False Dawn (2 page)

In the next instant she was reeling back. “Stupid, stupid!” she said aloud. “Stupid!” For there was a man in the silo, waving something at her. She started to run, angry and frustrated.

“No! No!” The voice followed her. “Don’t run away! Wait!” it got louder. “That’s my arm!”

Thea stopped. His arm. “What?” she yelled back, ready to bolt.

“It’s my arm. They cut it off.” The words made a weird echo in the corrugated walls of the silo. “Last week. I think.”

She started back toward the voice. “Who did?”

“The Pirates. In Orland, across the river from Chico. With a power saw.” He was getting weaker and his words came irregularly. “I got this far.”

She stood in the doorway looking down at him. “Why’d you keep it?”

He drew in a breath. “They were looking for a man with only one arm, So I pinned this into my jacket. It’s going bad—I can’t use it much longer.” He paused a moment, then finished, “I can’t get any farther without help.”

She ignored this and cast a glance at the arm that lay on the floor of the silo. “Well, you better bury that.”

His eyes met hers. “I can’t.”

Thea looked him over carefully. He was at least fifteen years older than she was, with a stocky body made gaunt with hunger and pain. His wide, square face was deeply lined and the lines were grimy. He wore filthy clothes, but in spite of the dirt and rents, Thea saw that they had been well made.

He moaned and tried to look away from her.

“How long you been here?”

“I think two, or maybe three days.”

“Oh.” From the state of the arm she reckoned three days was right. She pointed to the stump just below his shoulder. “How does it feel? Infected? Can you feel anything?”

He frowned. “I don’t think it’s infected. Or not much. It itches.”

She accepted this for the moment. “Where were you going? You got a place to go?”

“I was trying to get into the mountains.”

Thea considered this, and her first impulse was to run, to leave this man to rot or live as it happened. But she hesitated, and saw disbelief and hope in his blue eyes. She thought about Gold Lake, so far away, and knew that getting there would be hard.

“I’ve got medicine,” she said, making up her mind. “You can have some of it. Not all, ‘cause I might need it. But you can have a little.”

He looked at her, his rumpled face puzzled. “Thank you,” he said, unused to the words.

“I got parapenicillin and a little sporomicin. They’re both still good. Which one do you

want?”

“The penicillin.”

“I got some ascorbic tablets for later,” she added, looking thought fully at the stump of his arm as she came completely into the silo and tugged the door behind her, leaving just enough space to escape. She gave her attention to his injury. There had been an infection but it was clearing and she saw that the skin was the tawny orange color of regenerating tissue. “You left-handed?”

“Yes.”

“You’re lucky.”

After releasing the crossbow’s straps and storing her quarrels in a side pocket of her pack, she put it down, not too close to the man. He still had one good arm and had admitted that he was left-handed. “What’s your name?” she asked as she dug into the pack.

“Seth Pearson,” he answered with slight hesitation.

She looked at him sharply. “It says David Rossi on your neck tags. Which is it?”

“It doesn’t matter. Whichever you like.” He sounded tired now, and the color had gone from his face and his voice.

Thea looked away. “Okay. That’s the way we’ll do it, Rossi.” She handed him a packet, worn but still intact. “That’s the parapenicillin. You’ll have to eat it; I don’t have any needles.” Then she added, “It tastes terrible. Here.” She handed him a short, flat piece of jerky. “It’s venison; tough, but it’ll take the taste away.” She put her pack between them and sank to the floor. When the man had managed to choke down the white slime, she spoke again. “Tomorrow I’m going east. You can come with me if you can keep up. There’s one more bad river ahead, and you might have to swim it. It’s fast though, and rocky. So you better make up your mind tonight.”

She did not look for an answer. She took two more sticks of jerky out of her pack and ate them in guarded silence.

The north wind bit through them as they walked; the sun was bright but cold. Gradually the gentle slope grew steeper and they climbed more slowly, saying nothing and keeping wary eyes on the bushes that littered the hillside. By mid-afternoon, they were walking over the crumbling trunks of large pine trees that had fallen, victims of invisible smog. The dust from the dead trees blew in plumes around them; stinging their eyes and making them sneeze. Yet they climbed on.

Their going got rougher and slower until they were forced to call a halt in the lee of a huge stamp. Rossi braced his good shoulder and held out his tattered jacket to protect them both from the wind.

