Refugees from the Righteous Horde (Toxic World Book 2) (9 page)

Everyone turned to him. Jeb licked his lips and continued.

“An older guy. I met him before I was captured by the cult. Said it was two month’s walk to the south from here along a dried up river. They had a real nice outfit going the
re. From what he said it was bigger than this place and just as advanced.”

“So why did he leave?” The Doctor said, doubt lacing his voice.

Jeb shrugged. “He was a wanderer. Never stayed put except in winter. You know how scavengers are. I was a farmer myself.”

The Doctor let out a bitter little laugh. “And I bet he tried to sell you a treasure map to this place!”

Jeb shook his head. “No. But it sure sounded nice. Electricity, machines. . .civilization, just like here.”

“We’re the only city left,” The Doctor
stated.

Jeb studied him
.
And you’re damn proud of that, aren’t you? You wouldn’t be so special if you weren’t the only one. But maybe you aren’t the only one. Maybe the rumors are true.

“So where is this guy now?” Clyde asked. Jeb noticed he still had the
pistol pointed at him.

“He wintered with us a few years back and wandered off come spring. I never saw him again.”

“The point isn’t whether these rumors are true or not,” Annette said, “what matters is that The Pure One thinks they are so that’s where he’s headed.”

The Doctor wound some gauze around Jeb’s forearm. “In that case he’s no longer a threat. He and the rest of those fundamentalist throwbacks will starve out on the plains. We can forget about them.”

Annette shook her head. “No we can’t. He’ll wreck the farms, kill all the scavengers. Look how much he’s laid waste to the countryside already! What are we going to do for trade next harvest fair? There won’t be any more scavengers or independent farmers coming in. And who’s to say he won’t turn back around and try to get us, or take over that city and build his own little empire?”

“As long as he’s alive he’s a threat,” Clyde agreed.

The Doctor didn’t say anything, lost in thought.

“You said I could go hunt him down. Let me do that and end this once
and for all,” Annette said.

“I agree,” Clyde said. “It’s the best strategic alternative.”

The Doctor hesitated. Before he could say anything Jeb spoke up.

“Let me join you. I want to help.”

Annette looked at him. “What can you do?”

Jeb suddenly remembered
something.

“On the march The Pure One doesn’t wear his white robes,” he said. “Wants to look less conspicuous in case of attack. I can identify him for you.”

“We know what he looks like.”

“He wears a cowl. So does his high priest. If you haven’t seen their
robes up close you won’t be able to tell the difference.”

The Doctor gave him a suspicious look. “And what do you want in return?”

The next words surprised everyone, Jeb most of all. They came out naturally, without any thought or conniving.

“I want to li
ve here.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Bridget looked at Susanna. The Weissberg woman’s face was etched with lines of concern.

“You look half dead. All of you do.”

Susanna nodded. “We hardly got anything to eat on the march, and after the attack the Righteous Horde left us behind. I was with one of the other porters. He had a pack of food and I had a pack of blankets. Some machete men stole them. We were lucky they didn’t kill us.”

“You poor dears,” Bridget said.

Susanna took a second look at her. Bridget looked to be in her late twenties, well fed like all the citizens and reasonably attractive. She was dressed in canvas pants and a homespun sweater. Her face was open and simple. Unlike Susanna’s other captors, her expressions of sympathy appeared to be heartfelt.

Then something else caught her attention—Bridget had the trace of a black eye.

Had that happened in the attack, or at some other time?

Bridget went on talking. “You seem nice. Mr. Weissman said I could pick out a servant to help around the house. I hav
e two kids and they run me ragged. Plus there’s all the housework to do. We used to have a servant but she got killed in the attack.”

Bridget’s face clouded over.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Susanna said.

Bridget brightened again. “Would you like to work in
my home? Derren says it’s OK.”

“Is Derren your husband?”

“Yes,” Bridget said, as a strange flicker of emotion passed over her face. Susanna couldn’t figure out what it was. Fear? Embarrassment? It sure wasn’t happiness. The expression passed, quickly replaced with Bridget’s usual smile. “He’s our Head of the Watch. He’s very busy as we set up Weissberg so I don’t get to see him much. I’m lonely at home and would love some extra help. Please say yes!”

Susanna thought for a moment. There was something a bit off here, but it couldn’t be worse than her current situation. And working in one of the homes would get her out of sight of the guards and away from the barracks.

“All right,” Susanna said.

“That’s great!” Bridget said, sounding unusually happy and relieve
d. “Derren told me that you’d have to sleep in the barracks, and I’d have to pick you up and drop you off. Otherwise you’re like one of the family.”

One of the family? Yeah, right.

