Carry the Flame (25 page)

The creature bugled and arched his bulky neck, visibly straining against boards and earth. He bulled his head as far as he could and tried to roll his massive wrinkled shoulders into the widening gap. The gate sounded like it was truly splitting apart.

Jessie drew her blade again. So did Burned Fingers. But she knew it was a hopeless gesture. A few inches of flint to face down a raging carnivore at the peak of the food chain?

The giant lizard paused in his wild struggle only to stare at them and probe the air with his long wounded tongue—as if he were already tasting his prey.

Great gobs of drool spilled from his gums.

And then he lunged like a beast that had broken his chains.

Chapter Thirteen

E
sau perched on the back of the Harley, hands hanging limply by his sides. The slave had wanted to hold his master through the long night, but found no excuse. Hunt drove slowly behind the disarmed gunmen as they navigated mine fields and tramped around sand dunes that would have bogged down the bike.

Light seeped across a gray, awakening sky, exposing a bald absence of soil, brush, or life. Hunt steered around another dune, and the slave saw the City of Shade for the first time. It stood in the desert a half mile away, colossal and unyielding, as if risen of sulfur and rock salt.

The sidecar creaked brazenly, weighty with food and water, confiscated firearms, and the medieval-looking cage. A moan sounded above the axles and iron. Jester, the defeated gunman with a burned and leaking eye, staggered to keep up with the motorcycle, openly fearful of being chained and dragged in the sand and grit, turned to scab and bone. Ahead of them the short black gunman still carried Hunt's torch, its reach weakening in the looming day.

When the band drew to within a couple hundred feet of the City of Shade, three sentries raised their rifles and shouted for them to stop. The bricks and mortar looked even more massive now, a beastly edifice extruded from earth, heavy as a mountain. Fat columns supported the roof every twenty feet along the broad face, bones protruding rudely like compound fractures. From what Esau could glean of the torchlit interior, many more columns studded the shadows.

Far to his right he spied rows of towering junked cars, taller than any building he had ever seen. In his youth, before he was taken slave, he had passed through a city called Mobile. Thousands of cars had been bombed or burned or discarded like trash amid piles of rubble so thick that finding streets was impossible. Even the city's graveyards, with their cherubs and angels, crosses and chiseled paeans to the dead, lay flattened and shattered, slabs of marble and concrete no stronger than china or ceramic under the crushing weight of the collapse.

But Esau had never seen anything like the wrecking yard. All that destruction so orderly, so neat, as if to defy devastation. Only a God of infinite mystery could have granted such design to such ruin.

Two of the sentries approached. Hunt drew his pistol, then settled his hand back on the ape-hanger handlebar, muzzle pointed casually to the side.

“
He
did this to me,” Jester suddenly screamed, jerking his head toward Hunt. “This fucker burned my face. Shoot him! Fucking
kill
him!”

The pair of sentries glared at Hunt, but Esau found it telling that they didn't raise their weapons at his master, who got off his bike, leaving it to idle. Esau, alone on the seat, wondered if he could drive it. He'd watched Hunt touch wires together to start the engine, and use his hand and foot to change gears.

“Shoot him!” Jester screamed again.

“I want to see the Mayor,” Hunt said to the sentries. He looked at Jester. “And
I'm
taking him with me.”

“No you're not, you fucking—”

Hunt silenced Jester by gripping the back of his neck, as he had when he forced him to confront his failure to find the girl or the dead man's gun.

“The others can have their weapons back,” Hunt announced, glancing at the wary men who'd led them to the City of Shade. “As long as they move on,” he added sharply.

Jester tried to wrest his head away from Hunt. “You're not doing jack shit with me, you mother—”

Hunt released him, only to punch his burned face so hard Esau heard a bone crack in Jester's nose. It sounded like a twig snapping. Blood flushed from his nostrils. He put his head back to try to stop the bleeding, reeling away in agony. Hunt grabbed the lone hank of dark hair hanging from the side of the gunman's head and jerked it like a dog's leash. A
pop
sounded—it might have been Jester's neck. “Sit,” Hunt commanded, as if to humiliate him further.

Jester collapsed on the ground, blood dribbling from his nose, head tilted awkwardly. Hunt flipped aside Jester's hair. Still holding his pistol to his side, the blond man opened the cage with his free hand and returned the firearms he'd seized from the gunmen.

