Prophet of the Badlands (The Awakened Book 1) (33 page)

nocking.

Father went to the door; the worried voice of another man floated in from the living room. Althea overheard enough to understand his daughter, Corinne, had gone missing and he wanted the Prophet to find her. The two men returned to the kitchen, the guest declined an offer of food. His worry was genuine; dread clung to him like a garment.

“If she is hurt I can help, but I have not seen her.” She felt ashamed at being unable to offer anything, and lowered her gaze to the table.

“Prophet, please. You must be able to find her.” He slid to his knees at her side, taking her hand.

“Sam, if she cannot do anything… You know how stories grow tall.” Father’s voice was somber.

Althea wanted so much to be able to help him, but could not think of how. Desperate tugging at her arm jostled her, and the agate pendant tapped against her chest. The touch of it made her look up with eager eyes. Clasping it, she slid off the chair and stood.

“Do you have a thing she liked?” She held up the pendant so he could see.

The man thought, urgency clouding his mind. A moment later came enlightenment. “Yes, she made a bracelet for her husband.”

The four of them fast-walked six blocks to a small building made of rough beige stone with large windows. Fading words on the glass surrounded a circle of red and white splotches with a brown edge. One triangular piece slid out from the rest. Inside, brick-colored floor tiles traced a path alongside a counter behind which wide metal doors hung open into blackened chambers now used as storage spaces. A handful of chairs identical to the ones from their kitchen piled against the wall. The floor bore the scars of a dozen bolted-down tables and booth seating, removed to allow the trappings of a home. Rope hung about here and there, draped with sheets to section the large area into smaller rooms.

At the center of it all, a young man paced a circle, pausing at their approach. Althea walked over to him and looked up into his eyes. As soon as he saw the blue glow, he collapsed to his knees, bowed, and kissed the tops of her feet. She tensed with a startled squeal.

“What are you doing?” She tried to pull him up by his shirt.

Father intervened, lifting the man away from her.

“Praise the Prophet. She has come to help.” The young man, no older than twenty, held his hands to the ceiling.

She felt awkward. Two other villages in her past had treated her like this; one even carted her around on a hand-carried chair, refusing to let her touch the ground. Raiders had walked right in and grabbed her; no one lifted a finger to protect her, thinking it was her will to be taken away.

“Get up. Please don’t do that.” She folded her arms. “You don’t have to bow to me.”

The man bowed three more times, offering a timid apology.

Althea stepped closer, taking hold of his arm and lacing her fingers around the braided leather bracelet. “She made this for you?”

“Yes.” He put a hand on hers, holding her tight to his arm.

Closing her eyes, she rubbed the material, searching for any emotion embedded into it. Her focus deepened and she felt wooziness, then burning as if hot water spilled in her lap. After a flash of light and a vision of brown rocks, the pain moved up into her stomach and grew stronger.

The hot flash of fever spread over her, followed by disorientation and icy cold on her legs. A sensation as though a sharp stone edge, slick with algae and cold with running water, raked across the sole of her right foot made her whine. A burst of agony went through her shin, a broken bone. Icy coldness covered her, and she could not breathe. When reality returned, she found herself sprawled on the ground.

Althea gasped and pushed herself up off the floor. It felt like water covered her mouth, and she fought for breath, unable to decide between cradling the phantom cut on her foot or the burning between her legs. Karina and Father each took an arm and lifted her, looking worried.

“Are you okay? You just fainted.” Karina wiped the tears from Althea’s cheek.

She had not noticed them; the pain drew them forth without thought. Her mind searched for words but could not speak, feeling like a fish out of water. Father carried her to the tattered green sofa and held her until the shaking subsided. Corinne’s father and husband paced and muttered, exchanging anxious glances.

Between the secure presence of Father and a few minutes, Althea’s body reoriented itself to the here and now, leaving the vision-senses behind. She smiled at Father, and waved the worrying men over.

“She is sick.” Althea put a hand over her bladder. “There is fire here. She has a sick and does not know the world around her as it really is. She walks a dream.”

“Is she alive?” Sam gathered Althea’s hands together and clung to them.

Althea offered a pained expression. “Yes. I think so, but she is in danger. There is water, very cold water. I think she fell into it. Her leg may be broken.” She tapped her right shin.

“Where?” Father’s voice came from above and behind, comforting.

“Shallow, fast water full of rocks as big as my head. Square and sharp.”

“Corinne has not been missing long enough to get far.” Father squeezed her hand. “I know the place of which she speaks.”

The young husband started for the door. “We must go now.”

“Easy, Carlos.” Sam patted his son-in-law on the shoulder.

“We cannot wait.” He yanked the door open. “She is alone in the river. What if bandits find her?”

Althea looked at them. Here it was. The reason for the feeling she had earlier. They would insist on bringing her out to the river, out of the walls and safety of this place. That is where the raiders would come and take her away from Karina and Father―and so it continued.

