King Eden

Chapter Ten: Rockfish Gap

The main roads belonged to the dead. We took the parkways, and I fell in love with them all over again every time. They twisted through valleys that performed for their visitors no matter the season, welcoming us with dances of alabaster and ivory in the winter, then halcyon and scarlet waltzes in the fall. A ballroom with all of nature's brutality hiding underneath the splendor.

The Empress demanded we maintain these roadways for trade. We passed trucks of coal coming from Hecate to trade for food. Haulers lifted hands in greeting, their fingers black with soot. Fat nobles looked out the passenger windows to watch the blue ridge mountains sprawl, coming along to make sure they squeezed as many goods as possible out of me during the negotiations. Then there were vans from Zoar delivering our medicines. Sometimes we drove by convoys from Ira; the armored vehicles painted a camouflage accurate enough to make them one with the mountains. A few were on their way to trade weapons for food at the Aurelian. Others were tracking Titan, seeking out hordes of dead too large to leave alone, and scouting the wastes for garbage they could turn into artillery. I held a decent amount of sway over the other clans when it came to trade. I kept them fed well enough not to give me too much trouble.

The Frog made it to the last climb of Rockfish Gap before it decided it had suffered enough and quit. The needle had been in the red for at least an hour, so I was impressed. Thief drifted to a somewhat flat patch of brush where dead sprigs scraped rust off the undercarriage. She parked, stared out the window and listened to it die, then slammed the sides of her fists against the steering wheel and cursed.

I untangled my gun from the seatbelt. "It's alright; our stop is just ahead." I patted the dashboard and tumbled outside, crunching across the gravel road to the overlook. The incline shut the door for me.

Thief cranked my window open so she could yell at me instead of getting out to talk. "Everything's going to get stolen."

I stretched. "I'm not worried about thieves."

"There were some encampments back there."

"I'm more worried about black bears destroying the Frog to get to the obscene amount of food you brought."

"We can carry the food between us. We'll lose the truck if we leave it here...then we're fucked."

"No, it'll be alright if we push it into the woods and hide it."

"You're being stupid."

"I'm not leaving you here alone to guard it; there's too many dead in these woods. When the wind shifts and carries your scent, you're joining them. We'll hide it, get some fuel, and come right back. It'll be fine."

"You smell like shit, too, King."

I muttered a "fuck you" under a half-grin. A day's drive with hot air blowing through the AC didn't serve either of us well.

"How far?" she asked.

"A mile, maybe."

The truck whined about its age as she heaved her door open and jumped out of the cabin. She still limped from an old break in her foot that never healed right. The steep rise left her breathless.

I frowned. "You're smoking too much."

"I quit."

"Uh-huh." I nodded at the valley. "Take a look at this. Pretty sure people around here are too fucking high to steal anything."

The gap was a valley of black trees standing out from a gray sky. Our road ended at the wasteland's edge, a disappointing finale to the deep mountainous forests that had accompanied us for the past twelve hours. One of Darius' abandoned trading routes twisted through the dead woods below us, the tarmac still filthy from the slaves and livestock he marched to Pallas every month. The Empress gave his kingdom of ash and misery to the dead years ago. Now, the route was nothing but a host for silver-eyed cannibals and red silk poppies. The flowers consumed the gorge like blisters on the back of some pale-skinned wretch.