I believed the Chariot was a decent-minded, disciplined guy. But I also suspected he would slit my throat with a song in his heart if it meant saving his wife.
Still, he'd gotten me thinking. What if we Arcana had all banded together to fight our shitty fates?
Each of us had myriad weaknesses and strengths. Ogen had been immune to my poison but suffered from hydrophobia. Though Joules didn't have great physical strength, he could electrify his body in defense. Gabriel's black-feathered wings were awing, but they were also a huge target. All-powerful Aric had succumbed to Paul's influence, yet hapless Finn had been unaffected.
What could we all have accomplished if we'd pooled the resources of twenty-two Arcana?
Would even the gods have trembled?
I leaned my head back and stared at the ceiling, thoughts racing. This was my first night away from Aric in months. I tried to call up a memory of his unguarded smile, but all I saw was that rage in his eyes.
The image of him in the window had been seared into my brain forever. I'd learned something in that moment: Rage is a type of madness.
Would he ever come back from it? Did some deep-down part of him understand what he'd done? No matter what, he must be hurting.
How was Lark dealing with her grief? A new worry emerged. What would happen if she tried her faunagenesis--on Finn?
No, Paul would never allow it. The Hanged Man's powers had been activated with that kill.
Closing my eyes, I replayed Finn's beach illusion. That last bit of harmony had been the calm before the storm. Years seemed to have passed, but less than a day had gone by.
Finn's voice echoed in my head. I freaking love you guys.
Tears spilled down my cheeks.
Though I cried silently, Joules woke. In a rough voice, he said, "Finn was my friend too."
14
Day 536 A.F.
Still in the foothills
"I say we rent her out at the Sick House."
"No way. The Stix will pay more for her."
"But they'll be wantin' her untouched. And dang it, we should acknowledge our own limitations."
"Excuse me, gentlemen," I told my two would-be pimps as they debated what to do with me. Stix? Sick House? I had no idea what they were talking about and didn't care. I just wanted to be absolutely certain they deserved what was coming to them: their executions. "Look, I don't want any trouble with either of you." My damsel-in-distress act was getting old.
One guy's halitosis smelled like radioactive waste. I'd deemed him Hal. The other had a handlebar moustache littered with food debris. He was Stache.
"Please let me go." I wasn't managing a believable level of panic. "I'm trying to make it home to my husband." Not a lie.
After parking their serial-killer van, they'd approached me with raised weapons--a bat and what was probably an empty pistol. They'd asked me if I was alone, and I'd said I was.
Definitely a lie. Kentarch and Joules crouched nearby behind an overturned tractor trailer.
I still hesitated to steal from innocent folks, so whenever Kentarch heard a vehicle coming, he and Joules got scarce, and I trotted out to the road to do my damsel routine. If anyone tried to hurt me, the boys stepped in, and the non-innocent forfeited everything. Including their lives.
All I had to do was give the signal. Kentarch would easily pick them off with his rifle, pistol, or throwing blades. Joules normally held off using his spears in close quarters. His javelins tended to go boom in a big way.
My powers remained fritzed.
"You ain't ever gonna see your husband again, peach," Hal told me from way too up-close. His mouth smelled like someone had told him to eat shit, and he'd complied. He kept licking his chapped lips as he leered at me. "But soon you're gonna have plenty of fellas to keep you company."
I was so over this. For the last week, we'd encountered a surprising number of survivors; I supposed they tended to converge like Arcana did.
Not as surprising--they'd all been bad guys. We'd scored twenty-three gallons of gasoline, a bug-out bag for me, half a bottle of gin, and a case of Sheba canned cat food.
I'd declined my share of kitty chow, fearing I'd just throw it up anyway. When Joules had first dug his fingers into a can to scoop chunks to his mouth, I'd gone running to vomit.
My perilous escape from the castle seemed to have done nothing to interrupt my pregnancy. Fatigue was taking its toll. My hunger pangs were constant, the pain like an old, untended wound.
Maybe Hal and Stache had food, something to keep me from daydreaming about hush puppies and ice cream and mashed potatoes and cheeseburgers with extra, gooey cheese.