“Are you all right?” Thea asked him when she had caught her breath. “You’re the wrong color; kind of purple and green at once.”

“Just a little winded.” He nodded. “I’m…still weak.”

“Yeah,” she said, looking covertly at his stump. The tawny shade was deepening. “You’re getting better.”

He started to make a flippant reply and his feet slid suddenly on the rolling dust. He grabbed out to her to keep from falling.

She stepped back. “Don’t do that.”

As he regained his footing, he looked at her in some surprise. “Why?” he asked gently.

“Don’t you touch me.” She grabbed at her crossbow defensively. Superimposed over his features she could see the hate that had been in Mackley’s face at the river.

He frowned, his eyes troubled, then his brow cleared. “I won’t.” In those two words there was great understanding. He knew the world that Thea lived in, and the price it exacted from her.

With a look of defiance she tightened the crossbow’s straps on her arm, never taking her eyes from the man. “I can shoot this real fast, Rossi. Remember that.”

Whatever he might have said was lost. “Hold it right there,” came the voice from behind them.

Aside from a quick exchange of frightened glances, they did not move.

“That’s right.” There was a puff of dust, and another, then a young man in a ruined C. D. uniform stood in front of them, an assault rifle cradled in his arms. “I knew I’d catch you,” he said aloud to himself. “I been following you all morning.”

Thea edged closer to Rossi.

“You people come out from Chico, right?” He bounced the weapon he carried, eyes glittering.

“No.”

“What about you?” he demanded of Thea.

“No.”

He looked back toward Rossi, an unpleasant smile widening on his face. “What about you…Rossi, is it? Sure you didn’t come through Chico? I heard a guy named Rossi was killed outside of Orland. One of Montague’s men, Rossi was.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“They said he was trying to save Montague when Cox took over. You know anything about that? Rossi?”

“No.”

The younger man laughed. “Hey, don’t lie to me, Rossi. You lie to me and I’m gonna kill you.”

In the shadow of the tree-stump, Thea slowly put a quarrel to her crossbow, keeping as much out of sight as she could.

“You’re going to kill us anyway, so what does it matter if we lie?” Rossi was asking.

“Listen,” the C. D. man began. “What’s that?” he interrupted himself, looking straight at Thea. “What are you doing?” And he reached out, grabbing her by the arm and jerking her off her feet. You bitch-piece! He kicked savagely into her shoulder as she fell, just once. Then Rossi put himself between them. “Stop this.” “Move!” The order was accompanied by a shove with the butt of his rifle.

“No. You want me to move, you’ll have to kill me.”Rossi was so calm no one doubted him.

The young man wavered for a moment, his hands restlessly fingering the dark metal. His face twitched.

Without turning, Rossi said to Thea, “Did he hurt you?”

“Some,” she admitted as she got to her knees. “I’ll be okay.”

The C. D. man glowered. “She your woman? Is she?”

Rossi turned slowly, forcing the man with the rifle to move back. “No. She’s nobody’s woman.”

At that the other man giggled. In that case, I bet she needs it. I bet she’s real hungry for it.”

He winked at Rossi. “What do you think?”

Thea closed her eyes to hide the indignation and terror in her: if this was to be rape, being used…She opened her eyes when Rossi’s hand touched her shoulder. “I’m okay,” she muttered, though she wasn’t.

“You try any more dumb things like that, cunt, and that’s going to be the end. Understand?”

“Yes,” she mumbled.

“And what will Cox say when he finds out what you’re doing?” Rossi asked. He still kept himself between Thea and the other man.

“Cox won’t say nothing!” the C. D. man spat.

“So you deserted.” Rossi nodded measuredly at the guilt in the man’s face. “That was stupid.”

“You shut up!” He leaned toward them. “You are going to take me out of here, wherever you’re going. If anybody spots us, or we get trapped, I am going to make both of you look like a butcher shop. You got that?…HUH?”

“You stink,” said Thea.

For a moment there was anger in the young, hard eyes, then he grabbed her face with one hand. “Not yet, not yet,” His grip tightened, his fingers bruising her jaw. “You want some of that, you’re gonna have to beg for it, real hard. You’re gonna have to suck it right out of me. Right?” He looked defiantly at Rossi. “Right?” he repeated.

“Let her go.”

“You want her?”

“Leave her alone.”