“I want mine, too,” Jester cried.

Hunt ignored him, turning to the others. “Don't think of helping him. He made mistakes. You don't want to.”

The short black man actually nodded and hefted his sawed-off single shot. He looked happy. Hunt told him to give the torch to Esau, who jumped off the Harley. The four gunmen walked toward the City of Shade.

One of the two sentries grimaced. The other, more muscular man, stepped closer. His lips were pierced with tiny polished bones. From babies, Esau thought. He had seen that once before.

“Why the fuck are
you
telling them what to do?” the sentry demanded.

Before Hunt could reply, Jester cried, “Because he's a fucker.”

Hunt glanced at the departing gunmen. “They're smart enough to listen. Are you?”

The question hung as a challenge. When the sentry didn't respond with words or weapon, Esau saw that his master had taken command again. He behaved as if no one would dare shoot him; therefore, no one did.

“Tell the Mayor the Alliance guy is here,” the sentry said to his brother-in-arms. But he kept a defiant tone and an eye on Hunt, who drove the Harley to the City of Shade, cutting the engine only after facing it away from the building.

The slave followed on foot. Jester still sat in the dust.

“Get up here,” Hunt shouted to him, “or you'll never walk again.”

The gunman climbed to his feet and stumbled toward them, moaning as he lowered himself gingerly to the ground about ten feet away.

A lean African guard stepped from the building, saying the Mayor would “receive” Hunt in the Oval Office. Esau knew the real Oval Office was not in the Great American Desert, much less the City of Shade, built on the remains of a prison. His master had told him that many years ago the actual Oval Office—and the rest of the White House—were looted by a mob of thousands that hung the president naked from the rooftop flagpole, which quickly grew so heavy with her husband, children, and members of her cabinet that the top half snapped off. Hunt said the building itself, stripped of every last plumbing fixture and chandelier, switch plate and knickknack, was finally “blown to bits.”

“What's he talking about?” Esau whispered.

“Idiots,” was all his master said before telling Jester to get up.

The gunman didn't budge. When Hunt reached down, the African tried to push him away. Hunt shoved him back. As the black man moved to draw his weapon, Jester came to life, screaming, “Kill the fucker!”

Hunt thrust his gun in the African's face, freezing him with his revolver barely out of his belt.

“Put it away,” Hunt said evenly to the man, “or I'll kill you.” He spoke with the same menacingly calm voice to Jester. “I'm tired of you. If you make one more mistake, I'll kill you, too.”

The African put away his gun. Hunt grabbed Jester by his strange hair and dragged him to his feet, before returning his gaze to the black man. “I know you have a job to do, but don't waste yourself on him. I doubt his life is worth the dust around here. Now let's go see your Mayor.”

At Hunt's direction, Esau snuffed the torch and left it by the motorcycle. His master told Jester to follow him—and warned the gunman not to try to run off. The slave doubted that he could; Jester looked barely capable of standing as he got to his feet.

Without a word, the African led them along a torchlit path that revealed a structure unlike any Esau had ever seen, even at the old military base with its huge assembly halls and chapel. Sparse daylight crept into what appeared a mostly open but crowded interior. More than a dozen long rows of sleeping mats disappeared into the shadowy distance, but no one rested. The men were squeezed around cold fire pits eating their morning meal, or pressed hip-to-hip on heavy benches that might once have lined the visitors' gallery in the Ohio state capitol. They stopped talking and stared at Jester and the others.

From stoves in adjoining canteens, the acrid odor of burning coal tainted the air. A cook pounded a long metal cookie sheet, jarring loose a pile of hard biscuits. Esau heard them fall onto a concrete counter. Farther along, five men lifted dumbbells crudely constructed from rocks and metal bars that looked like car or truck parts, or steel studs ripped from the walls of abandoned homes. The weightlifters barely paused to notice the passersby, but the slave was mesmerized by their glistening, well-nourished muscles.

They approached a white guard, who opened a door to a large room lit by several torches. The fumy air irritated Esau's lungs. There were no vents in the walls, empty except for a jagged circle of blue carpet with an official-looking seal. It hung behind a table that dominated the room as wholly as a rapaciously rendered eagle dominated the emblem. The bird's wings were aggressively outstretched, and a red-and-white-striped shield protected its chest. One talon clutched an olive branch, the other arrows. Esau noticed the colors were dull, most likely from smoke and dust and the insults of smuggling.

