Conceived in Blood, A Post-Apocalyptic/Dystopian Novel (33 page)

Harry hadn't killed her sons. Belle resisted the urge to clap. He was innocent.

'Vider Brolyn smiled. "Excellent. We shall have a little test before the main entertainment."

But he was still going to die. Killing a 'Vider was punishable by death. Hell, even speaking to a 'Vider was punishable by death.

A scuffle erupted at the doorway. Silhouettes blocked the sun before a man stumbled inside.

Belle backed up. "Titan."

Harry shifted in front of her.

Titan straightened his clothes. Blood spattered his chest and face. "What is the meaning of this? I'm entitled by 'Vider Code to discipline my tribute."

"'Vider Titan." Brolyn's lip curled back. "You have been charged with violating the 'Vider Code by unlawfully killing Stiletto and Hammer outside of Jury-approved combat."

"Wh-What?" The man paled.

A curl of excitement unfurled inside Belle. It was about time the sniveling weasel was punished.

 Brolyn handed the crossbow to Harry then motioned him up with her knife. "If the experiment proves that a shot arrow would pierce a neck then your blood, Titan, can be claimed by the blood of your victims."

Belle stood next to her brother. What was this about?

Titan ran his tongue over his lips. "North is back?"

"No." Brolyn gestured to Harry. "Harlan Westminster is blood of Mirabelle. When she became a 'Vider, so too did he. He will be her champion. He will balance the scales of justice."

Titan straightened. "He will challenge me?"

"Yes, and we shall see if the raiders have been lucky these last ten years, or if a 'Vider heart beats in Harlan's chest." Brolyn smiled and pounded on her armor. "To the death."

The other five jurors imitated her. "To the death!"

Chapter 38

Sera clamped her lips together to keep from crying out.  The 'Viders were leaving the old courthouse, sweeping Harlan and Belle out with them. What was she, chopped liver here?

Still, she knew better than to speak.

One slap across the face was enough. She hated to think how things would escalate if she disobeyed the same rule twice.

Belle's eyes had told of unimaginable suffering.

Suffering Sera could end when she escaped this place. She freed her right hand. Holding her dislocated thumb in her mouth, she slipped the digit back into place. Thank God one of her ancestors had loose joints.

And that the old 'Vider hadn't tied her too tightly.

Although she had an inkling that was part of some master bad-guy plan. That, and using Harlan to do their dirty work. She only hoped he stayed alive until she brought help. Her legs trembled when she rose on tiptoe and worked at untying the bonds on her left wrist.

They wouldn't use her against Harlan. No way.

But she would use their plan against them. With one last yank, the leather strap slipped free, and she pulled her hand out. Record time. Hopefully, she'd have a good twenty minutes to get out of town.

She glanced at the doorway. Everyone seemed to have gathered for the show. Stay safe, Harlan.

Crossing the floor, she scooped up her pack and drifted across the room. First, she had to get out of here. Just as she reached the door, another woman filled it.

Sera stumbled back. Dammit. She should have known it had been too easy. Those loose bonds should have clued her in. The 'Viders wanted her to try to escape. She balanced her weight on the balls of her feet, raised her hands and prepared to fight.

Bright eyes glanced at her from under a handkerchief stuffed with matted hair and straw. She balanced two shiny stun-guns in her palm. "Which Tesla Stun-Gun model is this?"

Sera's shoulders drooped. Since she had hair, she obviously wasn't a 'Vider. The council had been right–the stun guns were headed for Sanctuary and Gavin Neville's descendants. Well, shit. She hated being wrong.

Uncle Joseph would hate it even more.

And it would set back this inevitable war between Dark Hope and the 'Viders.

The woman's mouth thinned. "You're losing your opportunity to escape."

The crowd started chanting names.

Sera sighed. What did it matter if she told the TSG's model? "Twenty-seven."

The woman shook her head. Clumps of matted hair fell around her shoulders. "They were working on the prototype of fifteen when I set out for the Great American Desert." She stroked her dirty fingers over the gleaming sides. "Does it have a failsafe built-in?"

Sera stepped back. This woman was from Dark Hope. "How... Why... Who are you?"

