Avarice Desperation Valley Ch. 33

Bennett emerged in the maw of the communal cave and strode purposefully toward the old man, seemingly unaffected by the strange weather, he had eyes only for Father Andrew.

Those around him parted as their leader sought his target, the fanatical preaching came to a halt, the sound of a fist hitting flesh hard. The old man falling to the earth with a thud, his staff rattling with a hollow sound on the stone, the battered bible coming to rest some feet away in the dirt, those about him frozen in a tableau of silence.

Marcus usually placid growled at Bennett and gave him a challenging look, going to his friends aid when no one else dared. Bennett in an artful movement drew his pistol aiming it squarely at the simple man's head, he would have no compunction in finishing the slow-witted brute off. Marcus was little more to him than a beast of burden.

"This is not an act of God!" Bennett roared into the silence. "Listening to the ranting of this foolish old man will not get us anywhere. I will not have this in my camp. Take him, silence him, and put him with the other prisoner. I will hear no more of this understood!"

His words were like steel unflinching and unfeeling, as was his command. In spite of this their leader had not assuaged any fears. Sven came through the stunned crowd to do his leader's bidding, he too knew this old man's fear mongering would serve no purpose other than to divide and imperil the camp, it was in everyone's best interests he was silenced.

Father Andrew had been as his own flesh and blood, loving Marcus unconditionally as a son when most had only spurned him for his mental deficiencies. Always patient and kind and in Marcus' eyes very wise, he adored this old man.

Marcus was as strong as the greatest men there in the camp, the strength in his mere body a weapon and today he had decided his best friend and beloved Father needed him, and he would not be found wanting. The old man looked diminutive and frail cradled in Marcus' brawny arms bleeding from a gash on his forehead when he had fallen, the blood staining his white hair.

"I'll look after you." Marcus cooed fussing over the fallen man protectively looking into his rheumy eyes.

Sven thinking nothing of this made to wrest the old man from his grasp and Marcus exploded in an impassioned rage, not caring a gun was pointed at his head. Father Andrew tried to halt him in a thin voice but it was already too late, the single well placed shot had taken the pure life in a heartbeat. The massive man sunk to the earth his face in a pool of fast congealing blood.

Bennett sheathed the gun nonchalantly. "There will be no more of this foolishness." He added, walking away from the silent crowd shivering in the snow.

Most said nothing and drifted away, some of the slaves openly wept, Raissa included. Sven seeing this ordered her to leave, he would have no one from his family embroiled in this matter.

As Will and Todd took Father Andrew away he cried hardest of all, his heart broken, the death of an innocent on his hands. The old man was gagged and interred in the forbidding enclosure of the cattle trailer with its other shivering inhabitant Renard.

Marcus's death reinforced to all the precariousness of their positions and lives. Most before the coming of this strange winter had even begun to feel comfort of sorts, but that had now evaporated and fear reigned ruling their lives once more.

Aran crossed the open space through the departing crowd toward his brother, a mantle of white snowfall accumulating on the shoulders of his vast cloak. None noticed Nathan as he took the bible from the dirt and smoothed down it's crumpled pages with his elegant fingers, tucking it into his heavy navy blue overcoat. The two golden brothers were left alone standing in the snow flurry over the large body of Marcus. Sven looked at Aran and Aran gave him a wry smile in return.

"I guess we get to bury him huh?"

"I guess?" Shrugged Sven and the two men set about the task.

*****

In the subsequent dark days there was an underlying current of unease in the encampment. It was now too cold to sit out any kind of a watch, and it had been abandoned. All reasoning that any likelihood of an attack in this inclement weather was slim. The cabins had been vacated also, all the prisoners had to be relocated to the rear of the cave, chained to one another and a large immobile rock for fear they would perish from the cold.

With no other form of heat but the communal fire all were forced to sleep in the great cave. Many spoke in hushed tones, fear was paramount as stifling as the heavy cloud cover. The crops were all dead, the neat rows of corn turned to icy green sludge as did the squash plants. All the chickens too had perished from the cold, and the goats, cows, and horses were faring poorly. Soon there would be no more for even the wily goats to eat if this weather did not abate.

There were still those who believed steadfastly in the words of Father Andrew and the good book. It was spoken of in hushed tones in the way sailors would speak of a mutiny. However Sven had another theory, and in his mind it was a more fearsome one than that of an angry God seeking repentance.

He voiced it to the warriors the evening after he and Aran buried Marcus, he was one of the eldest of the men, and he had served in war and knew of its reality. All sat about the welcome warmth of the fire, still a chill pervaded the cave as it never had in times past. Sven sighed knowing what he was about to say would surely incite much stress and panic, yet it had to be uttered.

He took another drink of the warm milk in his tankard and pulled the hide about his shoulders snugly before speaking.

"I had always figured this would have happened at the start of the war, but as most of you can remember there was never the volume of nuclear attacks we thought there would be. Sure there were some, but the majority of the war heads were never deployed. I'm not sure how or why but it appears now that they finally have been." There was an audible murmur but no one interrupted. "I think what we are seeing here is a nuclear winter, the dust from the explosions has blanketed the sun, and until it lifts which could be many months it will be cold and dark and everything will continue to die."

