Prophet of the Badlands (The Awakened Book 1) (16 page)

“There’s an old town that way.” Zhar pointed. “Might be some stuff there we can scavenge. I didn’t want to go there at first in case a bandits… and it’s off course.”

“How far is it, and do they have bolt cutters or a hacksaw?” Rachel shifted, looking for a more comfortable seat.

“The hell is a hacksaw?” Zhar glanced at her. “Maybe two days… One if Aya wasn’t so lazy.”

“I’m not lazy,” the curvy woman mewled. “I’m just not used to walking.”

“She has been kept since she was small.” Althea spoke in an ephemeral tone, like a detached observer. “She does not know how to fend for herself. She has always been owned.”

“Like you?” Zhar quipped.

“No.” Althea fiddled with the agate arrowhead. “I am stolen a lot, but I am not owned.”

Zhar smiled at the spark of willfulness in the girl. “Good. Stay here, I will hunt.”

“There.” Althea pointed. “Bread root grows.”

Zhar squinted in the direction she indicated. “What?”

With a sigh, Althea let her foot slip forward and stood. “I can see in the dark. I will find food-plant. No bang.”

Althea clambered up the rock face on all fours to what had once been riverbank some dozen feet above the mucky bed. She ventured into the flat open ground towards an uneven section covered in scattered growth. Remembering months of memorization, she smiled fondly at thoughts of the closest thing she had ever known to a father. Reed’s voice whispered the names of herbs in her memory’s ear as she knelt and scratched at the ground.

When she returned with an armload of breadroot tubers, she found Ramani failing to weave a skirt out of too-short grass, and Rachel seething as she repeatedly bashed her wrists into a rock trying to break her restraints. Althea slid down the gentle curve of the stone into the space around the pitiful stream, and distributed her findings before taking a seat by Rachel and holding one out to feed her.

Rachel stared at the plant in front of her lips, trembling with a curious mixture of anger, finality, and humiliation. Althea titled her head, feeling several emotions cycle through Rachel’s energy as well as on her face. The woman finally narrowed her eyes, overtaken by a transcendent calm. Being “fed” like a pet had tweaked the last nerve.

Her voice was a shuddery near-whisper. “Kid, I’ve had enough of these fucking things. I am not walking another god damned hour like this. I’m not sleeping another god damned night like this.”

Zhar threw a dubious stare at Althea. “Don’t you dare magic me.”

The shaking woman leaned, touching foreheads with Althea. “At the arena, you fixed that man’s arm when the bones were cut clean through. I need you to do the same for me.”

Althea trembled. “But, you are not hurt.”

“You want someone to cut your hand off?” Zhar glanced at the spear, blinking in disbelief.

“No!” Althea begged. “Please, Zhar, Please shoot the chain. Don’t make me force―”

Everyone jumped at a sudden loud crack. Rachel’s soft, brown face reddened as she screamed through clenched teeth. Shuddering, her mouth fell open in a silent cry of agony as she writhed. When her hands came free in front of her, it was evident she had broken her thumb. A grin of endorphin elation alighted upon her face as she held her disfigured limb up and laughed at the dangling cuffs.

“Why didn’t you do that yesterday?” Zhar muttered over a mouthful of root mash.

Althea shot a somber stare at Zhar. “Even you would cry at this hurt.”

She set her hand on Rachel’s, numbing the pain as soon as she could focus. Once she was sure Rachel could feel nothing, Althea yanked the thumb into place, making a faint crunch. Aya and Ramani cringed away. A moment of focusing on the broken bones brought a muted crunch, and an intact hand. With her arms now free, Rachel squeezed Althea in a desperate embrace that tried to make up for weeks of wanting to hug the one person who kept her sane through the nightmare in which she woke up. Rachel cried first, but after a minute, it was unclear who consoled who. Loving contact was not something Althea encountered often.

“Lock the loose end on the same wrist so you don’t get caught on something.” Zhar muttered over a mouthful of tuber.

Rachel grabbed her other thumb and shuddered as tears ran down her cheeks.

She drew in a breath. “Screw that… I want this fucker gone.”

Althea grabbed her hand. “Let me stop pain first!”

The snap of the break was startling, despite everyone expecting it. This time Rachel’s face did not distort and she stared at her twisted appendage with curiosity as she wriggled the metal horror over her hand and threw it as hard as she could off into the sands.

Once Althea mended her hand, Rachel’s ration of tubers died a fast death. She reveled in the ability to feed herself after weeks of total dependence on others. The amount of relief and confidence Althea felt from her was a stark change from how she had been, as though she had turned into a different person inside. Rachel took the second spear as they huddled close for warmth again through the night.

Althea was happy to have someone who would protect her.

har nudged everyone awake a few minutes before the sun slid over the eastern horizon. Getting started before light afforded a little bit of protection in case any surviving raiders continued to look for them. Althea was quick to point out Vakkar’s men were not the only threats out here. One by one, they got up, shivering, and prepared to set out into the frigid morning.

Rachel shook her head at the sight. “Four women traipsing around bare-assed with a kid… Wouldn’t we get a bit of sympathy if we find some survivors?”