"Natasha Wilson." Tugging off the handkerchief, Natasha's dreadlocks slapped her shoulders and back. She wrapped up the weapons, tucked them under her arm, then stuck her hand down her blouse. A moment later, she handed a card to Sera.

Sera read the card, once, twice. Holy crap! The woman before her had disappeared twenty-seven years ago.

"Natasha Wilson. The author of Human Evolution in Dark Hope and her sister cities?" The woman who claimed the Redaction and Meltdown had split humanity into two distinct races——one evolved, the other still savage. Sera pinched the worn and crumpled identification card. The picture was the same as on the text-books, but the youthful face didn't match the woman standing before her.

Even the eyes seemed different.

Harder.

Natasha smiled, flashing rotting teeth. "Unlike fine wine, I didn't age well. Now your turn."

Sera opened her pack and rooted around inside. "I don't have my ID as I'm undercover, but I’m Sera Tahoma." She tugged out her pouch of jewelry and dumped the contents onto her palm. Shoving aside a brooch, she pulled out her new communicator. The black mic dangled from the molded plastic earpiece. "Do you know what this is?"

"Do you?"

"My com." Geez, she was suspicious. Sera wiggled the communicator into her ear and adjusted the mic near her mouth. She tapped the tech and static crackled in her ear. "I need higher ground to call for reinforcements."

Natasha squeezed her eyes closed. "After all this time... I knew I was close... I was planning to leave, prepared to leave without fearing they'd follow...

Obviously Natasha was walking the line between nuts and crazy while intoxicated. Then again, after nearly three decades with the 'Viders, maybe that was to be expected.

"I can get you home, Natasha, but I need to get out of here." Sera tugged a necklace from under her shirt and switched off the jamming signal.

With luck Uncle Joseph and his crew in the war room would pick it up, maybe meet her halfway.

Natasha grabbed Sera's hair and dragged her out the door by it. "Now come with me and act like you don't want to."

Pain burned along Sera's scalp, she grabbed her hair to stop the other woman from snatching her bald. Stumbling down the stairs, she stuffed her make-up into her pocket. The pouch was shoved into the swinging pack before working it onto her back. Geez, she didn't have to act like she didn't want to go with the other woman. She really didn't want to go.

Natasha hummed as she steered around the crowds.

Bent over, Sera scanned the people. Harlan and Belle were nowhere to be seen. But 'Viders were. They gathered in clumps——talking, sharpening their weapons, and debating the merits of the men in the pen.

Women with unbound hair around their shoulders hacked limbs off bodies and divvied them up. Some wearing blood mitts stopped to watch her being dragged by.

No one intervened.

The crone who'd taken Wayne and his men's gold scuttled out of an alley. She fanned herself with the ragged ends of her long gray hair. "Nattie! Oh, Nattie."

Natasha slowed. "What?"

The crone brushed her scarred cheek with her hair. A bruise peeked out from under her torn collar. "I haven't gotten my share of today's bounty. You don't mind me taking the tribute's gold, do you? 'Viders don't have much use for it, and I——I'll put a good word in with my daughter."

Natasha spat at the woman's feet. "I don't care about your daughter. Touch my possession and I'll take your fingers, one at a time, then your hands, then your arms up to the elbows, then up to your shoulders. You'll still be alive when I start on your toes."

Blanching, the crone shrunk back into the shadowed alley.

Bent over, Sera stumbled along the rutted road behind her keeper. She hoped Natasha's crazy was an act. The crowd thinned and soon it was just the two of them. "I can walk faster if I'm not bent over."

"The guards are watching."

What guards? Sera faced left then right. Well crap. Two 'Viders stood at the end of the street; each carried a shiny axe and watched her and Natasha's approach. "I can take them out with my stun-gun."

Hint, hint.

Natasha kept them tucked in her armpit. "I'll take care of them."

"How many are guarding the way out?"

Natasha turned into a yard. Chickens scattered as she approached. She released her grip and leapt onto the porch. "You won't be going through the canyon."

"I won't?" Sera rubbed her abused scalp. "I've memorized the topographical maps, the only way in or out is through the canyon."

Natasha opened the crooked screen door and waved her inside. "Book learning doesn't work well out here. Neither does observation. God, I can't believe I was ever that naive."

