Emergence (Eden's Root Trilogy) (12 page)

Lucy pinched the candle, plunging them into darkness
. She choked back a sob as she embraced him. “Sean! You’re alive! And Sara!” She pulled Sara in with her free arm. “Darryl! Where have you been?”

Sean’s heart leapt
as the rest of the Skillmans slid from their beds to greet them. He fought tears when his father wrapped him in a bear hug, slapping him on the back like a man. “’S good to see ya, kid,” John choked.

“We knew you would find us,” Lucy added, wiping her tears
. “We knew you wouldn’t stop until you did.” Her eyes darted beyond them, searching, and Sean knew she wondered why it was only the two of them.

He
pulled back from their embrace and saw that the entire cabin had risen. They watched the reunion with glimmering eyes. “Where’s Kiara?” he asked.

“Here, Uncle Sean.”
Little hands reached for his. “Where’s Fi?”

Sean’s heart
twisted and he knelt. “She’s fine, Kiara. She’s safe. Her only worry was that something happened to you.” He felt tears of relief and anger prick at his eyes. “That something had happened to all of you.”

“Why isn’t she with you?”
Kiara whimpered. “Where’s Ash?”

“They’re still at Eden, Kiara
. Fi couldn’t come. She…she had a baby.”

“What?”
Lucy gasped.

“It’s true,” Sara said.
“ She was eight months along when we got to Eden. The shock sent her into labor.”

Frightened murmurs rippled through the cabin.

“
No, she’s all right,” Sara added. “She delivered a healthy boy. They named him Luke.”

“Oh, God, thank God.”
Lucy’s hand rested on her heart. “Jesus, you’ve all been through too much.”

“Us?”
Sean swiped at his eyes with his coat sleeve. “What about all of you?”

“We’re ok,” Lucy murmured
. “But none of us knows what to do. They have one guardian ‘Angel’ for every three of us. And we’re not fighters. We were all so afraid for the kids that we didn’t fight. When we did, they…” She stopped, her hand flying to her mouth.

Her eyes squeezed shut and she shook her head
. Her hand was shaking…
she
was shaking. Time slowed as Sean’s rage turned milliseconds to eons. “They did
what,
Mom?”

His youngest sister,
Zoe, pressed her face into Lucy’s leg, her free hand wrapped tightly in Kiara’s. His mother shook her head. Sean turned to his father.

John dropped his head
. It was the first time in the dim light that Sean really saw the fatigue and starvation that was etched on all their faces. Post-Famine, everyone was thin, but he hadn’t seen his father’s eyes so hollow since…since he’d carried Sean’s other little sister Rachel on his back for fifty miles.

“There were
a few warning shots, that’s all,” he said.

Lucy choked.

“And some…beatings.”

Sean
’s jaw set as his gaze traveled over the exhausted colonists. “Don’t worry,” he said, addressing all of them. “We’re going to get you the hell out of here.”

“But the
re are only the two of you,” Lucy protested. “How can you possibly get us out?”

“
I don’t know, Mom,” he said, managing a weak smile. No matter how bad the situation, his heart soared at being here, with his family. They were alive. “We’ll just have to think of something.”

“Sean,” Sara whispered
, tugging his sleeve. “I gotta go.”

He nodded, grabbing her into a quick kiss before she slipped away to find her family
. The rest of the evening was spent trading information. Sean brought those in his cabin up to date on the summer Seed, including Sara’s kidnapping and Fi’s prescience in realizing that the Truthers had hired Lobos as mercenaries. “I couldn’t imagine it,” he said. “That Carter would go this far.”

“I know,
” Lucy agreed. “We couldn’t believe it either. Most of the colonists had barely given him a thought all this time because we assumed we were safe, and that he was just…”

“…
a crackpot.” Sean finished. “Unfortunately he’s not so crazy that he’s stupid. He must’ve been planning this for a while.”

From the corner,
Darryl cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, but I can’t wait any longer. What did Lawson do with…the ones I named?”

Lucy dropped her head
. “Honestly, Darryl, we’re not sure. We just know that he took them away.”

“Dammit!”
He smacked his fist against his palm.

“At the time, none of us even knew w
hy,” Lucy added. “We were just frozen stiff. Louis kept yelling, ‘Where are you taking us?’ Lizzie’s been like a ghost ever since. The only good thing is they took them away with our security, so wherever they are, we think they’re probably together. At least, we hope they are.”

Darryl bit back a cry and slid to the floor, head in hands.

Lucy eyed Sean
. “But you’re saying all this is because this guy is really…a scientist?”

“Not just a scientist, Mom
. He was one of the original Diaspora participants. We have no idea why he was cut from his final spot or how he found out, but we’re pretty sure he’s the reason that Diaspora I failed.”

The listeners gasped.

John
sat up. “Seriously? Do you mean…”

“…
sabotage, Dad. Yeah, that’s what we think. We think he slipped into Diaspora I before it was sealed and then blew the seals to scatter the residents.”

“Oh
, God, those poor people.” Lucy murmured, frowning. “ So why didn’t the Council tell us he was this dangerous? Why didn’t we take more precaution?”

Sean sighed
. “I know, Mom. We made a mistake. We underestimated him. It’s like you said, we thought he was just a crackpot…maybe with a few followers, but we didn’t think he’d ever find Eden. And we really never imagined he’d have a force capable of taking it over.”

John snorted
. “Well, he does. He’s got at least a hundred of these ‘Angels’ and that’s just a rough estimate based on the ones who rounded us up and marched us all down here.”

The door to the cabin cracked and Sara slipped back
inside. She settled beside Sean on the bunk and gave him a quick kiss just as he was overtaken by a yawn. It was time to rest.

