Five...six...seven...eight...
Any moment a bullet could slam into his back. All he wanted was to get Willadean to those trees before that happened.
Another shot fired. This time the bullet shattered one of the front windows. The cacophony of exploding glass and more shots sent a second jolt of adrenaline through his veins.
Ten seconds later he charged into the forest, but he didn’t slacken his pace until he made it to the juniper bush where the boys hid. He set Willadean on the ground as the boys scurried out through the spiny branches.
The moment her feet connected with the forest floor, she emitted a low-pitched furious growl, then in a voice that definitely didn’t sound like it belonged in a Broadway production, she said, “Why the hell did you do that?”
Chapter 21
Fergus
A few minutes earlier, Lizzy had come to fetch Willadean, wordlessly indicating her directives with awkward hand motions and grunting noises. She was definitely in pain. After they left, Fergus closed his eyes and sent out his scythen. Something major was going down while he remained chained in a basement cage.
Bloody hell.
His scythen picked up disjointed thoughts. Who was out there? Skeeter? Through the back door...gotta be quieter than I ever been. Ray? Let’s talk. You don’t want to hurt a child. Let her go. Keep Fergus...he’s a big boy.
Definitely Ray. His new friend was an inadvertent sender with little filtration.
Well, fuck you too, Ray, he thought, smiling now. Throwing an adult to the wolves to save a child was exactly what he would have done.
The sound of rifle shots snatched him out of his scythen state. Next came a muffled crash, then thumping and pounding on the ceiling above.
Silence for thirty heartbeats.
Someone was descending the stairs. No...two someones.
The basement door burst open again, slamming against the cinderblock wall. Skeeter loomed in the doorway, blood streaming from his nose, his hands in the air.
“On. The. Bed,” Lizzy hissed.
Skeeter complied. The barrel of Lizzy’s handgun, pressed against the bald head, brooked no argument. How she got the old man chained up, Fergus had no idea; her body blocked his view from the cage, but it must have been excruciating. Some of the fingers of one hand had appeared broken, and the bullet wound in the other shoulder was surely hurting like hell.
Once Skeeter was restrained, she turned to face Fergus. Gone was the normally composed Lizzy. In her place was a wild-eyed banshee wearing a mask of agony.
“I’ll be back,” she said. “And when I return, you’ll have a front-row seat for the show.”
After the door slammed behind her, Skeeter raised his head and scanned the room. The keen blue eyes settled on Fergus in the cage. A wide grin just about split the wrinkled face in two.
“Welcome to hell,” Fergus said. “What are you so happy about?”
“Got Willa outta here. This might just be the happiest day of my life.”
“Thank goodness. Ray has her?”
“Yep. How’d you know?”
“Same way you know stuff. About that happiest-day-of-your-life business, enjoy it now. When Lizzy comes back, she’s probably going to torture you.”
Skeeter chuckled. “I ain’t worried ‘bout that. Not even a little bit.”
“You say that now. Ever been tortured before? I have a feeling Lizzy is a real pro.”
The bald head tilted to one side, identical to Willadean’s when she contemplated something important.
“Nope, never been, but I still ain’t worried about it. She got cameras in here? Audio?”
“Good question. Unknown, but better to be safe...”
“Gotcha. Anyways, like I said, I ain’t worried about it. There’s a reason folks don’t leave the holler.”
“You’ve said that before and I still don’t know what it means.”
Another chuckle, this time more enigmatic than joyful. “Gotta keep them talents from gettin’...attenuated. Willadean taught me that word. Know what it means?”
“Of course. Weakened...diluted.”
“Right. Maybe I ain’t told you ‘bout all of the abilities I got.”
Fergus considered the words. What additional talents could the old man possess besides scythen? He pondered the survivors with whom he’d had contact after the plague. What had their gifts been? Elevated intelligence, obviously. Everyone these days was special, but not all in the same way. Some actually registered below average in terms of brain power, but Fergus knew compensations existed that offset lackluster intellects.
Mentally challenged savants were no longer as rare as they used to be. Even beyond inherent artistic, intellectual, or even biomechanical gifts, less obvious ‘enhanced’ attributes surfaced within the surviving population. A person came to mind at that moment from his recent travels in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas.
Sam.
Sam was no intellectual giant, but his physical prowess was extraordinary. Still, that wasn’t the most impressive thing about Sam. Fergus had watched the young man’s horrific wounds heal practically overnight...wounds that should have proved fatal or at least required weeks of recovery. Even more recently, he’d witnessed that same rapid healing in Willadean’s self-inflicted blood-oath cut; it had gone from open wound to pink scar overnight. Was this the genetic gift that Skeeter was alluding to? Being able to heal quickly didn’t mean you could withstand torture, though. Skeeter had said he’d never been through that, so how could he be so unconcerned about it? Was there something else?
“I see your hamster’s goin’ hard on his little wheel,” Skeeter said with a tap to his bald temple.
Fergus laughed. “Yes. I’m considering the possibilities.”
The old man leaned his back against the concrete wall. “You ever hear of a family in Italy just before Chicksy happened? Last name’s...” Skeeter mouthed the