Hunt studied it, too, as the Mayor entered through a door neither master nor slave had noticed. Both started when the wall opened, and turned their eyes from the carpet.

“Do you like my art?” the Mayor asked in a silky accent. He settled at the table, the African guard standing by his side.

“Fuck that shit!” Jester bellowed, lurching toward the table. “Look what that asshole did to me.” The gunman thrust his face at the Mayor to show him his bloody, rheumy wound. “He burned my eye and beat me with a fucking torch.”

Hunt nodded his assent. The Mayor stared at Jester. “Be silent. We are discussing art.”

Jester trembled, Esau guessed, with suppressed fury.

“It's a replica, right?” Hunt asked the Mayor, who shook his head.

“No, it is the real carpet from the Oval Office. My grandfather brought it back to Curacao when he sailed from this country. He took it from the White House himself on the day it fell. He saved it from certain destruction. I am proud to have brought it back home to the Bloodlands. Do you want to touch it? Make sure your eyes are not dreaming?”

Hunt shook his head. Esau knew better than to respond.

“Then answer another question and tell me why you demanded a meeting with me at this hour?”

Hunt glanced at Jester. “This joker doesn't know how to do his job. He didn't find a small girl who escaped when your men raided the caravan—”

“That's a lie,” Jester shouted, but the Mayor sat forward.

“And he did such a lousy job of searching a man he killed, somebody else found the guy's gun and fired at me. None of your men managed to find this one,” Hunt held up the pistol he'd dug out of the sand, “after they burned through a bunch of ammo last night, killing five guys. I'm guessing the dead ones were out there trying to claim whatever they could, like the missing girl. Somebody did, too. Probably the same one who shot at me. I don't mind this joker missing the gun I found, because I'm keeping it, but another gun
and
a girl? That's not good for you or me.”

“He's a fucking liar,” Jester shouted.

“And if he keeps calling me a liar, I'm going to kill him.”

The Mayor shook his head. “Do not press your luck, Mr. Soul Hunter, but you must tell me, did my other men see evidence of the girl you say got away?”

“They sure did.”

“I will talk to the them—but you, Jester, will not be a happy man if you are lying to me. If this is what you are doing, I will feed you to my pets. So tell me now—this is the Mayor talking to you, not the Alliance—and I will give you one more chance. Is there any truth to what Mr. Soul Hunter says?”

The gunman said nothing.

“Now I will tell you what you will do, Jester. You will go find the missing girl. You may take food and water for five days. If you do not find the property that is mine, you will have stolen from me. So then you should kill yourself because it will be faster than dying without food or water. If you insist on coming back anyway, I will feed you to Tonga and Chunga.”

Jester looked stunned. The Mayor smiled and continued. “You can see that finding the girl is your only hope. It is daybreak. The clock starts now. I would go to the wrecking yard. I would search every car, if I had to. Do what you must to find her, but do not set off a rebellion. I do not need that kind of problem. We have a glorious celebration tomorrow night. Do not spoil that for me.”

“Why don't I heal up for a day or two, then? I can't even see out of this goddamn eye.”

Hunt walked toward Jester, who backpedaled, tripped, and fell to the floor. “What did I say about using the Lord's name in vain?” Hunt demanded.

“You do not have authority here,” the Mayor said. “If he wants to say ‘goddamn,' it is okay with me. Now, stand,” he ordered Jester, who rose but shrank from Hunt. “When a child is missing, time is of the essence. This has always been true, now more than ever. You have made a most serious error, and you should go before I change my mind and take you to the special pit.”

“I need my gun,” Jester said sullenly.

“How will I get it back if you fail to find the girl and must kill yourself? Then you will have stolen more property from me, even in death. I cannot have this be. Here.” The Mayor pulled a steel knife from the African guard's belt and slid it across the table. “You are a skilled eviscerator. But that is all you get.”

Jester grabbed the blade and barreled from the room.

Hunt pressed both fists on the table and leaned toward the Mayor. “I want everybody on that caravan back. The girls, boys, the
demon,
the insurrectionists, and that includes Burned Fingers. And—”