Breath entered Euan’s lungs. ‘Christ.’
Knight sighed and met Euan’s eye over the flames. ‘Jesus loved us that day. But that was our last miracle.’ Knight’s expression turned desolate, a man destroyed. ‘It wasn’t just the bunker they hit. It was a double-headed operation. They found the hotel. Burned it all to dust. The most precious of us survived. But everything we’d built is destroyed. Supplies, most of the weapons. All gone.’
Euan’s breath was harsh, so was the hammer of his heart. Pain radiated out from his core, it incinerated his hope, his confidence. ‘Parker?’
Knight swallowed. Palms faced a black sky when he said, ‘There can be no one else.’
Fuck, it hurt. Hands to the back of his head, Euan looked towards stars hidden by clouds. His eye was out of focus. He couldn’t cease the shake of his head.
‘Kira.’ It was all he could say.
Knight’s lips hardened. A strange light burned the backs of his dark eyes. ‘They have more than just Kira. We need to end this. Once and for all.’
Euan nodded. Nodded again. He was wrong. Hell hadn’t met its quota. ‘Hell is empty and all the devils are here,’ he said.
Knight’s laughter was sardonic, the edge laced with surprise. ‘Never took you as a thespian.’
‘I’m not, but my mother loved Shakespeare.’ His gaze returned to the man who sat opposite. Between them, the tiny flame crackled and popped. Fire that represented both life and death.
‘They need you, McKay. They need you to lead them, take them from this nightmare.’
Euan didn’t immediately reply. He couldn’t. His mind was at war. Obliterate them? Save them? Leave them all so they could destroy themselves?
The air he took into his lungs was laced with indecision. ‘Take me to what’s left.’
***
They followed the smoke. The scent of burned timber was just a whiff in the air, a remnant memory that clung to the blackened husks of what remained. They travelled a path made from fire. Where destruction and ruin were their guideposts and the charred scenery was their guide. Steadily moving upwards, at a pace Euan could manage, they marched until the remnants of a forest surrounded them and only smouldering stumps and black boulders remained.
Trees that would have concealed them were gone. Paths that had laid obscured by undergrowth were seen. Euan could not fathom the work required to ensure this level of inconspicuousness, only for it to be all destroyed by a few hours of flame. When they came to the cliff face, Euan halted. Beside him, Knight did the same.
‘Nick told me this is where he found you.’ He looked to his left were a murky lake lay still in homage to the dead. ‘Said that I just had to find the cliff and the lake and I would be saved. I never would have found this place without you.’
‘Good thing that I came to find you.’
They made their way through a labyrinth of boulders strategically placed to conceal the entrance and hinder an enemy’s approach. But the clever design had done nothing to save those that sought refuge on the other side.
Euan needed an army. Instead, he found a massacre.
Where once stood buildings, nothing but enormous piles of charred debris remained. White, black, yellow, grey, the wreckage was twisted and warped from the heat and the weight of collapse. Grass scorched, paths blackened, the burned husks of cars and trucks littered the landscape.
To his left were neatly ordered mounds of sandy dirt that rose like goosebumps along the lake’s shoreline. To his right were the remains of grand structures. Stumps, ash and decay surrounded them. The puddles at his feet were black and as thick as molasses. The water sloshed with each footfall. The tar hit his ankles, saturated his socks, stung the open wounds on his feet. The scent of wetness, decay and soiled earth was pungent. It overwhelmed, consumed, foreshadowed more death.
Euan clenched his jaw. How could he save them? Kira was lost, taken, her precious soul was likely even now being torn apart. He’d promised Nick he would bring him an army, he promised himself he would terminate them all.
But this? This was the definition of desolation, of lost hope. This was nothingness and oblivion. He couldn’t save Kira, and he couldn’t save anyone with this.
‘How did they get in here?’
Knight pointed to the lake. ‘They had boats.’
Euan tasted blood as he bit into his tongue.
They continued to move into the chaos. They stepped over the smouldering logs in unison, each pulling his boots from the black mud. They were silent, words and thoughts lost to the wasteland that surrounded them.
A discarded shoe snagged Euan’s attention. Its pink shoelaces glittered in wan daylight. It was covered in mud and ash, not much more than the shape and size could be discerned through the dirt. But one thing was certain. It was too small for an adult.
Euan’s hand was at his face as he attempted to scrub the revelation from his mind. They had had children here? Children small enough to fit into that tiny shoe. Euan’s gut rebelled. He stopped to catch his breath.
Knight’s voice was hoarse when Euan changed directions. ‘McKay?’
The shoe was wet, sodden from the rain. He held the tiny thing towards Knight voiceless, because no words would come.
Knight’s mouth twisted. The scar through his upper lip morphed until the grimace was more akin to a sneer. ‘Many died protecting them. But they succeeded. The children …’ His voice caught and he cleared it before he continued. ‘The kids are okay.’
Euan nodded and the steel band loosened somewhat. But it was painful, even as it released. Knight wanted him to step up, to lead this? How could he, when ‘okay’ was now a relative term. Okay? Those children had likely watched their parents and families die from a horrific disease that
