The Passage

FIFTY-SIX

From the Journal of Sara Fisher (“The Book of Sara”)

Presented at the Third Global Conference on the North American Quarantine Period

Center for the Study of Human Cultures and Conflicts

University of New South Wales, Indo-Australian Republic

April 16-21, 1003 A.V.

[Excerpt begins.]

… and that was when we found the orchard-a welcome sight, since none of us has had anything like enough to eat since three days ago, when Hollis shot the deer. Now we are loaded up with apples. They’re small and wormy and if you eat too many of them all at once you get cramps, but it’s good to have a full belly again. We’re bedding down tonight in a rusted metal shed that’s full of old cars and stinks like pigeons. It seems we’ve lost the road for good now, but Peter says that if we continue walking straight east, we should hit Highway 15 in a day or so. The map we found at the gas station in Caliente is all we have to go by.

Amy is talking a little bit more every day. It all still seems new to her, just to have someone to talk to, and sometimes she seems to struggle for the words, like she’s reading a book in her mind and looking for the right ones. But I can tell that talking makes her happy. She likes to use our names a lot, even when it’s clear who she’s speaking to, which sounds funny but by now we are all used to it and even doing it ourselves. (Yesterday she saw me stepping behind a bush and asked me what I was doing, and when I said, I have to pee, she beamed like I’d just given her the best news in the world and said, too loudly, I have to pee also, Sara. Michael burst out laughing, but Amy didn’t seem to mind, and when we were done with our business she said, very politely-she is always polite-I’d forgotten that was what it’s called. Thank you for peeing with me, Sara.)

Which isn’t to say that we always understand her, because half the time we don’t. Michael says it reminds him of talking to Auntie only worse, because with Auntie you always knew she was fooling with you. Amy doesn’t appear to remember anything about where she comes from, except that it was a place with mountains and that it snowed there, which could be Colorado, though we don’t really know. She doesn’t seem afraid of the virals at all, not even the ones, like Babcock, who she calls the Twelve. When Peter asked her what she did in the ring to make him not kill Theo, Amy shrugged and said, as if this were nothing, I asked him to please not do it. I didn’t like that one, she said. He’s full of bad dreams. I thought it would be better to use my please and thank you.

A viral, and she actually said please!

But the thing that sticks in my mind most of all is what happened when Michael asked her how she’d known to blow the coupler. A man named Gus told me, Amy said. I never even knew that Gus was on the train, but Peter explained what had happened to Gus and Billie, that they’d been killed by the virals, and Amy said, nodding, That was when. Peter got very quiet for a moment, staring at her. What do you mean that was when? he said, and Amy answered, That was when he told me, after he’d fallen off the train. The virals didn’t kill him, I think he broke his neck. But he was around for a little bit after. He was the one who put the bomb between the cars. He saw what was going to happen to the train and thought someone should know.

Michael says there has to be some other explanation, that Gus must have said something to her earlier. But I can tell Peter believes her, and I know I do, too. Peter is more convinced than ever that the signal from Colorado is the key to all of this, and I agree. After what we saw in the Haven, I am beginning to think that Amy is the only hope we have-that any of us has.

Day 31

A real town, the first since Caliente. We are spending the night in some kind of school, like the Sanctuary, with the same little desks in rows in all the rooms. I was worried that it would have more slims in it, but we haven’t found any. We’ve been taking the watch in shifts of two. I’m on second shift with Hollis, which I thought would be hard, sleeping a few hours and then waking up again, then trying to sleep a couple more before dawn. But Hollis makes the time pass easily. For a while we talked of home, and Hollis asked me what I missed the most, and the first thing that came to mind was soap, which made Hollis laugh. I said, What’s so funny and he said, I thought you were going to say the lights. Because I sure as hell miss those lights, Sara. And I said, What do you miss and he was quiet for a moment, and I thought he was going to say Arlo, but he didn’t. He said, The Littles. Dora and the others. The sounds of their voices in the courtyard, and the smell in the Big Room at night. Maybe it’s this place, that it kind of reminds me of them. But that’s what I’m missing tonight, the Littles.

Still no virals. Everybody’s wondering how long our luck will hold out.

Day 32

It looks like we’re going to spend an extra night here-everybody needs to rest.

The big news is the store we found, Outdoor World, full of all kinds of supplies we can use, including bows. (The gun case was empty.) We got knives and a hand axe and canteens and packs with frames and a pair of binoculars and a camp stove and fuel that we can use to boil water. Also maps and a compass and sleeping sacks and warm jackets. Now we all have new gaps to wear, and warm socks for our boots, and thermal underwear, which we don’t really need yet but probably will soon. There was one slim in the store, we didn’t see him until we were almost done, lying under the counter with the binoculars. It made us all feel a little bad that we’d been pulling stuff off the shelves and not even noticing he was there. I know Caleb would have made a joke about it to cheer everyone up. I can’t believe he’s gone.

Alicia and Hollis went hunting and came back with another deer, a yearling. I wish we could stay long enough to cure the meat but Hollis thinks there’ll be more where we’re going. What he didn’t say because he didn’t need to was that if there’s game there’s probably smokes, too.

It’s cold tonight. I think it must be fall.

Day 33

Walking again. We’re on Highway 15 now, headed north. The highway is quaked out but at least we know we’re going the right way. Lots of abandoned vehicles. They seem to come in clusters, you see a bunch of them together and then nothing for a while and then you hit a line of twenty or even more. We’ve stopped to rest by a river. Hoping to make Parowan by late afternoon.

Day 35

Still walking. Peter thinks we are covering about 25 kilometers a day. Exhausted. I am worried about Maus. How can she keep this up? She’s clearly showing now. Theo never leaves her side.

It’s suddenly hot again, scorching. At night there’s lightning to the east, where the mountains are, but never any rain. Hollis got a jack on the bow so that’s what we’re eating, roast jack split eight ways, plus a few leftover apples. Tomorrow we’re going to try to look for a grocery and see if there are any cans there that are still okay to eat. Amy says that you can eat plenty of what’s there if you have to. More 100-year-old food

Why no virals?

Day 36

We smelled the fires last night and by morning we knew the forest was burning over the ridgeline to the east. We debated if we should turn around or wait or try to go around somehow, but that would mean leaving the highway, which no one wants to do. We’ve decided to press on and if the air gets worse we’ll have to make a decision.

Day 36 (again)

A mistake. The fires are close now, no way to outrun them. We have taken shelter in a garage off the highway. Peter isn’t sure what town this is, or if there even is a town. We used the tarps and some nails and a hammer we found to cover the broken windows in the front and now all we can do is wait and hope the wind shifts. The air is so thick I can barely see what I’m writing.

[Pages missing.]

Day 38

We’re past Richfield now, on Highway 70. In places it’s washed away but Hollis was right about the major roads, how they follow the passes. The fire came straight through here. There are dead animals everywhere, and the air smells like charred meat. Everyone thinks the sound we heard that night was the screams of virals, caught in the fire.

Day 39

The first dead virals. They were beneath a bridge, three of them huddled together. Peter thinks we haven’t seen any before because they’d driven all the game up into the higher elevations. When the wind changed, they got trapped by the fire.

Maybe it was just the way they looked, all burned up and their faces pressed to the ground, but I found myself feeling sorry for them. If I didn’t know they were virals I would have sworn they were human, and I know it could just as easily have been us lying dead there. I asked Amy do you think they were afraid and she said yes, she thought that they had been.

We’re going to stay an extra day in the next town we come to, to rest and scavenge supplies. (Amy was right about the cans. As long as the seams are tight and it feels heavy in your hand, they’re OK.)

[Pages missing.]

Day 48

Moving east again, the mountains behind us. Hollis thinks we’ve seen the last game for a while. We are crossing a dry, open tableland, stitched by deep gullies. There are bones everywhere you look-not just small game but deer and antelope and sheep, and something that resembles a cow only larger, with a huge knobby skull (Michael says they’re buffalo). At half-day we stopped to rest by an outcrop of boulders and saw, scraped into the rocks, “Darren loves Lexie 4Ever” and “Green River SHS ’16, PIRATES KICK ASS!!!” The first part everybody understood but nobody knew what to make of the rest. It made me feel a little sad, I can’t quite say why, maybe it was just that the words had been there so long with no one to read them. I wonder if Lexie loved Darren back?

We got off the highway and are sheltering near the town of Emery. Nothing really left here, just foundations and a few sheds with rusted farm equipment, full of mice. There’s no pump we can find, but Peter says there’s a river near here and tomorrow we’ll go look for it.

Stars everywhere. A beautiful night.

Day 49

I have decided to marry Hollis Wilson.

Day 52

Going south now from Crescent Junction, on Highway 191. At least we think it’s 191. We actually walked straight past the turnoff at least five clicks and had to double back. There’s not much of a road to follow, which was why we missed it in the first place. I asked Peter why we had to get off the 70 and he said we’re too far north for where we’re going. Sooner or later we’ll have to head south, so it might as well be now.

Hollis and I have decided not to tell anyone about what’s happened. It’s funny how when I made up my mind about him I realized I had been thinking it for a long time without knowing it. I wish all the time I could kiss him again but everyone’s around or else we’re on watch. I still feel kind of guilty about the other night. Also, he really needs a bath. (So do I.)

No towns at all. Peter doesn’t think we’ll hit one till Moab. We are spending the night in a shallow cave, really just a recess with an overhang, though it’s better than nothing. The rocks here are all a kind of orange-pink color, very lovely and strange.

Day 53

Today was the day we found the farmstead.

At first we thought it was just a ruin, like all the others we’ve seen. But as we got closer, we saw it was in much better shape-a cluster of woodframe houses, with barns and outbuildings and paddocks for animals. Two of the houses are empty, but one of them, the largest, looks like someone was actually living here not so long ago. The table in the kitchen was actually set with places and cups; there are curtains in the windows, clothing folded in the drawers. Furniture and pots and pans and books on the shelves. In the barn we found an old car, covered in dust, the shelves lined with jugs of lantern fuel, empty jars for canning, tools. There’s what looks like a graveyard, too, four plots marked with circles of stones. Michael said we should dig one up to see who’s down there. But nobody took this suggestion seriously.

We found the wellhead but the pump was rusted tight; it took three of us to free it, but once we did the water that came out was cold and clear, the best we’ve had in a long while. There’s a pump in the kitchen that Hollis is still trying to free up and a woodstove for cooking. In the basement we found more shelves stacked with cans of beans and squash and corn, the seals still good. We still have the tins we scavenged in Green River, plus some of the smoked venison and a bit of lard we saved. Our first real meal in weeks. Peter says there’s a river not far and tomorrow we’re going to go look for it. We’re all bedding down in the biggest house, using mattresses we dragged from upstairs and set around the fireplace.

Peter believes the place has been abandoned at least ten years, but probably not more than twenty. Who lived here? How did they survive? The place has a haunted feeling to it, more than any of the towns we’ve seen. It’s as if whoever lived here went out one day, expecting to be back for supper, and simply never returned.

Day 54

We are staying an extra day. Theo is insistent, says Maus can’t keep up this kind of pace, but Peter says we have to leave soon if we want to make it to Colorado before the snow. Snow. I hadn’t thought about that.

Day 56

Still at the farmstead. We decided to stay a few more days, though Peter is antsy and wants to get moving. He and Theo actually argued about this. I think [indecipherable]

[Pages missing.]

Day 59

We are leaving in the morning, but Theo and Maus are staying behind. I think everyone knew this was coming. They made the announcement right after supper. Peter objected, but in the end there was nothing he could say to change Theo’s mind. They have shelter, there’s plenty of small game around plus the cans in the basement, they can ride out the winter here and have the baby. We’ll see you in the spring, brother, Theo said. Just don’t forget to stop in on your way back from whatever it is you find.

I’m supposed to be on watch in a few hours, and I really should be sleeping. I think Maus and Theo are doing the right thing, even Peter has to know it. But it’s sad to be leaving them behind. I think it’s making us all think about Caleb, Alicia especially, who clammed up completely after Maus and Theo gave their news and has yet to say a word to anyone. I think everyone’s remembering those graves in the yard, wondering if we’ll ever see Maus and Theo again.

I wish Hollis were awake. I told myself I wouldn’t cry. Oh damn, damn.

Day 60

Traveling again. Theo was right about one thing-without Maus, we are making better time. The six of us got to Moab well before dusk. There’s nothing here; the river has washed everything away. A huge wall of debris is blocking the way, trees and houses and cars and old tires and every kind of thing, filling the narrow canyon where the town once was. We’ve sheltered for the night in one of the few remaining structures, up in the hills. A complete derelict, just the framing and a patchy roof over our heads. We might just as well be out in the open, and I doubt anyone’s going to get much sleep tonight. Tomorrow we’re going to walk up the ridge, try to find a way through to the other side.

[Pages missing.]

Day 64

We found another animal carcass today, some kind of large cat. It was hanging in the limbs of a tree, like the others. The body was too rotted to tell, but everyone is thinking it was a viral that killed it.

Day 65

Still in the La Sal Mountains, heading east. The sky has turned from white to blue, the color of autumn. There’s a damp, delicious smell to everything. The leaves are coming down, and there’s frost at night, and in the morning, a heavy, silver mist hugs the hills. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything so lovely.

Day 66

Last night Amy had another nightmare. We were sleeping out in the open again, under the tarps. I had just come off watch with Hollis and was prying my boots off when I heard her mumbling in her sleep. I was thinking maybe I should wake her up when suddenly she sat bolt upright. She was all wrapped up in her bag, only her face showing. She looked at me for a long moment, her eyes unfocused, like she didn’t know who I was. He’s dying, she said. He keeps on dying and can’t stop. Who’s dying, I said, Amy, who? The man, she said. The man is dying. What man? I asked her. But then she lay back down and was fast asleep again.

Sometimes I wonder if we are heading toward something terrible, more terrible than any of us can imagine.

Day 67

Today we came to a rusted sign by the road that said, “Paradox pop. 2387.” I think we’re here, Peter said, and showed us all on the map

We are in Colorado .

FIFTY-SEVEN

The mountains declined at last to a broad valley, wide in the autumn sunlight, beneath an azure dome of sky. The grass was tall and parched, the limbs of the trees barren or else dotted with a few remaining leaves, the stragglers, bleached to the color of bone. They lifted in the breeze like waving hands, rustling like old paper. The ground was dry, but in the culverts water ran freely. They filled their canteens with it, cold as ice against their teeth. Winter was in the air.

They were six now. They moved across the empty land like visitors to a forgotten world, a world without memory, stilled in time. Here and there the shell of a farmhouse, the skull-like grille of a rusted truck; no sound but the wind and the creak of the crickets, flicking through the grass as they walked. The terrain was easy, but this wouldn’t last. A distant white shape, painted across a far horizon, told a story of mountains to come.

