Crisped + Sere (Immemorial Year Book 2) (41 page)

Cavalo tried to sit up again.

The bees screamed at him to move, move,
move
.

Patrick said, “Should have killed you. Long time ago.”

The axe
scraped
against the ground.

Cavalo gritted his teeth as he pushed himself back with his feet and left arm, his right curled uselessly against his chest. His left foot skittered into nothing off the edge of Dworshak. For a brief, shining moment, he considered just rolling right off the edge. If he had to go, at least it would be on his terms. At least it would be his decision. He wouldn’t give Patrick the satisfaction of his murder.

Steeling his resolve, he started to move toward the edge and—

Movement behind Patrick. On the other side of the divide.

Through the smoke and snow, Lucas was standing fiercely, eyes blazing, knife clenched between his teeth, a thin metal pole in his hands. Cavalo didn’t know what Lucas planned to do with it. He couldn’t launch himself over. There wouldn’t be enough momentum. The snow would cause the broken pole to slide off the edge and into the crack in Dworshak.

Patrick dragged the axe from behind him and rested the blade against Cavalo’s leg. “We could have been such
friends
,” Patrick said, blood dripping down onto Cavalo. “You have fire, James. Such
fire
.”

“Fuck you,” Cavalo spat.

“No,” Patrick said. “I think not. I think this might be the end of you. And then I’ll take Lucas, and for the rest of his short, miserable life, he will know what pain truly is. And when I am finished with him, I will go back to the people of Cottonwood. I will eat them. I will
rape
them. I will
pillage
and
plunder
, and when their blood soaks my skin, I will look to the east and rise from the ashes of a forgotten world. I will be reborn, and nothing, not
you
, not your
people
, not your tiny little
dream
will be able to stop me. There is power here. And it will be mine.”

Cavalo laughed, harsh and broken. “You’re such a fucking cliché. No one cares. No one fucking
cares
.”

Patrick’s eyes narrowed. “That’s where you’re wrong. You just won’t be around to see it.”

Cavalo looked back at Lucas, trying to figure out how he was going to say good-bye. Or rather,
see you soon
, if the sounds of the Dead Rabbits were any indication. Some were screaming in pain, yes, and the sounds were less than they’d been before, but there was an undercurrent there. A pull of anger and rage, and Cavalo knew the helicopter hadn’t gotten them all. It hadn’t killed every single goddamn one of them.

Lucas didn’t look frantic. He didn’t look as if he were accepting his inevitable fate. He didn’t look as if he were about to die.

He gripped the broken metal pole in his hands.

Making sure Cavalo was watching him, he looked pointedly over the edge of the dam. For a moment, Cavalo thought Lucas was going to do what Cavalo himself had been considering just seconds before.

But Cavalo knew Lucas. The months they’d spent together with nothing but looks between them had not gone to waste. Cavalo didn’t know whether he could actually hear Lucas talk or not, understand him correctly or not. If he wasn’t just absolutely out of his goddamn mind. He didn’t know how he had ended up here. In this moment.

Lucas bounced his feet once, twice and then took very measured steps away from the divide.

And Cavalo
knew
.

“Oh fuck,” he breathed.

“Indeed,” Patrick said. “And now, my dear fellow, is where we have found your ending. Go, knowing you have failed and that everything you have ever loved will burn.”

He raised the axe above his head.

Cavalo grinned up at him and said, “I’ll see you in hell.”

Then a voice came, a whip crack of anger. “Hey!”

Patrick snapped his head over.

Hank. No weapon. Looking furious. Staring straight at them.

And Lucas ran.

He was beaten. Bloody. His muscles had to be sore, his body battered and weak. But Cavalo had learned he couldn’t underestimate the clever monster.

Cavalo rolled to his left side, his good arm hanging off the edge of Dworshak, reaching toward Lucas. Cavalo felt everything slow around him, his breath roaring in his ears, his thunderous heart tripping in his chest.

He thought,
Please
.

Lucas reached the divide. The muscles in his legs coiled, and he jumped, not across the crack in Dworshak, but angling outward, toward Cavalo but into nothingness. The snow battered against his face, and there wouldn’t be a do-over here. There wouldn’t be a second chance.