“All right,” he said with a little nod. He stepped back from her. “Later, huh? When you’ve thought it over.”

Thea bit the insides of her cheeks to keep from screaming.

Rossi looked at the C. D. man. “I’ll be close, Thea. Just call.”

As the two men stared at each other, Thea was tempted to run from them both, to the protection of the destroyed forest. But she could not escape on the open hillside. She rubbed her shoulder gingerly and went to Rossi’s side.

“I’m a better choice,” the C. D. man mocked her, “My name’s Lastly. You can call me that, bitch-piece. Don’t call me anything else.”

She said nothing as she looked up the slope.

Rossi’s voice was soft. “Don’t try it now. There’s cover up ahead and I’ll get him into a fight. Take your chance when you can.”

In deep surprise she turned to him, seeing the sincerity in his eyes, She thought of the rifle in Lastly’s hands and Rossi’s one arm. “Truly? You’d do that?”

He might have said more hut Lastly shoved them apart. “I don’t want none of that. You don’t whisper when I’m around, hear? You got anything to say, you speak up.”

“I want to piss,” said Rossi.

Lastly giggled again. “Oh no. You aren’t gonna leave a trail. Not for a while, till we’re in the trees. Hold it in; got that?”

With a shrug Rossi led the others as they began the long walk toward the rotting line of timber.

For half an hour they moved in silence, and then a wail like a distant wind halted them in their tracks.

“What was that?” Lastly turned the barrel of his gun toward the sound that once again surged through the underbrush.

The ululation rose and fell through the trees for a third time, lonely and terrible.

“Dogs,” said Rossi bluntly. “They’re hunting?’

In the deep shadows of dusk the scattered trees seemed to grow together as if to surround the three people who moved through the gloom. The sound came again, closer and sharper.

“Where are they?”

Thea looked back at him. “They’re a way off yet. You can’t shoot them until they get close.”

“How many?” Lastly was panting now, and not from exertion.

“Who knows?” Rossi replied. “Dog packs can get pretty large.”

“We got to get out of here,” Lastly said in fear. He swung his rifle uneasily. “Right? We got to find some place safe?”

Rossi squinted up at the fading sky. “They haven’t picked up our scent yet. I’d say we have another hour yet. After that, we’d better climb trees.”

“But they’re rotten—” Lastly protested.

“They’re better than dogs,” Rossi said gently.

But Lastly wasn’t listening. “There used to be camps around here, didn’t there? We got to find them. No dogs gonna come into camp.”

“You fool.” Rossi’s voice was dispassionate, and whatever expression might show in his blue eyes was hidden by the waning light.

“No talking. I don’t want to hear it.” Lastly’s gun wavered in front of Rossi.

“Then both of you stop it,” Thea put in quietly, staring at Lastly. “The dogs can hear you when you shout.”

All fell silent. In a moment Rossi murmured, “Thea’s right. If we’re quiet we might find one of your camps in time.” There was doubt in the tone.

“You get moving then,” Lastly said hurriedly. “Right now. We don’t stop ‘til we find someplace safe.”

It had been a summer cabin once, when people still had summer cabins, about a century old with rusted pipes that no longer ran water, and kerosene-lamps in sconces; there was no sign that it had ever been wired for electricity. The view below it had been of pine forests giving way to the fertile swath of the Valley. Now it stood in, a clearing surrounded by rotting trees high above the spreading contamination of the river. Oddly enough the windows were still intact.

Rossi tapped one. “Break-resistant plastic. Probably had trouble with bears getting in.”

“You think there’re bears?” Lastly demanded.

“Not with dog packs about. They tend to remain in the high country. We can stay here for a while—a couple of days at least,” Rossi said after circling the cabin. “The back porch is heavily screened with metallic weaving; we can’t cut through it, but we can get the door off its hinges.”

“We can break through a window.” Lastly said eagerly. “I’ll shoot one out.”

“If the window is broken, the dogs can get in.” When this had sunk in Rossi went on. “The back is secure. We’ll be able to protect ourse1ves.”

“You two get it done,” Lastly ordered, pointing his rifle toward the rear porch. “Get it done fast.”

As Thea and Rossi struggled with the door Lastly straddled the remains of the fence. “Say, Rossi, you see what Cox did to that Mute in Chico? Took the skin right off him, hey. Cox, he’s gonna get rid of all the Mutes—just you wait.”