The Land of the Shadow (18 page)

“Or if they’re going to be a problem,” Pearl said. “Far too close for comfort.”

Justin nodded. “I think we should leave the wagon and Shadowfax here.”

“I agree. Kaden—”

“No,” Kaden said, his voice sharp. “I’m coming with you.”

Pearl put the binoculars back in the case. “We need someone to have a fallback position, Kaden. Someone who can lay down covering fire if we had to retreat quickly. I’ll go with Justin because the men in that town will see a man and a woman as less of a threat. Two men together might get their hackles up. We don’t want to look like . . . victims, but we don’t want to seem threatening, either.”

Kaden’s expression made it clear he didn’t like it, but he gave Pearl a short nod. Justin had to rein in the impulse to pat her on the back for her diplomacy and good tactical sense.

They drove the wagon back down the road about a quarter of a mile. There was a half-burned house that made for a perfect sniper’s perch and could conceal the wagon from the road. They unharnessed Shadowfax so she could graze—she knew by now to hide from strange humans if any approached.

He and Pearl both shouldered an assault rifle. Justin wore two pistols at his hips and one tucked into a holster at the small of his back. He tucked a knife down into his boot and another into a wrist harness concealed under the sleeve of his shirt. They might think he was odd for wearing long sleeves in such hot weather, but he could always hope they were afflicted with that nonobservant nature of most human beings.

Pearl picked up a bag and stuffed some of their food into it along with a box of shotgun shells. She had extra magazines for the rifle she carried tucked into her waistband under the hem of her shirt. As Justin watched, she pulled the hair tie out of her tiny braids, which had been swept back in a knot, and put them back up in a high ponytail, the ends fanning out to frame her face. He blinked in surprise at the difference it made. She looked younger, softer.

She saw Justin’s stare and smiled, pointing at herself. “Hollywood, remember? I know how little alterations in appearance can change perceptions.”

With a grin, he fluffed out his own hair.

“Sorry, that doesn’t work for you,” Kaden said. “You just look like you’ve been electrocuted.”

Pearl gave Justin a critical once-over. “It might help if you shaved.”

He shrugged. “I didn’t bring a razor since we were only going to be gone two days, and I’m not using a knife to shave unless Carly is around to be impressed by it.”

“That reminds me. Here.” Kaden reached into his pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. “Carly told me to give this to you if we ran into any . . . issues.”

He glanced down at it. His wife had written him a short note in her large, loopy handwriting. His dyslexia had never been triggered by her writing, but she took care to make her lettering clear and distinct.
 

Please
be careful. I love you.
 

He smiled and put it in his own pocket. Pearl gave him a small smile. “A reminder I’ve got to bring you back in one piece. Carly looks soft, but I’d bet she’s like a koala bear—all cute and cuddly until she’s ripping your face off.”

“She has her moments,” Justin said, and his mind drifted back to the time they were ambushed on the road. It had been Carly who saved the day after he was taken out by an arrow.

They started down the roadway, walking in a casual, easy stride, though Pearl kept a hand at her hip, inches from the butt of her pistol. He noticed she kept a friendly smile intact even as she spoke, in case they were being watched.

“How we gonna play this?”

Justin considered. “We’re staying in one of the nearby towns, scouting for supplies. Let’s hope they’re doing the same.”

“You’ve been through this area, haven’t you?”

“Only briefly. I didn’t search it. I didn’t think there’d be much here. But I doubt they were around at that time. I saw no evidence of recent occupation. No fresh candy wrappers, scent of fire, that sort of thing.”

“How long ago was your last pass-through?”

Justin scratched his chin. “Maybe two, three months ago? I’m not sure.”

The strangers had spotted them. Some stood, heads turned toward one another in conversation. Their hands stayed down, loose at their hips.

“They’re armed,” Justin murmured. His cheeks hurt from holding his grin in place, and he had to remind himself not to tense up as they approached. He glanced around quickly, noting positions where they could take cover, fast, if they had to.

Pearl nodded, showing no surprise. Justin lifted a hand in greeting and waved at the men. “Hey there!”

A few of them waved in return. The rest watched in wary silence. Pearl’s smile never wavered as they continued forward, but the skin around her eyes was tight. This was always the most nerve-wracking walk, toward an uncertain target, trying not to convey hostility by posture but remaining alert and ready to take cover and return fire if the Outsiders proved too jumpy.

Justin and Pearl stopped a few yards away from their group of chairs. “Hi.”

“Hi, yourself.” The man who spoke was short and stocky, his hair trimmed close to his skull. Muscles bulged beneath his T-shirt. His face was expressionless as he stepped to the front of the group. “What are you doing here?”

Justin’s friendly posture didn’t waver. “We’re just scouting for supplies, and when we saw you guys, we thought it might be a chance to do some trading.”

Another man spoke up. “Trading, huh?”

The guy looked like a stereotypical all-American, Midwest, corn-fed, high school football player. Blond hair and blue eyes, white teeth gleaming against his tanned skin, and a thin thread of nasty arrogance beneath his smile. It made Justin’s skin crawl.

Blondie’s eyes slid over to Pearl and his grin widened. “You got anything good to trade?”

Justin ignored that and turned back to the short, stocky fellow. “You the leader?”

“It ain’t like that,” the man replied. “We’re all equals here.”

Yeah, right
. “No leader at all?”

Shorty shifted on his feet. “Well, yeah. But he ain’t here.”

“I see. I’m Justin, by the way.”

Shorty stuck out his hand. “Max.”

“Nice to meet you, Max. This is—”

“Can I offer you a drink?” Max said before Justin could introduce Pearl.

