Surviving the Dead (Book 7): The Killing Line (10 page)

I retrieved my hatchet and got back to my feet. Someone else shouted and Eric’s rifle gave two muted cracks. The others were hard at work, steadily reducing the infected’s numbers. I waded back into the fight, swinging two handed. My arms began to spin in a familiar figure-eight pattern, each swipe sending a ghoul to its final rest. The diminished left hand held up to the strain, fingers one and two and the thumb maintaining grip strength while the little guy in the back assisted with direction and aim.

Finally, there were only two undead left. McCoy decapitated one with his cleaver and Sarah cut down the last one with her long-handled hatchet.

We stood in a loose knot, chests heaving, weapons dripping with gore. Sweat dripped down the center of my back. My core temperature was up, but it would soon drop. And when it did, the biting wind would set me to shivering unless I could get someplace warm. I doubted the others were in any better condition.

“Okay,” Sarah said between deep breaths. “Good work. Mount up and let’s ride a circle. Make an assessment.”

We walked back to our horses, cleaned the brains and bone from our weapons, and got back on our horses. It took another twenty minutes to assess the damage. There were to three-hundred infected down, and no one injured. The horses did not seem the worse for wear. All told, a successful sweep.

“I don’t know about you fellas,” Sarah said. “But I’m freezing. How about we head home?”

We all agreed this was a good idea.

The bad weather moved out overnight and a clear, bright morning greeted Eric and I as we entered the caravan district.

Sabrina came with us. When asking if she could tag along, she had claimed she wanted to learn more about the business, get a clearer idea of how we conducted operations and who with. But I knew better. Two months with me had not fundamentally changed who she was—a Traveler, one of the tens of thousands of people who stayed alive by staying on the move. She’d had no news from the road in all the time she had been with me, and despite her professed lack of interest thereof, I had no doubt she was curious. I did not blame her. I was curious too.

It was cold that morning, down in the low twenties. Every breath was a white cloud, exposed skin became dry and itchy and red, and ungloved hands quickly numbed until one could not touch pinky finger and thumb together at the tips. The sun was a lemon colored explosion in the sky, its brilliance sharpening the edges of high cirrus clouds on the outskirts of the horizon. A dendritic sprawl of leafless trees lined the distance like a cloak, patches of light skewering the gaps between dark gray limbs. I took a deep breath. The air was clean and bracing.

At least until we reached Spike’s caravan.

The air no longer smelled clean. It smelled like horses, cook fires, hot animal fat, and above all, dung. Thankfully, Spike ran a good camp, or it would have been a lot worse. The cook fires were communal, a few people around each one preparing breakfast for more than a dozen others. The animals were corralled in a space provided by the city for the purpose. The wagons were neatly organized, spaced a reasonable distance apart, and covered in case a storm blew up. The tents were also well situated, women and children in the middle and the men on the perimeter. Not that men, women, and children did not spend time together—they did. But when it came time to sleep, the men left the center and took position on the fringes. If a woman wanted to follow her man back to his tent, which happened a lot, she had other women watch her kids until she came back. And they always came back, at least while on the road. Spike was adamant about that. He relaxed the rule in places like Hollow Rock, but made sure everyone knew it was only temporary. I once asked him about it, and he explained his philosophy.

“It’s not sexist or anything,” he’d said. “The women are armed. They know how to fight too. It’s just that they’re more valuable than men, you know? A man dies, big deal. There are plenty of other guys in the world. But women, they’re important. Kids even more. Women can have children. Kids grow up and carry on our work so there’s actually a tomorrow to worry about. So that’s how I prioritize it. If it comes to a fight, the men are shock troops. If someone gets past them, God help ‘em because the women won’t. And if that don’t work, the kids got guns too. And I can tell you with authority they ain’t afraid to use ‘em.”

“I believe it,” I said.

“I think they got it worst, the kids. They ain’t old like we are. They seen too much, too early. They don’t remember how things were before. They can be such sweethearts sometimes. But when they have to be, there ain’t nothing more ruthless.”

