The Copper Horse #2 Pride (39 page)

As the captives
were being herded towards a group of wooden buildings, Victor
couldn’t stop looking to the undead walking between the trees just
over a dozen yards away. His breath hitched, and he stumbled to the
side when one of the monsters crooked its head, trying to bite
through the iron bar. He fell out of the row with a yelp, his back
immediately covering in cold sweat, but the nearest guard didn't
tolerate any nonsense and roughly pushed Victor back in line,
straight into a young, shivering woman whose breasts were uncovered
by a torn blouse.

“Watch where
you’re going, knobhead!”

“But... there
are z--zombies.” Victor tried so hard not to stutter, but his voice
was trembling.

“There’s a
metal fence. Are you blind or somethin’?” The guard sneered at him,
patting the big, black shotgun in warning, a clear sign that
weakness would not be tolerated.

Victor’s
stomach cramped, and he had to blink to get his eyes back into
focus. Everything seemed far too bright after the dark days in the
wagon. He had no idea where he was. All he knew from the scraps of
conversation he overheard on the train, was that most of the people
he was taken with were indebted to the Dals, a powerful family that
ruled a whole district of Bylondon with an iron fist. It made him
want to cry in rage, as he did nothing that should have earned him
a fate such as this.

The sunshine,
the delicate rustle of leaves, or even the fresh autumn air could
not console Victor. From a dirt road leading through the forest,
they went on to one that was neater looking, and led along never
ending rows of trees with succulent, red apples pulling the
branches down with their weight.

“New
transport!” another guard yelled to someone at the front and the
half naked woman next to Victor broke into a sob, but he was too
stunned to make himself care. This couldn’t be happening to him. He
had money, he had a father who ran a successful business.

Between the
trees of the vast orchard, he noticed a group of people picking the
fruit, their thin bodies tanned by the sunlight that was
unnaturally strong for October. To his right, by the edge of the
pine forest was a collection of wooden buildings, some of them two
stories high. There were also sheds, all circled by an additional
row of fence, topped with barbed wire.

Victor rushed
to the side of the group, so he could see more of what awaited them
ahead, and the glimpse he got, made his heart sink. There was a
dozen of armed men, some with crossbows, others with swords or
machetes, and none of their faces was even remotely friendly. One
stepped in front of the others. From the way he moved in confident
strides, Victor assumed he was the leader. The man scratched his
bald head and took his time to assess the group with a sneer on his
wrinkled face. The grimace showcased an ugly scar across his
bulbous nose.

“Welcome to
your new home, or as we call it, Honeyhill.”

The guards
behind him laughed, and Victor could imagine the place was nothing
like the name suggested.

“You have all
begrudged the Dal family, and you are here to pay for it. You will
work, you will have food and shelter. Behave well and you will
live, behave badly and you will die,” continued the leader in a
loud and somewhat raspy voice

Victor
swallowed. How exactly was his ‘crime’ an insult? If anything, Frey
Dal should have taken it as a compliment. And how long would he
remain here anyway? There had been no trial, no sentence... Did
they really expect him to work in a field like some kind of pleb?
He was an educated man. He should be working on developing his
talent, protecting his voice, but there he was, on the edge of a
forest, in a dirty shirt and a pair of trousers that had been cut
off at the knee.

One moment, he
was drinking his coffee and reading the paper, the other, two thugs
were dragging him out, and no one rushed over to his aid!

The
introduction wasn't long, but he found out the leader was supposed
to be referred to as 'Mr. Dorset'. It made Victor cringe. Dorset
was no ‘mister’, but he didn’t have to dwell on that as soon, they
were separated into smaller groups, which the guards led into
different directions. At first, the shrinking number of captives
didn’t bother Victor much, but at some point, he noticed that each
time a guard chose his team, he was being overlooked. It was making
him wet with cold sweat because he could hardly predict what those
people would do with someone they deemed useless.

“Time for the
next shift.” A cheerful, raspy voice was accompanied by heavy
footsteps. Victor stuck his head out, surprised by the lack of
threat in the man's tone. He was desperate for some kind of anchor
amidst the chaos, and whoever it was, provided a shadow of hope for
it.

The crossbow at
the man’s hip was no less threatening than the other ones he’d seen
so far, but with his big frame, wide shoulders and a toothy grin,
this particular guard could definitely be an anchor. A heavy,
brawny anchor with soft, green eyes that belonged anywhere but in
Honeyhill.

It was the
glint of the sun reflecting on the smooth length of the man's
machete that brought Victor back to reality and back into the
row.