Zhar laughed. “You don’t know this place. Don’t even matter we’re women. Anyone out here roaming around is gonna try to take anyone weak looking captive. The safe spots are inside towns like mine.”

“If we don’t fight, we will be okay.” Aya smiled with unconvincing hope.

“Hey, you might feel cute with that metal thing around your neck, but no one, and I mean
fucking
no one, is gonna put a collar on me.” Rachel’s voice dripped with venom.

Ramani looked down, ashamed. Aya picked at her collar with a helpless look, having known no other life. Jealousy radiated from Zhar; Rachel had no unwanted metal locked anywhere on her body. She looked the least like a slave. Even if they failed to hinder them physically, the collars were a mark of station.

Althea put a hand on Rachel’s arm. “People will see the slave-metal on their neck and treat them like runaways. All towns are not nice.”

Zhar nodded, sounding humble for once and radiating the shame she had been hiding so long. “Yeah. A girl walks naked into most places the people feel bad for you… give you some clothes and a hot meal. If you got one of these on, you might get sympathy, but you’ll probably get put in a cage. This tells people you’re weak.”

Rachel took a step and grasped Aya’s collar, examining it. “This is just a cheap padlock. Fuck’s sake, gimme the gun. Spear’s heavier, but too unwieldy.” She held a hand to Zhar, who took a step back.

“I ain’t gonna
waste bullets
, bitch.” Rachel made a “give it here” gesture with her fingers.

“Trust her,” Althea said.

Zhar handed it over, scowling.

Rachel guided the Japanese girl to a large rock, balancing her over it with the collar braced against the stone such that the padlock dangled. A couple whacks from the handle of the pistol scratched it, but had little other effect.

Rachel grumbled. “Shit. My arms are fucked from being cuffed so long… stasis didn’t help much, either. These padlocks will pop open if you hit ‘em just right.”

Althea put a hand on Rachel’s back and concentrated, reaching with her mind into the amorphous shapes of her life essence. She focused energy toward the parts that corresponded to the arms, sending a surge of blood and adrenaline.

Rachel lifted an eyebrow as her muscles undulated and grew in prominence.

Althea smiled. “Try now. Hurry, it will not last long.”

One wallop popped the lock, astounding Rachel with her temporary strength. Ramani could not wait to dive over the stone, almost tackling Aya out of the way.

“I thought Aya was the only one here that eager to bend over.” Zhar chuckled.

“Stop it.” Althea glared. “Can’t you be nice to one person?”

Zhar reluctantly followed suit. She gave Rachel a look as if she expected the pistol to come down on her head rather than the lock, but the strike came true and destroyed the collar. Aya rubbed her bare neck, staring with powerless fear. Something in the woman’s eyes evoked pity from Zhar, and she put an arm around Aya’s back as the group got underway again. She told her about the city she came from and how she did not have to be anyone’s property again, provided they made it. The town had something called “electricity,” and the safety of a mountain to hide under.

Hours passed as the sun wound its way across the sky. Rachel swung the spear about as they traveled, acclimating to its weight and complete lack of balance. Zhar held up a hand to stop them as a structure came into view by a long strip of that same strange black stone path Althea remembered from the Lost Place.

She ran up ahead, squatted at the edge, and touched it. The strange stone burned her, but she smiled anyway. Waving her hand to cool it, she looked in both directions through the scintillating blur clinging to the surface. The others caught up, wary eyes upon the building across from where they had stopped.

“What’s wrong?” Rachel crouched next to Althea.

“This black stone path, I saw it in the Lost Place… where my home is.”

“Lost Place?” Ramani looked up. “What is that?”

Althea described it.

“Sounds like an abandoned city.” Zhar smirked. “There are hundreds of them all over the Badlands.”

Althea looked down with a face as if she had learned someone died. If there were many Lost Places, she may never find her way back to Den.

Rachel rubbed Althea’s back. “This is called a road. There used to be many of them. It’s what cars drive on.”

This, of course, begat a description of what cars were.

Althea had seen a lot of them, but never realized they were supposed to move. She had thought they were for making walls.

“Let’s check the building.” Zhar pointed.

Rachel pulled Althea to her feet, holding her hand in an effort to chase away the sadness settled into the child’s face. “Looks like a burger joint, something along the highway. From the size of it, this was probably an interstate.”

“Highway?” Althea looked up.

“The road.” Rachel smiled.

“But it’s… not high, it’s on the ground.”

“Come on.” Rachel shook her head.

The women sprinted over the boiling surface, pausing to let their feet cool in the shadow of a man, twenty feet tall, made of shattered plastic wrapped about a steel form. Dressed in white, the statue once held an arm aloft. Its eyes were broken out, but the exaggerated smile still gleamed in the sun. Fragments of the old sign had long ago been carried off by the wind and the frame now played host to an army of weeds and ants. Idle hornets glided in and out through the cracks riddling the large chef’s hat.

Most of the building’s windows were broken out, and bullet holes decorated the interior walls. Pictures of plated food hung over a countertop littered with junk and dishes.