World In Tatters Ch. 3

I move slowly, deliberately, between the thick, overgrown bushes. My head on a swivel. Still, I can hear nothing. Nothing, not even birds. It’s an eerie sort of quiet. My teeth are clenched, my muscles coiled and ready to strike. I pull the hunting rifle close into my shoulder, preparing for worst possible outcomes.

My mind, which had been racing so violently a moment ago, now turns to deadly calm. I know my task. I know the dangers if I fail. My senses are on high alert. I feel every breath of wind. Hear every crunch of leaves beneath my feet, every breath I take, every heartbeat in my chest.

Dense wood surrounds me as I move deeper and deeper onto the trail. Still nothing. The only movement is my own. My muscles ache with tension. Sixty yards into the brush, around twist and turn, I can no longer see where I entered this death trap. I feel the small hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. Suddenly, behind me, I hear an extra set of footsteps. How did they get behind me? Without my hearing them?

I spin, turning on them, rifle raised, ready to fire—

I turn to see nothing but Rachel’s damn cat skulking into the underbrush. Then Rachel coming around the corner shouting after him.

“Rachel, I almost shot him! I almost shot you! What the hell are you doing?” I shouted, dropping the barrel of the rifle.

“Jeez, Bro, he got away from me. Must’ve run off during the gunfire. I was just trying to find him. And you.”

“And you didn’t think to call out, before—you know what? Never mind. Where’s Jason? The kid? We have to get going. The path seems clear.”

“Alright, fine. Jeez. I’ll go get them.”

“No, it’s fine. We’ll both go. I didn’t mean to yell at you. Come on, we do need to get moving.”

“I know. I’m sorry. The others should be ready to go by now.”

The two of us moved back toward the trailhead, with Rachel carrying that infernal cat of hers. I close my eyes for a second and take a deep breath, releasing the tension in my body. I hate this. I hate living on edge all the time, but it’s been necessary.

Rachel and I hurry back to the house where Jason and Chris appear to be finished loading supplies. We now have nine horses to deal with. But if we can get them to town, the extras will be worth quite a stockpile of supplies. We’re just gonna have to be really careful to avoid anyone who might recognize us. We haven’t been to Picayune in a long time, so anyone who knew us while our parents were alive shouldn’t know our faces. We’ve gotta offload these spare horses and get moving. Get as far out of dodge as we can.

After we tie the spare horses to the backs of our saddles, we ride toward the deer trail. We ride single file until the trail widens. Chris rides up just ahead of me where I can keep an eye on him. He guides us along the trail for a few hours. Until we come to a large clearing on the bank of a small creek.

“Hey, guys, lets break here for a little while. I don’t think any of us have eaten much since yesterday. But this doesn’t mean to let your guard down. Chris, take care of the horses. Get them some water. I’m gonna make a sweep, cover some of our tracks. Make sure we aren’t being followed.”

We all dismount. My body is stiff, sore from the hours of riding. I grab the hunting rifle off my saddle and throw it over my shoulder. I grab my canteen and head back the way we came through.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes. Rest up. Grab some food.”

That deadly calm washed over me. I hear everything. The birds, cicadas, the flow of the creek. Everything is as it should be. I can finally breathe easy. That dark feeling from earlier is long gone, but my mind can’t be at ease. Why were those bounty hunters after us? Who put out that bounty? If I’m right, this is only the beginning of our troubles.

This new kid, Chris, I want to trust him. He seems genuine, but if there’s one thing I know, it’s that you shouldn’t trust strangers out here. But I don’t know. There’s something about him. Something I can’t really put my finger on. He’s a good kid. He’s going to get us to Picayune. After that, I don’t know.

The hard packed ground kept our tracks from being too prominent. Only a good tracker would be able to follow us. We’re going to have to be careful around the creek though. The ground is soft, wet. I think we’re alright though. I move back to our little camp. Jason is down at the creek filling the canteens. The water is clear, but we’ll have to treat them with the iodine we picked up last week. Just to be safe. Chris is sitting over with the horses while they graze fiddling with a piece of rope. Rachel is sitting with her back to one of the trees, staring at Chris with her knife in hand, Rex milling about by her feet. Anyone can tell that she doesn’t trust Chris, but she doesn’t she trust anyone but Jason and me. In some ways, she’s more built for this life than I am. But she’s too young to have to deal with any of this.