Dorset frowned
at him and covered his bald head with a brownish cap. “Yeah,
they’re all yours, Crunch.”

Crunch
?
What kind of name was that?

Victor bit his
lip, straightening up and getting to his toes in an attempt to look
taller and bigger than he was.

Crunch came
followed by a group of prisoners. They were the epitome of tired,
with rugged, thin clothes sticking to their bodies. Slouching, with
bloodshot eyes and dry lips, they were pushing wheelbarrows filled
with apples. But Victor’s focus quickly turned back to Crunch as
the man passed his group in a pair of tight, brown leather trousers
tucked into well used boots. Victor's eyes followed the fine arse,
but when his gaze crawled up the guard’s back, now only covered by
a tight, dirty undershirt, he realized that he was being
scrutinized as well. Blood ran cold in his veins when he looked
into the man’s clear eyes. From the slightly crooked nose that must
had been broken some time ago and the scar that ran across one of
Crunch’s brows, Victor deduced the man wasn’t one to mess with.

The group of
tired men and women was taken over by another guard, but Crunch
didn't seem to notice, keeping up eye contact with Victor. He
wasn't smiling, but Victor's heart skipped a beat then he noticed
the guard licking his upper front teeth, which was the first
fucking thing he understood in this godforsaken place! Victor knew
men found him attractive, and apparently this sod was yet another
admirer.

Victor’s mouth
stretched into a seductive smile before he even thought about it,
and when he noticed a flicker of growing interest on the masculine
face, it occurred to him that anchoring himself to a man in charge
might be exactly the thing he needed. He let his eyes drift down
for a second before darting a shy yet promising look at Crunch. He
sucked his bottom lip into his mouth and made a show out of it.
Just for Crunch.

The man didn’t
smile, but he didn’t look away either. Just when Victor was
starting to doubt his initial conclusion about him, Crunch yawned
theatrically and stretched, showing off that big, muscled body.
Victor was tempted to laugh at such blatant peacocking, but he did
find the man very attractive, and the display was a promising sign,
so he winked instead. With his hands still bound behind his back,
there wasn’t much he could do to show interest. The only idea he
had was to trace his lips with his tongue before poking it hard
into the inner side of his cheek in the well-known suggestion of
cocksucking. Crunch’s package looked promising in that
department.

The delicious
looking guard gave him one more moment of attention before walking
over to Dorset to have a word with him. Victor's stomach tightened
when Crunch gestured towards the group of new arrivals that
included him.
Oh God
, what if the guard understood it all
wrong? What if they beat him? He wouldn’t even be able to defend
himself.

All he wanted
was to form some kind of alliance here, maybe get some food because
back there, in the train, there were moments when his head spun
from hunger. Since he had been taken two days ago, all he got was
stale water and bread.

All the guards
shared a laugh about something Victor couldn't overhear, but he
stood up straight when Crunch started walking towards him.

“I’m Crunch,
you’re coming with me,” he said and pointed his machete to the way
down the track, back to the orchard, like he intended to use it for
cutting a passage through rainforest. He was joined by a young,
blond guard who couldn't be more than twenty.

“You will pick
apples. They’re not yours to eat. No talking. Try anything funny,
and you will be punished,” said the second guard, watching them
with angelically blue eyes.

Victor
swallowed. What about food? Wouldn’t they get any? He was too
afraid to ask though. A hiss to his left caught his attention, and
when he looked to where it came from, he came face to face with a
thin man with a hawk-like nose and eyes so swollen he looked like a
victim of a beating.

“What did they
get you for?”

Victor bit his
lip nervously. “Um... I don’t know... they made a mistake.”

A big man at
his other side eyed him up with a sneer. “Yeah right. Save it.”

“No talking!”
Crunch's voice from the back stung as much as the poke of something
hard and cold at his back. He tensed, squeezing his mouth shut and
shied away from the touch. Maybe teasing the man wasn’t the best
idea after all.

Following the
blond guard, they entered the vast orchard. A thin girl walked out
from a shed at its border and distributed baskets without a word.
The constant buzzing was still lingering at the back of Victor's
mind, and he looked around to find its source. He frowned at a
shining dome-like structure looming on the top of a nearby hill.
Who would have need for modern architecture in a place such as
this? He didn’t have much time to dwell on it though as the guards
herded them deeper between the rows of trees, past groups of
workers who did their job without protest, silent as puppets at the
hands of their masters. They seemed to have come to terms with
their fate. Then again, what could they do in bright daylight
against a bunch of men with weapons and surrounded by a forest full
of bloodthirsty undead?