The Drowned Cities (18 page)

Something about the moment of vulnerability pleased Mahlia. The half-man wasn’t unstoppable. It might be strong, but it had its weaknesses, too.

The monster limped around the edge of the swamp pool.

“What the—” Mouse started to ask, but Mahlia already guessed what it was doing. The corpse of the alligator still lay in the water, bloating and torn. The half-man waded slowly into the reeds and seized it. Dragged the body onto the bank, grunting and growling with the effort.

With a low snarl, the half-man tore open the alligator’s belly. It dipped into the reptile’s entrails and began to feed, unbothered by the miasma of carrion.

The half-man looked up at them and bared its teeth. “My kill,” it growled, and then it plunged an arm deep into the alligator. Came up with the heart. “Mine.” It bit into the red muscle. Gulping it down.

“Damn, that’s nasty,” Mouse said.

Mahlia’s stomach churned in agreement. Watching
something that looked so nearly like a human being feed like a beast—it wasn’t natural, and it filled Mahlia with queasy dread.

What was this thing that she had persuaded them to save?

The half-man continued to feed, tearing and gulping. But there was something else there, too… the way the monster crouched over its kill, victorious, dining on the heart of its enemy…

“Ritual,” the doctor murmured.

The monster looked up, gore dripping from its muzzle. The yellow dog eye fixed on him. “We are nourished by victory, Doctor. Life’s blood, from the beating hearts of our foes. Our enemy fortifies us. The more enemies we have, the more we feed. And the stronger we become.”

“And you never stop fighting,” Mahlia whispered.

The monster smiled, all razor teeth and bloody humor. “Conquest feeds itself, girl.” It gulped down the last of the alligator’s heart. “We welcome our enemies, as we welcome life.”

The half-man seemed about to say more, but instead it froze. Its ears pricked up. The monster sniffed the air, broad nostrils flaring. Its ears spread out wider, then snapped back, close to its huge pit-bull skull.

“My name is Tool,” it said. “It seems that your enemies have found something to feed upon as well.”

“W
HAT ENEMIES?”
M
AHLIA ASKED
.

“I smell a great deal of smoke. Wood. Plastics.” Tool’s nostrils flared. “Flesh. A town is dying.”

“They’re burning Banyan?” the doctor demanded.

Tool was quiet, his ears twitching, listening to things beyond Mahlia’s senses. “People are fleeing—”

Gunfire echoed over the jungle, something even she could hear, despite the distance. Startled ravens and magpies filled the air. Flocks of sparrows rose and swirled overhead. More gunfire. Mahlia exchanged worried glances with Mouse and the doctor.

The half-man was still listening and sniffing the wind. “Our mutual enemies seem to have tired of their failures.”

“So they’re going after the town?”

The doctor was starting to grab his medical tools, throwing them into his hospital bag. “We have to help. Quickly! They’ll need us.”

As Mahlia gathered the last of the much-reduced supplies and handed them to the doctor, she noticed her hand trembling. She remembered other villages where soldiers had swept through, recruiting and burning. Remembered picking her way through blackened homes, with nothing but skinny dogs and coywolv flickering in the shadows.

“Doc?” she asked. “Shouldn’t we be running instead?”

Tool laughed, a low rumbling sound. “The girl shows wisdom. Better to run and live than walk into a tornado.”

The doctor glared at Mahlia and she shrank from his gaze. “You caused this,” he said. “Violence feeding violence. I’ve told you again and again and again, but still you never listen. You loose coywolv on soldiers and now the soldiers burn Banyan Town. Tit for tat until the whole world dies.”

Smoke was starting to blow over them. Acrid scents of the world on fire that even Mahlia could smell.

“Why are you mad at me? I’m not the one burning the town!”

Doctor Mahfouz snapped his bag closed and looked up at Mahlia. “Are you coming or not?”

“Back to town?” Mahlia stared at the doctor. “Are you sliding? We got no guns. They’ll kill us.”