They rested for the night in a barn by a river. Old tack hung on the walls, buckets for milking, lengths of chains. An old tractor sat on flattened tires. The house was gone, collapsed into its foundation, its walls improbably folded one on top of another like the flaps of a box, not so much destroyed as packed away. They divvied the cans they’d found and sat on the floor to eat the contents cold. Through the ragged tears in the roof they could see stars, and then, as the night drew down, the moon, ringed by scudding clouds. Peter took first watch with Michael; by the time Hollis and Sara relieved them, the stars were gone, the moon no more than a region of paleness in the cloud-thickened sky. He slept, dreaming of nothing, and when he awoke in the morning, he saw that it had snowed in the night.

By midmorning the air had warmed again; the snow had melted away. On the map, the next town was named Placerville. Eight days had passed since they’d seen the body of the cat in the trees. The feeling that something was following them had dissipated over the long days of walking, the silent, star-strewn nights. The farmstead was a distant memory; the Haven, and all that had occurred there, seemed like years ago.

They were tracing a river now. Peter thought it was the Dolores, or the San Miguel. The road was long gone, absorbed by the grass, the wash of earth and time. They marched in silence, two rows of three. What were they looking for, what would they find? The journey had acquired a meaning of its own, intrinsic: to move, to keep moving. The thought of stopping, of reaching the end, seemed beyond Peter’s power to imagine. Amy was walking beside him, her back sloped forward against the heft of her pack, her sleeping sack and winter jacket lashed to the bottom of the frame. She was dressed, like all of them, in clothing scavenged at Outdoor World: a pair of gaps cinched to her hips and, on her upper body, a loose-fitting blouse of red and white checks, the sleeves unsnapped and flapping around her wrists. On her feet, a pair of leather sneakers; her head was bare. She had given up the glasses long ago. She kept her eyes forward, squinting against the brightness. In the days since they’d left the farmstead, a shift had occurred, subtle but unmistakable. Like the river, she was leading them now; their job was simply to follow. With each passing day, the feeling grew stronger. Peter thought, as he often did, of the message Michael had shown him, that long-ago night in the Lighthouse. Its words formed a backbeat to the rhythm of his walking, each footfall carrying him forward, into a world he didn’t know, into the hidden heart of the past, to the place where Amy came from.

If you found her, bring her here. If you found her, bring her here.

He had discovered, in the days since they’d left the farmstead, that he did not miss Theo as he’d thought he would. As with the Haven and all that had happened before it-even the Colony itself-thoughts of his brother seemed to have fallen away, subsumed like the grassy road by the project of simply moving forward. At first, that night when Theo and Maus had called them all together and announced their decision, Peter had been angry. He had not shown this, or hoped he hadn’t. Even in the midst of it, he knew this anger was irrational; it was obvious that Maus could not continue. Part of him simply didn’t want his brother to leave him again so soon. But Theo had the facts on his side, and in the end, Peter could only agree.

But he had also come to see, over the days, a deeper truth behind his brother’s decision. His path and Theo’s had been destined to diverge again, because their cause was not the same. Theo did not seem to doubt their story of Amy, or at least he had said nothing to make Peter think so. He had absorbed Peter’s explanation, fantastic as it was, with no more or less skepticism than it deserved. Yet Peter could detect in his brother’s compliance a feeling of detachment; Amy meant nothing to him, or meant very little. If anything, he seemed a little afraid of her. It was clear that he had come as far as he had only because that’s where the group was headed; at the first opportunity, and under the circumstances of Mausami’s pregnancy, he had quickly given this up. Selfishly, Peter would have wished for more, if only for Theo to have expressed some regret, however small, at their separation. But he hadn’t done this. The morning of their departure, as the six of them had walked away from the farmhouse, Peter had turned to see his brother and Mausami watching them. A small thing, but it had seemed important to Peter that Theo remain where he was, standing on the porch, until the six of them were out of sight. But when Peter looked again, his brother was gone; only Mausami was there.

When the sun was high they stopped to rest. They could see the line of mountains plainly now, a rugged bulk against the eastern skyline, the peaks dolloped in white. The day had grown warm again, enough to make them sweat; but up high, where they were going, winter had already arrived.

“More snow up there,” Hollis said.

He was sitting beside Peter on a fallen log, its rotted bark blackened with dampness. No one had spoken a word in at least an hour. The others were scattered around, all except Alicia, who had gone ahead to scout the terrain. Hollis knifed open a can and begun to spoon the contents to his mouth, some kind of shredded meat. A bit got caught in the coarse tangle of his beard; he wiped it away, washed the last of his meal down with a long, throat-pumping drink of water, and passed the can to Peter.

Peter took the can and ate. Sara, sitting across from him with her back against a tree, was writing in her book. She paused, her eyes focused intently at what she’d written; her pencil was just a nub, almost too short to hold. While Peter watched, she drew her blade from her belt, scraped it across the tip, and then resumed her patient scribbling.

“What are you writing about?”

Sara shrugged, hooking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “The snow. What we ate, where we slept.” She lifted her face to the trees, squinting into the sunlight descending through the sodden branches. “How beautiful it is here.”

He felt himself smile. How long had it been since he’d smiled?

“I guess it is, isn’t it?”

A new feeling seemed to have come over Sara since they’d left the farmstead, Peter thought, an unhurried calm. It was as if she had decided something and, in so doing, had moved more deeply into herself, into a state beyond worry or fear. He felt a flicker of regret; watching her now, he realized how foolish he’d been. Her hair was long and matted, her face and bare arms streaked with grime. Her nails were blackened with crescents of dirt. And yet she’d never looked more radiant. As if all that she had seen had become a part of her, infusing her with a glowing stillness. It wasn’t a small thing, to love a person. That was the gift she had offered him, had always offered him. And yet he had refused it.

Sara met his eyes then. She cocked her head in puzzlement. “What?”

He shook his head, embarrassed. “Nothing.”

“You were staring.”

Sara shifted her gaze to Hollis; the corners of her mouth lifted in a quick flash of a smile. Just a moment, but Peter felt it keenly, the invisible line of connection between the two of them. Of course. How could he have been so blind?

“It wasn’t anything,” he managed. “Just… you looked happy, sitting there. It surprised me is all.”

Alicia emerged from the brush. Balancing her rifle against a tree, she retrieved a can from the pile of packs and bladed it open, frowning at the contents.

“Peaches,” she groaned. “Why do I always get peaches?” She took a place on the log and began to spear the soft yellow fruit from the can, straight into her mouth.

“What’s down there?” Peter asked.

Juice was dripping down her chin. She gestured with her blade in the direction she had come. “About half a click east, the river narrows and turns south. There’s hills on either side, heavy cover, lots of high points.” The peaches gone, she drained the can into her mouth and cast it aside, wiping her hands on her gaps. “The middle of the day like this, we’re probably okay. But we shouldn’t hang around too long.”

Michael was sitting a few meters away on the damp ground, his back braced against a log. The days of walking had made him leaner, harder; his chin now sported a wisp of pale beard. A shotgun was resting across his lap, his finger close to the trigger.

“No sign in what, seven days?” He spoke with his eyes closed, his face tipped toward the sun. He was wearing only a T-shirt; his jacket was tied around his waist.

“Eight,” Alicia corrected. “That doesn’t mean we should let our guard down.”

“I’m just saying.” He opened his eyes and turned toward Alicia, shrugging. “A lot of things could have killed that cat. Maybe it died of old age.”

Alicia gave a laugh. “Sounds good to me,” she said.

Amy was standing by herself at the edge of the glade. She was always drifting off like this. For a while this habit had made Peter worry, but she never went very far, and by now they were all accustomed to it.

He rose and went to her. “Amy, you should eat something. We’re moving on soon.”

For a moment the girl said nothing. Her eyes were directed toward the mountains, rising in the sunlight beyond the river and the grassy fields beyond.

“I remember the snow,” she said. “Lying down in it. How cold it was.” She looked at him, squinting. “We’re close, aren’t we?”

Peter nodded. “A few days, I think.”

“Telluride,” Amy said.

“Yes, Telluride.”

She turned away again. Peter saw her shiver, though the sun was warm.

“Will it snow again?” she asked.

“Hollis thinks so.”

Amy nodded, satisfied. Her face had filled with a warm light; the memory was a happy one. “I would like to lie down in it again, to make snow angels.”

She often spoke like this, in vague riddles. Yet something felt different this time. It was as if the past were rising up before her eyes, stepping into view like a deer from the brush. Even to move would scare it away.

“What are snow angels?”

“You move your arms and legs, in the snow,” she explained. “Like the ones in heaven. Like the ghost Jacob Marley.”

Peter was aware that the others were listening now. A single strand of black hair pushed over her eyes in the wind. Watching her, he felt himself transported back through the months to that night in the Infirmary when Amy had washed his wound. He wanted to ask her: How did you know, Amy? How did you know my mother misses me, and how much I miss her? Because I never told her, Amy. She was dying, and I never told her how much I would miss her when she was gone.

“Who’s Jacob Marley?” he asked.

Her brow furrowed with a sudden grief. “He wore the chains he forged in life,” she said, and shook her head. “It was such a sad story.”

They followed the river, into the afternoon. They were in the foothills now, leaving the plateau behind. The land began to rise and thicken with trees-naked, twiglike aspens and huge, ancient pines, their trunks wide as houses, towering over their heads. Beneath their vast canopies, the ground was open and shaded, pillowed with needles. The air was cold with the dampness of the river. They moved, as always, without speaking, scanning the trees. All eyes.

There was no Placerville; it was easy to see what had occurred. The narrow valley, the river carving through it. In spring, when the snowpack melted, it would be a raging torrent. Like Moab, the town had washed away.

They sheltered that night at the river’s edge, stretching the tarp between a pair of trees to fashion a roof and laying their sleeping bags in the soft dirt. Peter was on the third shift, with Michael. They took their positions. The night was still and cold, filled with the sound of the river. Standing at his post, trying to keep motionless despite the chill, Peter thought of Sara, and the feeling he had detected between her and Hollis in that private gaze, and realized he was honestly happy for the two of them. He’d had his chance, after all, and Hollis obviously loved her, as she deserved to be loved. Hollis had told him as much, he realized, that night at Milagro, when Sara was taken: Peter, you of all people should know I have to go. Not just the words themselves but the look in his eyes-an absolute fearlessness. He’d given it up, right then; he’d given it up for Sara.

The sky was just paling when Alicia stepped from the shelter and walked toward him.

“So,” she said, and gave a loose-jawed yawn. “Still here.”

He nodded. “Still here.”

Each night without sign made him wonder how much longer their luck could hold. But he never thought about this for long; it seemed dangerous, like daring fate, to question their good fortune.

Alicia said, “Turn around, I have to go.”

Facing away, he heard Alicia unbuckle her trousers and lower herself to a squat. Ten meters upstream, Michael was resting on the ground with his back against a boulder. Peter realized he was fast asleep.

“So what do you make of this business?” Alicia asked. “Ghosts and angels and all that.”

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Peter,” she scolded, “I don’t believe that for a second.” A moment passed, then: “Okay, you can turn around now.”

He faced her again. Alicia was cinching her belt. “You’re the reason we’re here, after all,” she said.

“I thought Amy was.”

Alicia turned her eyes away, toward the trees on the far side of river. She let a silent moment pass. “We’ve been friends as long as I can remember. Nothing can change that. So what I’m going to tell you is between us. Understood?”

Peter nodded.

“The night before we left, the two of us were in the trailer outside the lockup. You asked me what I saw when I looked at Amy. I don’t think I ever answered, and probably I didn’t know at the time. But I’ll tell you my answer now. What I see is you.”

She was regarding him closely, wearing an expression that was almost pained. Peter fumbled for a response. “I don’t… understand.”

“Yes, you do. You may not know it, but you do. You never talk about your father, or the Long Rides. I’ve never pressed. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t know what they meant to you. You’ve been waiting for something like Amy to come along your whole life. You can call it destiny if you want, or fate. Auntie would probably call it the hand of God. Believe me, I’ve heard those speeches too. I don’t think it matters what name you give it. It is what it is. So you ask me why we’re here, and I’ll say, sure, we’re here because of Amy. But she’s only half the reason. The funny thing is, everybody knows it but you.”

Peter didn’t know what to say. Ever since Amy had come into his life, he had felt himself caught in a strong current, and that this current was pulling him toward something, something he had to find. Every step along the way had told him so. But it was also true that each of them had played a part, and a great deal had simply come down to luck.

“I don’t know, Lish. It could have been anyone that day at the mall. It could have been you. Or Theo.”

She dismissed this with a wave. “You give your brother too much credit, but you always did. And where is he now? Don’t get me wrong, I think he did the right thing. Maus was in no shape to travel, and I said so from the start. But that’s not the only reason he stayed behind.” She shrugged. “I’m only saying this because you might need to hear it. This is your Long Ride, Peter. Whatever’s up that mountain, it’s yours to find. Whatever else happens, I hope you get that chance.”

Another silence fell. Something about the way she was speaking disturbed him. It was as if these words were final ones. As if she were saying goodbye.

“You think they’re all right?” he asked. “Theo and Maus.”

“I couldn’t say. I hope so.”

“You know,” he said, and cleared his throat, “I think Hollis and Sara-”

“Are together?” She gave a quiet laugh. “And here I was, thinking you hadn’t noticed. You should tell them you know. Personally, it will be a load off everyone’s mind.”

He was completely astounded. “Everyone knows?”

“Peter.” She met his eye with a correcting frown. “This is exactly what I’m taking about. It’s all well and good to save the human race. You could say I’m in favor. But you might want to pay a little more attention to what’s right in front of you.”

“I thought I was.”

“That’s what you thought. We’re just people. I don’t know what’s up that mountain, but I do know that much. We live, we die. Somewhere along the way, if we’re lucky, we may find someone to help lighten the load. You should tell them it’s okay. They’re waiting to hear from you.”

It still confounded him, how slow he’d been to detect what was happening with Sara and Hollis. Perhaps, he thought, it was something he hadn’t wanted to see. Looking at Alicia now, her hair shining in the morning light, he found himself recalling their night together on the roof of the power station, the two of them talking about pairing, having Littles; that strange and amazing night, when Alicia had given him the gift of stars. At the time, just the idea of it, of living a normal life, or what passed for one, had seemed as distant and impossible as the stars themselves. Now here they were, more than a thousand kilometers from home-a home they would probably never see again-the same people they had always been, but also not the same, because something had happened; love was among them.

That’s what Alicia was telling him now; that’s what she had been trying to tell him that night on the roof of the power station, in that last easy hour before everything had happened. That what they did, they did for love. Not just Sara and Hollis; all of them.

“Lish-” he began.

But she shook her head, cutting him off. Her face was suddenly flustered. Behind her, Sara and Hollis were emerging from the shelter, into the morning.

“Like I said, we’re all here because of you,” Alicia said. “Me more than anyone. Now, are you going to wake up the Circuit or am I?”

They broke camp; by the time they were moving downriver, the sun had lifted over the crest of the valley, filling the branches of the trees with a vaporous light.

It was almost half-day when Alicia, at the head of the line, abruptly halted. She raised a hand to silence everyone.

“Lish,” Michael called from the rear, “why are we stopping?”

“Quiet.”

She was sniffing the air. Peter smelled it too: a strange and powerful odor, stinging his nostrils.

Behind him, Sara whispered, “What is that?”

