Scarlet and the Keepers of Light (24 page)

Scarlet

and the Dragon’s Burden

Three young men sat huddled around a campfire that sputtered and sizzled under a steady rain. They were cold and hungry, but filled with a hope that they had not felt for a long time. If the stories they’d been hearing were true, they might just have a chance against the monstrous plague that had ravaged their world, robbing them of their families, of their dreams, of any hope of peace, leaving only dread. Two of the three, born after the world had already succumbed to the destructive force from Satorium, had never known what it was to feel safe.

The story that most concerned the three young men had traveled by word of mouth around the wild, war-torn earth. It told of a cunning dog, a fairy, a giant, and a young sorceress who traveled by starlight and possessed powers that might help her vanquish the dark creatures. Sixty years ago, had they heard such a story, most would have dismissed it as the plot of a children’s novel or a fantasy movie. But those carefree days were gone. There were no longer any theaters to take the kids to, no Barnes & Nobles in which to browse while sipping coffee on a busy weekend. The world was now a savage, cruel place.

“How much farther to the city?” one of the young men, Brian, asked, raising a tin cup full of hot soup that was little more than flavored water to his lips.

The eldest of the group, whose name was Gerald, looked out toward the eastern horizon. “Another day, I figure,” he said, although he had no idea if this were true. In fact, he’d been saying the same thing for days now. His companions never complained. It was as good an answer as any, and better than admitting that he didn’t know.

“How much do you think is true?” The youngest and smallest of the three men directed his question to Gerald, as he always did.

“I don’t know, Mike. I guess I’d have to hope all of it.” Gerald offered his most reassuring smile. In addition to being the reluctant leader, and a surrogate big brother to the other two, he was also the most skeptical. In his mind, the stories must contain some grain of truth if they’d reached all the way to Tennessee, but he wasn’t ready to believe them wholesale. In his life thus far, if something was too good to be true—well, actually, if it was good at all—it was not. He had agreed to travel to Washington, DC, not because he expected to find answers there but because it was better than cowering in some cellar or cave, waiting to die.

“I think they are,” Mike said wistfully. “I mean, they gotta be, right? Everywhere we go, no matter who we talk to, it’s always the same. That’s gotta count for something.”

G
erald dragged his pack in front of him and began taking inventory by firelight. “The stories are not all the same, though. And if we’re being honest with ourselves, they’ve gotten more outrageous the closer we’ve come to DC.” Instantly he regretted that he’d spoken his feelings out loud. Mike and Brian didn’t need his doubts weighing them down. Let them believe if they wanted to. Heck, he wished he coul
d.

“Well, the safe haven hasn’t changed. The Sanctuary. That part has always been the same, no matter where we go,” Brian said, his voice confident. “No one person we’ve talked to has ever described anything different. A great sphere around the Library of Congress that keeps the darkness out____”

“Where safe haven is to be had for any human seeking refuge,” Gerald cut him off. He was tired and out of sorts, and he didn’t feel like going over it all again. “You’re right, Brian. That part’s always been the same.”

“Who wants first watch?” Mike asked, trying to change the subject. He also hoped that if he brought it up, Brian and Gerald would offer it to him. It was so much easier to stay up late and then sleep without interruption until morning.

“I’ll take it,” Gerald answered quickly. “I don’t have a good feeling about tonight. I’ll take a long watch, let you two get some extra sleep.”

Neither Mike nor Brian argued, partly because they’d learned it was useless to argue with Gerald once he’d made up his mind and partly because extra sleep was a rare luxury. They rolled out their sleeping bags, placing them as close to the fire as possible. As they crawled inside, ready to take advantage of Gerald’s generosity, a sound carried across the night and straight up their spines.

“How close?” Mike whimpered.

“Too close,” Gerald whispered back.

Quickly and quietly they began stuffing their things back into their packs. Gerald stomped out the fire, cursing himself for having lit it in the first place. It had been such a cold night. . . . Still, he should have known better. They had come all this way, and now they were done for; there was no use pretending any different.

The roar of the tiranthropes came again, already much closer. The three young men began to move away from the campsite as quietly as they could. With any luck, the creatures would spend a while sniffing around the campsite and lose interest. The area was thick with trees, and Gerald was pretty sure that a river lay not too far to the east. If they could get across it, maybe they could lose the tiranthropes. Surely the beasts couldn’t follow scent across a river.

A tiranthrope let out a bloodcurdling roar. The creature must have reached their campsite. The river was their only hope, Gerald decided. Abandoning any pretense of stealth, he motioned to his companions and they took off in a full sprint toward the east. The ground was uneven and thick with underbrush, slowing them but also offering some cover from the keen eyes of the tiranthropes that would be bearing down on them any minute. The three men plunged headlong through the forest, dodging trees and jumping logs, their ears straining for the unmistakable sound of heavy footsteps on their heels.

The forest thinned, and they broke into a clearing. At its center stone steps led to a flat marble edifice, surrounded by uniform white headstones. In the distance was the river, and beyond, a towering white obelisk.

