Evolution (23 page)

"Maybe he’ll come around if we get him out of
here," Apollon speculates reassuringly.  "There's obviously
something in this city that makes people crazy.  Once we've reduced his
exposure, maybe he'll be normal again."

"Maybe," I say, but I'm not convinced.

"At any rate," Apollon says, "we really do
need to leave before we share his fate."

Jonas and I glance at each other.  Fate.

We start hunting for the way out of the city.  It looks
like we're going to keep moving.

As we wander through the streets, Apollon glances at our
stray, then at me.  "Does he have a name?"

"No."

"Let's call him George."

We share a look.  George it is.

The southern exit is blocked by a group of men and some
cars.  We wander toward them for a closer look, but keep a safe
distance.  They're lolling, a couple of men sitting on the hood of one of
the cars, swinging their legs, looking bored.  Another group of four plays
cards on the ground at the side.  Funny thing is, none of them look crazy.

"I'll go talk to them," Apollon says.  He
makes off before we can stop him.

"What do you think?" I ask Jonas as we watch
Apollon approach the men.

He shakes his head.  "I think we're not getting
out of this city without their consent."  He nods past them. 
"There's more of them outside the gate."

I squint, and he's right.  There's more.  Maybe a
lot more.

We watch Apollon talk to the men.  They study him, but
don't seem unfriendly.  They talk for a moment, then Apollon turns and
walks back toward us, looking grim.

"This isn't good," he says.  "They claim
to be an 'escort' service.  If you pay them enough, they'll take you right
to the next city.  They even guarantee they'll get you there safely."

"And if you don't pay them?" I ask.

Jonas glances at me, apparently already having caught on to
what I have not.  "You won't get there at all."

"They're the ones you'd need to be kept safe
from," Apollon agrees.  "Probably just easier for them to rob
travelers this way.  The ones who can pay do.  The ones who can't
pay, who are desperate enough, try to get onto the road anyway, and get killed
and robbed."

"How much do they want?" I ask.

"A lot more than we have.  And even if we could
pay their fare, they run the convoy once a week.  It’s three days from now. 
We’re stuck."

I purse my lips and look up at him.  "I don’t know
if we’ll last three days in this city.  Can't you like... charm them with
those dimples or something?"

Apollon throws his head back and laughs.  He gives me a
sly look.  "A lot more likely you could charm them than I
could."

"Alright then."  I start marching toward the
gate to the sound of Jonas and Apollon cursing behind me.  Clearly neither
of them expected me to try.  They rush to follow along behind me, and
George takes up the rear.

"Hi there," I say as I come to a stop before the
pair of bored-looking men lounging on the car.  Better to deal with the
ones who would like to quit sitting around and do something.  "How
much exactly does it cost to get the hell out of here?"  These guys are
not who I really need to talk to anyway.  I just need to entertain them
and give them some bait—enough to get to talk to whoever is really in
charge.  I already know it’s going to cost to get out of this city. 
I’m not in denial.  And when it comes down to it, I'm willing to barter
away a lot of things in order to make it to the next city without having to
fight for my life.  Luckily, I’m not without resources.  I’ve learned
the value of information, if the gold in my backpack is not enough.

The pair of them look at each other after summing me
up.  One of them grins at me.  "Probably a lot more than you
have, sweetheart."

"We'll never know if you don't name a price," I
say, grinning right back at him, "now will we, darling?"

He wiggles in his spot, looking pleased to have something to
play with, if nothing else.  "Train doesn’t leave for three days,” he
says.  “But you wanna get on it?  I could name a price for
you."  He glances at Apollon, Jonas, and George.  “Don't know
about your friends.  But definitely for you."

I step on Jonas' toe, and elbow Apollon as both of them
start to step forward.  They restrain themselves... for now.

"I guess your boss isn't into making a real profit,
then," I say, glancing past him, where a group of guys trails after a man
who is clearly in charge.  He's wiry, starting to go grey, medium
build.  But he carries himself with authority, and the others look a
little humbled in his presence.  The guy I'm talking to looks over his
shoulder at the man in question and falls silent.

When he turns back to me, his eyes narrow.  "Now
don’t be jerking me around, gorgeous.  You think you really have something
that’ll interest my boss?  ‘Cause he doesn’t like when people mess
around.”