Hollis pointed with his rifle over their heads. “Look-”

Suspended from the limbs above their heads were dozens of long strands of small, white objects, bunched like fruit.

“What the hell is that?”

But Alicia was looking at the ground now, anxiously scanning the carpeted earth beneath their feet. She dropped to a knee and brushed the heavy covering of dead leaves aside.

“Oh, shit.”

Peter heard the groan of the dropping weight. Before he could speak the net had swallowed them; they were rising, lifting through the air, all of them yelling and tumbling, their bodies caught in its weave. It reached the apex of its ascent, everything cradled in suspension for one weightless instant, and then they descended, a hard drop, their bodies jamming together as the ropes compressed them into a single, twisting, captive mass.

Peter was upside down. Somebody, Hollis, was on top of him. Hollis and also Sara and a sneaker, close to his face, which he recognized as Amy’s. It was impossible to tell where one body ended and the next began. They were spinning like a top. His chest was compressed so tightly he could barely breathe. The skin of his cheek was pressed against the ropes, which were made of some heavy, fibrous twine. The ground was twirling under him, a rush of undifferentiated color.

“Lish!”

“I can’t move!”

“Can anyone?”

Michael: “I think I’m going to be sick!”

Sara, her voice shrill with panic: “Michael, don’t you dare!”

There was no way Peter could reach his blade; even if he could have, severing the ropes would have sent them all plunging headlong to the ground. The spinning motion slowed, then stopped, then started again, its velocity increasing as they were flung in the opposite direction. Somewhere above him in the jumble of bodies he heard Michael wretch.

They spun and spun and spun some more. It was on the sixth rotation that Peter detected, from the corner of his rolling eye, a tremulous motion in the brush. Like the woods were moving, coming to life. But by then he was too disoriented to speak. Part of him felt fear, but the rest of him could not seem to find this part.

“Holy goddamn,” a voice below them said, “they’re strags.”

And then Peter saw: they were soldiers.

FIFTY-EIGHT

In the first days, Mausami slept-sixteen, eighteen, twenty hours at a stretch. Theo had chased the mice away from the upstairs bedroom, whisking them down the stairs and out the door with a broom and a great deal of yelling. In a closet they had found, folded with an eerie care, smelling of time and dust, a pile of sheets and blankets, even a couple of pillows, one for her head and a second to fold between her knees to straighten her back. Random electric currents, exquisitely painful, had begun to shoot down one of her legs-the baby, compressing her spine. She took it as a sign that the baby was doing what it was supposed to do, making space for himself in the densely packed room of her body. Theo came and went, fussing over her like a nurse, bringing her meals and water. He slept during the afternoons on the old saggy sofa downstairs, and when evening fell he dragged a chair out to the porch, where he sat through the night, a shotgun on his lap, staring into the dark.

Then one morning she awoke to a fresh, new vigor coursing through her. The drought of energy was over; the days of rest had done their work. She drew up to a sitting position and saw that the sun was shining in the window. The air was cool and dry, pushing a gentle breeze that shifted in the curtains. She did not remember opening the window but perhaps Theo had done this, sometime in the night.

The baby was sitting on her bladder. Theo had left a pail for her, but she didn’t want to use this, now that she no longer needed to. She would make the long march to the privy, to show Theo that she was finally awake.

Even now, she could detect his movements somewhere in the house below. She rose, pulled a sweater over her long-tailed shirt-she was suddenly much too big for the only pair of gaps she had-and descended the stairs. Her center of gravity seemed to have shifted overnight; the frank bulge of her stomach made her feel top-heavy and clumsy. She supposed this was just something to get used to. Not even six months, and here she was, huge already.

She stepped into a room she barely remembered; it took her a moment to absorb the fact that a great deal had changed. The sofa and chairs, which before had been pushed against the walls, now stood in the middle of the room at right angles to the fireplace, facing one another. Between them rested a small wooden table atop a threadbare woolen rug. The floor under her bare feet was free of dirt, swept clean. Theo had laid more blankets over the sofa, tucking the edges in, to cover the places where it was worn through and stained.

But what drew her attention were the pictures propped on the mantel. A series of yellowed photographs-the same people, at different ages and in different configurations, all posed before the very house in which she now stood. A man and his wife and three children, a boy and two girls. The photos seemed to have been taken at intervals of a year; in each, the children had grown. The youngest, a baby in the first photograph, held in his mother’s arms-a tired-looking woman wearing a pair of dark glasses perched above her forehead-was, by the final image, a boy of five or six. He was standing in front of his older sisters, grinning greedily for the camera, showing the gap in his smile where he had lost a tooth. His T-shirt read, incomprehensibly, UTAH JAZZ.

“They’re something, aren’t they?”

Mausami turned to discover Theo observing her from the kitchen door.

“Where did you find them?”

He approached the mantel and took the last photograph, with the smiling boy, in his hands. “They were in a crawl space, under the stairs. See this here?” He tapped the glass to show her: in the background, at the edge of the photo, an automobile, packed to the tops of its windows, with more belongings lashed to the roof. “It’s the same car we found in the barn.”

Mausami regarded the photos another moment. How happy they all looked. Not just the smiling boy but his parents and sisters, as well-all of them.

“You think they lived here?”

Theo nodded, returning the picture to its place on the mantel with the others. “My guess is, they came here before the outbreak and got stranded. Or else they just decided to stay on. And don’t forget the four graves out back.”

Mausami was about to point out that there were four graves, not five. But then she realized her error. The fourth grave would have been dug by the last survivor, who couldn’t bury himself.

“Hungry?” Theo asked her.

She ran a hand through her dirty hair. “What I’d really like is a bath.”

“As it happens, I thought you might.” He was wearing a sly smile. “Come on.”

He led her out to the yard. A large cast-iron pot now hung from a length of chain over a pile of glowing embers; beside it was a metal trough, long and deep enough for a person to sit in. He used a plastic bucket to fill the trough with water from the pump, then, gripping the handle with a heavy cloth, lifted the metal pot and poured the steaming contents into the trough as well.

“Go on, get in,” Theo said.

She felt suddenly embarrassed.

“It’s okay,” he said, laughing gently, “I won’t watch.”

It seemed foolish, after everything, to be shy about her body. And yet she was. With Theo’s eyes averted, she removed her clothing quickly, standing naked for a moment in the autumn sunshine. The air was cold against her tightening skin, the taut, round shape of her belly. She eased herself into the water, which rose to cover her stomach, her swollen breasts, laced with a nimbus of blue veins.

“Okay if I turn around?”

“I feel so huge, Theo. I can’t believe you want to see me like this.”

“You’ll get bigger before you get smaller. Might as well get used to it.”

What was she afraid of? They could have a baby together, but she wouldn’t let him see her naked? They hadn’t so much as touched in days; she realized she had been waiting for him to do this, to cross the barrier that separated them, now that they were alone.

“It’s okay, you can turn around.”

For a moment his eyebrows raised at the sight of her. But just a moment. She saw that he was holding a blackened fry pan, full of some hard, glistening substance. He placed it on the ground by the trough and knelt to carve a wedge-shaped piece with his blade.

“My God, Theo. You made soap?”

“I used to make it with my mother sometimes. I don’t know if I used enough ash, though. The fat comes from a pronghorn I shot yesterday morning. They’re lean sons of bitches, but I got enough to render one batch.”

“You shot a pronghorn?”

He nodded. “It was hell dragging him back here, too,” he said. “At least five clicks. And there’s lots of fish in the river. I’m figuring we can put up enough stores to make it through the winter easy.” He rose, dusting his hands on his trouser legs. “Go ahead and finish and I’ll make breakfast.”

By the time she was done, the water was opaque with dirt and filmed with grease from the soap. She rose to her feet and used the rest of the heated water to rinse herself off, standing naked in the yard to let the sun dry her, feeling the moisture wicking off her skin in the arid air. She couldn’t remember when she’d felt so clean.

She dressed-her clothing felt filthy against her skin; she’d have to see about doing the laundry-and reentered the house. More surprises from the basement: Theo had set the table-actual china, laid out with utensils and drinking cups, the glass murky with age. He was cooking some kind of steak in a fry pan, with translucent slivers of onion. The room was roaring with heat from the stove, fueled by logs taken from a pile he’d stacked at the door.

“The last of the antelope,” he explained. “The rest is up for smoking.” He flipped the steaks and turned toward her, drying his hands on a rag. “It’s a little stringy but not bad. There’s wild onions down by the river, and bushes I think may be blackberries, though we’ll have to wait till spring.”

“Flyers, Theo, what else?” The question wasn’t serious; she was amazed at all he’d done.

“Potatoes.”

“Potatoes?”

“They’re mostly gone to seed now, but we can still use some. I’ve moved a bunch down to the bins in the cellar.” With a long fork he speared the steaks onto their plates. “We won’t starve. There’s lots, once you look.”

After breakfast, he washed the dishes in the sink while she watched. She wanted to help, but he insisted that she do nothing.

“Feel up to a walk?” he asked.

He disappeared into the barn and returned with a bucket and a pair of fishing poles, still strung with plastic monofilament. He gave her a small spade and the shotgun to carry, and a handful of shells. By the time they reached the river, the sun was high in the sky. They were at a spot where the river slowed and widened into a broad, shallow bend; the banks were dense with vegetation, tall weeds golden with autumnal color. Theo had no hooks but had found, tucked in a kitchen drawer, a small sewing kit, containing a tin of safety pins. While Maus dug in the dirt for worms, Theo tied these to the ends of their lines.

“So, how do you fish, exactly?” Maus said. Her hands were full of wriggling dirt; everywhere she looked, the ground was teeming with life.

“I think you just put them in the water and see what happens.”

They did. But after a while, this seemed silly. Their hooks were sitting in the shallows where they could see them.

“Stand back,” Theo said. “I’m going to try to get mine farther out.”

He drew back the latch on his reel, lifted the rod over his shoulder, and threw the line forward. It shot out in a long arc over the water, disappearing into the current with a plunk. Almost at once, the tip of the rod bent sharply.

“Shit!” His eyes went wide with panic. “What do I do?”

“Don’t let him get away!”

The fish broke the surface with a shimmering splash. Theo began to reel him in.

“He feels huge!”

As Theo pulled the fish toward shore, Maus stumbled into the shallows-the water was astonishingly cold, filling her boots-and bent to grab him. He darted away, and in another moment her ankles were all wrapped up in the fishing line.

“Theo, help!”

They were both laughing. Theo snatched the fish and rolled him onto his back, which seemed to have the desired effect; the fish gave up his struggles. Maus managed to untangle herself and retrieved the bucket from shore while Theo pulled the fish from the river-a long, glimmering thing, like a single slab of muscle flecked with brilliant color, as if hundreds of tiny gems were set into its flesh. The pin was hooked through its lower lip, the worm still on it.

“What part do you eat?” Maus asked.

“I guess that depends on how hungry we get.”

He kissed her then; she felt a flood of happiness. He was still Theo, her Theo. She could feel it in his kiss. Whatever had happened in that cell hadn’t taken this away from her.

“My turn,” she said, pushing him away, and took up her rod to cast as he had done.

They filled the bucket with wriggling fish; the abundance of the river seemed almost too much, like an overly extravagant present. The wide blue sky and the sun-dappled river and the forgotten countryside and the two of them together, in it: it all seemed, somehow, miraculous. Walking back to the house, Maus found her mind returning to the family in the pictures. The mother and the father and the two girls and the boy with his victorious, gap-toothed smile. They had lived here, died here. But most of all, she felt certain, they had lived.

They cleaned the fish and set the tender meat on racks in the smokehouse; tomorrow they would take them out to dry in the sun. One they saved for dinner, and cooked it in the pan with a bit of onion and one of the seedy potatoes.

As the sun was setting, Theo took up the shotgun from its place in the corner of the kitchen. Maus was putting the last of the dishes away in the cabinets. She turned to see him ejecting the shells, three of them, into his palm, blowing on each to clean the cap of dust, then sliding them back into the magazine. Next he removed his blade and cleaned this also, wiping it on his pants.

“Well.” He cleared his throat. “I guess it’s time.”

“No, Theo.”

She put down the plate she was holding and stepped toward him, taking the gun from his hands and placing it on the kitchen table.

“We’re safe here, I know it.” Even as she said the words, she felt their veracity. They were safe because she believed they were safe. “Don’t go.”

He shook his head. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Maus.”

She leaned her face into his and kissed him again, long and slow, so he would know this about her, about both of them. They were safe. Inside her, the baby had begun to hiccup.

“Come to bed, Theo,” said Mausami. “Please. I want you to come to bed with me, now.”

It was sleep he feared. He told her that night, as they lay curled together. He couldn’t not sleep; he knew that. Not sleeping was like not eating, he explained, or not breathing; it was like holding your breath in your chest as long as you could, until motes of light were dancing before your eyes and every part of you was saying one word: breathe. That’s what it had been like in the cell, for days and days and days.

And now: the dream was gone, but not the feeling of it. The fear that he would close his eyes and find himself in the dream again. Because, at the end, if not for the girl, he would have done it. She’d come into the dream and stayed his hand, but by then it was too late. He would have killed the woman, killed anyone. He would have done whatever they wanted. And once you knew that about yourself, he said, you could never unknow it. Whoever you thought you were, you were somebody else entirely.

She held him as he spoke, his voice drifting in the darkness, and then for a long time both of them were silent.

Maus? Are you awake?

I’m right here. Though this wasn’t so: she had, in fact, dozed off.

He shifted against her, pulling her arm over his chest like a blanket to keep him warm. Stay awake for me, he said. Can you do that? Until I’m asleep.

Yes, she said. Yes, I can do that.

He was quiet for a while. In the marginless space between their bodies, the baby flipped and kicked.

We’re safe here, Theo, she said. As long as we’re together, we’ll be safe.

I hope that’s true, he said.

I know it’s true, Mausami said. But even as she felt his breathing slow against her, sleep taking him at last, she kept her eyes open, staring into the dark. It’s true, she thought, because it has to be.

FIFTY-NINE

By the time they reached the garrison, it was midafternoon. Their packs had been returned but not their weapons; they were not prisoners, but neither were they free to go as they wished. The term the major had used was “under protection.” From the river they had marched straight north over the ridge. At the base of a second valley they’d come to a muddy trace, rutted with hoofprints and tire tracks. It was sheer chance that they had missed it on their own. Heavy clouds had moved in from the west; the air looked and felt like rain. As the first spits commenced to fall, Peter tasted woodsmoke in the wind.

Major Greer came up beside him. He was a tall, well-built man with a brow so furrowed it looked plowed. He might have been forty years old. He was dressed in loose-fitting camouflage spattered in a pattern of green and brown, drawn tight at the waist by a wide belt, pockets fat with gear. His head, covered by a woolen cap, was shaved clean. Like all his men, a squad of fifteen, he’d painted his face with streaks of mud and charcoal, giving the whites of his eyes a startling vividness. They looked like wolves, like creatures of the forest; they looked like the forest itself. A long-range patrol unit; they had been in the woods for weeks.

Greer paused on the path and shouldered his rifle. A black pistol was holstered at his waist. He took a long drink from his canteen and waved it toward the hillside. They were close now; Peter could feel it in the quickening step of Greer’s men. A hot meal, a cot to sleep on, a roof over their heads.