“It’s a graveyard.” Mike’s voice quivered uncontrollably.

“This is the soldiers’ graveyard.” Gerald pointed toward the Washington Monument. “That’s DC. We were camped right across the river from it. It’s right there.”

Brian grabbed Gerald’s shoulder and pulled at him. “We gotta go,” he said frantically. “They’re coming.”

Gerald shook his head clear, his momentary sense of wonder replaced by a primal fear. He could hear the tiranthropes approaching, their heavily muscled legs pounding the earth as they tore through the underbrush. The three men dropped their packs and ran as hard as they could for the river. Never had anything seemed so blissfully close and yet so painfully far away.

The tiranthropes broke through the trees as the three men reached the middle of Arlington National Cemetery. The average man can run maybe twelve miles an hour, the average tiranthrope, closer to fifty. With nothing but open ground ahead, the three men stood no chance. At the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Gerald stopped running. He had made his decision. He would not be run down like a deer; he’d fight like a man. He’d fight as his father had, when Gerald was newborn and the world not yet fallen. His companions stopped as well, ready to stand beside him, but Gerald waved them on, pushing them away.

“Maybe I can buy you some time,” he said, sounding braver than he felt. “Find the Sanctuary. Find safety.”

Brian and Mike remained frozen by indecision, trapped between their desire to survive and their instinct to stand by their friend. And then it was too late; the tiranthropes had bounded up the steps, stopping mere feet from the three young men.

“Should we play with them a little?” one of the creatures growled, deep and menacing.

There were three of the giant feline figures, lithe despite their massive size, each standing near eight feet tall, covered head to foot in a tiger’s fur, their faces more cat than man.

One, set apart from the others by his snow-white coat, stepped slightly forward and sniffed at the air. “I don’t think you’d play with them long before they all dropped dead. You can smell the fear on them thicker than their blood.” His laugh sounded more like a roar.

“Better not, then,” the first answered. “I like my meat fresh. I hate it when their hearts give out before the first bite.”

The tiranthropes moved in, and then stopped abruptly. The white tiranthrope’s nose again searched the air. This time his eyes, focused on someth
ing behind Gerald and his friends, narrowed in alarm, not in amusement. Gerald turned his head to look: behind him, a man was walking up the steps. As the newcomer neared, the tiranthropes stepped back.

“Times must be getting desperate, for you to be hunting this close to the Capitol,” the new figure said.

At once the three young men knew who he was: this was the giant of the stories they’d heard.

In reality, Brennan was significantly smaller than the tiranthropes who seemed so afraid of him. True, next to Gerald, Brian, and Mike he was a very large young man, nearly seven feet tall, thickly muscled and broad-shouldered. But it wasn’t his size that identified him. The young men, now spectators in an exchange they didn’t understand, could see why he’d been described as a giant. It was the way that he carried himself.

“There are three of us, Satoriun,” the white tiranthrope said. His attempt to sound confident came out more like pleading. “You are outnumbered.”

“Am I?” Brennan said, his voice calm and even.

From the left side of the monument, a German shepherd padded into the invisible circle around the tiranthropes and men. He too was quite large.

Gerald looked from the giant to the dog to the tiranthropes, utterly bewildered. Not half an hour ago, he hadn’t been sure whether he believed any of the stories, and not five minutes ago he had been sure that he was about to die. His mind struggled to process what was happening and what, if anything, he and his friends should do. It cer
tainly didn’t seem smart to remain between the giant and the tiranthropes.

The next development in the odd standoff served only to further baffle Gerald. There was a flash of light, and two teenagers appeared, seemingly out of thin air, on the right side of the monument: an elfish boy and a beautiful girl with long red hair.

“Seems you got the odds a bit wrong,” Brennan said as he stepped through Gerald, Brian, and Mike, pushing them behind him.

Slowly the three young men began to back down the steps. Although a part of Gerald wanted to see what would happen next, it was not a large enough part to overrule his desire to escape.

“We won’t let them leave,” the white tiranthrope growled. “That is our prey.”

“You don’t have a choice,” Brennan responded, standing like a stone sentry between the young men and the tiranthropes.

The white tiranthrope’s eyes blazed with anger, and he charged Brennan, his fellow beasts close at his heels.

Gerald watched in horror, his head craned over his shoulder even as he turned to run. There was a blinding flash of light, and the world went white. Gerald tumbled down the last few steps, reaching out for Brian and Mike, who’d been knocked over as he fell. There was snarling, and then a thwack as a body hit the marble above. Gerald tried to blink away the blindness, but his eyes were agonizingly slow to readjust. Then he heard footsteps coming down the stairs toward him.

“Get back, get back!” Gerald screamed, lashing blindly out at the air. His inability to see made his fear so overpowering that tears began to flow down his face, and his body shook.

“It’s okay,” said a feminine voice. “You’re safe now.”

It was the sweetest voice he had ever heard.

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Brandon Charles West

is the author of the Scarlet Hopewell series of books for young adults. When not writing, he works as a firefighter and paramedic in the state of Virginia, where he lives with his wife and daughters.

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