Carry the Flame (46 page)

Authors: James Jaros

BOOK: Carry the Flame

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What the hell is the Dominion, anyway? she wondered.

Esau knew only what he'd overheard from His Piety and the Chief Elder, but he didn't think the Dominion was another cult, at least not a religious one.

Burned Fingers had certainly prepared for the worst. He had salvaged a .45 revolver from the rubble, along with ample ammo, and plundered the Mayor's office for the despot's bolt action rifle and bandoliers. The marauder looked ready for war.

That's what he knows best.

Jessie assumed her perch on top of the tanker trailer. The truck's engine rumbled to life, and the twin stacks on either side of the cab belched black smoke into the air. She still thought they looked like the smoldering horns of a demonâbut a demon they needed desperately; after they arrived at Lake Michigan's cracked bed, they would still have to travel almost 3,500 miles to the Arctic.

Bliss climbed on top of the van as a lookout for Jaya at the wheel. Exigencies, as much as love, had brought them together.

The girl's shotgun, like her mom's Mâ16, had been taken by the Mayor and his minions and lost in the destruction of the city. Bliss was now armed with the Colt single-action pistol. By edict of her mother, she would have to surrender the handgun to Ananda on her sister's fourteenth birthday. The young warrior was the rightful owner, under rules that still governed the spoils of war.

Jessie carried a pistol, too, the Mayor's chrome-plated Smith & Wesson .45. She was also armed with an AKâ47 the slaves had taken from a guard and given to her. The venerable rifle had outlasted most all the nations that once treasured it.

The cavern people had donated canisters, giving the smaller caravan crew enough water to see them beyond the desiccated lake that was their initial destination.

With a satisfied smile, Burned Fingers fired up the old Harley, signaling the caravan forward with his scarred hand. He raced ahead of the van, point man for any menace, a role he clearly relished. The van followed him, and the tanker truckâwith Jessie scanning the vast landscapeâfell into line.

She could see nothing in the Great American Desert but rubble, wrecked cars, and the cross-shaped tomb made of broken bricks. But if she could have viewed the cross from above, she would have spied scores of vultures that had come to scavenge in the open grave, teeming so thickly that they draped the moldering bodies in black as they stripped away the skin.

Only bones in time.

Acknowledgments

I'm honored to have a group of friends who read for me, point out my errors, make fruitful suggestions, and do so in the most supportive manner possible. With that in mind, many thanks to Dale Dauten, Darryl Santano, Monte Ferraro, and my lovely sister, Kim Nykanen.

I have a huge thank you for Mark Feldstein, an author who pulls out an especially sharp editor's pen and marks up my pages with insight and great diligence. We've been doing this for each other for a long time. May it ever be so.

Likewise, I want to thank Ed Stackler, who has provided a precise editor's eye for five books now. Ed is a marvel to work with and a pleasure to know.

This book wouldn't have appeared without Harper Voyager editor Will Hinton's ongoing and enthusiastic support. Will championed both this book and
Burn Down the Sky.
He's made many helpful suggestions en route to their publication, and I'm thankful for them.

I also want to direct lots of gratitude toward my agent, Howard Morhaim, for his redoubtable efforts on my behalf.

About the Author

JAMES JAROS is the pen name of the widely praised thriller author Mark Nykanen, the four-time Emmy-winning investigative reporter whose internationally bestselling books have been praised by critics as “irresistible,” “vivid and emotional,” “nerve-wracking,” and “furiously paced.” Europe's largest newspaper hailed him as “the new master of the psycho-sexual thriller” for his dark psychological tales. Now, as James Jaros, he sweeps readers into a post-apocalyptic world as real as it is horrifying.

Jaros blogs at “Postings from the Post-Apocalypse.”

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By James Jaros

Carry the Flame

Burn Down the SkyÂ

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Cover art by Getty Images/Stockbyte

CARRY THE FLAME
. Copyright Â© 2012 by Mark Nykanen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

EPub Edition AUGUST 2012 ISBN: 9780062096371

Print Edition ISBN: 9780062016317

FIRST EDITION

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