Dead World

CHAPTER 13

Anna stared in awe at the crumbling city. She had never seen so many buildings. Most of the structures were overgrown with ivy and various plants. Others had collapsed and lay in piles of rubble.

They had been marching most of the morning and the shackles had chaffed Anna’s ankles. The road was hard to navigate in places as the surface was cracked and uneven and plants, bushes and trees sprouted from within.

Jones held his hand up and the riders came to a halt. He jumped down, cigar between his lips as he surveyed the buildings, hand on the grip of his pistol. His men manned their guns. They all seemed jittery.

Anna saw movement and watched as a dirty figure dressed in rags suddenly appeared out of one of the buildings and held a cloth-wrapped hand up. More figures started appearing from the derelict structures.

“Captain. You have something to trade today?”

Jones removed his cigar and whistled loudly. His men pulled the prisoners forward.

“Should be something here that takes yer fancy.”

The dirty man scooted across the rubble and walked along the line of prisoners. He prodded and poked them as he went, squeezing their arms and stomachs. Anna flinched when he reached her. The man stared at her for a moment, then moved on. He paused at Zeke, squeezing the teen’s arms, as if testing his biceps, lifted his shirt to peer at his stomach and sides.

Anna held her breath; her eyes wide as she observed the man touching her son.

The man licked his lips, and after a moment he moved on. The elderly woman behind Lucy shuddered, holding back sobs. She kept her head down, visibly shaking. Once he reached the end of the line, the man came back, tapping the larger and heaviest people on the shoulder.

“This one. This one. Him. Her. This one definitely,” he said. When he reached Zeke again, he appraised him, seemed about to touch him on the shoulder, but moved on.

Anna breathed a sigh of relief. Zeke’s shoulders slumped. He appeared about to collapse.

“OK, separate them,” Jones said.

His men unlocked the tagged prisoners and pulled them aside. A woman started crying.

“So what have you got in return?” Jones asked.

The dirty figure waved his people forwards and they came carrying old rusty tins of food and drink that they had scavenged from the ruined city. While the food was old, it preserved well and didn’t seem to have gone off.

The man held up one finger, signalling Jones to wait. He grinned, revealing crooked yellow teeth. “For you.” He reached into his dirty clothing and pulled out a couple of packets of cigars that he tossed across. “I scavenged them myself. An extra gift.”

Jones caught the cigars, nodded and stuffed them in his shirt pocket. “Right, load up.”

Several of his troops accepted the produce and loaded the supplies on a horse drawn cart. The others led the remaining prisoners back.

Zeke was pushed into line behind Anna. “What’s going to happen to those people?” he asked.

Anna stared over her shoulder as the chosen prisoners were pushed into the shadows of the buildings, sobbing. She shook her head as she was roughly manhandled back into line.

“What’s going on?” Lucy asked.

As they were led away, Anna noticed something lining the road, and it took her a couple of moments to realise they were bones. Human bones.

A scream echoed out of the city, quickly joined by another and another. Screams of unmitigated pain. Lucy jumped, and Zeke peered over at his mother, eyes wide. Anna stumbled, her legs going weak.

“Now perhaps you’ll believe me” the old woman said. “There is no escape.”