“Yeah, sure.” Justin watched as Max fished around in the plastic Coleman cooler behind the lawn chairs and fished out a can of diet soda. It came out dripping water, cool to the touch. Justin offered it to Pearl, who politely declined, before he opened it and took a sip. “Thanks,” he said.

“No problem. Have a seat.” Max gestured to the lawn chairs.

Smart of him. Justin and Pearl would have to take their rifles from their shoulders and most people would lean them against the chair. Justin didn’t give a damn if he looked rude. He laid the rifle across his thigh and draped his hand near the trigger, just to make the point. Pearl followed suit, laying hers at an angle across her legs and tapping her fingers on the stock.

“You from around here, Justin?” Max asked.

“Sort of.” Justin took a sip of his soda. He hated this diet shit. He saw movement from the corner of his eye and noticed that some of the Lawn Chair Gang had edged their way around behind him. He beckoned them back. “Why don’t you guys come around and join the conversation?”

He glanced back at Max, who gave the men a tiny nod. They obeyed, shuffling around to stand on the opposite side of the chair circle, behind Max. Pearl shoved her chair back at an angle, watching the street behind them without any effort at subtlety.

“You don’t look like you’re on a long trip, or else you travel mighty light.” Max nodded his head toward Pearl’s pack.

“Well, you know what they say about possessions weighing you down,” Pearl said.

Max didn’t acknowledge her statement. “You stayin’ nearby?”

Justin took a sip of his soda and looked down to cover the flash of anger in his eyes. He needed to find out as much as he could before he lost his temper and shot these assholes on general principle. He didn’t know if they were treating Pearl like this because she was a woman or because she was black, but at this moment, he didn’t much care about the whys of the situation.

“We’re staying around. What about you boys? Where are you staying?”

“Here, for now,” Max said. “Sort of just . . . checking out our territory.”

Justin didn’t take the bait. “Will your leader be back soon? I’d like to meet him.”

“I think that’s a good idea. He’ll want to meet you, too. I’m sure he’ll have lots of questions. Is it just the two of you?”

Justin gave him a small smile. “You laying out place settings for dinner?”

Max laughed. “Just curious, I suppose. You two . . .
together
?”

Pearl snorted. “I’m not available.”

Max stared at Justin.

“You heard her,” Justin said.

Max’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond.

Justin sipped his soda again, keeping his face blank. Lewis had taught him that trick. People had a tendency to read their own anxieties into an expressionless face. Just like an uncomfortable silence, it made the nervous and weak-willed rush to fill it, often with the very thing they didn’t want to say.

Max wasn’t weak willed, but he wasn’t much of a poker player, either. He kept flicking his gaze toward the road. He shifted his weight, making the lawn chair creak as he drummed his fingers on the plastic arm, the tempo increasing with every passing moment. He opened his mouth to speak, and Justin would have bet something interesting was going to come out of it, but then he surged out of his chair, relief washing across his features.

“Marcus is back!”

“Who’s Marcus?” Justin asked, rising to his own feet. He held his rifle with seeming casualness, his hand gripped around the narrow section of the butt. He could hear a metallic rattling sound coming closer, perhaps the sound of wheels on pavement.

“You wanted to meet our leader,” Blondie said. He had a plastic grin plastered on his face again, the kind of grin someone might use when forced to hand a trophy to a team who’d just beaten their own in the final game of a championship.

Pearl edged over to stand beside Justin, and he could see her scanning the surrounding buildings with sharp and watchful eyes, just as a large group of people rounded the corner.

A small contingent of men with shotguns in hand guarded a column of ragged, filthy people shuffling along. The clanking they had heard was not wheels, but the rhythmic sound of chains being dragged with each step the group took. Men and women, some barely out of their teens and a few that had gray strands in their snarled hair. Their clothing was tattered, haphazardly worn, some of it inside out or backwards. One man wore only a pair of sweatpants, torn open down the leg, which flapped around his calf as he shuffled forward. They were bound together, tied to the person in front with what looked like zip ties attached to a collection of bicycle cables and dog chains. Bruises and abrasions marred their skin, and every one of them was thin to the point of emaciation.

Justin was surprised to see their faces were blank, the telltale look of the Infected who had survived the virus but were left with minds burned away by the high fever. Justin and Carly had encountered some of them in their travels. For the most part, they were harmless but helpless. Some could be violent, and they all had a tale of a terrible encounter, but those incidents were becoming infrequent. Few of the Infected had survived this long. This was more than Justin had seen in over a year. He counted twenty as the group passed by them.

Pearl made a small sound, and Justin noticed her hand tighten on the stock of her rifle until her knuckles blanched.

Two of the men led the group up the stairs of the building behind them and through the double doors. They remained outside, like guards. Though Justin watched, he saw no movement in any of the windows. He wondered how many more people were in there.

One of the men separated himself off from the group and waited until the columns had passed before he came forward, a curious tilt to his head but a smile on his face. “Hey there! I’m Marcus.”

He was tall, taller even than Justin who topped out at 6’4”, but unlike Justin, he was lanky and spare, which made his arms and legs look bizarrely long. His hair was pale blond where it stuck out from under his baseball cap, and his eyes were ice blue, crinkled at the corners with thin lines. His pale blond eyebrows and lashes disappeared against his tanned skin.

Justin said hello and gave his name. Marcus stuck out his hand, and Justin shook it, a gesture that seemed anachronistic in this new world. Marcus glanced over at Pearl, whose face was as impassive as a stone angel.

“And who might this be?” He smiled at Pearl, and she returned it with a brief smile that looked more like a grimace.

“I’m Pearl.”

“Nice to meet you.” Marcus offered his hand to her as well, and Pearl shook it politely.

Marcus gestured for them to sit again and took a seat across from them. He leaned forward, his elbows propped on his knees as he fished out a soda from the cooler.