Lucas stretched out the metal pole.

Cavalo reached for it with his good arm, fingers flexing reaching,
reaching
—

It slapped against his palm, stinging his skin.

He closed his fingers around it, tightening his grip.

Lucas reached the height of his jump and began to fall.

Cavalo held on as best he could, and as Lucas swung down, the pole slipped partway through his fist, the metal tearing against his skin. He looked down in time to see Lucas swing across the divide, grasping the pole with one hand, the other bearing the knife.

The muscles in his left arm strained heavily as he swung it down, skimming along the side of Dworshak. Lucas’s feet found purchase against the dam, and he ran along the side, picking up momentum for the arc back up.

They reached the midpoint, and only
seconds
had gone by since Lucas had leapt, and he was directly below Cavalo now, running perpendicular to him, counting on Cavalo’s strength to keep him from plummeting down Dworshak to his death hundreds of feet below.

The upswing began, and Cavalo’s arm tensed angrily. He didn’t think it would be enough, he didn’t think it’d be enough to—

Patrick said, “
No
,” but Cavalo could pay him no mind, there wasn’t
time
, and they were about to
die
—

Somehow it worked. Lucas, using the momentum from jumping across from the other side of the dam, ran up the wall even as something in Cavalo’s left shoulder snapped when he swung the pole up and over the lip of the concrete.

He and Lucas let go of the pole at the same time, Lucas spiraling gracefully over Cavalo, mouth bared in a silent snarl.

Lucas landed between Cavalo and Patrick, stumbling a step and then another, blocking Cavalo’s view.

Time snapped back into place.

Patrick brought the axe down.

Lucas stopped it with his hand, gripping Patrick’s wrists.

Patrick’s eyes widened.

“How,” he said.

Lucas jerked his other arm forward at his father’s chest.

Patrick said, “Oh.”

Lucas took a breath. His arm jerked again.

Patrick said, “
Oh
.”

The axe slipped from his fingers and clattered to the ground behind him.

Lucas let go of his wrists.

Lucas wrapped his arm around his father’s shoulders. Pulled him close. His other arm jerked again, and this time, Patrick said, “It hurts. More than I thought it would.”

He lay his forehead against his son’s shoulder. His hands came up and gripped the back of Cavalo’s jacket that Lucas still wore. He fisted the material.

He said, “Yes. It hurts more. Funny, that.”

Lucas’s arm jerked again.

Patrick lifted up his head. His eyes were glassy. He coughed. A burst of blood sprayed from his mouth, staining his teeth.

He said, “You were just a boy when—”

Lucas stabbed him again. And again. And again.

Patrick smiled that showman’s smile, bloody and sharp…. It lasted a second. Maybe two. Then it broke, fractured into pieces.

Lucas dropped his arms.

Blood dripped from the knife, red dashing into the snow.

Patrick held him for a moment longer, then his hands fell to his sides.

Lucas stepped back.

Patrick’s entire front was red, the blood soaked through, running down his chest and stomach. He coughed, and another bubble broke in his mouth. He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out aside from the pained rush of air.

He swayed.

Took a step.

Looked at Cavalo.

His hands went to his chest, rubbing gently.

Cavalo could hear the squelch of blood on Patrick’s hands and fingers.

He held them out to Cavalo, the palms red.

He opened his mouth and said, “We’re all Mr. Fluff, I guess.”

Then he tipped over the side of Dworshak.

Patrick, the great and the terrible, did not make a sound as he fell.

It was as if he never was at all.

Lucas looked down at his knife. He wiped the blade against his trousers.

Cavalo stared at the space Patrick had once inhabited. He wondered if that was the death of the dream. The end of life as they knew it.

He’d taken the other half of the schematics with him.

And for some reason, Cavalo couldn’t find the will to care.

The bees didn’t laugh this time. In fact, they didn’t make a sound.

For the first time in a long time, it was quiet in Cavalo’s head.

It was Hank who spoke first out of all of them. He said, “Holy shit,” and he broke them out of their reverie, everything slamming back at once.

It had only been two minutes since the helicopter had fallen.

Maybe three.

Richie was dead.

Patrick was dead.

