Fray (The Ruin Saga Book 3) (33 page)

Charlie crept closer, hesitated, then hissed, “Everybody stands here because you would have killed them if they ran.”

Again, silence.

Alexander watched the creature unsheathe his knife behind Charlie’s back, an ugly and disgusted glower about him. He began to inch closer until James waved him to be still—he complied, just, a feral bare-toothed sneer taking over his face.

James took a long breath. “We’re going to stop this ever happening again. As long as there remain those who remember the old ways, this world is in danger.”

Liar,
Alexander thought.
I feel what’s coming, what you’ve brought to this place. So does the kid. It’s not justice, and it’s not revenge. It’s darkness and pain, and—and nothingness. You bring the End with you. And you know it.

James laid a hand on Charlie’s shoulder. He turned his back to the city and whispered—though loud enough for Alexander to hear: “Question me again, and you’ll join them.”

He replaced his balaclava and trudged away through the grass. Passing by, he fixed Alexander with a dead, shark-eyed stare—glittering with the reflected blaze of New Canterbury—then was consumed by the ranks of his army.

Charlie took a shuddering breath and tightened before facing the others. A momentary flicker of disquiet cracked his outwards calm when he saw Jason only paces away, his gore-streaked knife still in hand and his feral leer very much in place. With visible effort he composed himself and called out to the ranks in the fields. Slowly, inexorably, the great bestial machine tore its gaze from the city and turned its back, heading back into the forest, heading east.

Alexander’s guards turned him away from his home and pushed him through the fields, his white tunic splashed across its front with a figure painted in red ochre: the sigil of a pigeon.

“Walk,
messiah
,” the creature hissed in his ear.

Tears fell into the grass as Alexander marched into the east, followed by creeping tendrils of cold and darkness.

Norman waited until the army had vanished before breaking his gaze from the fields. His mind raced with wild thoughts of escape routes, of how he could rally the refugees into the forest. He quickly realised it was fruitless. If the army came for them, there would be no running.

Those who had escaped lay crumpled in the grass like broken birds. As one stunned being, they watched the fires consume everything and slowly burn themselves out, all they had built and come to know and love, turned to so much ash. A great streak of darkness spread across the fields like treacle, a snail’s trail left by the departed army. The flocks of pigeons pursued close behind.

Norman knew they all felt it now: the cold. Everywhere people shivered despite the heat.

“Any sign of Alex?” Norman said.

Lucian paused beside him, gaunt faced. “Nobody saw him all day.”

“Maybe he ran.”

“He wouldn’t have done that.” Lucian’s throat worked. “James has him.” He didn’t wait for a reply, just headed away to watch the city, alone.

Once the last of James’s forces disappeared into the trees, Norman couldn’t look at the fires any more. Staggering through the grass, he knelt beside Allie, shame filling him to the brim. He couldn’t bear the look she gave him as he approached, that steady non-accusing smile.

She should hate me. How can she even look at me?

“I said I’d come home.”

“You did.”

“Too late.”

Still weak, she cupped his face. “You’re here now. Tell me it was worth it. Tell me it wasn’t for nothing.”

Norman swallowed. “I don’t know. I still don’t know.”

She looked pained. “The radio message… the Scots…”

Norman shook his head.

“Nothing?”

Norman looked over his shoulder at Billy, who still stared into space, muttering to herself. “I’m not sure.”

Allie followed his gaze. “Who is she?”

“She might be our only chance.”

“I don’t understand.”

Norman suppressed a grimace. “I gave up on that a long time ago.”

Lucian stepped into view. He seemed in a trance. “Robert,” he said quietly.

Norman drew a long sigh of relief. They had become separated in the firestorm; Robert had been like a man possessed. If he had survived, perhaps they were not lost yet.

The glimmer of hope winked out as Allie’s eyes filled with tears, looking down the hill over Norman’s shoulder. “Norman…,” she muttered, and the tears spilled over down her cheeks.

Norman turned to look down the hill, everything seemed to stop.

Robert Strong walked slowly up the hill towards them, his face utterly expressionless. In his arms, a figure hung limp, arms and legs swinging to the beat of his stride. One side of the body had been charred to uniform blackness, even the fire-red locks of hair. One remaining eye stared sightlessly, forever blind to the grey skies.