“Just over the next ridge,” Greer said.

In the intervening hours they had formed something that felt, to Peter, like the beginnings of a friendship. After the initial confusion of their capture, a situation compounded by the fact that neither group would agree to say who they were until the other blinked first, it was Michael who had broken the stalemate, lifting his vomit-smeared face from the dirt where the net had disgorged them to proclaim, “Oh, fuck. I surrender. We’re from California, all right? Somebody, please just shoot me so the ground will stop spinning.”

As Greer capped his canteen, Alicia caught up to them on the path. From the start she had been unusually silent. She’d voiced no objection to Greer’s order that they travel unarmed, a fact that now struck Peter as completely out of character. But probably she was just in shock, as they all were. For the duration of the march to camp she had kept protectively to Amy’s side. Perhaps, Peter thought, she was simply embarrassed that she’d led them straight into the soldiers’ trap. As for Amy, the girl seemed to have absorbed this new turn of events as she absorbed everything, with a neutral, watchful countenance.

“What’s it like?” he asked Greer.

The major shrugged. “Just like you’d think. It’s like a big latrine. It beats being out in the rain, though.”

As they crested the hill, nestled in a bowl-like valley below them, the garrison leapt into view: a cluster of canvas tents and vehicles ringed by a fence of timbers, fifteen meters tall at least and each honed at the top to a sharp point. Among the vehicles Peter saw at least half a dozen Humvees, two large tankers, and a number of smaller trucks, pickups and five-tons with heavy, mud-choked tires. At the perimeter, a dozen large floodlights stood on tall poles; at the far end of the compound horses were grazing in a paddock. More soldiers were moving among the buildings, and along a catwalk at the top of the wall. At the center of the compound, standing over all, a large flag flapped in the wind, blocks of red, white, and blue with a single white star. The whole thing couldn’t have been more than half a square kilometer, and yet, standing on the ridge, Peter felt as if he were gazing into an entire city, the heart of a world he’d always believed in but never actually imagined.

“They’ve got lights,” said Michael. More men from Greer’s unit moved past them, headed down the hill.

“Hell, son,” said the one named Muncey-a corporal, bald as the rest of them, with a wide, snaggle-toothed smile. Most of Greer’s men bore themselves with a soldierly silence, speaking only when spoken to, but not Muncey, who chattered like a bird. His job, fittingly, was to operate the radio, which he carried on his back, a mechanism with a generator run by a hand crank, which stuck from the bottom like a tail.

“Inside that fence?” Muncey said with a grin. “That dirt is Texas. If we ain’t got it, you don’t need it.”

They weren’t regular army, Greer had explained. At least not the U.S. Army. There was no U.S. Army anymore. Then whose army are you? Peter had asked.

That was when Greer had told them about Texas.

By the time they reached the base of the hill, a crowd of men had gathered. Despite the cold, and now the rain, a pattering drizzle, some were bare-chested, exposing their narrow waists, the densely ribboned muscles of their shoulders and chests. All were smooth-shaven, their heads, too. Everyone was armed; rifles and pistols, even a few crossbows.

“Folks’ll stare,” Greer said quietly. “You better get used to it.”

“How many… strags do you usually bring in?” Peter asked. The term, Greer had explained, was short for stragglers.

Greer frowned. They were moving toward the gate. “None. Farther east you still get some. Up in Oklahoma, Third Battalion once found a whole goddamn town. But way out here? We’re not even looking.”

“Then what was the net for?”

“Sorry,” Greer said, “I thought you understood. That’s for the dracs. What you all call smokes.” He twirled a finger in the air. “That twisting motion messes with their heads. They’re like ducks in a barrel in that thing.”

Peter recalled something Caleb had told him, about why the virals stayed out of the turbine field. Zander always said the movement screwed them up. He related this to Greer.

“Makes sense,” the major agreed. “They don’t like spinning. I haven’t heard that about turbines, though.”

Michael was walking beside them. “So what were those things? Hanging in the trees, with the bad smell.”

“Garlic.” Greer gave a little laugh. “Oldest trick in the book. The fucking dracs love it.”

The conversation was cut short as they stepped through the gate, into a tunnel of waiting men. Greer’s squad had dispersed among the crowd. No one was talking. As Peter passed, he saw their eyes darting quickly over him. That was when he realized what the soldiers were all looking at: they were looking at the women.

“Ten-shun.”

Everyone snapped to. Peter saw a figure stepping briskly toward them from one of the tents. At first glance, he was not what Peter would have expected of a high-ranking military officer: an almost barrel-shaped man, a full head shorter than Greer, with a waddling, round-heeled gate. Under the dome of his shorn head, the features of his face seemed scrunched, as if they had been placed too close together. But as he approached, Peter felt the force of his authority, a mysterious energy, like a zone of static electricity that hovered in the air around him. His eyes, small and dark, possessed a frank, piercing intensity, even if, as it appeared, they had been incongruously set in the wrong face.

He regarded Peter a long moment, his hands on his hips, then looked past him toward the others, holding each briefly with the same evaluating gaze.

“I’ll be goddamned.”

His voice was surprisingly deep. He spoke with the same loose-jawed accent as Greer and his men.

“At ease, all of you.”

Everyone relaxed. Peter didn’t know what to say; best, he thought, to wait to hear from this man first.

“Men of the Second,” he declared, lifting his voice to the gathered men, “it has come to my attention that some of these strags are women. You are not to look at these women. You are not to speak to them, or come near them, or approach them, or in any way think you have anything to do with them, or they with you. They are not your girlfriends or your wives. They are not your mothers or your sisters. They are nothing, they do not exist, they are not here. Am I clear?”

“Sir yes sir!”

Peter glanced at Alicia, where she was standing with Amy, but couldn’t meet her eye. Hollis shot him a skeptical frown: clearly he had no idea what to make of this, either.

“You six, drop your packs and come with me. Major, you too.”

They followed him into the tent, a single room with an earthen floor beneath a sagging canvas ceiling. The only furnishings were a potbellied stove, a pair of plywood trestle tables covered with papers, and, along the far wall, a smaller table with a radio manned by a soldier with earphones clamped to the sides of his head. On the wall above him was a large, multicolored map, marked with dozens of beaded pins forming an irregular V As Peter moved closer, he saw that the base of the V was in central Texas, with one arm reaching north across Oklahoma and into southern Kansas, the other veering west, into New Mexico, before it, too, turned north, ending just across the Colorado border-the place where he now stood. At the top of the map, written in yellow on a dark stripe, were the words UNITED STATES INTERMEDIATE POLITICAL, and, beneath that, Fox and Sons Classroom Maps, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Greer came up beside him. “Welcome to the war,” he murmured.

The commander, who had entered behind them, directed his voice to the radio operator, who, as the men outside had, was staring frankly at the women. He seemed to have chosen Sara, but then his eyes moved to Alicia, then Amy, in a series of nervous jerks.

“Corporal, excuse us, please.”

With obvious effort, he broke his gaze away, pulling the earphones from his head. His face bloomed with embarrassment. “Sir. Sorry, sir.”

“Now, son.”

The corporal got to his feet and scampered away.

“So.” The commander’s eyes settled on Greer. “Major. Is there something you neglected to tell me?”

“Three of the strags are women, sir.”

“Yes. Yes, they are. Thank you for letting me know.”

“Sorry, General.” He seemed to wince. “We should have called that in.”

“Yes, you should have. Since you found them, I’m putting you in charge. Think you can handle that?”

“Of course, sir. No problem.”

“Put together a detail, get them billeted. They’ll need their own latrine, too.”

“Yes, General.”

“Go.”

Greer nodded, glancing quickly toward Peter-Good luck, his eyes seemed to say-and exited the tent. The general, whose name, Peter realized, he had yet to learn, took another moment to look them over. Now that they were alone, his bearing had relaxed.

“You’re Jaxon?”

Peter nodded.

“I’m Brigadier General Curtis Vorhees. Second Expeditionary Forces, Army of the Republic of Texas.” A hint of a smile. “I’m the big dog around here, in case that was something else Major Greer neglected to mention.”

“He didn’t, sir. I mean, he did. Mention it.”

“Good.” Vorhees nodded, regarding them all another moment. “So, am I to understand-and forgive me if I seem incredulous on this point-that the six of you walked all the way from California?”

Actually, Peter thought, we drove some of the way. For some of it, we took a train. But instead he simply answered, “Yes, sir.”

“And why, may I ask, would anyone attempt such a thing?”

Peter opened his mouth to reply; but once again the answer, the true one, seemed too large. Outside, the rain had begun to fall in earnest, drumming on the tent’s canvas roof.

“It’s a long story,” he managed.

“Well, I’m sure it is, Mr. Jaxon. And I’d be very interested to hear it. For now, we need to concern ourselves with a few preliminaries. You are civilian guests of the Second Expeditionary. For the duration of your stay, you’re under my authority. Think you can live with that?”

Peter nodded.

“In another six days, this unit will be moving south to rendezvous with Third Battalion at the town of Roswell, New Mexico. From there, we can send you back to Kerrville with a supply convoy. I suggest you take this offer, but this is entirely your choice. No doubt it is something you will wish to discuss among yourselves.”

Peter broke his gaze away to look at the others, whose faces seemed to mirror his own surprise. He hadn’t considered the possibility that their journey might be over.

“Now, as for the other matter,” Vorhees went on, “which you heard me speak of with the major. I will need you to instruct the women in your party that they are not to have any contact with my men, beyond what is absolutely necessary. They are to remain in their tent, except to go to the latrine. Any needs they have are to go through you or Major Greer. Is this clear?”

Peter had no reason to refuse, other than the fact that the offer struck him as plainly ridiculous. “I’m not sure I can tell them that, sir.”

“You can’t?”

“No sir.” He shrugged. There were no other words for it. “We’re all together. That’s just how it is.”

The general sighed. “Perhaps you misunderstood me. I am asking only as a courtesy. The mission of the Second Expeditionary is such that it would be completely improper, even dangerous, for them to move freely among the unit.”

“Why would they be in danger?”

He frowned. “They wouldn’t. It’s not the women I’m thinking of.” Vorhees took a patient breath and began again. “I will explain this as simply as I know how. We are a volunteer force. To join the Expeditionary is to do so for life, by blood oath, and each of these men is sworn to die. He’s cut all ties to the world but this unit and the men within it. Each time a man leaves this compound, he wholly believes he’ll never come back. He accepts this. More than that, he embraces it. A man will happily die for his friends, but a woman-a woman makes him want to live. Once that happens, I promise you, he’ll walk through that gate and never come back.”

Vorhees was talking, Peter understood, about giving it up. But after all they had been through, it was simply impossible to imagine telling any of them, Alicia especially, that they would have to hide in their tent.

“I’m sure all of these women are fine fighters,” Vorhees continued. “You couldn’t have made it this far if they weren’t. But our code is very strict, and I need you to respect it. If you can’t, I will return your weapons and send you on your way.”

“Fine,” he said, “we’ll go.”

“Wait, Peter.”

It was Alicia who had spoken. Peter turned to face her.

“Lish, it’s all right. I’m with you on this. He says we go, we’ll go.”

But Alicia didn’t acknowledge him. Her eyes were pointed at the general. Peter realized she was standing at attention, her arms held rigidly at her sides.

“General Vorhees. Colonel Niles Coffee of the First Expeditionary sends his regards.”

“Niles Coffee?” A light seemed to come on in his face. “The Niles Coffee?”

“Lish,” Peter said, her meaning dawning upon him, “do you mean… the Colonel?”

But Alicia said nothing. She didn’t even look at him. Her expression was set in a way that Peter had never seen before.

“Young lady. Colonel Coffee was lost with all his men thirty years ago.”

“Not true, sir,” Alicia said. “He survived.”

“Coffee’s alive?”

“KIA, sir. Three months ago.”

Vorhees glanced around the room before finding Alicia with his eyes again. “And who, may I ask, are you?”

She gave a crisp nod from her chin. “His adopted daughter, sir. Private Alicia Donadio, First Expeditionary. Baptized and sworn.”

No one spoke. Something final was occurring, Peter knew. Something irrevocable. He felt a wave of disorienting panic rising inside him, as if some basic fact of his life, fundamental as gravity, had been suddenly, and without warning, stripped away.

“Lish, what are you saying?”

At last she turned her face to look at him; her eyes were pooled with trembling tears.

“Oh, Peter,” she said, as the first one broke away to descend her dirt-stained cheek, “I’m sorry. I really should have told you.”

“You can’t have her!”

“I’m sorry, Jaxon,” the general said. “This isn’t your decision to make. It’s no one’s decision.” He stepped briskly to the door of the tent. “Greer! Somebody get Major Greer to my tent, now.”

“What’s going on?” Michael demanded. “Peter, what is she talking about?”

Suddenly everybody was speaking at once. Peter gripped Alicia by the arms, making her look at him. “Lish, what are you doing? Think about what you’re doing.”

“It’s already done.” Through her tears, her face seemed to glow with relief, as if a burden long carried had finally been put to rest. “It was done before I knew you. Long before. The day the Colonel came into the Sanctuary to claim me. He made me promise not to tell.”

He understood, then, what she’d been trying to say to him that morning. “You were tracking them.”

She nodded. “Yes, for the last two days. When I was scouting downstream I found one of their camps. The ashes of their fire were still warm. Way out here, I didn’t think it could be anybody else.” She shook her head faintly. “Honestly, Peter, I didn’t know if I even wanted to find them. Part of me always thought they were just an old man’s stories. You have to believe that.”

Greer appeared at the door of the tent, dripping with rain.

“Major Greer,” the general said, “this woman is First Expeditionary.”

Greer’s jaw fell open. “She’s what?”

“Niles Coffee’s daughter.”

Greer stared at Alicia, his eyes wide with shock, as if he were looking at some strange animal. “Holy goddamn. Coffee had a daughter?”

“She says she’s sworn.”

Greer scratched his bare head in puzzlement. “Christ. She’s a woman. What do you want to do?”

“There’s nothing to do. Sworn is sworn. The men will have to learn to live with it. Take her to the barber, get her assigned.”

It was all happening too fast. Peter felt as if something huge were breaking open inside him. “Lish, tell them you’re lying!”

“I’m sorry. This is how it has to be. Major?”

Greer nodded, his face grave, and stepped to her side.

“You can’t leave me,” Peter heard himself say, though the voice that spoke these words did not seem to be his own.

“I have to, Peter. It’s who I am.”

He had, without realizing it, stepped into her arms. He felt the tears in his throat. “I can’t… do this without you.”

“Yes, you can. I know you can.”

It was no use. Alicia was leaving him; he felt her slipping away. “I can’t, I can’t.”

“It’s all right,” she said, her voice close to his ear. “Hush now.”

She held him that way a long moment, the two of them wrapped in a bubble of silence, as if they were alone. Then Alicia took his face in her hands and bent him toward her; she kissed him, once and quickly, on the forehead. A kiss that both sought forgiveness and bestowed it: a kiss of goodbye. The air parted between them. She had released him, stepping away.