Dead Rabbits were dead, but not all of them. And they were getting louder.

Hank was on him then, hands sliding under his arms, pulling him up. His left shoulder protested loudly, and he gritted his teeth against the pain, trying to keep his right arm from jostling too much.

He said, “Ah,” and, “Fuck,” and felt hazy with it, absolutely
dreamlike
with the pain. He felt himself start to drift, to float, and thought how much nicer that would be than trying to stay awake.

But then Alma was there, and Aubrey, and they were bruised and bleeding but alive. Bill accidentally jostled Cavalo’s broken arm, fucking
Bill
, but the sharp stab of fractured bone cut through the haze like ice water in the veins. Bill’s breath hitched in his chest, and tears ran down his face,
fucking Bill
, but Cavalo felt clear. Clear
er
, at the very least. There was—

He said, “SIRS.” It came out garbled.

He said, “Bad Dog.” It came out bloody.

He’d seen the building collapse on top of them. He
knew
.

Hank said, “We have to
go
. They’re coming.”

Cavalo shook his head. “Can’t leave them. We can’t.” He struggled to get away from them. It hurt. Everything. His head. His chest. His heart.

“They’re
gone
, James,” Alma said, that bitch, that fucking bitch using his name like she
knew
him, like she was
allowed
. She wasn’t
allowed
. She didn’t know what the fuck she was talking about because she—

There must have been something on his face, something that gave his thoughts away, because Alma flinched and Bill flinched and Hank’s face hardened slightly. Aubrey just looked away.

But it was Lucas. Lucas who stepped forward. Lucas who had just killed his father to save Cavalo. Lucas who didn’t recoil away at Cavalo’s cold fury, really never had. Lucas who had somehow gotten under Cavalo’s skin and shattered like glass. Cavalo had tried to pick out the pieces, but all it did was leave scars, and Cavalo was scarred enough.

Lucas stood in front of him, bloody knife in his hands, looking impossibly young. He met Cavalo’s gaze and said,
We have to go. We don’t have much time.

Cavalo shook his head again, even as he heard the Dead Rabbits getting louder. Angrier. “They’re my
family
,” he croaked out. “Can’t you see? They’re my
family
.”

Lucas said,
I know. I know. I know.

Cavalo believed him.

And then a great cry came up from the Dead Rabbits, shouts of fear and warning. There was a crash of metal and rock, the blare of a machine: “
OUT OF MY WAY, YOU DISGUSTING CREATURES!
” There was the windup of a machine, the electric snap that sounded of lightning. The helicopter began to shake dangerously, and for a moment, Cavalo thought it would slide off the dam, leaving them exposed. The Dead Rabbits had guns.

But it didn’t, at least not yet. It wasn’t sliding off the dam. The helicopter was shaking because a giant metal robot leapt up and over the rear of it, sliding down the body of the machine, sparks flying, metal creaking. A dog was held tight against its chest, and Cavalo could
breathe
.

Until he saw the state of his friend.

SIRS was not in good shape. His head was dented on the left side, concaved but not split. The bulb that was his left eye was shattered and dark. His left arm had been torn from his body, wires crackling and smoking. His chest plate was cracked and dinged. Splashes of blood covered him, and for a moment, Cavalo wondered if he was bleeding.

SIRS landed unsteadily on his feet next to the humans. He swayed once, took a step. He said, voice skipping and cracking, “Hello! Welcome to the North Idaho Correctional Institution. Please check in at the visitor’s desk. There are no weapons allowed at any time on the premises. Remember, safe inmates means
happy
inmates, and
it hurts
.
It hurrrrrrrts and
feel free to ask any questions to ensure a pleasant visit with your loved ones. Warden Martin Hale thanks you and wishes you a pleasant day!”

Bad Dog squirmed against his chest, SIRS’s remaining arm wrapped around him.
Tin Man, put me down. Put me down!

SIRS said, “I dream in colors and code. I don’t think they expected that when they made me. And and and
and
welcome to the North Idaho Correctional—”

“SIRS,” Cavalo said quietly.

The robot’s remaining eye flashed red. Then yellow. Then orange. He said, “Cavalo?” He sounded unsure. Hesitant.