Carry the Flame (23 page)

“No, you're
wrong.
I'm just thirsty. I don't
need
extra water. I took it because you said I could have it. I don't even want it anymore. Keep your water.”

“You are angry. That is understandable. I could be wrong, little one, but I do not think so. You have so many symptoms of diabetes.”

He brushed hair out of her face, then did it again. She wished she could stop him. She'd stopped Zekiel with words. The leader of the Army of God also touched her hair in bed. The zealot rubbed it between his fingers and told her that soon it would cover the most sacred part of her body. He kept toying with it, tugging hard enough to pull her face close to his. Terrified, she had asked him, “What is sin?” Zekiel had stopped and stared at the ceiling then. The Mayor stopped on his own now, but
his
words already doomed her: diabetes would go on and on and get worse until she died.

Ananda had thought she would die at the Army of God. She fought like an animal to survive. And she was brave. Everyone said so, and she knew she had been. She couldn't believe she survived the massacre and all those horrible men and the burning at the stake and a bloody battle, only to be killed by a stupid disease that wasn't nearly as bad as Wicca. Wicca was the only disease that mattered, right?
Right,
she answered herself fiercely.

Bastard.

She moved her eyes from the Mayor and looked around the room. The torch flickered. Only a tiny, blurry flame now.
It's going to die like me.
Tears spilled down her cheeks.
No, you're not dying,
she scolded herself immediately.
You're not a stupid torch.
But every time her eyes strayed to the blurry flame, she thought of what the Mayor said. She couldn't stop herself.

He shifted toward her. “Go to sleep, little one. Do not worry. This world, it is not so kind to ones like you. It is not a good place to stay.” He rolled her toward M-girl.

When his breathing deepened, she buried her face in her girlfriend's shoulder. After several seconds, and without a word, they separated and peeked around. The torch had gone out but still glowed red, casting a blush on the African who stood by it. He looked sleepy, too tired to stare. Ananda wanted to make out with M-girl and forget everything she'd just heard, push as hard as she could against her girlfriend's chest and hips and mouth so maybe for a second or two they'd become one. Twice before they'd flooded with pleasure together, lifting so far from all they'd ever known of life they might never have returned. But now only their lips and tongues touched, and only for a glorious, bewitching instant before M-girl's eyes flew open. Ananda looked over her shoulder and saw the African guard watching them.

They lay in silence for several seconds before M-girl whispered, “What's diabetes?”

“Don't believe him.” Lowering her voice even more, Ananda said, “He's just another killer. What does he know? He fed that girl to a monster.” She wanted to spare M-girl her own fears.

“But something's wrong with you. You're weak. You know you are. You shake a lot, and those burns aren't healing. My scabs are almost gone.”

“He's . . . a . . .
liar.
Have you ever heard of diabetes?” M-girl shook her head. “Me, neither. He's
crazy.
You know he is. So don't listen to him.”

She wasn't trying to spare just M-girl's feelings anymore, she was trying to ease her own anguish. And she did feel better. Much better. Diabetes sounded like one of those silly things people worried about in the long ago, like zits or fat or catching a sniffle. That's what it was, a
little
problem.
And you've got
big
problems, like getting out of here.

She couldn't fathom how. The glow of the torch vanished, throwing a blanket of darkness over the room.

“I love you,” whispered M-girl. “I'll always love you.”

“Don't say it like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like ‘I'll always love you' because I'll be gone. I
won't
be gone.”

“I didn't mean it like that.”

Yes, you did.
But then Ananda realized that M-girl might have been trying to convince herself that she hadn't meant what she'd really said. “Listen to me, girlfriend: I'm not going anywhere. And I love you, too. I'll always love you,” she added impishly, tapping her forehead gently against M-girl's.

They kissed deeply till weariness made them stop. Ananda wanted so much to wrap her arms around M-girl and hold her close, but all she could do was rest her forehead back against her girlfriend's, sharing the air they breathed as exhaustion finally stilled them both.