I looked at a few small, dirty faces as I walked through the camp. They looked back with hard eyes glittering with distrust. As Spike had said, all but the smallest of them were armed with hand weapons, the older ones with firearms. And ‘older’ seemed to mean anyone over the age of twelve.

Their mothers hovered nearby, eyes watching, hands going through the routine motions of people who live their lives outdoors and have grown accustomed to the hardships of the road. Meals were made quickly and efficiently. No food was wasted. When people burn an average of five-thousand calories a day just going about their business, leftovers are not a problem. Dishes were cleaned with the minimum water necessary, and what was left was used to douse the cook fires. A gaggle of kids between the ages of five and eleven darted around the animal pens with buckets and small shovels gathering droppings. Most folks in town found this strange, but I knew why they went to the trouble. It was the same reason Sioux children used to gather buffalo turds; dry them out, and they make an excellent fuel that gives off minimal smoke.

“Nothing gets wasted,” I muttered.

Sabrina turned her head. “What’s that?”

I pointed. “Efficient people.”

“Yeah. Have to be. Can’t waste things on the road. Got to make the most of everything.”

I looked down at my daughter and felt a surge of anger at how much time she had spent on her own. “I’m sorry you had to go through all that, Sabrina. I wish your mother had told me about you. I would have found you. I would have kept you safe.”

She put her hand in the crook of my arm and held it as we walked. “I know. But what happened, happened. No changing it. We’re here now. Best just to move on.”

“Yeah.”

She looked up at me. “I get the feeling you really do understand what it’s like for Travelers. Most people don’t.”

“I’m not most people.”

We found Spike near the edge of the district sitting beside a fire and eating some kind of porridge from a metal bowl. A few others sat around him, men and women with travel-stained clothes and hard, sun-browned faces.

“Mornin’, Garrett,” Spike said without looking up.

“It certainly is.”

His eyes strayed to Sabrina. “Who’s the lovely young lady?”

“My daughter, Sabrina.”

A moment of silence. “You have a daughter?”

“Apparently so.”

“When did this happen?”

“A little over fourteen years ago,” Sabrina said. “And stop talking like I’m not fucking here.”

The corners of Spike’s mouth twitched. “I like you already.”

“Everything set?” I asked.

“Yeah. Ready to go.” Spike stood up and motioned to two of his people. “Let’s get this done. We need to be on the road in two hours.”

Eric and I split up and spent the next hour examining the cargo. I knew it was largely a ceremonial thing—Spike had a good reputation for a reason—but in my experience, traders are only as honest as they are forced to be. Just because Spike and I had a good working relationship did not necessarily mean he wouldn’t stiff me if he thought he could get away with it.

That said, there was not much to examine. The barrels were all sealed, filled properly, and in good condition. The time consuming part was weighing them. Sabrina helped by keeping a running tally on a notepad, and when the final barrel came off the scale, I glanced at the total.

“You’re three pounds light, Spike.”

“You told me to take lodging expenses out of the shipment.”

“I know what it costs to camp here, even for a caravan this size. A pound and a half should have covered it.”

“I bought food as well.”

“Not my problem. You’re responsible for feeding your people. I never said I would pay for that.”

Spike glared a moment, but finally relented. “Fine. Saul, give him back a pound.”

“And a half.”

“Goddammit, Gabe. It took me twelve weeks to get here.”

“For which you were well compensated. Pound and a half.”

Saul measured out the salt with Spike looking on in discontent. I think he was less mad about the lost trade than he was about the fact he tried to pull one over on me and got busted in front of his people. I did not feel sorry for him. I run a business, not a charity.

Spike’s people unloaded the barrels onto the ground, struck camp, and left through the north gate. Spike did not speak to me, but told Eric to use the usual channels if we wanted to hire him again. They shook on it.

“I think you hurt his feelings,” Eric said while we waited for the transport to arrive. The caravan district was empty now, the scents of beasts, wood smoke, and shit still clinging to the air.

“Fuck his feelings. We agreed on a price and he tried to get more than what he negotiated for. These traders see a fortune and think they’re entitled to a piece of it just because they did what the hell they were hired to do. I have no patience for that kind of thing.”