“Thank you, General,” she said. “Major Greer, I’m ready now.”

SIXTY

The days of rain: Peter told them everything.

For five full days the rain poured down. He sat for hours at the long table in Vorhees’s tent, sometimes just the two of them, but usually with Greer as well. He told them about Amy, and the Colony, and the signal they had come to find; he told them about Theo and Mausami, and the Haven, and all that had happened there. He told them that sixteen hundred kilometers away, on a mountaintop in California, ninety souls were waiting for the lights to go out.

“I won’t lie to you,” Vorhees said, when Peter asked them if they could send the soldiers there. It was late afternoon. Alicia had left in the morning, on patrol. Just like that, she had been subsumed into the life of Vorhees’s men.

“It’s not that I don’t believe you,” Vorhees explained. “And this bunker of yours alone sounds like it would be worth the trip. But I’ll have to take this up the line, and that means Division. It would be next spring at the earliest before we could think about making such a trip. That’s all uncharted ground.”

“I’m not sure they can wait that long.”

“Well, they’ll have to. My biggest worry is getting out of this valley before the snow hits. This rain doesn’t let up, we could get stuck here. There’s only enough fuel to keep our lights going another thirty days.”

“What I want to know more about is this place, the Haven,” Greer cut in. Outside the walls of the tent and in the presence of any of the men, Greer’s and Vorhees’s relationship was rigidly formal; but inside, as they were now, they visibly relaxed into friendship. Greer looked at the general, his eyes darkening thoughtfully. “Sounds a little like those folks in Oklahoma.”

“What folks?” Peter asked.

“Place called Homer,” Vorhees replied, picking up the thread. “Third Battalion came across them about ten years ago, way the hell and gone out in the panhandle. A whole town of survivors, over eleven hundred men, women, and children. I wasn’t there, but I heard the stories. It was like stepping back a hundred years; they didn’t even seem to know what the dracs were. Just going about their business, nice as you please, no lights or fencing, happy to see you but don’t slam the door on your way out. The CO offered them transport but they said no thanks, and in any case, the Third wasn’t really equipped to move that many bodies south to Kerrville. It was the damndest thing. Survivors, and they didn’t want to be rescued. Third Battalion left a squad behind and moved on north, up to Wichita, where got their happy asses handed to them. Lost half their men; the rest hightailed it back. When they got there, the place was empty.”

“What do you mean ‘empty’?” Peter asked.

Vorhees’s eyebrows lifted sharply. “I mean empty. Not a soul, and no bodies. Everything neat as a pin, dinner dishes sitting on the table. No sign of the squad they’d left, either.”

Peter had to admit it was puzzling, but he didn’t see what this had to do with the Haven. “Maybe they decided to go somewhere safer,” Peter offered.

“Maybe. Maybe the dracs just took them so fast they didn’t have time to wash the dishes. You’re asking something I don’t know the answer to. But I will tell you this. Thirty years ago, when Kerrville sent out the First Expeditionary, you couldn’t walk a hundred meters without tripping over a drac. The First lost half a dozen men on a good day, and when Coffee’s unit disappeared, people pretty much thought it was over. I mean, the guy was a legend. The Expeditionary more or less disbanded right then. But now here you are, having traveled all the way from California. Back in the day, you wouldn’t have made it twenty steps to the latrine.”

Peter glanced at Greer, who acknowledged this truth with a nod, then looked back at Vorhees. “Are you saying they’re dying off?”

“Oh, there’s plenty, believe me. You just got to know where to look. What I’m saying is something’s different. Something’s changed. In the last sixty months, we’ve run two supply lines from Kerrville, one up as far as Hutchinson, Kansas, another through New Mexico into Colorado. What we’ve seen is that you tend to find them in clusters now. They’re burrowing deeper, too, using mines, caves, places like that mountain you found. They’re sometimes packed in there so tightly you’d need a crowbar to pry them apart. The cities are still crawling, with all the empty buildings, but there’s plenty of open countryside where you could go for days without seeing one.”

“What about Kerrville? Why is that safe?”

The general frowned. “Well, it isn’t. Not a hundred percent. Most of Texas is pretty bad, actually. Laredo is no place you’d ever want to go, or Dallas. Houston, what’s left of it, is like a goddamn bloodsucker swamp. The place is so polluted with petrochemicals I don’t know how they survive there, but they do. San Antonio and Austin were both pretty much leveled in the first war, El Paso, too. Fucking federal government, trying to burn the dracs out. That’s what led to the Declaration, along about the same time California split off.”

“Split off?” Peter asked.

Vorhees nodded. “From the Union. Declared its independence. The California thing was a real bloodbath, pretty much open warfare for a while, like there wasn’t anything else to worry about. But Texas got lost in the shuffle. Maybe the federals just didn’t want to fight on two fronts. The governor seized all military assets, which wasn’t hard, since the Army by then was in total free fall, everything coming apart. They moved the capital to Kerrville and dug in. Walled it off, like your Colony, but the difference is, we had oil, and lots of it. Down near Freeport, there’s about five hundred million barrels sitting in underground salt domes, the old Strategic Petroleum Reserve. You got oil, you got power. You got power, you got lights. We’ve got over thirty thousand souls inside the walls, plus another fifty thousand acres under irrigation and a fortified supply line running to a working refinery on the coast.”

“The coast,” Peter repeated. The word felt heavy in his mouth. “You mean the ocean?”

“The Gulf of Mexico, anyway.” Vorhees shrugged. “Calling it the ocean would be polite. It’s pretty much a chemical slick. All those offshore platforms still pumping the crap out, plus the discharge from New Orleans. Ocean currents pushed a lot of debris in through there, too. Tankers, cargo ships, you name it. In places you can practically walk across it without getting your feet wet.”

“But you could still leave from there,” Peter tendered. “If you had a boat.”

“In theory. But I wouldn’t recommend it. The problem is getting past the barrier.”

“Mines,” Greer explained.

Vorhees nodded. “And lots of them. In the last days of the war, the NATO alliance, our so-called friends, banded together and made one last effort to contain the infection. Heavy bombing along the coasts, and not just conventional explosives. They blasted just about anything in the water. You can still see the wreckage down in Corpus. Then they laid mines, just to slam the door.”

Peter remembered the stories his father had told him. The stories of the ocean, and the Long Beach. The rusting ribs of the great ships, stretching as far as the eye could see. Never had he thought to wonder how this had come about. He had lived in a world without history, without cause, a world where things just were what they were. Talking to Vorhees and Greer was like looking at lines on a page and suddenly seeing words written there.

“What about farther east?” he asked. “Have you ever sent anybody there?”

Vorhees shook his head. “Not for years. The First Expeditionary sent two battalions that way, one north into Louisiana through Shreveport, another across Missouri toward St. Louis. They never came back.” He shrugged. “Maybe someday. For now, Texas is what we’ve got.”

“I’d like to see it,” Peter said after a moment. “The city. Kerrville.”

“And you will, Peter.” Vorhees allowed himself a rare smile. “If you take that convoy.”

They had yet to give Vorhees an answer, and Peter felt torn. They had safety, they had lights, they had found the Army after all. It might not be until spring, but Peter felt confident that Vorhees would send an expedition to the Colony and bring the others in. They had found what they had come for, in other words-more than found it. To ask his friends to continue seemed like an unnecessary risk. And without Alicia, part of him wanted to say yes, to just let the whole thing be over.

But whenever he thought this, his next thought would be of Amy. Alicia had been right: to come so close and turn away felt like something he would regret, probably for the rest of his life. Michael had tried to pick up the signal from the radio in the general’s tent, but their radio equipment was all short range, worthless in the mountains. In the end, Vorhees said he had no reason to doubt their story, but who knew what the signal meant?

“The military left all kinds of crap behind. Civilians, too. Believe me, we’ve seen it before. You can’t go chasing every squeak.” He spoke with the weariness of a man who had seen a lot, more than enough. “This girl of yours, Amy. Maybe she’s a hundred years old, like you say, and maybe she isn’t. I have no reason to disbelieve you, except for the fact that she looks about fifteen and scared shitless. You can’t always explain these things. My guess is she’s just some poor traumatized soul who survived somehow and by a stroke of luck just wandered into your camp.”

“What about the transmitter in her neck?”

“Well, what about it?” Vorhees’s tone wasn’t mocking, merely factual. “Hell, maybe she’s Russian or Chinese. We’ve been waiting for those people to show up, assuming there’s even anyone left alive out there.”

“Is there?”

Vorhees paused; he and Greer exchanged a look of caution.

“The truth is, we don’t know. Some people say the quarantine worked, that the rest of the world is just humming right along out there without us. This raises the question as to why we wouldn’t hear anything over the wireless, but I suppose it’s possible they set up some kind of electronic barricade in addition to the mines. Others believe-and I think the major and I share this opinion-that everybody’s dead. This is all conjecture, mind you, but the story goes that the quarantine wasn’t quite as tight as people thought. Five years after the outbreak, the continental United States was pretty much depopulated, ripe for the picking. The gold depository at Fort Knox. The vault at the Federal Reserve in New York. Every museum and jewelry shop and bank, right down to the corner savings and loan, all just sitting there, nobody minding the store. But the real prize was all that American military ordnance just lying around, including upwards of ten thousand nuclear weapons, any one of which could shift the balance of power in a world without the United States to babysit it. Frankly, I don’t think it’s a question of if anyone came ashore, but how many and who. Chances are, they took the virus back with them.”

Peter gave himself a moment to absorb all this. Vorhees was telling him the world was empty, an empty place.

“I don’t think Amy’s here to steal anything,” he said finally.

“If it’s any help, I don’t think so either. She’s just a kid, Peter. How she survived out there is anybody’s guess. Maybe she’ll find a way to tell you.”

“I think she already has.”

“That’s what you believe. And I won’t disagree with you. But I’ll tell you something else. I knew a woman growing up, crazy old lady lived in a shack behind our housing section, an old falling-down dump of a place. Wrinkled as a raisin, kept about a hundred cats, place absolutely reeked of cat piss. This woman claimed she could hear what the dracs were thinking. We kids would tease the hell out of her, though of course we couldn’t get enough of her, either. The kind of thing you feel bad about later, but not at the time. She was what you all call a Walker, just appeared at the gates one day.” Vorhees concluded with a shrug: “Time to time you hear stories like this. Old people mostly, half-crazy mystics, never a young one like this girl. But it’s not a new story.”

Greer leaned forward. He seemed suddenly interested. “What happened to her?”

“The woman?” The general rubbed his chin as he searched his memory. “As I recall, she took the trip. Hanged herself in her cat-piss-smelling house.” When neither Peter nor Greer said anything, the general went on: “You can’t overthink these things. Or at least we can’t. I’m sure the major will agree with me. We’re here to clear out as many dracs as we can, lay in supplies, find the hot spots and burn them out. Maybe someday it’ll all add up to something. I’m sure it’s nothing I’ll live to see.”

The general pushed back from the table, and Greer as well; the time for talk was over, at least for the day. “In the meantime, think about my offer, Jaxon. A ride home. You’ve earned it.”

By the time Peter had stepped to the door, Greer and Vorhees were already leaning over the table, where a large map had been unrolled. Vorhees raised his face, frowning.

“Was there something else?”

“It’s just… ” What did he want to say? “I was wondering about Alicia. How she’s doing.”

“She’s fine, Peter. However Coffee did it, he taught her well. You probably wouldn’t even recognize her.”

He felt stung. “I’d like to see her.”

“I know you would. But it’s just not a good idea right now.” When Peter didn’t move from the door, Vorhees said, with barely concealed impatience, “Is that all?”

Peter shook his head. “Just tell her I asked for her.”

“I’ll do that, son.”

Peter stepped through the flap, into the darkening afternoon. The rain had let up, but the air felt completely saturated, heavy with bone-chilling dampness. Beyond the walls of the garrison, a dense fogbank was drifting over the ridge. Everything was spattered with mud. He hugged his jacket around himself as he crossed the open ground between Vorhees’s tent and the mess hall, where he caught sight of Hollis, sitting alone at one of the long tables, spooning beans into his mouth from a battered plastic tray. More soldiers were scattered around the room, quietly talking. Peter fetched a tray and filled it from the pot and went to where Hollis was sitting.

“This seat taken?”

“They’re all taken,” Hollis said glumly. “They’re just letting me borrow this one.”

Peter took a place on the bench. He knew what Hollis meant; they were like extra limbs here, something vestigial, with nothing to do, no role to play. Sara and Amy had been relegated to their tent, but for all his relative freedom, Peter felt just as trapped. And none of the soldiers would have anything to do with them. The unstated assumption was that they had nothing worth saying and would be leaving soon anyway.

He updated Hollis on all he had learned, then asked the question that was really on his mind: “Any sign of her?”

“I saw them leaving this morning, with Raimey’s squad.”

Raimey’s unit, one of six, was doing short recon patrols to the southeast. When Peter had asked Vorhees how long they’d be gone, he had answered, enigmatically, “However long it takes.”

“How’d she look?”

“Like one of them.” Hollis paused. “I waved to her, but I don’t think she saw me. Know what they’re calling her?”

Peter shook his head.

“The Last Expeditionary.” Hollis frowned at this. “Kind of a mouthful, if you ask me.”

They fell silent; there was nothing more to say. If they were extra limbs, Alicia felt to Peter like a missing one. He kept looking for her in his mind, turning his thoughts to the place where Alicia should be. It wasn’t the kind of thing he thought he could ever really get used to.

“I don’t think they really believe us about Amy,” Peter said.

“Would you?”

Peter shook his head, conceding the point. “I guess not.”

Another silence descended.

“So what do you think?” Hollis said. “About the evac.”

With all the rain, the battalion’s departure had been delayed another week. “Vorhees keeps urging us to go. He may be right.”

“But you don’t think so.” When Peter hesitated, Hollis put down his fork and looked him in the eye. “You know me, Peter. I’ll do whatever you want to do.”

“Why am I in charge? I don’t want to decide for everyone.”

“I didn’t say you were. I think it’s just a case of what is, Peter. If you don’t know yet, you don’t know. It’ll keep until the rain lets up.”

Peter felt a twinge of guilt. Since they’d arrived at the garrison, he had somehow never quite found the moment to tell Hollis that he knew about him and Sara. With Alicia gone, part of him didn’t want to face the fact that the force that held them all together was dissolving. The three men had been billeted in a tent adjacent to the one where Sara and Amy now bided their time, playing hands of go-to and waiting for the rain to stop; for two nights running, Peter had awakened to find that Hollis’s bunk was empty. But always he was there in the morning, snoring away. Peter wondered if Hollis and Sara were staging this for his benefit or for Michael’s, who was, after all, her brother. As for Amy: after a period of time, a day or so, in which she had seemed nervous, even a little afraid of the soldiers who brought them their meals and escorted them to the latrine, she appeared to have moved into a state of hopeful, even cheerful waiting, content to bide her time but wholly expecting to press forward. Will we be leaving soon? she had asked Peter, her voice gently urging. Because I would like to see the snow. To which Peter had only said, I don’t know, Amy. We’ll see, after the rain stops. The truth, yet even as he’d spoken, the words had the hollow taste of a lie.

