Unworthy: Marked to die. Raised to survive. (15 page)

“Please Mother… don’t make me,” he whimpers softly.

My feelings are cloudy. Mixed in with my revulsion I now feel pity. I don’t know if he thinks he’s been talking with his mother all along, but it’s clear that his family life wasn’t warm and loving. I have no idea whether the picture I’m gaining of Hayes’s family life is usual for the Polis, but it wouldn’t surprise me. It would fit with their attitude to pretty much everything else I know. Ruthless. I had always resented their influence in my life and envied their control over their own. Perhaps this view was hasty. I have to admit that I know nothing about the way Polis families work.

Polisborn love stories about valour and strength, and we spent time in school studying the legacy of the Ancients who followed these same ideals. I recall a Polis story from school about a mother sending her sons away to battle with the final words “Come back with your shield, or on it”.

I bring the lamp over, and pick up the wrist again which moments ago gave me a pulse. Looking closely I see what my fingertips had felt. The raised welt of another scar, wrapping his wrist like a bracelet. Badly mended, knotted and lumpy. This one, I’m guessing, was self-inflicted.

I gently put the wrist back on his chest. My fingertips brush my open lips as I stifle a long gasp of realisation at the broken story I’m compiling. Captain Alex Hayes, a Polis tracker. A cold-blooded killer. And a suicide survivor.

I know enough about Polis philosophy to realise that suicide is seen as the most cowardly death of all. Life should be lost in combat, to serve a purpose, or for the greater good of the Polis, but not taken at will. 

“Please don’t tell Father,” he whispers, as he curls again into a ball.

Chapter Seventeen

Through the long night he continues to toss and turn. He mutters to himself and sobs, but I can make out no more. Towards dawn his breathing calms and deepens, and I think he must finally be resting. Whatever demons came to visit him while he was fevered have finally moved on.

The monitor is clear for most of the night, although at one stage a dot appears at the south east corner of the screen, moves in a very haphazard way and then clears off again. I’m guessing it’s a wild creature big enough to register on the monitor, but I have no idea how to tell what it is. I compare it to the other heat signatures on the screen, mine and Hayes’s. It seems to be a different shade. Later I hear some rustling outside the tent although there is nothing to show on the screen and my heart leaps into my throat. It moves off and I hear possums rasping in the trees. I let out the breath I’m holding.

When I no longer need the lamp in order to make out the shapes inside the tent, I rub my tired eyes and look around me. After forcing down some more of the glutinous soup, I pack the lamp, rope, half the dry food and water purifier, First Aid box and spare triggers in my bag, along with my canteen, blanket and wet clothes. I pull out his dazer and heft it in my hand. I really can’t leave him to pursue me with a fully functional weapon such as this. He’s made it perfectly obvious he needs me alive, but I know the dazer can stun as well as kill. I sigh and bang it on the soldier’s cooking pot. It seems indestructible. I feed a narrow splinter from my poisons pouch into the dazer’s pinhole until I feel resistance, then bang it with the pot. When I shake it, I hear a tiny but satisfying rattle from the shaft. The splinter disappears inside the pinhole.

Then I unzip the door to the tent and the grey light of dawn filters in. I crouch for a moment in the doorway, monitor in hand, boots laced, rucksack on my back. I’m finally getting away from him.

I turn slowly back to look at the figure in the corner. He’s not moved for at least an hour, but has been breathing evenly and his temperature seems to be back to normal. The swelling around his wound has reduced and the infection seems to be clearing. I’ve left some soup mixed up in his pot next to a full canteen of water. I’ve also left out the bottle of painkillers.

Leaning over him, I study his face for a second, relaxed in sleep. His eyes closed, tension gone, he doesn’t seem so serious. He also looks younger; maybe still in his teens. My gaze lingers on his dark lashes, their tight curves strangely out of place on the angular face. A week of dark facial hair shows on his cheeks and chin. I gently rest my fingers on his chest, which rises and falls slowly. It’s as much of a farewell as I dare.

