Path of the Horseman (28 page)

Simon muttered under his breath, probably not
even aware that I was standing behind him. Once he made up his mind
about where he wanted to go, he turned and started walking through
the dark, rocky desert.

I looked over my shoulder to check on Maddy.
Her body language was practically screaming for me not to talk to
her, and I knew I’d crushed any chance of her seeing a friend in
me, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to try.

Maddy felt me staring at her and slowed down.
A flash of nervousness went through her eyes, but she hardened them
quickly.

“The trail’s that way,” she stated.

Well. That answers that.
I sighed,
gave up on explaining myself, and walked after my brother.

***

The trail was insane. It twisted and weaved
in directions that made no sense to me, took us between narrow
walls of rock, then flattened out into wide open plains. Earlier
on, I was grateful that Simon was looking at his map. I thought it
meant he was checking the directions so we wouldn’t get lost. Now I
wasn’t so sure.

But we didn’t see a single soul on the hike.
No Plagued, no Soulless, no humans. If there was any wildlife out
here, they were keeping themselves hidden. When the Plague consumed
the world, it hadn’t only corrupted human life. I morphed it so it
could be transmitted into animals. I had as much guilt over that as
I did with the humans, but my job had been to wipe the earth clean
of all life. Still, it didn’t seem fair that the animals wouldn’t
even get an ark to float to safety.

Not that anywhere was really safe when we
were done.

“We’re almost there,” Simon reported ahead of
us. He nudged his torch up. “Once we pass that hill, we’ll be at
the cabins. We can take a short break, then head for the
campground.”

“Sounds good to me.”

Simon tucked the map into his pocket and
started to climb. I gave him enough space, then started to follow.
The hill was off the main trail, so the climb was a little more
arduous. My footing slipped a couple times and I needed to support
myself with one hand to keep from face planting into the sand.

Simon had the same issues as me, but he made
it to the top of the hill without falling on his face. When I
reached the top, I brought myself up in a single smooth motion.
Before Simon could scoff and say something sarcastic to hide his
jealousy, I turned and checked on Maddy.

She was making her way just fine, but her
steps were slower and heavier. I frowned. Maddy was a survivor, but
how long had it been since she’d slept or ate? I couldn’t picture
her sleeping in Kade’s suite, which meant Maddy had been awake
since the demon attack, and she might not have eaten anything since
then. Being held prisoner, running for her life, and wandering
through the desert with two men she didn’t trust couldn’t be
helping her state. I watched her stumble at the top of the hill,
and rushed over to help her.

Maddy flinched when I took her hands and
pulled her to her feet. She struggled and tried to pull away, but I
didn’t want her to go tumbling down the hill, so I pulled her
closer.

Maddy tripped and bumped against my chest,
staring at me with wide, confused eyes. I was the bringer of death
in her eyes, but here I was, hanging onto her gently and making
sure she could stand. For a single, desperate moment, I thought
Maddy was going to trust me again. Her expression softened, and she
looked at me with the same curiosity as she had before. I thought
that she would see that I was trying to be more than the instrument
of destruction.

Then she pulled her yanked her hands out of
my fingers and stepped back. She held her wrists up and scanned
them eagerly.

“What did you do to me?”

I slumped. “Pulled you up so you didn’t fall
down a hill.”

Maddy glared. “So what happens now? Am I
going to drop dead like those two guards you took down at the
Venetian?”

“I didn’t kill them,” I defended. “I
paralyzed them.”

She lowered her hands and snorted.
“Right.”

I could have given up then, but she was
talking to me. This had to mean that she was willing to see reason.
Didn’t it? I took a very small, very careful step toward her. Maddy
stiffened, but didn’t back away.

“I’ll tell you a secret,” I said.

That made Maddy even tenser. Definitely the
wrong approach, but there was no going back.