And the bed started spinning.

B
liss hung from the manacles, awakening in starts throughout the evening. The rusty metal cut her skin, and the pressure on her arms sent sharp pains through her shoulders. Tired, she tried to stand, but her shin throbbed where the black guard had struck her with his truncheon. She worried he might have done more damage to her leg than she'd thought, and her mouth still ached from his vicious elbow jab. But at least she could move it. A broken jaw could have been fatal without straws or blended food. She hadn't known any relief from the burning pain of her scalp; and from the excited remarks of men staring at her nakedness, she knew more blood had trickled onto her face.

Dozens of guards and gunmen had passed through the modestly sized amphitheater. To avoid their stares, she closed her eyes long before she tried to sleep. Even now they gathered near the small stage, only feet away, lathered with lust, mouths agape, fevered hands on themselves and one another.

The morbid sexual spectacle made Bliss dread what would happen if the guards left her alone. Two of them collected weapons at the door, and three more kept the gapers from climbing on the stage. Without the guards, she thought she would have been raped to death hours ago. But she knew the real reason for the armed presence wasn't to shield her—it was to protect the men from acting on impulses likely fatal to
them.

A wiry Asian did make it partway onto the stage, just long enough to grab her pile of torn clothes. The guards laughed and let him keep them. They might have grabbed them back—if they'd known his plans. The Asian ripped apart her pants and shirt, sharing his bounty until the last shred was taken. A dozen or so men sniffed the rags like animals, violated them freely, and became the first group to actually storm the stage. The guards bellowed warnings and threats, and pushed them back. But no one was struck, and she closed her eyes on spasms and groans and the twisted, contorted faces that held no feeling for the object of their desire.

When the melee ended, Bliss heard someone in heavy boots walking toward her. “Look at me,” he growled. His familiar, demanding voice reached only dimly through her fatigue and simmering fear. He repeated himself even more harshly.

With her head hanging down, she opened her eyes on the stage floor, a patchwork of peeling plywood and grayed planking. His shadow fell across thin vomit, and she recalled pain building convulsively in her gut from the black guard's punch. She thought she'd passed out—and maybe she had—but not before she sickened.

She also spotted the shadow of a knife coming closer. A second later, alert at last to the threat, she raised her head. The white guard who'd ripped out clumps of her hair—and stripped her naked—stood only feet away.

“Don't ever make me tell you something twice. I say, ‘Look at me,' you
look
at me,” he shouted. He crossed his arms, as if to hold himself back, and stared at her body. “You're putting on a helluva show. You think you're pretty fucking hot, don't you? Got all the guys dying for you.” He glanced at the men behind him. She avoided their jumpy eyes. “Sure you do,” he went on, arms still crossed, only now he was also appreciating his knife in the torchlight, angling the blade from side to side. He caught her staring at it and smiled. “You think nothing can touch you, not even this.” He waved the blade in her face. Bliss forced the back of her head against the brick wall. She would have smashed her skull through it, if she could have.

He went on: “You're wrong. We
can
touch you. It's all in how and when we do it. You know why? 'Cause you're a porn queen. We've seen tons of them. You're just another skuzzy one. You'd give us the disease, if we gave you half a chance. You'd torture us to death with it.” He waved the knife in her face again. “Wouldn't you?”

“No,” she gasped. Her throat was so dry she could hardly speak.

“Uh-uh.” He grabbed her jaw where his partner smashed her. She screeched from the pain. “Wrong answer,” he laughed, pressing the flat of the blade against her cheek. “Say, ‘Yes, I'm a porn queen,' and make me believe you or I'm going to start cutting.”

Despite his grip and the blade, she managed to parrot him. He let go of her face.

“Glad to see your mouth is still working. That's important. Now I'll tell you what I'm going to do 'cause I'm a good guy. I'm going to get you some water. But you pee it out and you're going to clean it up.” He glanced down. “Looks like you've got lots of scrubbing to do.”