Robert laid Sarah in the grass, placing her down as though nestling an infant into a cradle, and sat back on his haunches. He reached out to touch her, but his fingers froze an inch from her blackened shirt. Instead they hovered, tracing the contours of her stomach, and gradually his lips parted. He took one breath, then another, deeper, and another. After that the heaving started, great breathless gasps that ripped away the sheer enormity of his frame and left in its place a small child.

“Norman,” Allie wept quietly. “You…”

“I know,” Norman said, rising. It took everything he had not to look at Sarah, walking through the grass to Robert’s side. He crouched down and tried to ignore the horrific stench of cooked flesh—

Like bacon
, an insidious part of his mind chimed.

“Robert… Robert, I’m sorry.”

Robert didn’t react, just sucked in gasp after gasp.

“I’m so sorry. You did everything you could. And she saved so many. All these people are here because of her.” Norman steeled himself for what had to come next—for he had to win Robert back now, before grief consumed him. “I need your help. There’s no time. They’re moving.”

Robert stood slowly, giving no indication of being aware of Norman’s presence. His entire body had turned milky pale under his coffee-coloured skin. He stood over Sarah with fists bunched, taking those same long, gasping breaths.

“Robert—”

Robert ran. Before Norman could react he launched away, skirting the crest of the hillside, charging around the edge of the city in pursuit of the departed army.

“Norman!” Allie cried.

Norman was on his feet before he had fully appreciated what was happening. People still dead-eyed and distant tumbled aside as he made after Robert, who bulldozed his way through the crowd and was gone, gaining ground by the second.

He’s so fast! I’ll never catch him.

Robert stood two heads taller than Norman and was animated by pure rage. By the time Norman cleared the crowd, Robert had vanished into the forest. It was a lonely thirty-second race to the gloomy forest, with only his own panting and the crunch of his footfalls to fill the silence.

The city is so quiet, now
, he thought.
As soon as the fires go out, you’d never know it had been there at all.

He plunged into the forest, slapping branches from his path. “Robert, stop! You have to come back.”

Crashing up ahead, receding ever farther away.

“Robert, please. We need you!” Twigs tore at his cheeks, gouging for his eyes, and gnarled roots threatened to trip him up and sever a tendon.

He skidded to a halt as the trees ended. Robert stood not far from where the canopy’s shadow ended. Peering over his shoulder, Norman caught sight of two dozen horses grazing in a small clearing; those they had freed from the stables. Forest lay on all sides, a small glade in the hills where neither smoke nor shadow had yet reached. The sight of such pristine, peaceful scenery stabbed at Norman like a hot blade.

“She’s… she’s gone, Norman,” Robert said, a broken whisper that couldn’t have been further from his usual deep tenor.

Norman made to comfort him, beg him, to do something, but he couldn’t find a single word worth uttering. He could only watch the horses, spooked but feeding, watching him closely.

Robert sank to his knees and bunched his hands into claws. His breath came in seething gasps once more, building in intensity until he threw back his head and roared, an unending bellow that seemed to tear open the skies and shake the entire forest. Birds exploded from the canopy, and for a brilliant moment the sky was alive with them in their teeming thousands, whirling and scattering away into the grey nothing. By the time it finally ended, Robert seemed a wisp of his former self, stunted and bent double on the ground.

Norman found strength enough to step forwards. The horses, having spooked and regrouped on the other side of the glade, stood ready to take flight, no longer grazing.

“Nothing any of us say or do can change what happened. But we have the choice to keep going. This isn’t over.”

Robert shook his head, tears beading on the tip of his nose. “I can’t, Norman. I’m done.”

“They’re on the move, right now. In hours they’ll be in London, and then… then it really will be over.”

“There’s nothing to do,” Robert spat venomously. “We’re
done
.”

Norman gripped his shoulder, suddenly seething. “No. No, I refuse to believe that. I haven’t been put through this crap all my life just to be told that there’s nothing to be done, when the time finally comes. I
won’t
believe it. Even if all that waits for me is a quick, stupid death somewhere out there, I’m going to it anyway, because that’s all I’ve got.”