I nod.

He looks me over again.  “How much are we talking?"

I shrug.  "How much of a guarantee are you giving
that we'll get to the next city without any trouble?"

"Now see, sugar," he says, "You just don’t
look like you have deep enough pockets.  I think you might just be jerking
me around, after all.  I’m not even sure you have anything that's gonna be
worth my time."  But the way he smiles says that even this
distraction is worth his time.  He's bored as hell.  Not that it
matters much.

"I have a gold ring," I say, and wait for his
response.

He looks me up and down.  "Now where would you get
a gold ring from?" he asks, both hesitant and amused.

“It was a Christmas present.”

“A what?”

"My boyfriend," I amend, rolling my eyes. 
"Where do rings usually come from?"

He looks doubtfully from Apollon to Jonas.  "One
of them?"

I snort.  "An old boyfriend.  Does it matter
where it came from?"

He shakes his head, looking me up and down one more
time.  "I guess I might give you a gold ring if I had one," he
finally says.

I toss him my best sultry smile.  "You might not
need to.  Now, will a gold ring do?"  I don’t expect it to be
enough for my purposes, but it’s pretty decent bait.

He looks a little dazed for a second.  Then he breaks
into action, climbing down from the hood of the car.  "Let's have a
look.”

I reluctantly fish through my pack to find my pouch of
rings, and, shielding it from view, pull out one.  It's the lion. 
Beauty is the first thing to go.  I hand it to him, deciding it's better
to feign trust right now.  If these guys wanted to, they could take
everything from us.  They're armed to the teeth, and they outnumber us by
two dozen at least.

The guy looks at his friend, then back at me. 
"Let me go see," he says, then hesitates.  “Just… if he comes to
talk to you, better to take the deal he offers and not argue.”  He winks,
takes my ring, and wanders off toward the boss.

I glance back at Apollon.  He licks his lips, watching
the conversation in the distance.  "Careful, Eden," he murmurs,
turning his eyes down on me.

I nudge him again with my elbow and give him a smile. 
We don't have a lot of choices right now.  We can't stay here, and we
can't go back.  Whatever this takes, we need to get out.  I'm
surprised Jonas isn't chewing me out by now, but a quick glance at him reveals
that blank face that I can't read.  He's just... intense.  I hate
when I can't tell what he's thinking.

The guy walks back toward us, leading his boss.  The
older man has a long look at each of us, and holds up my ring in one
hand.  "This is nice," he says with an easy manner. 
"Enough for two of you.  Come back in three days.  I’ll just
hang onto it to save your place.”  He puts it in his pocket.

“Why don’t you do that,” I say.  “Only, we want to go
today.  And there’s four of us.  So I guess we need to talk.”

The guy from the hood of the car grimaces and looks
away.  His boss’ eyes narrow on me, summing me up.  “Your boyfriend’s
going to need to be considerably richer,” he says.  “Or should I say
you’re going to need to get a lot better at thieving?”

I sigh.  Why does everyone always assume I steal
things?  “Have you heard about the things happening in the Outposts?” I
ask, changing the subject.

Again, his eyes narrow.  I have the feeling he is
trying to see through me, figure me out.  Good luck.

“We’ve heard a lot of rumors from up there,” he says,
finally.  “All of it sounds like complete bullshit.”

I study the boss’ face, then glance at the other guy. 
He’s not as good at hiding his interest.  I’m onto something.  I look
back at the boss, smile, and shrug.  “We just came from Three.”

He snorts.  “Likely.”

“Have you ever been there?”

He crosses his arms, a warning.  “I have.”

Perfect.  “Then you know some of the people.”

“A few,” he says stiffly.  “But names have a way of
getting around.  They mean nothing.”

I nod.  “Have a look at the inside of that ring.”

He frowns, but he pulls the ring from his pocket and gives
it a closer inspection.

Meanwhile, Jonas tenses beside me, leaning slightly forward,
though there’s no way he’s going to read anything from here.

The boss’ eyes dart from the inscription to my face. 
He’s reconsidering his assumption.

I smile again.  “Turns out my boyfriend
is
considerably richer,” I say.  “Or I’m better at thieving than you
thought.”