Susanna smiled. Yes, there’s was something wrong with this woman. She seemed to blithely ignore what was going on around her. Or maybe that was just Susanna’s own cynicism. She had been unhappy for so long maybe she couldn’t recognize happiness in other people anymore.

Bridget turned to the guard. “Carlos, I’m picking this
one.”

Carlos nodded. “Derren told me you’d come today. Best to go on home now.”

“Oh, right! We have a lot to do before dinnertime. Tell Derren I got some nice lamb for dinner. His favorite! He will come, won’t he?” Bridget looked pained.

“I’ll tell him,” C
arlos replied, looking bored.

Bridget took Susanna by the hand—a strange, intimate gesture that made Susanna cringe—and led her to the small cluster of houses on one side of the compound.

They came to a large cabin made of hewn logs. Susanna was surprised to see glass in the windows. Unbroken panes of glass from the Old Times were hard to find and demanded high trade. Two young boys were roughhousing in the yard.

“These are my boys, Tommy and Kent. They’re sev
en and six. Tommy, Kent, say hello to. . .um. . .”

“Susanna.”

“What the hell is she doing here?” Tommy asked.

“Now Tommy, be nice. She’s come to cook and clean, like April used to do.”

“She one of those Righteous Horde scum?” Kent asked, trying to put on an adult voice.

“Now Kent, be nice. Remember what I told you. They’re not to blame for what happened.”

Bridget gave Susanna an apologetic smile. The boys went back to wrestling in the dirt. Kent squawked as Tommy pulled his hair. Bridget gave a nervous laugh.

“Boys will be boys,” Bridget said.

She led Susanna inside. Half the cabin was taken up with a generous front room that acted as a lounge, dining room, and kitchen. A flagstone hearth stood to one side with various battered cooking implements from the Old Times. A wisp of smoke rose from the red coals. A lumpy homemade couch took up much of one wall, along with a crudely made table and four chairs. Beyond this room was a short hallway with a door on either side and another at the end.

“Home sweet home,” Bridget said in a singsong voice. She stepped into the hallway. “This is Derren’s and my room, this one is for the boys, and the end is the toilet. Isn’t that nice? No outhouse! Derren is very clever. He made all this himself.”

Susanna looked around. From what she could see Derren wasn’t that great of a woodworker. The log walls had several gaps plugged with dried mud, and the furniture looked ready to collapse. Still, it was a big step up from what she’d had to endure these past few months.

“Let’s get star
ted,” Bridget said. “Oh, wait, I bet you’re hungry.”

Bridget went over to a basket sitting by the hearth and pulled out half a loaf of bread and an apple. Susanna’s stomach growled.

“There aren’t many apples left, I’m afraid. Getting too late in the season. Here, let me get you something to put on that bread.”

Bridget went over to a far corner and pulled up a flagstone on the floor. Susanna saw a stone-lined pit underneath with various small bundles.

“Nice and cool in here,” Bridget chattered away. “Such a cold winter we’re having. Almost like the Old Times. Did you know that back then it would snow in the lowlands? Imagine that, just like in the mountains!”

Susanna nodded, her mouth stuffed with bread.

Bridget unwrapped a burlap package and pulled out a chunk of goat’s cheese that she put on the table. Sliding the top of the root cellar closed with a lou
d
clon
k
, she sat down next to Susanna, her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands, and watched Susanna eat.

“My, you’re hungry! So thin too,” Bridget
said.

“The Pure One starved us,” Susanna said around another mouthful of bread as she broke off some of the cheese. “I haven’t eaten this well in months. Thank you.”

“There’s plenty more where that came from. We have everything we need right here.”

“New City is expanding, huh?” Susanna asked.

Bridget laughed. “Oh no! We’re breaking away. Abe and the rest of us are tired of taking The Doctor’s orders. I guess you don’t know, but we have something called the Merchants Association. It’s all the best leaders and businessmen in New City except for a few of The Doctor’s puppets like Marcus and Clyde and the rest. We’re the ones who should be in charge, but we came later. The Doctor and his buddies founded New City so they voted themselves in charge. But we’re the ones who really keep New City going.”

Susanna wondered about that. Abe certainly looked wealthy, but when Bridget said “we” she certainly couldn’t mean herself. She didn’t look like she did much of anything. Susanna could still hear her kids hollering ou
t front, the floor was unswept, and the lamb was still not getting cooked. Back when she had a house to call home, Susanna had kept it in order.

But Susanna supposed that was her job. She finished up the meal and asked, “Shall we get started? How about I s
weep the floor and then I’ll get to work on that lamb?”

“All right,” Bridget said, not moving from the table.

