Three shotguns were pointed at my face.
“Looky what we found,” the leader of our captors announced as he shoved Matthew and me through the crowd in their camp.
On the long trek here, I’d determined that he was as dentally challenged as he was odor-enhanced. Apparently this entire encampment was.
These militiamen were what Jackson would call cou rouge.
Because they were seriously red of the neck.
During our capture, Matthew hadn’t fought whatsoever. In fact, as they’d snared my wrists with those plastic zip ties, he’d put his hands behind him, making it easier for them to bind.
I hadn’t wanted him to resist—we’d been surrounded by aimed rifles—but maybe he could have made a show of displeasure?
We’d been abducted, our van looted, my bag ransacked. The leader had stolen all my jewelry and whiskey bottles, tossing the rest.
Now as the head Cou Rouge maneuvered us through the camp, I kept my eyes open for Jackson and Selena—and tried to ignore the way men stood when I passed, ogling me with lecherous eyes.
They all seemed to have winter-weather gear, though many of their jackets sported what looked like bullet holes. I frowned. Bloody ones—often in the back.
My lips parted with realization. Bullet holes from where they’d gunned down their victims, then stripped their clothes.
“She smells good enough to eat,” one man said as he grabbed his crotch.
I shuddered with revulsion, so tempted to try my claws. They could easily slice through those ties. Matthew had once told me they could even cut through metal.
But then what? These men had guns. I was a slow runner, and I’d never leave Matthew behind.
I’d probably end up cutting myself anyway. And what would I do if dead grass sprouted green under my drops of blood?
Cou Rouge marched us past numerous RVs with their generators humming, scores of tents, and vehicles of all kinds. Cookout fires abounded, with men barbecuing what looked like small mammals. Despite the circumstances, the smell of grilled meat made my mouth water.
I also spotted plastic cans of gas everywhere. I’d decided this militia was rich with fuel—even before I saw an actual tanker. They safeguarded it in the center of the encampment like a golden idol.
And that wasn’t all. Near the tanker was a raised cistern, its iron sides dripping. Filled with water.
Cou Rouge stopped before an improvised jail cell, a cage made from wooden packing crates nailed together. Only one boy was within. At least Jackson and Selena remained free.
Shoving Matthew and me inside, Cou Rouge padlocked the door and posted three guards. “Don’t be leavin’ this spot,” he ordered them. “Not for any reason.”
The other prisoner was around our age, with freckles on his nose and chin-length dirty-blond hair. This boy was the card in the cage I was supposed to be listening for? The one we’d needed to find? He seemed so unremarkable.
“ ’S’up,” he said mildly as we sat on the cold, ashy ground. “Name’s Finneas. Call me Finn. . . .” He trailed off as he stared at me, then Matthew.
He was seeing our tableaus; I knew because I was beholding his. For a split second, Finn was clad in a red robe, holding a wand to the sky while pointing to the ground with his other hand. On a table before him lay a pentagram, a chalice, a sword, and a cane. A bed of roses and lilies grew at his feet, vines trailing above.
—Don’t look at this hand, look at that one.— Then his call grew silent. Was he hearing ours?
And was the boy associated with plants in some way? Matthew’s card also had a flower on it, a white rose!
Of course, so had Death’s card—an emblem on the black flag he carried.
While I was blinking, regaining my focus, Finn said, “Whoa. I think I just had an acid flashback.” He sounded as if he belonged on a beach in Cali.
“I-I’m Evie. This is Matthew.” I indicated him with a jerk of my chin.
Matthew met his gaze and said, “Card. Arcana. Secrets. Card.”
“Whatever, dude.”
“Um, Finn, I couldn’t help but notice that you seem really calm.”
Matthew, too, looked unaffected by our predicament. He began inspecting the grain on one of the boards.
“I am calm, blondie.”
“Even though these men are probably slavers or cannibals?”
“Nah, homeowners’ association gone awry.”
I frowned at his flippant tone. “What do they want with us?”
