The World Without Flags

“There’s a community around here somewhere. I guess it’s built on a hill. You’ll be safer there, trust me,” Boston tells me, turning slightly to face me. “It’s dangerous out here, especially with the Gearheads around.” What can I do? I can’t say we want to go walking off into the wilderness to trade with squirrels and raccoons. I can’t tell him that the most dangerous place for me is the place they’re taking me. It’s like a death sentence for Eric. And if they kill Eric, my life will be over. I can only join them until I can slip away or think of something.

“Well, I haven’t seen any Gearheads,” I say. I’m hoping to talk them into letting us move on alone by ourselves.

Sidney makes a gruff sound behind me. “They’re around.”

Something in his tone. Maybe he’s worried that we are Gearheads. Spies or something. Like them? Is that what they’re doing? Are they spies for the Stars? I want to ask some questions to get more information, something I can use to get free of them, but I ask myself, what do spies want? Information. The more questions I ask, the more suspicious they’ll become. So I do what I’ve done most of my life. Keep my mouth shut.

With every step, we are closer to the Homestead. I feel a sense of doom. I know in the end, I will have to pull my gun. It will have to be at the desperate end. These two seem like hardened soldiers. They’ve been trained. They’ve seen battle. All I did was shoot someone with a shotgun once, and it nearly broke my shoulder. Pulling my gun has to be the last resort. It almost certainly means that I will die, and Eric soon afterward. But what’s the difference if we die out here or back at the Homestead?

Boston slows his horse to ride next to me.

“I wish we had some horses for you two,” he says. His orange eyes glimmer down at me.

I shrug. “He doesn’t ride,” I say, jerking my head toward Eric. “He just falls off.”

Boston looks back at Eric who is plodding ahead as usual.

“And he doesn’t move faster than that, I take it?” he asks.

I shake my head.

Boston studies me for a moment. I watch him out of the corner of my eye. I try to figure out what he’s studying me for. There’s a certain look, a way that a man has when his intentions aren’t decent. I’m looking for that. Maybe he sucks a tooth or licks his lips or lets his eyes rake at me, up and down. I don’t think I’m much to look at, but that’s never stopped men before, especially out here. I’m not stupid. I have to watch myself.

But Boston doesn’t seem like that. He’s curious and suspicious, but not malignant, or he hides it well. The other one, Sidney, I don’t know yet. He’s behind me, so I can’t study him, though I feel his presence.

“Well, if you ask me, you’re lucky,” Boston says after a second. “Most bandits would’ve just killed you in the road and then taken your stuff. You’re lucky they let you go.”

I glance over to him. Boston is looking ahead, but I can tell he’s prodding at the weak point in my story, seeing if I get uncomfortable. He’s studying me like I studied him.

“You can thank Eric for that,” I say quickly. Hesitation here would sound false. “We were all camped one night and he got loose from the rope. By the time I found him and got back to camp, everything was gone.”

“Eric?” Boston asks. “How’d you know his name?”

Damn it. “I don’t know his name,” I say as easily as I can. “That’s the name I gave him.”

“Looks like Eric saved your life,” Boston says, seemingly satisfied. “Lucky.”

“Lucky,” I agree. Boston seems satisfied and gives me a little twitch of a smile. Then his horse gradually moves ahead and leaves us alone again. It’s hard to get a horse to walk as slow as Eric. I notice that Sidney has to stop his horse every quarter mile or so and let us get ahead.  It’s a boring, grindingly slow pace, but I’m glad for it. It gives me time to think of how to get us out of this mess.

My immediate worry is that Eric will cough up a big blob of black muck, crawling with worms. That would give him away. Or just the fact that he drools some weird black fluid, that could do it too, so I’m constantly wiping at his face. A couple of times, I do notice a worm or two, and, trying to keep my breakfast down, I wipe them away.