2) Strange Bedfellows

    She woke up and felt incredibly warm and comfortable despite still lying on the bare floor. Then she remembered who she was with and started but he wasn’t there. She was alone on the floor.

    He was standing and stretching and his back was covered in scars. Ugly, jagged scars. Long, sleek scars. Little ones were just as prominent as those that ran for inches.

    “You’re a Hun, aren’t you?”
    “I was.” He showed no reaction to the sound of her voice. “Not anymore.”
    “And you kill other Huns?”

    “They want to kill me, and to put my head on a pike. And my balls on another pike and my heart on another and you get the point.” He extended his arms and twisted his neck. It was difficult to tell if he was muscular or just underfed.

    “Why?”

    He didn’t answer and as they hadn’t exchanged names, she guessed that she wouldn’t learn anything about this piece of personal information either. She watched him go through his stretches and wondered if he always did that or if it was because of sleeping on the floor. Probably both.

    He turned and she saw his chest and it was no better than his back.

    “What?”

    “What happened to you?”

    “War.”

    She had never seen anyone with that many scars from war before. The Huns were a savage and brutal lot but the number of marks covering his body was ludicrous. If it wasn’t for his age, she would have guessed he was some kind of elite soldier. “War doesn’t do that to a person.”

    “It does when you have to get in among your enemies, where their bigger numbers of guns and crossbows don’t matter.”

    “That’s why you fight like that?”

    “If we fight at range, we’ll be overwhelmed. Fight close, fight hard… other people can’t stand it.”

    “But you’ve been cut to pieces!”

    “I’m still alive.” He declared and then replaced his shirt which alone seemed to be made of old cotton. His jacket and trousers were made of animal hides. She guessed if they were always being cut up, they had to make their own clothes from scratch. She watched him put on his jacket and the buttons seemed to be made of bone. She was curious about what type of bone though she knew enough about Huns not to ask. “What?”

    “You’re a scary person.”

    “If your enemy’s scared of you, you’ve already won half the battle.”

    “Your enemies are other Huns.”

    “They’re scared of me.”

    “Why?”
    “I left my mark.” He said lightly and she knew he wasn’t being figurative. “Are you going to lie there all day?”

    The simple truth was that she was very warm and comfortable but that feeling went away quickly under his icy stare.

    The feeling of constant terror that had pursued her before wasn’t there anymore and instead she was left with a constant unease at his presence even though he ignored her completely and she was very much trotting on his heels. Every now and then he would lift his nose in the air and breathe in heavily. Aside from that, he never slowed down. He kept his rifle in his hands, as if expecting combat at any moment. She didn’t forget that he had been fighting the day before and was probably on the lookout for survivors. But out here, danger was everywhere, so really, it wasn’t yesterday’s threat but today’s that he was looking out for.

    It seemed however that today’s threats were more afraid of him than she was of them. She couldn’t blame them for that. The two dead Huns she had seen the day before had been big men and maybe it was because they were dead but they hadn’t carried the same menace that he did.

    ‘He’. Only ‘he’. She was content to be ‘no one’ and so apparently was he. He didn’t even seem to acknowledge her until he stopped to inspect some greenery and then hesitated as she knelt beside him.

    “What are you doing?”

    “Foraging.” He drew one of his many knives and cut away some leaves that he stuffed into a pouch on his left trouser leg.

    “You can eat this?”

    “How are you alive?” He replied.

    “A few miracles.”

    He looked at her properly and a good deal of the indifference he had shown her before was missing. Now he seemed pitying. “You really don’t belong out here.”

    “And you do?”

    “I know what I’m doing.”

    “Do you?”
    “I know how to stay alive. I don’t know more than that.”

    It was the first thing he had shared and it was good to know he wasn’t as self-assured as he seemed. It also told her he wasn’t going anywhere in particular and this was good; if Huns were after him, her own people would be looking for her. If they were going nowhere in particular, it would be harder to find them.

    He astonished her later by killing a bird with a thrown knife. The blade pierced its head, leaving the rest of it undamaged for eating. Shooting it would have obliterated it so he had used a knife and his accuracy with shooting and throwing was apparently equal.

    “How do you do that?”
    “I was born that way. I don’t know why.” He shrugged. “Give me a target and I’ll hit it.”

    “Useful.”

    “Yeah…” His normal piercing stare became vacant as he became lost in some thought or memory. She pretended that her attention had been caught elsewhere.