He
squeezed beneath the thin blanket with Sara, Lucy, and his sister Rachel in one bunk. Despite the cold, his limbs transformed from concrete to jelly as the adrenaline relented. He yawned again, a real face-cracker this time.
Man, he was tired.

After all this time of seeking his family, being with them again should
have been a huge weight off his shoulders, but it only made it worse. It was one thing to say a bunch of encouraging crap about escape and rescue, but now, in the dark, pressed against the girls, the fear closed his throat. Somehow, some way, he had to get them out of this.

He had to think of something.

--------------- Sean -----------

There was a crackle
. Sean’s eyes fluttered.

Ri-ise and Shi-ine and Give God Your Glory, Glory!

Ri-ise and Shi-ine and Give God Your Glory, Glory!

Rise and Shine and Give God Your Glory, Glory!

Children of the Lord.

Sean sat straight up and nearly bashed his head on the wooden bunk above him before covering his ears
. Around him, the others were awakening with knitted brows. Children’s voices blared into the freezing dawn air.

“Ugh, what is that?”
Sara sat up beside him groggily.

“That,” Lucy muttered, “is the call to prayer.”

Sean sat stunned as the colonists rose and began piling on winter gear and trooping out the door. Lucy waved at them to stay down as she followed. Darryl sat in the corner, wrapped in a blanket and a frown. Once the others had left, Sean and Sara crept to the screened window and peeled back a corner of the plastic sheeting covering it. The colonists trudged into a small assembly and then sat, huddled together, on the snow-covered ground.

The song finished.

“Thank
goodness,” Sean murmured.

“
May the Lord be with you!”
A new voice came through. Carter. Sean’s knuckles cracked as his hands balled into fists.

“And also with you.”
The response rose from the colonists, and Sean felt Sara twitch in surprise beside him.

“
I’d like to begin the daily prayer with a few announcements. Ms. Patterson’s daughter has recovered from her fever. Praise be to God.”

“All praise
Him.”

The colonists’ dull voices made the hair on the back of Sean’s neck stand up
. They’d only been there a week and already everyone had learned the drill. He shuddered to think how they’d been “taught,” his gaze shifting to the watchtowers. The Lobos were lounging against the railings, their dangling guns a vivid reminder that this was not your average congregation. He searched for Carter in confusion, but didn’t see him.

“I’d also like to ask for more prayers for the Tyson family
. They’ve given their full Tithe, but it has been a burden on them. Please pray for their health and safety.”

“Look, Sean!”
Sara pointed to the gates of the prison yard and Sean finally saw the loudspeakers.

“Freaking coward,” he fumed
. “Too chicken to come give his sermons in person.”

“He can’t, Sean,” Darryl said wearily
. “Even though he removed the people from my list, he must be scared that others here know his secret.”

Sean’s gaze turned back to his family crouched in the frigid prison yard, Lucy’s arm anchoring his little sister Zoe to the ground where she could draw no
attention from the Lobos. The only warmth he felt was the burning in his chest. “I don’t care. He’s still a coward.”

After the daily prayers, the colonists were free to do what they wanted within the confines of the prison yard. Sean and Sara spent the day hiding inside until nightfall, when they reluctantly left their families behind. Darryl elected to stay with the colonists as the “watchdog,” knowing full well that if he were caught, he’d be killed.

“It’s the least I can do, Sean,” Darryl insisted
.

“All right,” Sean agreed
. “Remember, no contact unless it’s an emergency.”

Darryl faked a salute, his forced smile dying before it reached the worry lines spidering from the corners of his eyes.

They set out to do some reconnaissance before heading back north. Unfortunately, what they found wasn’t good. Camp Truth, which they learned from a discarded sign was once called “Great Times River Camp,” turned out to be something of an impenetrable fortress. The river wound around it like a moat around a castle, forming a peninsula that was two stories high on all sides, save to the south, where a massive Dead Zone prevented any surprise attack.

The settlement itself included a large cluster of screened cabins, just like those in the prison
camp, only their screens had been boarded up, rather than sealed with flimsy plastic like the ones housing the colonists. He estimated that Camp Truth housed between three and four hundred Truthers.

“How are so many of them staying fed through the winter in such a tight space?” Sara said
. “The Tithe?”

“I don’t know, but I wouldn’t put anything past
Carter. Probably has his so-called ‘Angels’ go steal food from non-Truthers.”

Harsh laughter slashed the night air
. Sean jumped back behind the thicket where he and Sara were wedged, his jacket snagging on the brambles. Sara cursed and worked his coat free just as a stream of Lobo “Angels” appeared on the path. Sean gaped, counting the shadows.
There had to be close to a hundred of them.
He counted again, desperately trying to make out weapons. A pair of Lobos coming from the cliffs carried the automatic weapons he’d seen from a distance. As he’d thought, they were Eden’s. He sucked his teeth.

The Lobos with weapons headed toward a large shed from which, to Sean’s surprise, electric light streamed each time the door swung open
. Most of the settlement was dark, with the exception of flickering candles, but this shed was important enough that they’d found a way to light it.

Sara tapped him on the shoulder
. “Armory?”

The ball that had been circling around and around his mind slowed and settled
. Those with weapons left without them. Those without them left with them.
Shift change
, he thought,
just like Eden
. Sara was right. “C’mon,” he said, nodding. “Time to get out of here.”

They made their way east, following the cliff as it curled back on itself, and then finally turned north
. After half a night of searching the best they could find was a point where the cliff dipped to just one story. Sean lay, peering over the edge with his flashlight. The light barely penetrated five feet of the mist above the river, but in some ways that was comforting. The route to the bottom was a treacherous tangle of roots and ledges, many coated in ice. Seeing it probably wouldn’t make it more appealing.