“The things that let us out put us in human
bodies,” I explained. “I feel everything that you do, all the
emotions and sensations. It helped us blend in. We were given
endless banks of memories so we could understand everything around
us, and could complete our mission effectively.”

“Avery.”

I ignored Simon. I was just feet away from
Maddy, and she wasn’t trying to run or punch me.

“But when I felt the gravity of what I was
doing, when I saw all the lives I was ruining…” I lowered my eyes
and shook my head. “I can’t tell you how terrible it was. To know
that I was the reason it all started, and there was nothing I could
do to stop it. I was made to believe there would be another chance
for humanity. I tried to tell myself that this was the right thing
to do, it had to be done, all that crap. But it was torture.”

“Then why didn’t you stop?”

I sighed. “I couldn’t.”

“Yes, you could have,” she protested. “You
have all these incredible powers that I don’t understand, but you
never tried to reverse the Plague.”

“I did try!” I shouted. I took a deep breath
and lowered my voice. “There’s nothing that can be done about the
Soulless since they aren’t under my control, and the Plagued remain
dead when I lift the infection from them.” I scrubbed a hand over
my face. “There is no cure. I made sure of it.”

I couldn’t bring myself to look at the hatred
on Maddy’s face. I was half expecting her to pull out the knife I
loaned her and shove it into my skull. I didn’t think I would stop
her. The weight in my chest was too heavy. Every time I thought
about the fires and smoke, the starving humans lying next to their
dead friends, the lifeless creatures walking without a direction or
purpose, it was enough to make me scream. Enough to make me want to
kill every Plagued I saw just to end their oblivious misery. Enough
to find all the surviving humans, drop to my knees, beg
forgiveness, and take all the beatings and abuse they would rain
down on me. I ignored Simon calling my name again and debated on
starting my forgiveness campaign with Maddy, when her voice stopped
me.

“You really mean that.”

I looked up, glad it was uncertainty in her
eyes and not hatred.

“You risked your life for ours, because you
actually want to save us. Not to finish the job you started. Which
is what you could have done the moment you saw us.”

She was talking it out to make sense of it
all. I wanted to feel good about that, but the tightness in my
chest just wouldn’t leave. I don’t know what Maddy saw on my face
when I nodded, but her stare was sympathetic. I didn’t want pity. I
just wanted her to forgive me.

Her face was cast in shadow, but the torch
illuminated her well enough. Thick, honey blonde hair rested
against her pale, tired face. The smell of dirt, blood, and stale
sweat on her skin didn’t bother me because she was standing so
close to me. I could feel the warmth of her breath as it left her
perfect, full lips. Every time I looked at Maddy, I saw something
new. The light freckles on her nose. A new shade of blue in her
eyes. The birthmark hiding under her right ear. Her beauty was
hypnotizing, but that wasn’t what made my heart race.

Maddy was the only person I knew who could be
two things at once. Fragile and strong, hopeful and practical,
selfless and independent. I wanted to do everything in my power to
make her life simpler, to keep her safe and see her happy. If I
could only save one person, I wanted it to be Maddy.

She read my expression again, and took a
careful breath. I don’t know what she saw, and it didn’t matter.
Maddy was seeing the real me now. Whatever she did next was up to
her.

Slowly, tentatively, she moved toward my
face, glancing quickly at my lips–

“Avery!”

Maddy jumped back and I turned on Simon,
ready to knock him out.

The impulse disappeared when I saw what was
behind him, probably the same thing that was making him so
antsy.

Sitting in front of a spiky wall of rough,
rust-colored rock was a nightmarish forest. Decaying roots were
strewn across the dirt road like stretched out snakes. They grew
thicker and draped lazily over one another as they neared the clump
of trees. I took a step closer to my brother, and saw that the
expansive mess spreading out twenty feet across the road wasn’t a
set of trees at all. The source of the twisted growing seemed to be
a creosote bush that must have been injected with steroids. The
stems of the plant were ten times as thick as they should be, the
thinner branches extended in wild directions, the far ends drooping
under the weight of the sickly grey leaves and shriveled black
flowers. Some of the branches coiled around each other in knots,
and others looked a little too much like barbed wire. I thought I
could see something rectangular behind it, but when I shone my
torchlight on the mini Sleepy Hollow, all I did was bleach out the
color from the branches and make the wall look creepier.