I turn away from him, close my eyes and breathe deeply in the crisp morning air. Magpies are raucously starting their song in the gums above me. There’s nothing else I can do for him, so why do I feel so reluctant to leave?

Zipping closed the door behind me, I can hear Grandad’s voice in my head. I know full well what he’s trying to tell me, but I have been looking for this opportunity to leave my captor for four days, and I have finally found it. The last thing I need is my conscience telling me that I’m doing the wrong thing.

I make my way to the stream where I quickly wash my face and neck. It’s been a long night and I don’t feel particularly rested, but at least I’m dry. The monitor is clear in all directions. Balanced on the balls of my feet, I stand and stretch, my chest breathing deeply and my mind making a partition between last night and this morning.

No looking back.

I’ve spent long enough at the stream. I shrug my backpack on, grimacing at the added weight, and set off through the forest with purposeful steps. I skirt the location of the pop-up tent, then continue in a northerly direction. I set myself a goal. On the map, I can pick out the spot I will stop for a rest.

The forest is beautiful at this time of day. The calls of birdlife from the trees echo through the bush, quietened by the tell-tale crackling under my feet. There is still a chill crispness in the air. A delicate morning mist has settled at ankle-level, not yet burned off by the warmth of the sun. For the first hour, as I tramp steadily through the thick underbrush, I can see my breath every time I exhale.

I keep the monitor handy, and check it habitually. I can see other dots appear from time to time and I’m getting better at recognising the difference between them. I still can’t tell the wild creatures from each other, but I can tell what’s human and what’s not. I watched Alex’s prone form disappear from the screen but I’ve not seen another human dot since.

As the light changes and becomes more golden, it gets hotter and by mid-morning I have to stop and take off a layer of clothing. I’ve seen a change in the trees since leaving the stream, and they’re becoming sparser, well-established gum giving way to spindly new beech. It’s easier to move in more of a straight line, rather than having to change my route constantly to get around impenetrable thickets.

I take a swig from my canteen and check the monitor. I am about half way to the next water source and have to make it last till then. I pause and look more closely. A form has entered the range of the monitor and it definitely looks human.

I screw the cap back on and stow it. The dot is perfectly in line with my route, about half a kilometre to the north. Only one shape, and it’s not moving. If I continue on my chosen course, I’ll pass very close to the figure indicated on the monitor. I decide to play it safe and give the dot a wide berth, although keep it within view. The ground begins to incline and I tramp up the hill, hanging onto slim beech trees for balance.

Within one hundred metres of the figure, I see a battered house, and realise the person must be inside. The tracker has been at the forefront of my mind, but now I also recall Hayes’ reluctance to go near the inhabited house on the hillside. I skirt around the structure, hidden well within the treeline.

Stifling the crunch of broken branches under my boots, I hear a human voice, raised in panic. Listening carefully, I can hear someone yelling. Unlike the farmhouse on the in the bowl, this house shows no signs of having been lived in for a very long time. Once a grand, two-storeyed mansion, the weatherboard timber of the walls is haphazardly loose and much of the roof has fallen in. The windows are empty frames, shutters hanging at drunken angles. Someone is calling for help from inside.

With only one form visible on the monitor, I know that the cries for help are from them. Approaching the house slowly, I pass the shell of a rusty pick-up truck. The bonnet is completely missing, and only small slivers of glass remain around the edges of the windscreen.

I climb the porch steps and they creak ominously under my weight. The voice from inside stops for a moment and then changes.

“Is there someone there? Please, help me!” The pleading desperation in the young voice gives me the confidence I need, and I cross the porch, stepping into the front room through a gaping hole in the timber wall.

The cry comes from below me, and when I look down I see that the floorboards in the centre of the room have rotted and given way. Through a rugged, yawning hole I can see the darkness of a dugout cellar below. I can smell the damp earth and can tell that it’s hollowed out from the ground underneath the house. I lean forward carefully and a frightened face looks up at me. A young girl with dirtied cheeks and wide, glistening eyes.