“They’re going to use me and your weird companion here as cistern diversion.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Bagman bait. The woods around here are thick with Baggers. At dusk, they advance on that cistern in this big wave of creep—unless live meat runs past and distracts them. Then the hicks pick them off. Oh, and while we’re out running for our lives, you’re going to be married off to, like, all of this militia. Mazel tov.”
Dread swept over me—for both Matthew and myself. “H-how many soldiers are there?”
“Hundreds.”
“Hundreds?” Even if Jackson managed to figure out what happened to us, I didn’t know if we could be rescued.
“They’re just waiting for nightfall. Then you’re s.o.l., sister. There’s only one other chick in the entire camp. But she’s the chief redneck’s daughter, so they consider her off-limits, kind of a Smurfette situation.” He exhaled, grinning up at the slats of the cage roof. “Smoking body on that one—but shy a few teeth. Still, I’d do Hickette with a flag over her face.”
“Excuse me?”
Matthew chuckled. “Do her for his country.”
“Matthew!” I cried, frowning at him. I’d thought of him as more . . . innocent.
Finn laughed with him, the two of them apparently fast friends.
Ugh. Teenage boys! Jackson had told me I didn’t understand them. I realized then that I probably never would. “You two are joking around, not concerned about this at all.”
“I just had a hot blonde dropped into a Caged Heat scenario with me.” Finn waggled his brows. “A chesty blonde—with all her teeth. As my Flash-fried redneck cousins used to say, ‘I’m happy as a pig in shit.’ ”
Plant association or not, this self-important, smirky boy was getting on my nerves.
When he relaxed back against the side of the cage, I said, “You probably have someone coming to save you?”
“I can get out of this at any time.”
“Really?”
“I only let them capture me so I could get close to that daughter. I’m a magician, hotness. Getting out of binds is what I do.”
“The Magician,” Matthew said.
Finn’s chest puffed out. “Damn straight, dude.”
If he was an Arcana, then he had powers of some sort. Still, I couldn’t buy his total lack of worry. “Well, we have friends who are coming for us,” I told him under my breath, my words full of assurance. “We’ll be rescued soon.”
But time kept passing. One hour. Another.
For afternoon amusement, some soldiers set up target practice nearby—three moaning Bagmen impaled on spikes. One Bagger looked freshly turned, one had no legs, and the other no arms.
The soldiers opened fire and the Bagmen writhed and gurgled. Chunks of slimy skin flew off the targets, plopping near the cage, fouling the air.
I held my arms over my head to block out the gunshots, the moans. . . .
By late afternoon, I caught myself wondering why Jackson and Selena—two hard-core survivors—would risk their necks against tremendously shitty odds to rescue their pair of deadweights?
How strong was Selena’s influence over Jackson?
As much as I wanted to believe in our rescue, my current predicament—freezing, huddled in a cage, starving—wasn’t boosting my optimism.
Much less my future predicament.
And Matthew would say nothing to help. Did he not understand what was about to happen to us?
By sunset, I was awash in doubt. Why wouldn’t Jackson and Selena just run off together and be happy, without all the hassle, without all the danger? How many times had Jackson told me I was more trouble than I was worth?
I wondered how I would recover if he’d truly abandoned me here.
I wondered how I’d feel if he got killed trying to save me from these ignorant militiamen.
My eyes watered. At that moment, I hit my limit of fear and confusion and . . . and people. I was sick of them! Sick of danger lurking around every corner.
“Is everybody evil now?” I murmured to no one.
I had the strangest urge to shove my fingers into the dirt and feel them . . . take root. What if I could tap the earth and become a soldier at attention? I wouldn’t even have to be a girl anymore, just a part of something so much bigger.
If I surrendered, there’d be no more worries about Jackson, no more fears about facing the red witch—or Death.
Such a seductive pull . . . as alluring as a ripe berry. I gazed at the sooty ground with contemplation.
Then I grew ashamed. What would Mom think of me now? The woman who’d tackled a Bagman would never surrender like this.
“Yeah, everybody’s totally evil now,” Finn said, jarring me from my thoughts. “What, didja miss the memo? Dickwads. Pretty much uniformly, in my experience. All evil, all the time. But not me.” In a grand ringmaster’s tone, he breathed, “I’m mischievous. . . .”