“I had everything,” Robert said.

Norman dug his fingers into Robert’s shoulder.

He’s not listening.

“Robert, I can’t do this alone. I need you next to me.”

“What’s the point? Maybe they’re right. Maybe we are evil.”

Norman endured a bolt of impulse and grabbed hold of it. Without a moment of consideration, he punched Robert in the face. The blow landed like a fly glancing off a windshield, hardly making a dent in Robert’s skin. For a moment he thought Robert would peel the skin off his bones. Instead, Robert blinked. Something stirred, a flicker of presence.

Norman seized it. “Listen to me,
listen
. This was never about getting back at us. It’s all about the End. That Jester wasn’t lying. It’s coming, now. I feel it.”

“Don’t. Just… don’t.”

“It’s going to spread if we don’t stop them. This is our last chance. It’s going to take all of us—it’s
meant
to be all of us.”

Robert was silent for a long time. “We can never go back, can we?”

Norman shook his head.

Robert blinked, looking at his shaking hands. “I’ll go with you, but I’m not part of this. I’m going for her.”

“Fine. But we have to go now.”

Norman clocked the horses on the far side of the glade and nodded to them. “We’ll use them. If we leave now, we’ll make it in time.”

Robert turned without a word and headed into the trees, back towards the hillside.

“Fol,” Billy whispered to the skies. “Panda Man.” She willed him to appear and tell her what to do.

He said she was the only one who could stop it. But she hadn’t stopped anything.

“Where are you?” she hissed. “Stop hiding!”

Nothing, not a glimmer of otherworldly elsewhere, nor glimpse of those mischievous dark-streaked eyes.

“Please!”

I can’t do it all on my own.

The Jester did not appear. He had said he could go no farther, but she hadn’t really believed it until now.

She was on her own, without a clue of how to fight the darkness. It was so strong here, filling her up and eating away at her insides. How could she win when she had no idea how to use the Light?

Allie took her into her lap like Ma used to. She didn’t smell the same—Ma always smelled of lemons—but the way she stroked her hair made Billy relax. Watching the darkness moving slowly up the hill, she sighed. “I don’t understand,” she said.

“Me neither,” Allie said.

“I’m supposed to save it. But I don’t know how.”

Allie gave her a queer look, but she looked too sad to ask more. Tears stained her face. Even grown-ups hurt and cried when they lost friends.

Billy realised she had been betting on being a hero, saving everyone. She hadn’t remembered that she would still be
her
, that she would still be clueless, that it would all be so very strange.

“None of us ever understand,” Allie whispered in her ear.

The sky was growing darker still. Grey had given way to black, bulbous clouds that sagged under their own weight. The air cooled, charged with static, creating the phantom sensation of cooling sweat upon Billy’s skin.

“Storm’s coming,” she said.

Allie wiped her eyes as she watched the last of her home burn up. “Looks like it’ll be a big one.” She tittered, a little madly. “It would come after the fire.”

Billy didn’t answer, just sat in her lap and stared. Eventually, Norm and Robert reappeared. Watching them approach, Billy muttered, “We’re on our own, aren’t we?”

Allie held her tight. “Yes, dear. In the end, we’re on our own.”

“What is it?” Allie said.

“I don’t know, but it’s going to be everywhere if we don’t stop it,” said Norman. He had gathered those who would listen, anybody not totally lost to shock or injury, and explained the shadow over the city as best he could. It was a rambling, stuttering affair, but nobody questioned him. They all felt the Frost around their ankles, working its fingers into their bones. “It’s spreading,” he said. “I don’t know how it works, but it has something to do with the mission. Maybe it’s us holding on to the Old World that’s keeping the End from coming again. Once they get rid of us, there’ll be nothing to stop it. We can’t let that happen.”

“How? How can we stop so many?” Allie said.

He looked to Billy for help. Allie leaned over to look into the girl’s face.

“It’s you believing that keeps it away. The little lights inside everyone. Now they’re all going out, and it’s creeping in,” Billy said. “We have to make the monsters go away.”