“Please help me,” she pleads, her voice hoarse. “It’s d-dark down here.”

“It’s alright,” I try to keep my voice calm to soothe her. “I’ll get you out,” I call.

I uncoil the rope and toss it over the side of the hole. “Can you climb it?” I ask.

“I think so,” comes the reply. I tie the end to a sturdy wooden post, the remains of an ornate pillar on the inside of the grand old house. As soon as her hand appears above the edge of the broken planking I take it and help her up. She is surprisingly heavy for one so slight, but I realise she has a bulging rucksack on her back.

The girl I pull from the cellar looks about twelve, with a round pale face, delicate nose and wide sloping eyes. Dry leaves stick out of her straight black hair and there are tear stains on her dirty cheeks. As soon as she is on solid ground she wraps her arms around me and sobs into my shoulder. I pat her back in dismay.

While I take a drink she slings her pack from her back. “What brings you out here?” I ask.

I turn to her, screwing the cap back on the canteen, to find her pointing a dazer at me.

“You,” she replies, and fires.

Chapter Eighteen

I gradually become aware of pain in my wrists, shoulders and neck. My mind feels fuzzy and my tongue swollen. I realise that I’ve been dribbling onto my chest. Despite the complaints of my body, I lift my head. It weighs a ton.

My hazy vision starts to clear and I find I’m sitting awkwardly on the wooden floor of the ramshackle house. My back is propped up against a wooden post, my wrists bound behind it. My legs have gone numb under me and the pain in my shoulders and wrists is intense.

I groan when I try to move my legs, and lean back against the post. Through the gaping windows I can see that the sun is high, light falling in shafts through the broken weatherboards. I can hear a metallic scraping noise coming from somewhere behind me, and the hairs on my neck stand up.

“Finally,” a voice says. “I was beginning to wonder if I’d killed you already.” She steps into view, casually trailing the point of a long knife across the remains of a flaking timber wall.

The transformation is incredible, and I stare at the girl in front of me. Her hair, void of leaves, falls straight down her back. Her eyes, no longer glistening with tears, are cool and calculating. There is a predatory stillness about her that makes my stomach turn to liquid. Possibly eighteen or nineteen, I would guess. Older than me, anyway. She is no longer the frightened youngster I saved from the cellar, but a deadly hunter. A tracker.
My
tracker.

“Are you going to kill me?” I ask, my thick voice wobbling and betraying my fear.

“We’ll get to that,” she says calmly. “First, though, I have some questions.” Her voice rises and falls lightly, and sends the liquid from my stomach running cold through my veins.

My eyes never leave her as she moves through the bars of sunlight, dust motes whirling around her feet, and comes to sit cross-legged in front of me. She lays the knife gently in front of her knees, between us. Her palms come to rest on her thighs and she tilts her head left and right, stretching her neck. She makes a satisfied sigh and her eyes open to rest on me.

She runs her fingers through her hair and gathers it up at the base of her neck, then twists and twists it until she can stick a sharp pin through a tidy knot on the back of her head. She smiles at me all the while.

“Now, let’s get started,” she says, the words flat and emotionless.

I know it’s all an elaborate act for my benefit. Knowing makes no difference though - I’m terrified. It’s all I can do to stare back at her. My heart is thudding so hard in my chest that I am sure my shirt is shaking with it. I already feel like crying and sobbing, begging for mercy, and she hasn’t even touched me yet. However, I know without a shadow of a doubt that there is no point trying to reason or plead with this woman. She enjoys her craft too much.

“Ah, where are my manners? You’ll be thirsty. Water?” She leans forward and lifts my canteen from my side. I narrow my eyes at her, wondering if she would put something into the water, but my desperately dry mouth is crying out for it. I am also absolutely certain that she is going to kill me. What purpose would she have to drug me as well?

I nod and drink thirstily as she tips the bottle for me. Some runs down my face, but she doesn’t stop until the water is gone.