Susanna set to work. It turned out Derren and Bridget didn’t own a broom and so she had to go to the neighbor’s to get one. Susanna was surprised and intrigued to see that Bridget didn’t accompany her. She got the broom, which the neighbor gave to her with a suspicious look and a curt word, and swept out the cabin. In the meantime Kent came in squalling that Tommy had kicked him. Bridget comforted him but did nothing else to intervene. Soon the boys were back outside fighting again. Their screaming became a constant, annoying background noise as Susanna tidied the cabin, boiled some water, and retrieved the lamb from the root cellar.

In the meantime Bridget did nothing except talk about trivialities and take an occasional pull from an earthenware jug that sat on the table. When Susanna’s chores took her close to the table she caught a whiff of corn whiskey. Bridget offered her some but she shook her h
ead.

“I’m too weak to drink,” she said. Her new boss seemed disappointed that Susanna wouldn’t drink with her.

Susanna started preparing the lamb. It was a fine cut of meat and Bridget produced some vegetables and herbs to go with it. Otherwise she did nothing but sit at the table and tell Susanna all the latest gossip about the neighbors. Susanna learned who was sleeping with whom, who had a fight last night, and who complained that they didn’t want to leave New City. Susanna got the impression that not everyone thought it was a good idea to split off, but had followed Abe’s lead anyway. The kids continued playing rough outside. Every now and then one of them would come in to complain about the other.

If I wasn’t
starvingI’d tell these people to stuff it
,
Susanna thought
.
Bratty kids, dirty house, she’s got everything she wants and she just sits here and drinks all day. I’ve been here more than two hours and she hasn’t said anything intelligent yet. I’m learning some interesting things, though. I bet that doctor back in New City would like to hear some of this.

Once the lamb was basting over the hearth, Bridget told her to sit at the table. She broke out more bread and cheese and some dried fruit. Susanna wolfed down everything she was offered. As she ate s
he felt she had misjudged Bridget, or at least the situation she now found herself in. Sure, Bridget was a dull drunk, and the kids were terrors, but she was eating properly again. She felt the weight of the potato hidden inside her shirt and smiled. She’d give it to Donna once she had to go back to the barracks.

That thought gave her pause. While she was warm and well fed now, she’d be back to a cold night with a thin blanket soon enough.

“I hope you’re satisfied with my work, Bridget. It’s so nice working here, and I think you’re fun to talk to.”

The woman brightened. “Really? It’s great having more company around the house than those two monsters.”

“Oh, boys will be boys,” Susanna said, parroting Bridget’s earlier words.

“Do you think I’m pretty?” Bridget
asked suddenly, running her fingers through her hair.

Not particularly, but who am I to talk?

“Oh, you’re lovely! I wish—”

“Derren doesn’t think I’m pretty,” Bridget said, her face darkening. She took another pull from the jug.

“Oh, I’m sure he—”

“He does
n’t.”

Susanna felt a tug of pity. She took Bridget’s hand in both of hers and leaned forward.

“Well, if your husband doesn’t notice your beauty, he’s blind.”

Bridget laughed a little too loud. The whiskey was getting to her. “You’re so right! He’s totally
blind. Dumb too.”

Bridget leaned forward, her face a relaxed grin of drunken confidence. “You know, he’d be nothing without me. I always said, ‘Stick with Abraham Weissman, Derren. Stick with him and you’ll go far. You’re no good with your hands,”—she gest
ured at the poorly made house around them—“you’re not too smart,’ OK I didn’t say that, ‘and you don’t have what it takes to be a farmer or a market trader. But you’re good with a gun. That’s what Abe wants, people good with guns. If you’re loyal to him and can hold your own in a fight, you can go far with him.’ And where is he today? Head of the Watch in Weissberg!”

She raised her hands triumphantly over her head. Susanna nodded and smiled, not knowing what else to do.

Suddenly Bridget got morose. “Yeah, I got him where he is today, and does he appreciate it? Does he appreciate me giving him a good home and taking care of his kids? Hell. No.”

Susanna shifted in her seat, feeling uncomfortable. The smell of the cooking lamb wafted through the air, making her stomach growl. She patted Bridget’s hand and got up to check on dinner. When she turned back to her she found the woman taking a long pull from the jug again.

Tommy and Kent stomped into the room, covered head to toe in dirt. Tommy had torn the knees on his pants and Kent had a cut above the eye.

“Oh God, more trouble,” Bridget grumbled. She turned to Susanna. “Could you heat some water and wash their hands and faces? Then sew Tommy’s pants.”

“It’s Kent’s fault,” Tommy whined. “We were playing and—”

“I don
’t give a shit whose fault it is, how many times do I have to tell you not to ruin your clothes!” Bridget screeched.

Susanna tensed. She’d never liked shouting, and on the march shouting usually meant someone was about to get killed. She got a pail of water and stuck it next to the fire to heat up. Then she basted the lamb again, keeping her back to the sorry scene in the living room.