“The cabin’s supposed to be right there,”
Simon said, staring at the map as if it could explain what we were
looking at.

“Maybe the cabin’s behind it,” offered Maddy,
who had sidled up beside me when I wasn’t looking. I was shocked
that she was so close to me, but even more so when she added, “We
should check it out.”

Simon forgot about the map and gaped at her.
“You see that thing, right? The wall that basically screams ‘Enter
and Die’?”

Maddy’s smile was smug and teasing. A look I
never thought I would see from her again. “Come on, Simon. This was
your idea. Don’t be a chicken.”

He pursed his lips and glared at her. “I’m
not being a chicken. I’m being reasonable.”

Maddy’s lips split into a full smile. Her
eyes sparkled with challenge.

“Know who says that? Chickens.”

Without any warning, Maddy dashed down the
hill toward the unnatural forest. I hurried after the reckless
human girl, hearing Simon swear before chasing after me.

I almost expected Maddy to run full tilt into
the snarl of branches, but she slowed down where the wall was
thickest. I came up behind her, making enough noise so she wouldn’t
be startled. I stood by her side, coming to the same conclusion she
had.

“Doesn’t look like there’s a way in,” she
stated.

I looked at the angry branches in front of
me, then put the torchlight on my belt and drew the machete from my
back. I glanced at Maddy and grinned.

“Guess we’ll have to make our own.”

Maddy smiled without restraint, making my
heart soar. I had no problem clearing a path for her.

She moved to where Simon was standing, both
of them giving me space to swing the machete with both hands. The
first slash cut through the branches like they were made of tissue.
I watched the top of the wall, making sure it wouldn’t cave in on
me. Assured it would hold its structure, I continued hacking until
I had enough space to slip inside.

The branches for the creosote bush smelled
musty and old. Their tips scratched my face and tugged at my hair.
Maddy’s frustrated sighs came from behind me, and Simon’s
indiscernible cursing beyond that. I focused on cutting my way
through, my swings becoming harder and more frequent. I hated
feeling trapped.

But I was making progress. Through the
tangle, I could make out the edges of a red brick building against
the rock wall. And something sitting in front of that building.

I paused for a moment, not sure I believed
what I was seeing.
It can’t be…

I couldn’t see clearly to make up my mind, so
I started chopping faster and harder than ever, no longer caring
about the branches scratching my face. Soon I was all but shoving
the branches aside, and tumbling out of the knotted wall onto the
hard sand floor. I kept my footing, looked up, and froze in
place.

I didn’t expect to see the pale grey Horse
staring at me with angry black eyes, but I didn’t pay much
attention to the animal. I was too busy staring at its master.

It didn’t show on his face, but I knew he was
as surprised to see me, as I was to see him. He sat on a squat red
boulder, wearing a long black trench coat, black pants, and a plain
black shirt. His razor straight, crow black hair brushed his
shoulders, and he looked even paler in the darkness. A small goatee
circled his lips. A cigarette was clutched in his gloved hand,
trails of smoke drifting in front of him. He reclined back and took
a long drag from it. He blew out the smoke, murky black eyes
staring at me with disinterest.

“Well,” said Logan. “This is unexpected.”

I was going to respond with something like,
‘You’ve got that right,’ or even ‘No shit,’ but I was still coming
out of the shock of seeing my oldest brother. After his
confrontation with Kade, I thought I’d never see Logan again. I
certainly didn’t think he’d still be kicking around the wasteland
of Nevada. But every time I blinked, there he was, sitting and
smoking casually.
With his Horse.