“Is he innocent?” Milly said.
“It is not my place to say. Why worry of death, anyway?” Jerimiah said.
“Easy for you to say. You’ll never die,” Tye said.
“Eh? What foolishness do you speak?” Jerimiah said. “I will die, sir. All things fail, and so it will be with the bodies of the reborn. How long that will be, I cannot say, but I will die. As winter turns to spring, and the sun sets, even the reborns will eventually give up their ghosts.”
Pepper and Turnip migrated to Jerimiah, and the old man stroked the unlikely friends. Turnip didn’t even go near Tester or Tye, and Pepper was the most distrusting canine Tye had ever experienced, yet both seemed at ease with Jerimiah.
“What of the numbers around the turtle? Coordinates? How can I untangle them?” Tester said.
“And why the bloody hell are they even there if you’re here to give us an escort?” Tye added.
“The fathers and mothers of Argartha had to plan way in advance for the worst-case scenario, one in which there were no shepherds to guide the flock. The first citizens of Argartha followed the original path of understanding and used the cypher needed to decode the coordinates on the stones around the turtle,” Jerimiah said.
“Where might those coordinates take us?” Tye said.
“Fort AP Hill,” Jerimiah said.
“The Army training base in the Blue Ridge Mountains west of here?” Tester said.
“That very one. The squires… what you call greenies, are the gatekeepers.” The old man pulled a bottle from within his robe of rags.
“Holy shit,” Tester said. “Where’d you get that?”
“Is it real?” Tye said.
The old man handed Tye the half full pint of Johnnie Walker Blue. “That half bottle is worth a month’s pay back home. Take a swig. Me and the boys got a stash out here in the wild. The white wigs knew how to live.”
“How long have you been out here?” Milly said.
“Tours are for six months. I’m due to head home, so I’ll be taking you in,” Jerimiah said. “I’ve been a shepherd for thirty years.”
“Are you a knight of Argartha?” Tye said.
Jerimiah laughed. “No. Not a knight. They maintain the path, make sure the squires do their duty.”
“Were you not good enough to be a knight?” Ingo said.
“Discipline and control are the keys to a reborn’s growth and survival,” Jerimiah said. “Do you ever plan to learn either? If not, your stay in the city will be short.”
“What do you mean?” Milly said.
“He’s one of us. He’s held to a hi… different standard than survivors or their kin,” Jerimiah said. “But you’re a special kind of survivor, aren’t you Milly? Clean and unsullied. Rare. Very rare.”
“What can you tell us of Argartha?” Ingo said. “It’s a blank canvas for me. I have no images of it at all.”
“It is more than you could imagine. It’s the gone world reborn,” Jerimiah said.
“And there it is again. Reborn. You guys run everything?” Tester said.
“We get a say, even low bor… survivors get some say. They have two seats on the council,” Jerimiah said.
“Of how many total?” Tye said.
Jerimiah coughed. “Twenty-one,” he said.
“And highborns run things, I imagine?” Tye said.
“The people of Argartha choose their leadership, but yes, for the most part the highborns run our society,” Jerimiah said.
“So you’re shit like us?” Tester said.
“Maybe a bit less smelly,” Jerimiah said.
A horn sounded close by and Jerimiah was gone.
“Where the…” Tye said.
Jerimiah was back. “We need to leave. Whatever you wish to keep you better grab it fast,” sang Jerimiah.
“I know that song,” Tye said.
“Good for you. Hurry. Let’s go before they surround us,” Jerimiah said.
“They?” Milly said.
“The lost.”
The party packed up and put out the fire. Smoke filled the small glade, obscuring the turtle from view. The answering cries of other horns spurred everyone forward. Tye’s nerves tingled, fear knifing through him for the first time since the armory.
“Wait,” Jerimiah said. “Stop moving. Stand still a minute.”
“Are you crazy? I’m not stopping,” Tester said.
“Let me get a picture,” the old man said.
Jerimiah was gone again.
Tye blinked, and Jerimiah was back.
“They’re going around the front like you dolts did,” Jerimiah said. “Wait here a second.”
An owl hooted in warning, and somewhere, Larry squawked franticly. Pepper and Turnip were back beside Milly, alert muscles tensed.
“When I go, follow me through the trees. Shadow me, if you can’t see me, stop. Got it?” Jerimiah said.
Tye nodded along with his friends. Yelps and howls could be heard as the lost came for them. The air was still thick with smoke, and Tye’s eyes stung. Crickets chirped, and the world lightened around him as his eyes adjusted to the blackness. The virals filled the street beyond the thin forest.
They waited another minute before Jerimiah said, “Now.”
He slipped into the trees and made a left and disappeared. Tye jerked to a stop, and the others followed his lead. Jerimiah was back and plunging straight on through the woods. The last of the passing virals didn’t spot them as they emptied out of the vegetation and headed back up Independence Avenue.
A Uruk jumped from behind the cover of a disintegrated truck and lunged for Robin. Milly shot the creature three times in fast succession and the viral went down, its cries echoing off the old stone buildings. Shrieks and shouts in the darkness and torches came at them from up the road. Tye sighted his rifle at the torchlight. He couldn’t see the virals yet, so he aimed below and to the left of the torch and fired. There was a loud wail, and the sound of thundering feet.
“This way,” Jerimiah said.
They ran straight on down a deer trail, stopping and changing