I turned my thoughts from food, my bleary mind wandering over the last few days. As Kentarch, Joules, and I had descended from the mountains, the temperatures rose, and snow cover grew sparser.
The rivers and ponds had been only partially iced over. I'd hailed Circe at the larger ones. No answer. Nor had I heard from Matthew. Jack, are you out here?
Though I trusted my new traveling companions to a degree, I never told them about the Fool's last message. As time passed, Jack's survival seemed less and less believable, even to me.
I'd also never given them all the details of Aric's attack at the castle--even when I'd woken up screaming. My nightmares of Richter now alternated with those about Aric . . . .
We should've been able to pick up our pace to the coast, but so many roads had been washed out or blocked with vehicles. Whenever the Beast couldn't winch or bulldoze its way through, Kentarch had to teleport us.
He was also using his teleportation each night to measure the spread of the Hanged Man's influence. Kentarch's last report: It's unpredictable and sporadic.
Hunger and overuse had weakened the Chariot's abilities overall. Earlier today, he'd tried to teleport the truck across a wreck-choked bridge. We'd flashed from tangible to quavery and back as he'd gritted his teeth. He hadn't been able to move us an inch, so we'd had to backtrack and go around.
Afterward, his outline had wavered, making him look like a ghost, then a man, then a ghost.
At this point, I could have walked faster, but I never complained when I slept in the Beast's toasty cab. I'd once asked Kentarch, "Why don't you carry a bug-out bag?" His answer: "This truck is my bug-out bag." Several times an hour, his gaze would stray to Issa's picture on his visor.
His chariot was a weapon and a roving safe house rolled into one, but it was a demanding tool, requiring ever more fuel. As my own resource-suck did.
"Right on!" Stache said, waking me from my daze. "Then we're in agreement." He started forcing me toward their van.
"Guys, if you want to live past the next few seconds, then release me and keep moving."
Stache tightened his grip on my arm. "Another word out of you, and I'll cut out your tongue and feed it to you."
"Literally? Or is that just a saying? These days you have to wonder."
Stache raised his hand to backhand me. Before I could stop him, Hal grabbed his wrist. "Don't mark her up. I want her pretty. No reason not to enjoy her till we reach the Sick House."
Aaaaaand, we're done here. "Your lifetime's over." I gave the signal. "Come, touch," I told these men, "but you'll pay a price."
A knife flew past me, end over end. The blade plugged Hal in the face. He reeled before he collapsed.
Eyes gone wide, Stache released me and fled. He didn't get five steps before another knife sank into his back. THUNK. A kill shot.
Kentarch jogged over to retrieve his blades. The first time he'd made a throw like that, I'd gawked. His aim was so uncanny, even Joules--no slouch himself--had been impressed.
"Let's make quick work of this." Kentarch remained as reserved as Joules was mouthy. He mostly liked to talk about tactical things, or about mind over matter, and he never volunteered information about his life in Africa.
As Kentarch siphoned fuel, Joules investigated the men's van, tossing me their bags to root through. They had pictures of family, p
robably stolen from other victims. I snagged a flashlight and two flints to put in my bug-out bag. Not exactly winning Lotto.
I raised my head, suddenly feeling as if we were being watched. "Kentarch, do you see or hear anyone else around us?"
He assessed the area. "No, Empress."
"Probably nothing then."
"Food!" Joules cried from the van. "They've got food. A container full of soup."
I'd bet I could keep that down! I hurried over.
Joules held up a clear takeout container filled with a dark broth. He ripped off the lid and inhaled. "Take a whiff of that!"
Though the soup was cool, the delicious aroma reached me. My stomach was on board! My first real meal in days.
"Looks like we're goin' to vary our cat-food diet--"
A pinky finger floated to the surface. Mushy skin. With a long, dirty nail.
Joules yelled and hurled the container.
Then he puked right beside me.
_______________
Enough. The cannibal soup had marked a turning point for me. Resolve gave way under the weight of depression. My eyes watered, my bottom lip trembling.