I turned to Matthew. “Once again, anytime you feel like contributing, please do. We need to figure out our own escape.”
He nodded winningly. “Cards.”
“Yes, Matthew, but you really need—” A wail sounded from the nearby woods. I shot up straighter. “What was that?”
“Bagmen at the gates, baby,” Finn said, excitement flashing in his hazel eyes. “It’s almost showtime. I’ve only seen this from a distance before.”
Suddenly the earth quaked, an explosion rocking the camp. I cried out. The deafening blast was so strong my teeth clattered.
Bits of debris rained down through the slats of the cage. Smoke billowed. Men yelled from all directions, barking orders for fires to be put out.
Matthew yawned as a larger explosion followed.
When we heard a raging whoosh from that giant cistern toppling over, I shared a stunned glance with Finn.
Bagmen in number. A cistern of water.
“We’ll be overrun,” he said. “A pretty ballsy distraction. Did your people make with the mayhem?”
Chaos had broken out among the militia. “Yeah. Our people.”
Chapter 36
Smoke and fog blanketed the air until we could barely see five feet away.
But we could hear panicked soldiers all around us, fighting to secure their encampment. Then we heard a strangled yell: “Bagger breach!” They were past the militia’s defenses.
Guns popped, men screamed—and Bagmen howled as they swarmed the camp. The trio of guards in front of us shifted nervously, guns rattling in their shaking hands.
“Evie!” Jackson?
“I’m here!” He’d come for me!
An arrowhead suddenly jutted from one guard’s back. I just choked down a scream as he collapsed, twitching on the ground.
Jackson’s arrow.
The two remaining guards grew spooked, rifles at the ready, but they couldn’t see their enemy to fight.
Another arrow protruded from a second guard’s neck; he twirled toward us, patting his throat in bewilderment before he drowned on his own blood. The third guard got wise—and fled.
Then I spied Jackson sprinting through the smoke, hell-bent for our cage. He shoved soldiers out of the way, battering them with the end of his crossbow.
He skidded to a stop right before me, scanning me for injuries. “Bébé, are you okay?”
I nodded wordlessly.
“I’m goan to get you out of here.”
“The door’s padlocked, Jackson.”
“Putain.” But that didn’t stop him. He drew back his mighty fist and punched the boards, again and again, ripping at them to get to me. Splinters and blood flying.
I glanced behind him, caught sight of that third guard returning. Right when I was about to scream, Jackson yelled, “Selena, my six!”
The tip of a long arrow emerged from that guard’s chest. He’d just pitched onto his face when Selena came running up. My vision had come true. Sure enough, she saved someone I . . . love.
“Come on, J.D.!” she yelled. “It’s going to blow!”
What was going to blow? Something bigger than the current earthshaking explosions?
As Jackson freed Matthew and me, Finneas gawked at Selena—probably from witnessing her tableau, possibly because she was so freaking gorgeous anyway. “Another chick? Hellooo, hotness.” Though we were surrounded by a melee, Finn took his time checking her out. “Dude. It is raining hot ass today. Screw the toothless daughter—I’m coming with you guys.”
His bindings fell away. Sure enough, he’d escaped them.
Jackson grabbed my upper arm, and we started running, back in the direction of the van. I thought.
As we sprinted past the worst of the fray, I noticed several flaming arrows plugged that gas tanker. Time bomb.
“Come on, Evie!” Jackson was hauling me along; the rest of our group had run ahead. “You got to be faster than this!”
“Trying!”
He had just slowed, probably to toss me over his shoulder, when a soldier emerged from a bank of haze—with a rifle pointed at Jackson’s face.
It was Cou Rouge, the one who’d taken me. He wasn’t more than a few feet away—and he had Jackson dead to rights. “Just be steppin’ away from her, all nice and easylike, and we’ll let you go.”
Jackson evinced no fear. “Not goan to happen.”
“We only want the girl.”
“Well, now, that’s a problem,” Jackson grated, “ ’cause I just got her.”