“We’re not going back to fight. We’re going to help as many people as we can.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“You understand how hard I fought for you, Mahlia? How many times I convinced our neighbors not to run you off? I stood for you. I guaranteed you.”

Beside them, the half-man growled. “People are coming. You should flee, or else go to your death. Choose now, before the choice overtakes you.”

Mahlia turned to the half-man. “Would you come with us?” she asked. “Would you help us help them?”

Tool laughed. “This is not my war.”

Mahfouz glared up at the creature. “You brought the soldiers here, and you accept no responsibility?”

Tool’s teeth showed in a cold smile. “I neither started this war where your kind tears one another apart, nor did I choose it. I carry no burden of guilt.” He sniffed the air, then waved toward the swamps. “If you wish help in escape from your enemies, I offer you aid, willingly, in thanks for medicines.” Tool straightened to his full height, looming over them. “But I will not seek out a fight that cannot be won. And I will not suicide on any human being’s behalf.”

Their conversation was cut short by running feet.

Everyone tensed except for Tool. Mahlia expected soldier boys to come bursting into the swamps, rifles blazing, but it wasn’t soldiers at all, it was a woman…

Amaya.

She stopped short, staring. Her eyes widened in shock.
“You
,” she gasped as she saw Mahlia. And then she caught sight of the half-man.

“Amaya,” Doctor Mahfouz said. “What’s happening? What’s going on? Where are your children? Where is Salvatore’s grandchild?”

“You!” she said again. “They want you!” Her eyes narrowed. “This is your fault, castoff. They’re looking for you! We took you in and you brought the soldiers down on us!”

“Amaya—” the doctor tried again.

But Amaya had already turned. She was running back the way she had come.

“She’s going to tell them!” Mahlia said. “She’s going to give us up to the soldiers.”

She leaped after the woman. If she could take Amaya down before she made it back to town, before she could spread word to the other villagers, she might—

A hand grabbed Mahlia’s shirt and yanked her around. She spun with the force of it and landed in the mud. Doctor Mahfouz stood over her.

“Mahlia, don’t.”

Mahlia scrambled to her feet. “She’s going back to the soldiers! If she rats us, we’re all dead. Once they got our scent and our direction, there’s no way we shake free.” She made another run for the trails, but the doctor grabbed her.

“That still doesn’t justify whatever you were planning for Amaya,” he grunted.

Mahlia struggled to break free, but the doctor was surprisingly strong.

“She’s going to get us killed!” Mahlia’s hand went to her knife. Where was it?

The doctor must have felt her motion, because he caught her hand. “Always that’s your solution! Is that what you are?” he demanded. “Just like those soldiers out there? Always killing?”

Mahlia looked around frantically, still trying to fight free. Caught sight of Mouse. “Get her!” she said. “Don’t let Amaya get back to town!”

Mouse looked from the doctor to Mahlia, uncertain.

Mahlia glared at him. “She’s going to do us, unless you catch her.”

“Stay there, Mouse,” the doctor grunted. “Make the right choice.”

Mouse looked down the path after Amaya, then back to Mahlia. Finally shook his head. “She’s bigger than me. I don’t think I can catch her before she’s back in town.”

Mahlia twisted and fought, finally threw herself sideways, taking both of them to the ground. The doctor’s grip popped free and she tore loose. She scrambled back to her feet, glaring at Mouse. “You chickenshit farmer.”

Mouse hung his head, but he didn’t go running after Amaya. The doctor slowly got to his feet, panting. Tool was watching them all, curious, almost amused.

Mahlia looked toward the town. The smoke was thickening. The soldiers had to be burning everything. Not just the town. Probably the crops as well. Scorched earth. More
smoke billowed over her. Mahlia swore. She’d hoped to have more time to prepare for a journey north, but with Amaya ratting them out, it was time to run. Ready or not, it was time to run.