“Okay.” Althea tried to remain stoic, but her face twisted as tears came.

“She feels Corrine’s pain.” Carlos sighed, bowing again and muttering in whispered Spanish.

Father carried her outside. She clung to him, in no state able to walk, wanting to savor her last few minutes with this family as much as she could. Men’s voices shouted in a blur around her. Losing herself in his scent, Althea kept her face hidden in his jacket, and wept.

She would help this woman whatever the cost.

Gentle rocking made her look up. She lay in the back of a truck like that awful man had driven, sitting in an open space behind a small cabin. Ten men accompanied them, all dressed in blue jeans and blotchy green shirts. Every one of them carried a rifle, though only two of the weapons appeared to be the same type. One resembled what Rachel called an “M4” but it was a bit longer, the rest had wood parts like the Raiders who stole her from Den. Two other trucks, each with a dozen more men, rode on either side. The second truck carried a machine gun too large for anyone to hold, mounted on a post to which a standing man clung.

She put an arm over Father’s shoulder, pulling herself up and looking at the ground. If bandits were going to take her, there would be death. Perhaps that is what she sensed; a battle rather than losing her family.

Althea shivered. What if Father was to die?

“Calm yourself, child.” He kissed the top of her head.

“I don’t want you to get hurt,” she whispered. “Please be careful.”

He grinned.

The man next to him slapped the side of the truck bed. “Fernando cannot be hurt. He is too stubborn for even Hell to want him.”

All the men laughed.

The water she had seen raced past them, intermittent streaks of brown-green scrub shot past in the beige blur of the dirt. Metal, hot and smooth, caressed her legs with the grit of sand and the wind whipped through her hair. Someone ahead of them shouted, and the truck slowed to a stop. The men got out, but a hand on her shoulder held her back.

“Wait here, child.” An unfamiliar face greeted her. “We found her.”

Althea ran to the front of the truck bed, climbing up the roll cage to peek over the roof. Standing on her toes, she watched the men approach a fluttering ribbon of coral-colored fabric in the water. Two stayed in the truck with her, six others surrounded it. She twisted left and right, searching the endless dust, but found no sign of raiders or bandits.

A wounded moan came from the woman. Althea pulled herself up, beckoned by the pain in Corrine’s voice, but a hand clasped about her ankle kept her from leaping over the roof to run to her aid. She looked back at the man with a hurt expression, trying to squirm out of his grip.

He smiled. “Calm down, child. They will bring her to you.”

She clung to the roll bar and tugged at her leg. “They are hurting her.”

The dry calloused hand held her until the others carried Corrine to the back of the truck and laid her in a puddle of water. She looked to be about nineteen. One did not need to be the Prophet to detect the presence of sickness on her. Bone protruded from her right shin, and she mumbled an incoherent ramble in words neither Spanish nor English.

Sam held her husband back, knowing he would get in the way. Althea fell to her knees by Corinne’s side, placing her hands with care around the splintered bone; the skin was hot. The sense of her energy flooded Althea’s mind, torn blobs of color where the leg cracked and the bright yellow glow of infection shone from the center. The moaning lessened as Althea blocked the woman’s ability to feel pain. She scooted around to grab the broken limb with both hands.

Althea’s heels skidded over the sandy truck bed as she pulled. Carlos could not watch, and cringed away. Grunting, she hauled at the foot until the jagged white slid back beneath the soft brown skin. The squish caused a cringe from most of the men. Althea was faintly aware of Father assuring them Corinne could not feel a thing. The formless mass of red shades changed as little shreds and free-floating scraps reintegrated into a whole. By the time she opened her eyes, the leg had mended.

Althea shifted to set her hands on Corinne’s abdomen. The yellow presence of sick writhed in the non-space of her thoughts. Strand by strand, the ethereal tendrils it sent into the woman’s body withdrew into a central mass as Althea purged the poison of infection from her blood. With a final grunt of exertion, she forced the entirety of it apart from the rest of the shapes.

The aroma of death assaulted the air as a slimy purulent discharge pooled below the now-unconscious woman. Some of the men staggered away to avoid the smell, but Althea wrinkled her nose; there had been worse things.

“Fekshun.” She looked up at the men, remembering what she once heard someone call the fragrance.

Men brought buckets of water from the stream to purge the truck.

She clung to Father on the ride back into Querq, jumping at every strange shadow or noise, waiting for the raiders. His hand on her back held her close, calloused fingers absentmindedly stroking her back. Confusion surrounded him; Althea looked up. His confusion at her trembling was plain on his face, but she could find no voice to tell him why. When at long last the truck rolled through the yawning patchwork of old cars that comprised the gates of Querq, she set her cheek on his shoulder and relaxed.

It had just been insecurity.