Hollis tipped his head toward Peter’s plate. “You should eat.”

He pushed the tray aside. “I’m not hungry.”

They were joined by Michael, who swept down to the table in a rain-beaded poncho, carrying a tray piled high with food. Of all of them, he alone had found some use for his time: Vorhees had assigned him to the motor pool, helping to ready the vehicles for the trip south. He placed the tray on the table, sat before it, and dug in greedily, using a piece of corn bread to shovel beans into his mouth with his oil-stained hands.

“What’s the matter?” he said, looking up. He swallowed a mouthful of bread and beans. “The two of you look like somebody died.”

One of the soldiers moved past their table with his tray. A jug-eared private, his bald head shimmering with a downy fuzz.

“Hey, Lugnut,” he said to Michael.

Michael brightened. “Sancho. What’s the ups?”

“De nada. Listen. A bunch of us were talking, thought maybe you’d like to join us later.”

Michael smiled around a mouthful of beans. “Sure thing.”

“Nineteen hundred in the mess.” The soldier looked at Peter and Hollis as if noticing them for the first time. “You strags can come too, if you want.”

Peter had never quite gotten used to this term. There was always a note of derision in it.

“Come where?”

“Thanks, Sancho,” Michael said. “I’ll run it by them.”

When the soldier had moved on, Peter narrowed his eyes at Michael. “Lugnut?”

Michael had resumed eating. “They’re big on names like that. I kind of like it better than Circuit.” He mopped the last of the beans from his plate. “They’re not bad guys, Peter.”

“I didn’t say they were.”

“What’s tonight?” Hollis asked after a moment.

“Oh, that.” Michael shrugged dismissively, his face reddening. “I’m surprised no one told you. It’s movie night.”

By 18:30, all the tables had been pulled from the mess hall, the benches assembled in rows. With nightfall had come a distinct cooling and drying of the air; the rain had blown through. All the soldiers had gathered outside, noisily talking among themselves in a way that Peter had not seen before, laughing and joking and passing flasks of shine. He took a bench with Hollis at the back of the hall, facing the screen, a sheet of plywood covered in whitewash. Michael was somewhere up forward, among his new friends from the motor pool.

Michael had done his best to explain how the movie would work, but still Peter did not quite know what to expect, and he found the idea vaguely troubling, not rooted in any physical logic he understood. The projector, which rested on a high table behind them, would beam a current of moving images onto the screen-but if that was true, where did these images come from? If they were reflections, what did they reflect? A long electric cable had been run from the projector, out the door of the mess to one of the generators; Peter could not help but think how wasteful it was to use precious fuel for the simple purpose of entertainment. But as Major Greer stepped forward, to the excited hoots of sixty men, Peter felt it too: a pure anticipation, an almost childlike thrill.

Greer held up a hand to quiet the men, which only made them hoot louder.

“Shut up, you bloodbags!”

“Bring on the Count!” someone yelled.

More hooting and shouting. Standing in front of the screen, Greer wore a thinly concealed smile; for the moment, the hard carapace of military discipline had been allowed to crack. Peter had spent enough time in Greer’s company to know this was no accident.

Greer allowed the excitement to die down on its own, then cleared his throat and spoke: “All right, everyone, that’ll do. First, an announcement. I know you all have enjoyed your stay out here in the north woods-”

“Fucking A right!”

Greer shot a frown in the direction of the man who’d spoken. “Interrupt me again, Muncey, and you’ll be sucking latrines for a month.”

“Just saying how happy I am to be here poking dracs, sir!”

More laughter. Greer let it go.

“As I was saying, with the break in the weather, we have some news. General?”

Vorhees stepped forward from where he’d been waiting, off to the side. “Thank you, Major. Good evening, Second Battalion.”

A shouted chorus: “Good evening, sir!”

“It looks like we’ve got ourselves a bit of a window here with the weather, so I’m calling it. Oh-five-hundred, report to your squad leaders after morning chow for your sections. We need this place racked and packed by lights tomorrow. When Blue Squad gets back, we’re moving south. Any questions?”

A soldier raised his hand. Peter recognized him as the one who had spoken to Michael in the mess hall. Sancho.

“What about the heavy mechs, sir? They won’t make it in the mud.”

“The decision’s been made to leave them in place. We’ll be traveling L and Q. Your squad leaders will go over this with you. Anyone else?”

Silence from the crowd.

“All right then. Enjoy the show.”

The lanterns were doused; at the back of the room, the wheels of the projector began to turn. So there it was, Peter thought; the moment to decide was upon them. A week had suddenly become no time at all. Peter felt someone slip onto the bench next to him: Sara. Beside her was Amy, wearing a dark woolen blanket over her shoulders, against the cold.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Peter whispered.

“The hell with that,” Sara said quietly. “You think I’d miss this?”

The screen blazed with light. Encircled numbers, descending in sequence: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Then:

CARL LAEMMLE

PRESENTS

“DRACULA”

by BRAM STOKER

FROM THE PLAY ADAPTED BY

HAMILTON DEANE & JOHN L. BALDERSTON

A TOD BROWNING PRODUCTION

A chorus of cheers rose up from the benches as, incredibly, the screen was filled with the moving image of a horse-drawn carriage, racing along a mountain road. The picture was bleached of all color, composed entirely of tones of gray-the palette of a half-remembered dream.

“Dracs,” said Hollis. He turned to Peter, frowning. “Dracula?”

“Sound!” one of the soldiers bellowed, followed by others. “Sound! Sound!”

The soldier operating the projector was frantically checking connections, twisting knobs. He jogged briskly forward and knelt by a box positioned under the screen.

“Wait, there, I think that’s it-”

A crackling boom of static: Peter, entranced by the moving image on the screen-the carriage was entering a village now, people running to meet it-reflexively bolted in his chair. But then he realized what had occurred, what the box under the screen was. The clop of horses, the creak of the carriage on its springs and the voices of the villagers, speaking to one another in a strange language he had never heard before: the images were more than pictures, more than light. They were alive and breathing with sound.

On the screen, a man in a white hat waved a walking stick at the carriage man. As he opened his mouth to speak, all the soldiers chimed in as one:

“Don’t take my luggage down, I’m going on to Borgo Pass tonight!”

An explosion of general hilarity. Peter tore his gaze away to glance at Hollis. But his friend’s eyes, glowing with reflected light, were raptly focused on the moving images before them. He turned to Sara and Amy; they were the same.

On the screen, a heavyset man was speaking to the driver of the carriage, a burble of meaningless sounds. He returned to the first fellow, in the hat, his words amplified by the shouted recitation of the men:

“The driii-ver. He eez… afraid. Good fellow he eez. He wants me to ask if you can wait, and go on after sunrise.”

The first man waved his cane arrogantly, having none of it. “Well, I’m sorry, but there’s a carriage meeting me at Borgo Pass at midnight.”

“Borgo Pass? Whose carriage?”

“Why, Count Dracula’s.”

The mustached man’s eyes widened with terror. “Count… Dracula’s?”

“Don’t do it, Renfield!” one of the soldiers yelled, and everybody laughed.

It was a story, Peter realized. A story, like the old books in the Sanctuary, the ones Teacher read to them in circle, all those years ago. The people on the screen looked like they were pretending because they were; their exaggerated motions and expressions called to mind the way Teacher would act out the voices of the characters in the books she read. The heavy man with the mustache knew something that the man in the hat did not; there was danger ahead. Despite this warning, the traveler resumed his journey, to more mocking shouts from the soldiers. In darkness, the carriage ascended a mountain road, approaching a massive structure of turrets and walls, drenched in a forbidding moonlight. What lay ahead was obvious: the mustached man had more or less explained it. Vampires. An old word, but one Peter knew. He waited for the virals to appear, falling on the carriage and tearing the traveler to shreds, but this didn’t happen. The carriage pulled through the gate; the man, Renfield, stepped out to find that he was alone; the driver was gone. A creaking door, opening of its own accord, beckoned him inside, where he found himself in a great ruined cave of a room. Renfield, unaware, his innocence almost laughable, backed toward a massive flight of stairs, where a figure in a dark cloak, holding a single candle, was descending. As the cloaked figure reached the bottom, Renfield turned, the whites of his eyes expanding with such horror it was as if he’d stumbled on a whole pod of smokes, not a single man in a cape.

“I am… Drrrrrac-ulaaah.”

Another tent-shaking detonation of whoops, whistles, cheers. One of the soldiers in the front row shot to his feet.

“Hey, Count, eat this!”

A flash of spinning steel through the stream of light from the projector: the tip of the blade met the wood of the screen with a meaty thunk, burying itself squarely in the chest of the caped man, who seemed, surprisingly, to take no notice of this.

“Muncey, what the fuck!” the projector operator yelled.

“Get your blade,” someone else shouted, “it’s in the way!”

But the voices weren’t angry; everybody thought it was hilarious. Under a storm of catcalls, Muncey bounded to the screen, the images washing over him, to yank his blade free of the wood. He turned, grinning, and gave a little bow.

Despite it all-the chaotic interruptions, the laughter and mocking recitations of the soldiers, who anticipated every line-Peter soon found himself sliding into the story. He sensed that some pieces of the film were missing; the narrative leapt ahead in confusing jerks, leaving the castle behind for a ship at sea, then for a place called London. A city, he realized. A city from the Time Before. The Count-some kind of viral, though he didn’t look like one-was killing women. First a girl handing out flowers in the street, then a young woman asleep in her bed, with great sleepy curls of hair and a face so composed she looked like a doll. The Count’s movements were comically slow, as were his victim’s; everyone in the movie seemed trapped in a dream in which they couldn’t make themselves move fast enough, or even at all. Dracula himself possessed a pale, almost womanly face, his lips painted to look bowed, like the wings of a bat; whenever he was about to bite someone, the screen would hold for a long, lingering moment on his eyes, which were lit from below to glow like twin candle flames.

Part of Peter knew it was all fake, nothing to take seriously, and yet as the story continued, he found himself worried for the girl, Mina, the daughter of the doctor-Dr. Seward, owner of the sanatorium, whatever that was-and whose husband, the ineffectual Harker, seemed to have no idea how to help her, always standing around with his hands in his pockets, looking helpless and lost. None of them knew what to do, except for Van Helsing, the vampire hunter. He wasn’t like any hunter Peter had ever seen-an old man with thick, distorting eyeglasses, given to vast, windy pronouncements that were the object of the soldiers’ most outspoken mockery. “Gentlemen, we are dealing with the unthinkable!” and “The superstitions of tomorrow can become the scientific reality of today!” The catcalls flew each time, and yet a great deal of what Van Helsing said seemed true to Peter, especially the part about a vampire being “a creature whose life has been unnaturally prolonged.” If that didn’t describe a smoke, he didn’t know what did. He found himself wondering if Van Helsing’s trick with the jewelry-box mirror wasn’t some version of what had happened with the pans in Las Vegas, and if, as Van Helsing claimed, a vampire “must sleep each night in his native soil.” Was that why they always came home, the ones who’d been taken up? At times the movie seemed almost to be a kind of instruction manual. Peter wondered if it wasn’t a made-up tale at all but an account of something that had actually happened.

The girl, Mina, was taken up; Harker and Van Helsing pursued the vampire to his lair, a dank basement. Peter realized where the story was headed: they were going to perform the Mercy. They were going to hunt down Mina and kill her, and it was Harker, Mina’s husband, who would have to perform this terrible duty. Peter braced himself. The soldiers had finally grown quiet, their antics put aside as they were caught up, despite themselves, in the story’s final, grim unfolding.

He never got to see the end. A single soldier dashed into the tent.

“Lights up! Extraction at the gate!”

The movie was instantly forgotten; all the soldiers bolted from their chairs. Weapons were coming out, pistols, rifles, blades. In the rush to get to the door, someone tripped over the projector’s power cable, sinking the room into darkness. Everyone was pushing, shouting, calling out orders; Peter heard the pop of rifle fire from outside. As he followed the crowd from the tent, he saw a pair of flares rocketing over the walls toward the muddy field beyond the gate. Michael was running past him with Sancho; Peter seized him by the arm.

“What is it? What’s happening?”

Michael barely broke his stride. “It’s Blue Squad!” he said. “Come on!”

From the chaos of the mess hall had emerged a sudden orderliness; everyone knew what to do. The soldiers had broken into distinct groups, some quickly ascending the ladders to the catwalk at the tops of the pickets, others taking positions behind a barricade of sandbags just inside the gate. More men were swiveling the spotlights to aim them across the muddy field beyond the opening.

“Here they come!”

“Open it now!” Greer shouted from the base of the wall. “Open the goddamn gate!”

A deafening barrage of cover fire from the catwalk as half a dozen soldiers leapt into the space over the yard, holding the ropes that connected through a system of pulleys and blocks to the gate’s hinges. Peter was momentarily arrested by the coordinated grace of it all, the practiced beauty of their synchronized movements. As the soldiers descended, the gates began to part, revealing the light-bathed ground beyond the walls and a group of figures racing toward them. Alicia was leading the way. They hit the gate at a dead sprint, six of them, dropping and rolling in the dust as the men behind the sandbags opened fire, releasing a stream of rounds over their heads. If there were virals back there, Peter didn’t see any. It was all too fast, too loud, and then, just like that, it was over: the gates were sealed behind them.

Peter ran to where Alicia lay with the others. She was on all fours in the dirt, breathing hard; the paint was dripping down her face, her bald head shining like polished metal under the harsh glare of the spotlights.

As she rocked back onto her knees, their eyes met quickly. “Peter, get the hell out of here.”

From above, a few last halfhearted shots. The virals had scattered, retreating from the lights.

“I mean it,” she said fiercely. Every part of her seemed clenched. “Go.”

Others were crowding around. “Where’s Raimey?” Vorhees bellowed, moving through the men. “Where the hell’s Raimey?”

“He’s dead, sir.”

Vorhees turned to where Alicia was kneeling in the mud. When he saw Peter, his eyes flashed with anger. “Jaxon, you don’t belong here.”

“We found it, sir,” Alicia said. “Stumbled right into it. A regular hornet’s nest. There must be hundreds of them.”

Vorhees waved to Hollis and the others. “All of you, back to your quarters, now.” Without waiting for an answer, he turned back to Alicia. “Private Donadio, report.”

“The mine, General,” she said. “We found the mine.”

• • •

All that summer Vorhees’s men had been looking for it: the entrance shaft to an old copper mine, hidden somewhere in the hills. It was thought that this was one of the hot spots Vorhees had spoken of, a nest where the virals slept. Using old geological survey maps and tracking the creatures’ movements with the nets, they had narrowed their search to the southeast quadrant, an area of roughly twenty square kilometers above the river. Blue Squad’s mission had been one last attempt to locate it before the evac. It was sheer chance that they had; as Peter heard the story from Michael, Blue Squad had simply wandered into it, just before sundown-a soft depression in the earth, into which the point man had vanished with a scream. The first viral who emerged took two more men before anyone could get off a shot. The rest of the squad was able to form some kind of firing line, but more virals swarmed out, braving the last of daylight in their blood fury; once the sun went down, the unit would be quickly overwhelmed, the location of the mine shaft lost with them. The flares they carried would buy them a few minutes, but that was all. They broke into two groups; the first would make a run for it while the second, led by Lieutenant Raimey, would cover their escape, holding the creatures off as long as they could, until the sun went down and all the flares were gone, and that would be the end of it.