Mahlia turned to Tool. “Can you travel?”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Doctor Mahfouz shift in disappointment that she wasn’t interested in suicide. That was Mahfouz’s problem, though.

Tool’s yellow dog eye regarded her. “There is no choice. We travel or we fight. And if we fight, we die.”

That pretty much summed it up. So why was she even delaying?

They didn’t have enough food. Didn’t have tools. No machetes, no nothing.

“Okay,” she said. “Okay.” She wanted to scream in frustration at how quickly her bare plan had fallen apart. Her father had always said that battle plans fell apart. It was to be expected. A general had to adapt—that was what distinguished good soldiers from poor ones. So, she needed to adapt.

“We got to lose the trail,” she said. “We’re going into the swamp. Water travel.” She pointed. “Mouse can show us a way. He knows these swamps. We can still lose them.”

The half-man inclined his head in agreement. He limped over to a tree and took a branch in his fist. With a crackling explosion, he tore it free, making a staff to support himself.

“Damn,” Mouse muttered. “That’s what you do when you’re weak?”

The half-man showed his teeth and leaned on the makeshift crutch. “Come, boy. Show us this secret way.”

They all started into the water, but a moment later Mahlia realized the doctor wasn’t with them.

Mahlia turned. “Doc?”

The doctor was looking at her sadly.

“You can’t be serious,” Mahlia said. “You think you’re going to stay here? Let Amaya bring soldiers down on you?” She motioned for him to follow. “They hate you as much as they hate me, now.”

The doctor just looked at her. It made her uncomfortable.

“I thought for a little while that it was possible to save you,” he said. “To do some good. To stop…” He shook his head. “To change the sickness of this place.” He looked at Mahlia. “I taught you to heal, not to fight.”

“You think I was wrong to drop coywolv on them?” Mahlia said. “You wish you were back there with the soldier boys? They were going to kill you, too, you know. They deserved it. They started it.”

“And you did nothing to end it.”

Mahlia glared. “If I had some guns I would have.”

The half-man laughed, a low rumbling. He clapped Mahlia on the back approvingly. “War feeds itself well, don’t you think, Doctor?”

Mahfouz looked at the half-man with disgust. “I should never have allowed her to heal you.”

“A good thing, then, that I do not rely on a pacifist’s
goodwill.” The half-man’s fangs were showing, sharp knives all gleaming.

The doctor started to retort, but the half-man interrupted him. “Save your shaming for the girl, Doctor. If I cared for human approval, I would have been dead long ago.” He turned and started wading into the swamp. “Time is passing. I, for one, have no intention of remaining here for your betrayer to bring back the soldiers and their guns.”

“Doctor?” Mouse asked.

Mahfouz shook his head. “I’m not leaving these people to the soldiers. Come with me, or go with the half-man. But these people need our help.”

Smoke was blowing more strongly, gray mist thick with the scents of burn.

Mahlia’s eyes began to tear. She looked at the doctor, wishing that he wasn’t as crazy as he was, and realizing there was nothing she could do to move him.

“Come on, Mouse. Let’s get gone.” She turned and started walking. Behind her, she heard Mouse say something and then he was catching up, splashing into the water after her.

“You sure about this, Mahlia?”

“There’s nothing we can do back there.”

“They took us in.”

Mahlia looked at Mouse. “We got to look out for ourselves, first. If we don’t, we’re dead.”

“Yeah. Except I saved you.”

“And now I’m saving you, right? We ain’t going back there.”

Mouse subsided. Soon they caught up with the half-man.

“The doctor chose not to accompany you?” Tool asked.

Mahlia shook her head. “He’s stupid.”

“He has a cause,” the half-man said. “It makes him dangerous.”

“I got a cause,” Mahlia said. “It’s keeping my head from getting shot off.”

“A worthy one, I’m sure.”

Mahlia couldn’t tell if the half-man was mocking her or not. They kept walking through the swamp.

Abruptly the half-man said, “It seems your brother Mouse has found his own cause.”