He rubs the gold between his thumb and forefinger, but he
keeps looking at me.  I’ve just put myself in a potentially dangerous
situation, but it had to be done.  I move on before he can think too much
about ways to profit from this knowledge.

“We can tell you the real story,” I offer, though it will be
missing some key facts that aren’t believable anyway.  “And there’s three
more rings to go with that one.  One for each of us.  But we leave
today.  Right now.  All of us.”

“That sounds like a pretty good deal,” he says, then follows
up as expected.  “But say I believe you.  I could easily get ten
times the gold out of Matthew for your safe return.”  He smiles now, for
the first time.

He probably could, if Matt’s still alive.  I push the
doubt away, and with it, the longing to be back in the Outpost. 
“Possibly.  But it’s a long way to Outpost Three.  There are no
guarantees.  And if you had any idea what Matt has been up to, you’d know
better than to mess with him.”

He doesn’t react outright—just continues to squint at my
face.  But any mercenary worth his salt would know better than to cross
someone like Matt.  As tempting as the idea might be, the risks are not
worth it.  I’m offering him a far sweeter deal, and he knows it.

I shrug innocently, glancing to the side where some of his
men are still playing cards.  “Or we could gamble for it and you could see
what else you could get out of me.”

“Ha!” he barks, throwing back his head.  He holds out
his hand.  “Give me the rings.”

I consider him for only a second before deciding the only
way to go is to hand over the goods.  I rummage in my pack and carefully
pick out three more rings for him, not allowing him to see the one I’m
keeping—the otter.  I tuck it deep into my pack, trying not to think of
Matt.  I can't help but remember the day we went for the drive and he
showed the otters to me, playing in the ice and snow.  It went a long way
to dispelling my fear of the wilderness.  Now all I have left of him is
one ring and a few memories.  Sighing, I drop the other three rings into
the boss’ waiting palm.

He eyes me, then examines the rings, taking a moment to read
their inscriptions.  A wry smile stretches across his weathered face as he
holds up the crow ring, glances from me to the card players, and turns
away.  Smart guy.  He pockets the rings.  As he walks away, he
makes a little swirling gesture in the air with one hand.  Around us, his
men whip into a sudden frenzy of motion, without so much as a word to get them
going.

I soak in the awe of our apparent success.

Apollon pats me on the arm as we move forward. 
"You sure about this?" he asks, under his breath.

"Pretty sure."

Jonas meets my eyes and shakes his head, like he can't
believe me.  But he's not protesting.  He must agree with my
assumption that we might actually make it to the next city alive.  “Let me
deal with the story,” he says.  And he wanders off to join the boss while
everyone else prepares the convoy.  George goes with him without so much
as a glance back.  So Apollon and I stand quietly at a distance and try to
make out the conversation taking place between Jonas and the boss.  But
the boss’ back is turned to us, and as usual, Jonas’ face gives away
nothing.  I stare at him, fascinated, until Apollon nudges me in the ribs
and clears his throat.  Then I look away and pretend like I wasn’t
staring.

In short order, we're all piled into the back of a truck,
where we settle in against the cab.  Jonas says nothing of his
conversation with the boss.  Our mercenary buddies form up around the
truck.  There are more cars, and motorcycles, and another truck as
well.  An entire convoy.  Looks like they really are serious about
getting us to the next city.  We rumble along the old road toward the
southeast.  To be honest, I have no idea where we are going except that
it's away from here.  There is relief in the leaving, followed abruptly by
panic.  A thought that has occurred a little too late.  What if Oscar
is somewhere in that crazy city and we're leaving him behind?  Shouldn't
we have looked for him?  My thoughts are completely irrational.  I
have to smother them, stomp them down.  I buckle them all away inside my
heart.

The journey takes hours.  We've been riding for a long
while and I've been snoozing against Apollon's shoulder when the convoy stops
for a break.  I open my eyes groggily and find that the sun is already
sinking.  We won't get wherever we're going until nightfall, for
sure.  It's not the best time to waltz into a strange city, but it's not
like we have much of an option.  I raise my head sleepily and look across
at Jonas, who is awake, alert, and quiet.  He's looking at our stray, and
George is looking back at him.  The silence between them is thick with
something that neither of them is capable of putting words to.  It leaves
me chilled, uncertain, and strangely longing for a past I may never find.