Ruins

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

“There’s definitely someone there,” said Ariel, dropping back down behind a tree-lined snowbank. The snow was worse now than it had ever been, a blizzard so thick and windblown they could barely see one another at more than fifty feet. They were north of Riverhead, slogging through wide, flat farmland, and hadn’t heard the noise until it was practically on top of them. “I don’t know who it is, or if they’ve heard us as well.” Ariel shook her head, checking her rifle; it was covered with snow, but it seemed like everything still worked. She wouldn’t know until she tried to fire it. “We need to find better cover if this turns into a fight.”

Xochi scanned the area, though there was little to see. “We passed a farmhouse a ways back, or a church or something. Looked small, wood construction.”

“Not the best defense,” said Isolde. Khan was strapped to her chest, and she covered him protectively with her arms. “We’re on the main road—maybe they’re just passing through. If we get off it, they might not notice us at all.”

“And if they follow us, who knows where we’ll end up?” said Kessler. “You can smell the seawater, even through the storm—too far north and we have our backs against the ocean.”

“I think they’re coming toward us,” said Hobb, running back from his position at the front of the line. “I can take a few shots now, try and get lucky, but that’s only likely to make them mad.”

“We don’t even know if they’re aware of us,” said Nandita. “I can’t feel anything on the link, but who knows how the blizzard’s disrupting that?” She grimaced. “North, then, away from the road. We’ll take shelter in the first suitable structure we find.”

They trudged across the snowy field, Ariel shielding her face with her hands just to be able to see. The world was a white void, unshaped and unmade. Slashing pellets of ice bit into her skin. Slowly the world in front of her grew darker, a patch of gray slowly coalescing to black, and then a building appeared, wraithlike in the snow. It was stone, at least three stories high, with a heavy wooden door flanked by thick stone pillars. It felt unnatural to Ariel, like a castle made real in a realm of dreams, but she ran to the door and heaved against it. It didn’t open. A plaque on the door identified it as the Bluff Hollow Country Club.

“Over here,” said Xochi, “through the window.” They ran to the side, where a row of tattered red curtains blew fitfully through the empty windowpanes, and crawled through to the faded opulence of the clubhouse. The curtains had done little to keep the wind and weather outside; the floor was scattered with leaves and dirt, and the front edge was mounded with snow. The wooden floor was warped and discolored from long years of water damage, and the once-elegant rugs were molding and frozen.

“I think I saw them following us,” said Kessler, helping Isolde through the window before tumbling in after her. “I’m not sure.”

Ariel looked around the room: overstuffed chairs, embroidered couches, central fireplace, stonework bar. “Through that door,” she said. “There’ll be a restroom or something back there—no windows, no snow, and as soundproof a shelter as we’re likely to get. We don’t want Khan to give us away.”

“What’s our plan?” asked Isolde. Khan was fussing, but feebly. He was too sickly now even to scream, pale and skeletal, and Isolde’s eyes looked equally drained.

“Don’t get shot,” said Xochi. “Or captured, or separated, or anything bad.”

“Does besieged count as bad?” asked Hobb. “If they know we’re in here, the restroom will be the worst place we can hide—we need an exit.”

“The kitchen, then,” said Ariel. She jogged across the room, feeling her muscles protest, and looked through the door behind the bar. “It’s small, but there’s a back door, and a large central counter we can duck behind if anyone starts shooting.”

“If anyone starts shooting, we’re dead,” said Kessler. “A kitchen counter won’t protect us from an armed squad of Partials.” Even so, they all hurried to the back room, crowding in among the old steel bowls and copper pans. Ariel closed the door behind them and checked the door to the back; the view was as ghostly as the one they’d just walked through, and she couldn’t see anything at all past forty feet.

“We can talk to them,” said Nandita. “They might not be gathering refugees for East Meadow anymore—the storm could have changed that. Certainly they won’t want to take us there themselves, not in this weather. We’ll be reasonable, and maybe they’ll leave us alone.”

“Maybe,” said Kessler. “I don’t like any plan that relies on ‘Partial mercy.’”

“They’re not evil,” said Xochi, “they’re just the enemy.”

“That’s a meaningless distinction,” said Kessler.

“Quiet,” said Ariel. “I think they’re here.”