    It made her wonder what else he had in his pack as he produced a cooking pot so that he could turn the bird and the leaves he had gathered into a stew and then dished that into two mess tins. He definitely wasn’t exaggerating when he said he knew what he was doing, something she certainly hadn’t when she had fled in the night.

~~~~~~

    The night before she had taken a long time to go to sleep but this time she dropped off rapidly. Garrett was surprised but she had seemed completely exhausted. She wasn’t built for the pace he set and it was commendable that she hadn’t complained. Perhaps she was smart enough to know that you didn’t complain about the speed the person you chose to tag along with went at.

    He had noted it earlier but now her hair had slipped away, he could see her forehead and the distinctive mark was burned on her remarkably clear skin. C for Connolly. King Connolly, the man who led the faction that controlled the greatest spaceof farmland in the ruins and thus had the largest population. All of Connolly’s people were marked that way from when they were ten years old. For all the horrors of his own people, they didn’t brand themselves like cattle. No, their trademarks were violence and displaying their slain enemies in gross fashions.

    There was an innocence to her. It wasn’t the way she looked, it was simply a facet of her character. People who lived outside the factions, the homesteaders, the raiders, the scavengers who were referred to collectively as Crows; they all had a hardened look about them. They had seen things. This one had seen a little but not enough. Connollies had the highest standard of living in the ruins, they had shelter, plentiful food and an army large enough to protect them from all but the most organised raids on their home territory. Their lives were ridiculously soft compared to the Huns. That soft living showed on her.

    Which was why she was a mystery. People fled factions, usually for murder or other such serious crimes. She was perhaps his age, probably younger… she really did not look capable of murder. He couldn’t think of any reason why she had been wandering out in the wastes alone. It did however explain her willingness to follow him, she knew she couldn’t protect herself and she would have grown up on stories of the depredations of the Huns and even if he claimed to be an ex-Hun, she had no reason to trust him but an ex-Hun was a powerful protector. She was truly desperate.

    Here he was watching her sleep. She at least understood he wasn’t a sexual threat. That said a great deal about her character. Even if he hadn’t had a brief meltdown, the fact she trusted him not to do anything to her while she slept was proof that she had faith in human beings, a conviction entirely lacking in anyone who had spent time out in the wastes.

    He reached for her pack and rummaged. There was nothing much inside, some biscuit rations, a knife, two pairs of socks and a very worn pistol with a seven round clip containing only four rounds and none in the chamber. She had weapons and she kept them in her pack… There was true innocence.

    She was very pretty. That was a bad, bad thing out here. It made them prey. The sensible thing to do would have been to get far away from this helpless, little, pretty girl… but that description was why he couldn’t. He couldn’t live with himself if he left her to die or worse. Apparently there was a way for him to feel lower than he already did. He didn’t know if this was a good thing… or proof that there was truly no end to the misery he could feel.

    At least he wasn’t alone.

~~~~~~

    Alice thought that perhaps one of them should have been awake during the night, to keep watch for the myriad of dangers that were certainly lurking out in the world. But he seemed to think they were safe and who was she to argue? He was still asleep and she took the opportunity to take a closer look at him. In contrast to the scars on his front and back, there were only two on his face. One was a small indent on his nose and the other looked as if he had been burned by a drop of liquid, giving his right cheek a distinctive spot; like a beauty mark.

    She wasn’t surprised to see movement in his hair. She had gone through five head-lice bouts in her life and guessed that the sixth would happen any day now. Her people dealt with the lice but it seemed unlikely that the brutal Huns would care. They definitely didn’t seem to be thriving in his hair, there were only a couple shuffling around and she wondered if perhaps they were wary of angering their host. She knew this was an absurd thought but as his eyes suddenly snapped open and her heart skipped a beat in terror, she knew it wasn’t completely stupid.

    “What are you doing?”

    “You have lice.”

    “And?”

    “I was just looking.”

    He frowned at her and she knew he had a point. Staring at someone’s head lice infestation wasn’t a normal thing to do.

    He stretched and his joints cracked and she felt especially small and vulnerable as he got up out of the wolf fur. It wasn’t that he was large and imposing, he was only of an average build; it was that he already seemed ready to take on anything that came at him while she… she wanted to stay here where it was warm and somewhat comfortable. If today was anything like yesterday, she would be praying to back under this fur.

    Alice had the feeling that even before whatever had driven him out here had happened, he had never been a social person. Someone who was constantly sniffing like an inquisitive rat wasn’t likely to have a lot of friends. She wondered how things worked among the Huns, they had to have families and a way of living that she was familiar with. On the other hand, they were people who nailed their enemies to walls or made mobiles out of their limbs. What kind of man spent the day disembowelling other men and decorating the rubble with those guts before coming home and playing with his children?

    But she remembered his tone when he had said he was no longer a Hun. He had sounded remorseful. Perhaps that was why he had gotten out, someone his age not wanting to be a monster for the rest of his life. That was hopeful.

    She knew of the river though obviously she had never seen it. North of the river was Fredrickson’s territory, neatly dividing him from her people and the Huns. It might have separated them but it didn’t stop them fighting. Considering how much empty space lay between them, space she had now seen for herself, she didn’t know why they fought at all. They could all have happily ignored one another.

    The river ran through a stone channel and the ruined buildings on both banks had spilled into it long ago to break up the uniform lines of the channel. The water was murky, somewhere between brown and green, and certainly not what she had pictured from descriptions in books.

    “What?” He grunted at her.

    “I’ve never seen it before.”

    He peered at the water and then scoffed. “No charm to it.”

    She nodded. There was plenty of greenery in the ruins, grass growing out of the concrete and trees doing their best to rip it up. But the rubble made it all seem ugly. This river that slowly picked its way through the shattered rock was grotesque.

    He made one of his fires swiftly and gathered some of the river water and boiled it, poured it into a different container and let it boil again before topping up his canteen. He gathered some more and then looked at her expectantly.