Sera clenched her jaw. She knew book learning didn't account for much. Stepping into the dilapidated living area, she scanned for exits and weapons——a small hall, doorway to another room, worn furniture, floors and faded art decorated the place.

"This is Neville's town." Natasha angled down the hall and stopped near a bedroom. "They knew about the radiation and lived in an old railway tunnel outside of town. Belle's tribute will show you the way, but be careful. The 'Viders will be patrolling all around the village. Kill them before they can catch you, or you'll regret it."

"I won't be caught." Sera glanced inside a nearby bedroom.

A baby slept in a drawer. Three young girls played house with a smattering of miniature furniture and rag dolls. An older girl sat with her back against the wall, watching them.

"Tribute." Natasha barked.

The girl slouched down further and didn't look up. "Yes, 'Vider."

Natasha patted the girl's head awkwardly. "You have done well, child, but I haven't another 'Vider with me, so you may relax."

The girl looked up, hope in her blue eyes. The light faded when she saw Sera. "My mother?"

"Is still alive." Natasha wiped her hand on her shirt. "I gave the hardboiled eggs to your parents and sister."

The girl's fists tightened. "My brother?"

"He was trying to get water for them." Natasha studied a water stain on the far wall.

Sera held her breath. Food and water. Such basics and yet the 'Viders deprived their prisoners of that. "Animals."

"Worse than that." Natasha nodded. "But we'll fix that. Dark Hope will wipe them off the planet."

"Well..." Sera wouldn't lie. "The cabinet doesn't exactly see it that way."

"The cabinet!" Natasha pulled on her hair. "Those fools. Are they blind?" Her chest heaved before she shook herself. "That's okay, I planned for this. I can handle this."

Cheering rose outside the window.

"You must leave, while the others are occupied with the combat." Natasha pointed to the exit. "Girls," she addressed the ones playing house. "Behave while I step out for a minute, and don't go outside."

"Okay, Aun' Nattie." The oldest, a five or six year old missing her two front teeth, dropped her ragdoll over her shoulder and patted its back.

Natasha led Sera out the back door and across the yard. She looked around then nodded. "Go."

The girl sprinted across the green sprouts rising from the field and headed for a sheer rock face. Cracks carved out huge boulders but not an opening.

Sera chased the girl. Climbing it would leave them exposed to the 'Viders' view. She hogtied her doubts. This was their world, not hers. Still... How had it come to this? Her life was in the hands of a girl and a mentally unstable prisoner.

The girl disappeared behind the mountain. "It's me."

Her voice was a moan of wind.

Sera drew up short. Holy crap. A giant boulder was strategically positioned to disguise a partially collapsed tunnel.

The girl stood at the entrance. "My ancestor was a set designer. He made this, so if any of the bad guys from Dark Hope came looking for us, we could hide."

"Nice work." Sera swallowed her defense of her ancestors. People in Dark Hope weren't the bad guys. Not that she would share that tidbit, she needed the girl's help.

Darkness swallowed the girl. "The 'Viders were upon us before we could hide. But I managed to get most people out of the cellar and led them here before I was caught."

Fabric rustled in the inky blackness.

"I'm sure you did a fantastic job." Sera's hand dropped to her waistband. Damn, she forgot to get her weapon from Natasha. Before stepping inside, she watched the older woman head toward town.

"It's a little dark, but I know the way through. Just set your hand on my shoulder."

Sera pulled out the tube of lipstick from her pocket. Popping the cap and twisting the barrel, she turned on the flashlight.

Small bodies pressed against the light.

She arched the beam around the room. There must be twenty of them, from toddlers to near adults.

"Did you bring some food, Ester?" A naked preschooler wiped at the snot dripping from his nose.

Others, in similar state of undress, shivered.

"Not this time, Zac." Ester the tribute tussled his dirty hair.

Sera picked at her cuticles. That little girl had been taking care of all these children, while being held prisoner. She shrugged off her pack and handed it to a tall girl with frizzy red hair and a milky eye. "There's food, some clothes and a little bit of water inside. Enough for all of you to have a little something to eat."

The girl snatched it out of her hand and ripped it open. Clothes and food tumbled out. Instead of grabbing whatever was closest, the kids sorted the items in piles.

Red selected a shirt and shook it out. "Zac, wear this and try not to pee in it this time."