“Hey Chris, come here for a second.”

Chris looks up warily at me from his knot-work. He’s nervous around us. I can’t really blame him. “I-is something wrong?”

“No, not at all. I just want to talk to you.”

He rises from the ground, undoing his knots, carefully coiling his rope, and tucking it away into his saddlebag. I gesture towards the creek, asking Chris to follow me. We walk a little way away from the others, just far enough where they shouldn’t be able to hear us.

“So, Chris…” I start, not really knowing where to begin. “Tell me more about yourself.” I mumble.

“What?”

“Tell me about yourself. I’d like to get to know our trail guide. Even if you may not be traveling with us for very long.”

“Oh. Um… What do you want to know?”

“I don’t know. Where are you from? How did you end up working for mercenaries? Are you plotting to kill us all in our sleep?”

“What! I…uh…I wouldn’t…”

He looked truly mortified at that one. “I’m kidding, Chris.”

“Oh… Right…”

“But really, where are you from?”

“My family lives in a little cabin a bit outside Hattiesburg.”

“Family?”

“Yeah. My mom, dad, my siblings…”

“Oh, you have siblings? They anything like Rachel?”

It may just be a trick of the sunlight dancing off the water, but I could swear I saw his face turn a little red. Then he turned really sad, staring down into the creek. “N-no.. uh… I have two brothers and a sister, but they’re not… I haven’t seen any of them in a while. It’s been one year, three months and six days since I had to leave.” He looked up to see the puzzled look on my face. “More or less,” he added sheepishly.

“Had to leave? Why? I mean, I don’t mean to pry, but…”

“No, it’s fine.” He interrupted. “It’s just a painful memory. I don’t really like talking about it.”

“You don’t have to tell me. I’m not trying to interrogate you. And, we did just meet a few hours ago.”

“I should get back to the horses.”

“Wait. You hungry?” He nods as I pull a cloth pouch from my pocket, offering it to him. “It’s just some nuts. Go ahead.”

He looks at me tentatively, then takes the pouch from my hand. “Thanks.”

“I’m sorry. Family is tough. I can tell you that first hand. If it’s any consolation, Rachel and I haven’t had a home. Not really, anyway. Not for a long time. We spent a lot of time on the road. Now, we can’t even stay anywhere for a single night without something happening.”

“That doesn’t really make me feel better.”

“Yeah, I figured not. So, how did you end up with those bounty hunters back there?”

“Long story short? I was working at some stables in Picayune. I was just caring for the horses. About a week ago, their leader came in. I overheard him talking to my boss. He just wanted some horses and supplies, but he was really rude. Kept talking about how poor our stable was, how bad our rations taste. A couple of his men kept kicking over the wash buckets. They were just all around jerks.”

“Yeah, no surprise there. Clearly, your boss still did business with him. But that doesn’t explain how you ended up here.”

“My boss… he, uh… sold me.”

“You’re a slave?”

“No!” he shouted, turning red in the face and glaring at me. “I’m a person. I’m a human being. I’m no one’s property.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“It doesn’t matter.” The anger in his expression faded leaving only sadness. “My boss…my owner, at the stable wasn’t my first. Probably won’t be my last either.”

“That sucks.”

“What?” a slight smile crosses his face. “I tell you that I’ve been bought and sold like a piece of meat, and all you can say is ‘that sucks’?”

“What do you want me to say? That I know how it feels? Because I don’t. It would just be empty words.”

Laughing, “Yeah, I guess you’re right. And it does. Suck I mean.”

“We should probably get back to the others. I still need to tell them what’s going on.”

“Yeah. Speaking of the others… your sister. What’s her deal?”

“What do you mean?”

“She just keeps staring at me while fiddling with her knife. It’s like she’s trying to decide whether or not to gut me.”

“She doesn’t trust you.”

“Clearly.” He interjected.

“Can you blame her? We don’t really know you.”

“True. But she kinda freaks me out.”

“Yeah, me too. You get used to it.” With that, we made our way back into the camp. Rachel was still sitting against the tree. She notices us returning and draws her knife.

“It’s just her way of saying she likes you.” I jab at Chris.

“Yeah…right.”

“Hey, Jason, Rachel. Come here. We need to talk.”