All night long, the camp buzzed with activity. Peter could feel the change: the days of waiting, of hunt-and-peck missions in the forest, were over; Vorhees’s men were preparing themselves for battle. Michael was gone, helping to ready the vehicles that would carry the explosives, drums of diesel fuel and ammonium nitrate with a grenade-cluster igniter, known as a “flusher.” These would be lowered by winch straight into the exposed shaft. The explosion would no doubt kill many of the virals inside; the question was, where would the survivors emerge? In a hundred years the topography might have changed, and for all Vorhees and the others knew, a landslide or earthquake had opened an entirely new access point. While one squad put the explosives in place, the rest of the men would do their best to sniff out any other openings. With luck, everyone would be in position when the bomb went off.

The lights came down to a gray dawn. The temperature had dropped in the night, and all the puddles in the yard were encrusted with ice. The vehicles were being loaded; Vorhees’s soldiers were assembled at the gate, all but a single squad, which would stay behind to man the garrison. Alicia had spent many of the intervening hours in Vorhees’s tent. It was she who had led the survivors back to the garrison, using the route they had first traveled along the river. Now Peter saw her up front with the general, the two of them with a map spread over the hood of one of the Humvees. Greer, on horseback, was supervising the final loading of supplies. Watching from the sidelines, Peter felt a growing unease, but something else, too-a strong attractive force, instinctual as breathing. For days he had drifted between the poles of his uncertainty, knowing he should press on but unable to leave Alicia behind. Now, as he watched the soldiers completing their preparations at the gate, Alicia among them, a single desire pushed itself forward. Vorhees’s men were going to war; he wanted to be part of it.

As Greer moved down the line, Peter stepped forward. “Major, I’d like to speak with you.”

Greer’s face and voice were distracted, hasty. He looked over Peter’s head as he spoke: “What is it, Jaxon?”

“I’d like to go, sir.”

Greer regarded him a moment. “We can’t take civilians.”

“Just put me at the rear. There must be something I can do. I can, I don’t know, be a runner or something.”

Greer’s focus shifted to the back of one of the trucks, where a group of four men, including Michael, were winching the drums of fuel into place over the tailgate.

“Sergeant,” Greer barked to the squad sergeant, a man named Withers, “can you take over for me here? And Sancho, watch that chain-it’s all wrapped up.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”

“These are bombs, son. For Christsakes, be careful.” Then, to Peter: “Come with me.”

The major dismounted and took Peter aside, out of earshot. “I know you’re worried about her,” he said. “Okay? I get it. If it were up to me, I’d probably let you come.”

“Maybe if we talked to the general-”

“That’s not going to happen. I’m sorry.” A curious expression came into Greer’s face, a flickering indecision. “Look. What you told me about the girl, Amy. You should know something.” He shook his head, glancing away. “I can’t believe I’m about to tell you this. Maybe I really have been out in these woods too long. What’s that thing called? When you think something’s happened before, like you dreamed it. There’s a name for it.”

“Sir?”

Greer still wasn’t looking at him. “Déjà vu. That’s it. I’ve been feeling that way since I first found you guys. A big bad case of déjà vu. I know it doesn’t look like it now, but when I was a kid, I was a scrawny little thing, sick all the time. My parents died when I was small, I never even really met them, so probably it was just the orphanage where I was raised, fifty kids all crammed together, all that snot and dirty hands. You name it, I caught it. About a dozen times the sisters were ready to write me off. Fever dreams like you wouldn’t believe, too. Nothing I could really describe, or even remember. Just the feeling of it, like being lost in the dark for a thousand years. But the thing was, I wasn’t alone. That was part of the dream, too. I hadn’t thought about it for a long time, not until you all showed up. That girl. Those eyes of hers. You think I didn’t notice that? Jesus, it’s like I’m right back there, six years old and sweating my brains out with fever. I’m telling you, she was the one. I know it sounds crazy. She was in the dream with me.”

An expectant silence hung around his final words. Peter felt a shiver of recognition.

“Did you tell Vorhees this?”

“Are you kidding? What would I say? Hell, son, I’m not even telling you.”

To show Peter that the conversation was over, Greer took his mount by the reins and swung back up into the saddle. “That’s all. But you ask me why you can’t go, there’s my answer. We don’t come back, Red Squad has orders to evacuate you down to Roswell. That’s official. Unofficially, I will tell you they won’t stop you if you decide to press on.”

He heeled his mount to take his place at the head of the line. A roar of engines; the gates swung open. Peter watched as the men, five squads plus the horses and vehicles, moved slowly through. Alicia was somewhere in there, Peter thought, probably up front with Vorhees. But he couldn’t find her anywhere.

The line had long since passed when Michael came up beside him.

“He didn’t let you go, huh?”

Peter could only shake his head.

“Me neither,” said Michael.

SIXTY-ONE

They waited, through that day and into the next. With just a single squad remaining to man the walls, the camp felt strange, empty and alone. Amy and Sara were now free to move through the garrison as they wished, but there was nowhere to go, nothing to do but wait. Amy had lapsed into a silence so profound that Peter had begun to wonder if he had dreamed her voice in the first place; all day long she sat on her bunk in her tent, her eyes drawn into an intense look of concentration. When Peter could stand it no longer, he asked her if she knew what was happening out there.

Her voice when she answered was vague; she seemed to be looking at him and also not. “They’re lost. Lost in the woods.”

“Who is, Amy? Who’s lost?”

She seemed to discover him only then, to enter into the present moment and its circumstances. “Will we be leaving soon, Peter?” she asked again. “Because I would like to leave soon.” An airy smile. “To make the snow angels.”

It was more than puzzling; it was maddening. For the first time, Peter actually felt anger at her. Never had he felt so helpless, pinned in place by his own hesitancy and the delay it had created. They should have departed days ago; now they were trapped. To leave without knowing if Alicia was safe was simply impossible for him. He stormed from the women’s tent and resumed his haunted walks around the compound, filling the useless hours. He made no effort even to speak with the others, keeping his distance. The sky was clear, but to the east, the peaks of the mountains glinted with ice. It had begun to seem possible they would never leave the garrison at all.

Then, on the morning of the third day, they heard it: the sound of engines. Peter raced to the ladder and ascended to the catwalk, where the squad commander, whose name was Eustace, was looking south through a pair of binoculars. Eustace alone had deigned to talk to any of them, though he kept such exchanges brief and to the point.

“It’s them,” Eustace said. “Some of them, anyway.”

“How many?” Peter asked.

“Looks like two squads.”

The men who moved through the gate were filthy, exhausted; everything about them spoke of defeat. Alicia was nowhere among them. At the rear of the line, still on horseback, was Major Greer. Hollis and Michael had come running from their tent. Greer dismounted, looking dazed, and took a long drink of water before speaking.

“Are we the first?” he asked Peter. He seemed to not quite know where he was.

“Where’s Alicia?” Peter demanded.

“Christ, what a mess. The whole fucking hillside caved in. They came at us from everywhere. We were totally flanked.”

Peter could contain himself no longer. He grabbed Greer roughly by the shoulders, forcing the major to look him in the eye·· “Goddamnit, tell me where she is!”

Greer made no resistance. “I don’t know, Peter. I’m sorry. Everybody got split up in the dark. She was with Vorhees. We waited a day at the fallback point, but they never showed.”

More waiting; it was unbearable, infuriating. Peter had never felt so powerless. A short time later, a cry went up from the wall.

“Two more squads!”

Peter was sitting in the mess hall in a haze of worry. He dashed outside, arriving at the gate as the first truck pulled into the compound. It was the one that had carried the explosives; the winch was still attached to the bed, the empty hook swinging. Twenty-four men, three squads reconstituted as two. Peter searched for Alicia among their benumbed faces.

“Private Donadio! Does anyone know what happened to Private Donadio!”

No one did. Everyone told the same story: the bomb exploding, the ground tearing open beneath them, the virals pouring forth, everyone scattering, lost in the dark.

Someone claimed they’d seen Vorhees die, others that he was with Blue Squad. But no one had seen Alicia.

The day dragged on. Peter paced the parade ground, talking to no one. As senior officer, Greer was now in charge. He spoke briefly to Peter, telling him not to abandon hope. The general knew what he was doing; if anyone could bring his unit back alive, it was Curtis Vorhees. But Peter could see in Greer’s face that he, too, had begun to believe that no one else was coming back.

His hopes ended with the fall of darkness. He returned to the tent, where Hollis and Michael were playing hands of go-to. Both glanced up as he entered.

“Just keeping busy,” Hollis said.

“I didn’t say anything.”

Peter lay down on his bunk and drew a blanket over himself, not even bothering to remove his muddy boots. He was filthy, wrung out with fatigue; the last, unreal hours seemed to have transpired in a kind of trance. He had barely eaten for days, but the thought of food was impossible. A cold wind-a winter wind-was shaking the walls of the tent. His last thoughts before he slept were of Alicia’s final words to him: Get the hell out of here.

He was awakened by a distant cry that sent him lurching upright. Hollis’s face ducked through the flap of the tent.

“Someone’s at the gate.”

He threw the blanket aside and tore outside, into the glare of the spotlights. His doubts turned to certainty, and by the time he was halfway across the parade ground he knew what was waiting for him.

Alicia. Alicia had come back.

She was standing at the gate. His first impression, as he moved toward her, was that she was alone. But as he pushed his way through the gathering men, he saw a second soldier, kneeling on the dirt. It was Muncey. His wrists were bound before him. Under the blaze of the spotlights, Peter could see that his face was glazed with sweat. He was shivering, but not from the cold; one of his hands was wrapped in a rag sodden with blood.

The two were surrounded by soldiers now, everyone keeping their distance. A reverential hush had descended. Greer stepped forward to Alicia.

“The general?”

She shook her head: no.

The private was holding his bloody hand away from his body, breathing rapidly. Greer crouched before him. “Corporal Muncey.” His voice was quiet, soothing.

“Yes, sir.” Muncey licked his lips with a slow tongue. “Sorry, sir.”

“It’s all right, son. You’ve done well.”

“Don’t know how I missed the one that did it. Chewed me like a dog before Donadio got him.” He raised his head toward Alicia. “You wouldn’t know she was a girl from the way she fights. Hope you don’t mind I asked her to truss me up and bring me home.”

“That’s your perfect right, Muncey. That’s your right as a soldier of the Expeditionary.”

Muncey’s body shook then, a series of three hard spasms. His lips curled away, showing the gaps in his teeth. Peter felt the soldiers tense; all around him, hands dropped to their blades, a quick, unconscious movement. But Greer, crouched before the ailing soldier, didn’t flinch.

“Well, I guess that’s it now,” Muncey said when the spasms had passed. Peter could find no fear anywhere in the soldier’s eyes, only a calm acceptance. All the color had seeped from his face, like water down a drain. He lifted his bound hands to wipe the sweat from his brow with the bloody rag. “It’s like they say, the way it comes on. If it’s no trouble, I’d like it on the blade, Major. I want to feel it coming out of me.”

Greer nodded his approval. “Good man, Muncey.”

“Donadio should be the one to do it, if that’s all right. My mama always said you should dance with the one who brung you, and she was kind enough to bring me back. She didn’t have to do that.” His eyes were blinking now, the sweat was pouring down. “I just wanted to say it’s been an honor, sir. The general, too. I wanted to come home to say that. But I think you better step to it, Major.”

Greer rose to his feet and backed away. Everyone snapped to attention. He raised his voice to all of them:

“This man is a soldier of the Expeditionary! It is time for him to take the trip! All hail, Corporal Muncey. Hip hip… ”

“Hooray!”

“Hip hip-”

“Hooray!”

“Hip hip-”

“Hooray!”

Greer drew his blade and passed it to Alicia. Her face was composed, lacking all emotion: a soldier’s face, a face of duty. She gripped the blade in her fist and knelt before Muncey, who had bowed his head now, waiting, his bound hands slack in his lap. Alicia bent her head toward Muncey’s until their foreheads were touching. Peter saw that her lips were moving, murmuring quiet words to him. He felt no horror, only a sense of astonishment. The moment seemed frozen, not part of a flow of events but something fixed and singular-a line that, once crossed, could never be uncrossed. That Muncey would die was only a part of its meaning.

The knife did its work almost before Peter realized what had happened; when Alicia dropped her hand, it was buried to the hilt in Muncey’s chest. His eyes were open, wide and damp, his lips parted. Alicia was holding his face now, tenderly, like a mother with her child. “Go easy now, Muncey,” she said. “Go easy.” A bit of blood had risen to his lips. He breathed once more, holding the air in his chest, as if it were not air but something far more-a sweet taste of freedom, of all cares lifted, everything over and done. Then his life left him and he slumped forward, Alicia receiving him in her arms to ease his body’s passage to the muddy ground of the garrison.

Peter did not see her all through the next day and then the day after. He thought of sending her a message through Greer, but he didn’t know what to say. In his heart he knew the truth: Alicia was gone. She had slipped into a life he had no part of.

They’d lost a total of forty-six men, including General Vorhees. It stood to reason that some were not dead but had been taken up; the talk among the men was of sending out search parties. But Greer said no. The window for their departure was closing, if they were going to make their rendezvous with Third Battalion. Seventy-two hours, he announced, and that would be the end of it.

By the end of the second day, the camp was nearly buttoned up. Food, weapons, gear, most of the larger tents except the mess-all were packed and ready to go. The lights would remain, as would the large fuel tankers, now mostly empty, and a single Humvee. The battalion would be traveling south in two groups: a small scouting party on horseback, led by Alicia, with the rest following in the trucks and on foot. Alicia was now an officer; with so many men lost, including all but two squad leaders, the ranks had thinned, and Greer had given her a battlefield commission. She was now Lieutenant Donadio.

Greer had lifted the order to keep Sara and Amy segregated; a body was a body, he said, no reason at this point to split hairs. A lot of men had been injured in the raid; mostly small things, cuts and scratches and sprains, but one soldier had a broken collarbone, and two more, Sancho and Withers, had been badly burned in the detonation. The battalion’s two medical corpsmen had been killed, so with Amy helping her, Sara had taken over caring for the wounded, preparing them as best she could for the trip south. Peter and Hollis had been assigned to the packing crews, whose job was to sort through the contents of two large supply tents, culling what would travel with them and moving the rest to storage in a series of dugouts spread through the compound. Michael had more or less disappeared into the motor pool; he slept in the barracks, took his meals elbow to elbow with the other oilers. Even his name was gone, replaced by Lugnut.

