids. She pressed her hands against her ears, begging the voices to stop.

She heard—no, felt—a different voice, rising above the others, and she squeezed her eyes tight.

It will be okay, my dearest
, the singing voice said, soft and smooth. The others fell into a murmuring silence.
Shush now, don’t cry. Come home, and everything will be okay
.

And then other things, whispers that said her father would be in danger if she went back, that they wouldn’t be able to protect them both.

Your father will be protected, as long as you go with this man
.

Emma felt a presence behind her, a dark shadow looming, towering over her. She opened her eyes, and glanced over her shoulder, at Brad standing behind her. His ear had turned a nice shade of red.

As long as I go with him
.