“You are turning into a cynical, mean-spirited old miser.”

“Says the guy who screws the Army like a cheap whore every chance he gets.”

“It’s not the Army
per se
I like to rip off. Just Captain Harlow.”

“Amounts to the same thing.”

“We’ll have to agree to disagree.”

The throaty rumble of a multi-fuel engine cut off the argument. Johnny Greene was in the driver’s seat of the transport.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said. The brakes squealed as the big all-terrain truck came to a halt.

“What happened?” Eric asked. “You’re never late.”

“Last guy with the transport was late turning it in.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “Let’s get this stuff loaded.”

Johnny pulled a ramp from beneath the cargo hold, opened the bay doors, and wheeled down a pallet jack. Eric and I began loading barrels onto it.

“Hey Dad?”

I looked at Sabrina. It was the first time she had called me ‘dad’. I didn’t hate it.

“Yeah?”

“Can I drive?”

“Do you know how?”

“Sure.”

Eric looked skeptical. “Ever driven anything before?”

“Not exactly.”

“So no, you don’t know how to drive.”

She shrugged.

Eric turned his attention my way. “Gabe?”

What the hell. She called me dad
. “She’s gotta learn some time.”

A shake of the head. “This should be interesting.”

*****

“So when are you going to tell me why you bought a metric shit-ton of salt?”

I closed the transport’s bay doors and latched them. “Maple syrup was too hard to come by.”

The engine rumbled to life and Johnny drove sedately away. The trip to the warehouse had been, as Eric predicted, interesting. It had also taken about five times as long as it should have, and I was reasonably certain Sabrina had reduced the service life of the transport’s clutch by at least fifty percent. Eventually, however, she got the hang of it.

“That was fun,” my daughter said. “Can I drive next time?”

I smiled at her. “Maybe you should practice on something a little less valuable.”

“Like what?”

“Like a horse,” Eric said.

“I already know how to ride a horse.”

I patted her shoulder. “We’ll work something out.”

Eric locked up the warehouse and we began ambling back toward home. None of us were in any kind of a hurry. Miranda had little Gabriel, Allison was at the clinic, Elizabeth was doing whatever the hell she does all day, Great Hawk was minding the store, and Johnny Greene would soon be taking over for him.

I tried to keep the Hawk out from behind the counter as much as possible. While he has proven to be a valuable addition to our business, his customer service skills leave something to be desired. Not that he is rude or anything. He is always perfectly courteous. But a six-foot-three Apache with a mohawk, broad shoulders, a gaze that could intimidate a rabid Kodiak, and a minimum of three edged weapons on his person at all times—including a tomahawk forged during the French-Indian war—does not exactly put people at ease. For the most part, he sticks to running our salvage operations. Which is good because it frees Eric to spend more time with his family.

“So what’s the deal?”

I glanced at Eric and frowned. “You’re not going to let up about this, are you?”

“Nope.”

“Figured.”

“Why the salt, Gabe? And why so much of it?”

“Let’s get home first. This is best discussed over a drink.”

We were quiet the rest of the walk. I opened the door and went in first, lit a tallow candle in the kitchen, and fed some wood into the stove. The kettle was already full, so I put it on the stovetop and waited.

Sabrina and Eric took a seat at the table. “You’re stalling.”

“I’m putting the kettle on. Want some tea?”

“Sure.”

“Then shut up and wait.”

I could almost feel Eric and Sabrina exchange a glance. My daughter was still a little unsure of herself around me, but she and Eric got along just fine. In fact, they had hit it off from the get-go and had been in cahoots ever since. Even worse, somewhere along the way, they had drawn Elizabeth into their conspiratorial little circle. I was now hopelessly outnumbered, and I did not hold the belief this situation would amend itself any time soon.

The kettle started to whistle while I deposited little white bags into ceramic mugs with the names and skylines of extinct cities on them and poured in the water. Sabrina got Seattle, Chicago went to Eric, and I settled for Los Angeles. I always hated Los Angeles.

“I always wanted to see Los Angeles,” Sabrina said.

I grunted disapprovingly.
Figures
. “Trust me, sweetie. You’re not missing anything.”