    “Use your words.” She said daringly.

    He sighed. “May I please have your canteen, fair copper-haired maiden?”

    She was taken aback but pleasantly surprised by this floral speech and handed over her canteen which made him frown.

    “This isn’t Connolly made.”

    “It was bigger than mine.”

    “And where did you get it?”

    “They weren’t using it anymore.” She didn’t want to tell him the whole story.
    He didn’t press for details. “That’s the way it works out here.”

    They followed the river east and he seemed familiar with the territory. He wasn’t moving at the same pace as yesterday, trusting neither the footing nor his surroundings it seemed. She didn’t like this and she was tempted to retrieve her pistol from her pack but he thought she had no weapons and she thought it was better if he continued to believe that. There was also the fact she had never used a pistol before and she would probably be a bigger danger to him than any enemies out there.

    Eventually they came to a bridge that was half collapsed and he stopped, frowning at the expanse.

    “What’s the matter?”

    “Bridges are perfect for ambushing people. But there’s no one here.”

    “No one we can see.”

    “There’s no one here.” He repeated. “That’s strange. That’s very strange.”

     She wondered how he could be certain that there was no one around when all they could see was the bridge. There could be an army in the ruins on the other side and people lurking in those on this side. But he seemed convinced that they were alone.

    “Stay very close to me.” He said.

    Alice obeyed. She knew that he knew what he was doing, even if it didn’t seem to make sense to her. She wasn’t sure what very close meant however.

    One lane of the bridge had collapsed in the centre where it seemed a ruin had collapsed on it while the other was doing okay despite being strewn with rubble. Feeling absurd, she followed closely as he stepped slowly along. All she could see was harmless rubble. The bridge seemed completely harmless so she kept her eyes on the other side. She expected armed men to spring up at any moment, armed men who would want his weapons and her, just her…

    He stopped abruptly and she walked into him and he made a momentary sound of panic before regaining his balance. He glanced only briefly at her but it was more than enough to frighten her.

    He knelt as she stood back. Whatever had caught his attention, she couldn’t see. He reached around behind him and his hand closed on her neckline and pulled her down to his level.

    “See that?” He pointed.

    It took a moment but then she saw a transparent line suspended above the ground. It led into a pile of rubble to the left and toward a pile of what she realised were neatly stacked stones.

    “Some of the boys left a nasty surprise for anyone coming through.”

    “The boys?”

    “I’ve never seen your people leave traps like this. Only mine.” He grunted and then followed the line along the pile of stones. “Or did they leave it for me?” He reached out for the stones.

    “Don’t touch it!”
    He ignored her and pulled the pile apart. The transparent wire was connected to a pair of grenades which he took hold of and slackened the line. He untied the wire and inspected the two metal balls.

    “Waste of good grenades.” He declared and slipped them both into a side pocket of his pack.

    “Waste?”

    “You can make bullets but not grenades. They’re mine now.”

    She took his point. Someone had just handed him two explosives.

    He continued as cautiously, even though if grenades were as valuable as he claimed them to be, it was highly unlikely there would be more of them she thought.

    Finally they were over the bridge and he seemed satisfied. She wondered once more how he seemed to know that there were no people to threaten them.

    He did no hunting that day and she was pleased that his rations were the same as hers; hard biscuits. The difference was that he didn’t seem to mind them.

    “There’s a homestead nearby.” He said. “We’ll go there tomorrow. Learn.”

    “Learn what?”

    “What’s going on around here.”

    “So people live out here?”
    “They’re called homesteaders. Usually a few families with a little plot of land.”

    “And they survive?”

    “Raiders go after them sometimes but everyone else ignores them.”

    “Even Huns?”

    “You can make bullets but you don’t waste them on people who aren’t your enemies. Homesteaders have nothing valuable.”

    “So you leave them alone because it’s not worth it, not because it’s the right thing to do?”

    “Everyone ignores homesteaders.” He said coldly.

    “I didn’t mean-“
    “What exactly do you think I’ve done before?”

    “You were a Hun.”
    “Do you think I’ve stitched people’s mouths closed so they can’t scream as I skin them alive? And then sewn that skin over their eyes?”

     Alice felt her stomach shrivel up and she tried to keep her voice level. “I don’t know what you’ve done.”

    “I’ve killed people. I’ve never tortured them.” He looked up. “Bullet to the head, bullet to the heart, knife across the throat, knife into the heart.” He recited the words almost like a prayer. “I’m a soldier, not a monster.”

    “Okay then.” She did her best to try and smile reassuringly at him but it was difficult when she had visions of people stumbling around blinded and unable to scream at the horror of their existence.

    It was a relief to get back to the refuge of the wolf pelts though there was one last thing she needed clearing up.

    “You said ‘people’.”
    “I’ve never killed anyone who wasn’t armed and who couldn’t have killed me if they had tried a little harder.” He said, sounding very patient.

    “Okay then.”

    He growled, very much like a dog. It was not a comforting sound. The more she learned, the less comfortable she felt. She wrapped her half of the pelt more snugly around herself and at the same time, tried to keep the distance between them at a maximum.