Over everything, the question of the evacuation hung like a blade. Peter had yet to give Greer his answer, because the truth was, he didn’t know. The others-Sara and Hollis and Michael and even Amy, in her quiet, inward way-were all waiting, giving him the space to decide. That they said nothing on the subject made this fact all the more obvious. Or maybe they were simply avoiding him, for all he knew. Either way, leaving the safety of the garrison now seemed more perilous than ever. Greer had cautioned him that with the mine disturbed, the woods would be crawling; perhaps, he suggested, it would be best to wait until they returned next summer. He’d talk to Division, persuade them to mount a proper expedition. Whatever’s up that mountain, Greer said, it’s been there a long time. Surely it can wait another year.

The evening of the second day after Alicia’s return, Peter came into his tent to find Hollis alone, sitting on his cot. A winter parka was draped over his shoulders; he was holding a guitar in his lap.

“Where’d you find that?”

Hollis was idly plucking notes, his face drawn in concentration. He looked up and gave a smile through his heavy beard, which by now climbed halfway up his cheeks. “One of the oilers had it. Friend of Michael’s.” He blew on his hands and plucked a few more notes, nibbling around the edges of a melody that Peter couldn’t quite discern. “It’s been so long I thought I’d forgotten how to play.”

“I didn’t know you could.”

“I can’t, not really. Arlo was always the one.”

Peter sat on the bunk across from him. “Go on. Play something.”

“I don’t remember much. Just a song or two.”

“Then play that. Play anything.”

Hollis shrugged; but Peter could tell he was happy to be asked. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Hollis did something with the strings, tightening and testing, then began. It took Peter a moment to realize what he was hearing: one of Arlo’s funny, made-up songs, the ones he used to play for the Littles in the Sanctuary, yet different somehow. The same but not the same. Under Hollis’s fingers, it was deeper and richer, full of an aching sadness. Peter lay back on his cot and let the notes wash over him. Even when the song had ended, he could still feel it inside him, like an echo of longing in his chest.

“It’s all right,” he said. He took a deep breath, fixing his eyes on the tent’s sagging ceiling. “You and Sara should take that convoy. Michael, too. I doubt she’ll go without him.” When Hollis said nothing, Peter rose on his elbows and faced his friend. “It’s okay, Hollis. I mean it. That’s what I want you to do.”

“It’s what Vorhees said, when we first got here. About his men, the oath they take. He was right. I’m no good for this anymore, if I ever was. I really love her, Peter.”

“You don’t have to explain. I’m glad for you both. I’m glad you have this chance.”

“What will you do?” Hollis asked.

The answer was obvious. Still, it needed to be said. “What we came to do.”

It was strange. Peter felt sad, but something else as well. He felt at peace. The decision was behind him now; he was free of it. He wondered if this was how his father had felt the night before his final ride. Watching the ceiling of the tent shaking in the wintry wind, Peter recalled Theo’s words that night in the power station, all of them sitting around the table in the control room, drinking shine. Our father didn’t go out there to let it go. Whoever thinks so doesn’t understand the first thing about him. He went out there because he just couldn’t stand not knowing, not for one more minute of his life. It was the peace of truth that Peter felt, and he was glad for it, down to his bones.

Beyond the walls of the tent, Peter could hear the roar of the generators, the calls of Greer’s men on the pickets, standing the watch. One more night and all would be silent.

“There’s not any way I can talk you out of this, is there?” Hollis asked.

Peter shook his head. “Just do me a favor.”

“Whatever you want.”

“Don’t follow me.”

He found the major in the tent that once had been Vorhees’s. Peter and Greer had barely spoken since Alicia’s return; a heaviness seemed to have come over the major since the abortive raid, and Peter had kept his distance. It was more than the burden of command that was weighing on him, Peter knew. In those long hours he had spent with the two men, Peter had seen the depth of their bond. It was grief Greer was feeling now, grief for his lost friend.

A lamp was glowing in the tent.

“Major Greer?”

“Enter.”

Peter stepped through the flap. The room was blazing with warmth from the woodstove; the major, wearing his camo pants and an olive-drab T-shirt, was sitting at Vorhees’s desk, sorting through papers by lantern light. An open locker, half full of various belongings, rested on the floor at his feet.

“Jaxon. I was wondering when I’d hear from you.” Greer leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes wearily. “Come here and look at this.”

A pile of loose papers lay on the desk. On the top was a sheet bearing the image of three figures, a woman and two young girls. The image was so precisely rendered that Peter thought at first he was looking at a photograph, something from the Time Before. But then he realized that it was a drawing, rendered in charcoal. A portrait, done from the waist up; the bottom seemed to fade away, into nothing. The woman was holding the smaller girl, who couldn’t have been older than three, with a soft, baby-cheeked face, in her lap; the other, just a couple of years older than her sister, stood behind the two of them, over the woman’s left shoulder. Greer pulled more pages from the pile: the same three figures, in an identical pose.

“Vorhees did these?”

Greer nodded. “Curt wasn’t a lifer, like most of us. He had a whole life before the Expeditionary, a wife, two little girls. He was a farmer, if you can believe that.”

“What happened to them?”

Greer answered with a shrug. “What always happens, when it happens.”

Peter bent to examine the drawings again. He could feel the painstaking care of their creation, the force of concentration that lay behind each detail. The woman’s wry smile; the younger girl’s eyes, wide and refractive like her mother’s; the lift of the older one’s hair, caught on a sudden breeze. A bit of gray dust still floated on the surface of the paper, like ashes, pushed on this remembered wind.

“I guess he drew all these so he wouldn’t forget them,” Greer said.

Peter felt suddenly self-conscious-whatever these images had meant to the general, Peter knew they were private. “If you don’t mind my asking, Major, why are you showing these to me?”

Greer gathered them carefully together in a cardboard folder and placed them in the trunk at his feet. “Someone once told me that part of you lives on so long as somebody remembers you. Now you remember them, too.” He sealed the locker with a key he took from around his neck and leaned back in his chair. “But that’s not why you came to see me, is it? You’ve made your decision.”

“Yes, sir. I’ll be leaving in the morning.”

“Well.” A thoughtful nod, of something expected. “All five, or just you?”

“Hollis and Sara are going with the evac. Michael, too, though he may not know that yet.”

“So, the two of you, then. You and the mystery girl.”

“Amy.”

Greer nodded again. “Amy.” Peter waited for Greer to try to talk him out of it, but instead he said, “Take my mount. He’s a good horse, he won’t let you down. I’ll leave word at the gate to let you pass. You need weapons?”

“Whatever you can spare.”

“I’ll leave that too, then.”

“I appreciate that, sir. Thank you for everything.”

“Seems the least I can do.” Greer regarded his hands where they were folded in his lap. “You know it’s probably suicide, don’t you? Going up that mountain alone like that. I have to say it.”

“Maybe so. But it’s the best idea I’ve got.”

A moment of silent acknowledgment passed between them. Peter thought how he would miss Greer, his calm, steadfast presence.

“Well, this is goodbye then.” Greer rose and offered his hand to shake. “Look me up if you’re ever in Kerrville. I want to know how it ends.”

“How what ends?”

The major smiled, his big hand still wrapped around Peter’s. “The dream, Peter.”

A light was burning inside the barracks; Peter could hear murmuring behind the canvas walls. There was no proper door, no way to knock. But as he approached, a soldier appeared through the flap, drawing his parka around him. The one they called Wilco; he was one of the oilers.

“Jaxon.” He gave a startled look. “If you’re looking for Lugnut, he’s with some of the other guys, moving the last of the fuel off the tanker. I was just going over there.”

“I’m looking for Lish.” When Wilco met this request with an empty stare, Peter clarified. “Lieutenant Donadio.”

“I’m not sure-”

“Just tell her I’m here.”

Wilco shrugged and ducked back through the flap. Peter strained his ears to hear what, if anything, was being said inside. But all the voices had gone suddenly silent. He waited, long enough to wonder if Alicia would simply fail to appear. But then the flap drew aside and she stepped through.

It would not have been quite true, Peter thought, to say that she looked changed; she simply was changed. The woman who stood before him was both the same Alicia he had always known and someone entirely new. Her arms were crossed over her chest; on her upper body she was wearing nothing more than a T-shirt, despite the cold. A bit of her hair had grown back over the days, a ghostly scrim that clung to her scalp like a glowing cap under the lights. But it wasn’t any of these things that made the moment strange. It was the way she stood, holding herself apart from him.

“I heard about your promotion,” he said. “Congratulations.”

Alicia said nothing.

“Lish-”

“You shouldn’t be here, Peter. I shouldn’t be talking to you.”

“I just came to tell you that I understand. For a while I didn’t. But I do now.”

“Well.” She paused, hugging herself in the cold. “What changed your mind?”

He didn’t know quite what to say. Everything he’d meant to tell her seemed to have abruptly fled from his mind. Muncey’s death had something to do with it, and his father, and Amy. But the real reason wasn’t anything he possessed the words for.

He said the only thing he could think of. “Hollis’s guitar, actually.”

Alicia gave him a blank look. “Hollis has a guitar?”

“One of the soldiers gave it to him.” Peter stopped; there was no way to explain. “I’m sorry. I’m not making much sense.”

A space seemed to have opened in Peter’s chest, and he realized what it was; it was the pain of missing someone he had not yet left.

“Well, thank you for telling me. But I really have to get back inside.”

“Lish, wait.”

She turned to face him again, her eyebrows raised.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me? About the Colonel.”

“Is that why you came here? To ask me about the Colonel?” She sighed, looking away; it wasn’t anything she wanted to discuss. “Because he didn’t want anyone to know. About who he was.”

“But why wouldn’t he?”

“What would he have said, Peter? He was all alone. He’d lost all his men. As far as he was concerned, he should have died with them.” She paused to breathe. “As for the rest, I think he raised me the only way he knew how. For a long time, I thought it was fun, to tell you the truth. Stories about brave men crossing the Darklands to fight and die. Taking the oath, a bunch of mumbo jumbo that meant nothing to me, just words. Then I was angry. I was eight, Peter. Eight years old, and he took me outside the walls, underneath the power trunk, and left me there. At night, with nothing, not even a blade. You haven’t heard about that part.”

“Flyers, Lish. What happened?”

“Nothing. I’d be dead if it had. I just sat under a tree and cried all night. To this day I don’t know if he was testing my courage or my luck.”

Part of the story seemed missing. “He must have been out there with you. Watching you.”

“Maybe.” She angled her face to the wintry sky. “Sometimes I think he was, sometimes I don’t. You didn’t know him like I did. I hated him after that, for the longest time. Really and truly hated him. But you can only hate somebody for so long.” She breathed again-deeply, resignedly. “I hope that’s true for you, Peter. That someday you can find it in your heart to forgive me.” She sniffed and wiped her eyes. “That’s all. I’ve said too much as it is. I’m just glad I had you as long as I did.”

He looked at her, her stricken face, and he knew.

The Colonel wasn’t the real secret. He was. He was the secret she had kept. That they had kept from each other, even from themselves.

He reached for her. “Alicia, listen-”

“Don’t do this. Don’t.” And yet she did not back away.

“Those three days, when I thought you’d die and I wouldn’t be there.” A fist-sized lump had formed in his throat. “I always thought I’d be there.”

“Peter, goddamnit.” She was trembling; he felt the weight of her struggle. “You can’t do this now. It’s too late, Peter. It’s too late.”

“I know.”

“Don’t say it. Please. You said you understood.”

He did; he understood. All that they were to each other seemed cradled within this simple fact. He felt no surprise or even regret but, rather, a deep and sudden gratitude and, with it, a force of clarity, filling him like a breath of winter air. He wondered what this feeling was and then he knew. He was giving her up.

She let him put his arms around her then, pulling her into the open flaps of his jacket. He held her, as she had held him, all those days ago in Vorhees’s tent. The same goodbye reversed. He felt her stiffen and then relax against him, becoming smaller in his embrace.

“You’re leaving,” she said.

“I need you to promise me something. Keep the others safe. Get them to Roswell.”

A faint but discernible nod against his chest. “What about you?”

How he loved her. And yet the words themselves could never be spoken. Holding her in his arms, he closed his eyes and tried to inscribe the feeling of her into his mind, into memory, so that he could take this with him.

“I think you’ve looked after me long enough, don’t you?” He pulled away to see her face a final time. “That’s all,” he said. “I just wanted to thank you.”

And then he turned and walked away, leaving her standing alone in the icy wind outside the silent barracks.

He did his best to sleep, turning restlessly through the night, and in the last hour before dawn, when he could wait no more, rose and quickly packed his gear. It was the cold he was thinking of; they would need blankets, extra socks, anything that could keep them warm and dry. Sleeping sacks and ponchos and a tarp with a good sturdy rope. The night before, on his way back from the barracks, he had ducked into the supply tent and pilfered an entrenching tool and a hand axe, and a pair of heavy parkas. Hollis was softly snoring on his cot, a bearded face buried in blankets, oblivious. When he awoke, Peter would be gone.

He hoisted the pack to his shoulder and stepped outside, into a cold so sharp it stunned him, sucking the air from his lungs. The garrison was quiet, just a few men moving about; the smells of wood smoke and warm food reached him from the mess, making his stomach rumble. But there was no time for that. In the women’s tent he found Amy sitting on her bunk, her small pack resting on her lap. He’d told her nothing. She was alone; Sara was still with Sancho and the others, in the infirmary.

“Is it time?” she asked him. Her eyes were very bright.

“Yes, it’s time.”

They crossed together to the paddock. Greer’s horse, a large black gelding, his coat heavy for winter, was grazing with the others, noses angled to the wind. Peter retrieved a bridle from the shed and led him to the fence. He wished he could use a saddle, but it wouldn’t work with two. He lashed their packs together, draping them over the animal’s withers. His fingers were already stiff with the cold. He lifted Amy up, then used the fence to climb aboard. They rode around the edge of the paddock to the shadows under the pickets, headed for the gate. Dawn was just breaking, a gray softening, as if the darkness were not lifting but dissolving; a pale, almost invisible snow had begun to fall, flakes that seemed to materialize in the air before their faces.

They were met at the gate by a single sentry: Eustace, the lieutenant who had first alerted Peter to the raiding party’s return.

“Major says to let you pass. He also asked me to give you this.” Eustace dragged a duffel bag from the sentry hut and lay it on the ground before the horse. “Says to take whatever you need.”

Peter swung down and knelt to open it. Rifles, magazines, a couple of pistols, a belt of grenades. Peter looked through all of it, thinking about what to do.

“Thanks anyway,” he said, drawing upright. He drew his blade from his belt and held it out for Eustace to take. “Here. A present for the major.”

Eustace frowned. “I don’t get it. You want to give me your blade?”

Peter pushed it toward him. “Take it,” he said.

Reluctantly, Eustace accepted the blade. For a moment he just looked at it, as if it were some strange artifact he’d found in the forest.

“Give it to Major Greer,” Peter said. “I think he’ll understand.”

He turned to address Amy, sitting high above him. She had tipped her chin upward to the falling snow.

“Ready?”

The girl nodded. A faint smile shone on her face; flakes had caught on her lashes, in her hair, like jeweled dust. Eustace gave Peter a leg up; he swung onto the horse’s back, taking the reins in his hand. The gate drew open before them. He allowed himself one last look toward the barracks, but all was quiet, unchanged. Goodbye, he thought, goodbye. Then he heeled his mount and they rode out, into the breaking day.