He walked to the edge of the stage, returning with a dented metal cup. He let her empty it.

“Just remember, we don't ever clean up after porn queens, and you're not getting out of these things,” he shook a wrist manacle, “till Friday night.”

“When's Friday?” She had to know. The manacles were unbearable.

“You should have asked that before you drank all the water. That's two whole days from now. Then guess what?”

She shook her head. She was too frightened to offer the guesses that came immediately to mind.

“Uh-uh. You did it again. Stupid porn queen.” He jerked her arm down so hard Bliss's shoulder felt sundered. She screamed, and more blood ran from her wrist. “What do you do when I ask a question?” he said with exaggerated patience.

“Answer,” she cried.

“You got it,” he said cheerfully. He released her arm. Pain grilled the length of her limb. “We'll let you go Friday night. That's Fight Night. After it's over, when we're all warmed up,” he moved his fists like a boxer, “we'll be playing a game we all really like. Want to know what it is?”

“Yes.” She spoke mechanically now, without feeling or regard for meaning.

“ ‘Catch the Queen.' Isn't that cool? I'll be in charge, so don't you worry, I'll make sure to give you a head start. I always give the pretty ones a head start. Makes it more fun. And the rules are real simple: we catch you, and then we
kill
you, starting with all the porn parts. What's the porn queen then?”

She'd figured that out hours ago, and almost nodded before catching herself. “The reward.”

“That's right.” He flipped the knife, caught it smartly, and pointed the gleaming tip at her face. “Section R.”

C
hunga roared through much of the night. An hour might pass in silence, and then the dragon would wake Jessie again. His bellow, so sudden and sharp, brought back the ships' foghorns from her childhood, when she played on the sandy shores of Cape Hatteras and saw freighters and warships and oil tankers—and the bejeweled yachts they bought—fighting wind and chop and the treacherous currents that surged from the north and south and collided beneath their barnacled hulls. Mariners had called Hatteras the “Graveyard of the Atlantic,” and standing knee-deep in its Gulf-warmed waters, undertow tugging at her feet, it had been easy for a scared but astute twelve-year-old to imagine the whitecaps as the burgeoning tombstones of an imploding planet, the endless mournful waves the aggrieved survivors trying to hurl themselves back to land, to the ever-eroding promise of life.

Jessie nodded off, only to be startled awake when the Komodo smashed the wooden gate, rousing her from a vivid dream. Again he roared, as if tortured by Burned Fingers's knife attack on its tongue. Or because he's starving, she thought. Clamoring to eat them.

She'd been dreaming of Eden and their long trek to the dry reservoir bed, when Bliss was a toddler and she was pregnant with Ananda. The dream was strangely silent, like a film in the old days with the sound turned off. Her husband was the focus, armed as he always had been with his rifle and bandoliers. She watched him cast them aside, as he never had in real life. They fell to a fully muffled earth, raising a squall of dust. He walked away in the eerie hush, never turning back.

Jessie sat in the darkness believing the dream meant she'd broken a promise to him, and so he was done with her, now and forever. But what promise? They'd never had time for promises on that grueling trip south, only survival.

Burned Fingers stirred a few feet away. They had settled about halfway between the two gates, trying to get as far as possible from the stench of those dragon dens.

“You awake?” she asked quietly, though they'd detected no guards or anyone else the night long.

“Most of the time.”

“It sounds like that beast is trying to break out. Remember him saying he did that once before?”

“Nothing's broken yet. I've been listening. A couple of hours ago the one that ate the girl got back. I heard them getting it out of the wagon. There must be a tunnel they back that thing into. His name's Tonga.”

“Tonga? Tonga and Chunga?” She rolled her eyes in the darkness. “The Friday night fight?”

“ ‘Tonga the Terrible,' to be precise. That's what some joker called it, and it wasn't our smooth-talking Carib.”

She shuddered thinking of the woman, and the man who'd put her to death.
We're dead, too.
To have brought their daughters on such a harrowing journey now seemed unforgivably wrong.