There was a loud murmur at the idea of this.

"What will happen to everything if all the plants die?" Will blurted out, at once sorry he had voiced his fear aloud.

"So there is radiation?" Lucy interjected forgetting her slave status completely, Warren plucking nervously at her sleeve motioning her to quiet.

No one noticed, it seemed everyone had a question, a fear that needed to be let out and in no time the entire population were freely talking over and amongst themselves, status quite forgotten.

Seeing this Bennett stood, his very movement calling an abrupt halt to the cacophony echoing off the walls of the great cave. Carlos was huddled in a blanket at his feet, the listless man barely looked up, glazed black eyes fixated on the fire. Bennett never uttered a word but raised his hands for silence. All obeyed and he was gratified to observe the halfwits death had been a good example to all.

Sven continued, trying to answer the multitudes of questions to the best of his ability. Bennett resumed his seat, his hand wandering to his captive to caress the warm yielding flesh beneath the blanket. Bennett was concerned, but had already decided there was little he could do to alter the outcome, it was just as it had been an uncertain world after the war where only the strongest and boldest could triumph. He would save his energies for that.

Aran did not say a word but watched his brother, they had both spoken in private of this event and its ramifications, all of which were bleak for some days now. Like Bennett Aran would not fret, he would take each day as it presented and deal with it in turn.

Maya listened to the growing hysteria but seemed not to care for the argument either, she would have her questions answered by her man this night in the darkness, something deep within quivered deliciously at this thought. She brought him yet another choice piece of the cow they had slaughtered admiring his rugged handsomeness, his hair beautiful in the firelight like golden brass. Aran took the proffered morsel, touching Maya gently as she settled back under the vastness of his cape.

"I don't see what is to be gained by staying here? We should go south, there might be others there if what you say is true, cities, and a better way of life." Lucy stated, her hands set firmly on her solid hips, she might have been a slave but in arguments like this she always forgot her station.

Sven glowered at her, his gray eyes catching the firelight, it seemed many others here thought as she did. It had been a sentiment for some time, and now the crops had clearly failed and the animals were weakening, the ties to this place of shelter were weakening also.

"That there might be." Sven answered her. "But to do so would be folly, we are still better off out here. I've been there, there is nothing but death and disease and radiation sickness in the south. The people who inhabit it are quite mad. I have seen it with my own eyes. The water is poisoned, there is no food. Only a fool would go back there."

The arguments wavered back and forth, with no clear winners, Bennett did not intervene but studied his people carefully gauging who was interested in what course. It seemed even some of his men wanted to try to go south, had they so soon pushed aside the terror of seven years past? Human nature and the ability of denial sometimes amazed him.

Finally he stood motioning again for quiet. The faces that surrounded him were for the most part lost and searching. All looked to him, this hard man in their midst. A tyrant, a murderer perhaps, but they needed his firm guidance and what was more important, his words.

"We stay for now, Sven is right, to go south is to walk into the mouth of death. We will gather our stores and go on one more raid before the horses fail. We can last here for many months, maybe even a year. You heard Sven, the cloud will lift by then and who knows what fortune will provide us with?"

*****

Raissa looked down at her fussing child, as a mother she was a natural, but it would appear that even her talents would be tested. At three months Eirik was strong, but keeping him warm of late had become an art form. If he was not pressed close to her swaddled from the cold in his rabbit furs, he was close to his father's body warmth.

Fortunately Sven did not shirk this task, he saw as plainly as Raissa did they would both have to work together to ensure the survival of their precious little boy. Raissa was also very thankful her husband's desire for another child had not been answered, and with the lack of privacy Aran had ceased to bed her completely. At last she felt somewhat safe.

With Marcus's death the men had a new unthought of responsibility, it was true he was no longer needed for the heavy work in the garden but no one had credited him for the constant provision of firewood, and with the growing cold more and more was consumed.

Now it fell to the warriors to provide this warmth, many of them resented this essential task. Some not at all amused at Bennett's decision to waste a man who had done all this heavy work in the background. This small thing had begun to undermine the warriors satisfaction, no longer feeling like the ruling class when faced with having to do their own menial tasks.

Aran and Sven could see this plainly, and went to work cutting wood to provide an example to the others, but Bennett so self assured of his brutal rule never once did lift a finger to do this duty. Much of the remaining scrub was felled the poor slimy frost bitten leaves being fed to the livestock, and the branches burned.

Raissa stood looking out at the bleak twilight, it should be mid afternoon she mused. What she would not give to see the sun again even in its hellish desert fury it was preferable to the present. She could see the men Aran included felling more trees to burn, the animals milling about them hungry for whatever forage they could get.

She pulled her blanket closer about her shoulders and went to check on Father Andrew, it was a depressing business, he was old and she was sure he was dying. After losing Marcus he had finally given up. He had refused food and water and she did not even have the comfort of his bible to offer him.

Renard looked up at her, he was still handsome, even his unkempt appearance could not mask the man he was. Raissa smiled. "How is he today?"

"Not great." Renard replied, eagerly taking the food she had brought for him. These conditions he now found himself in had in the past days lent him new hope. If cold had been the common enemy, to him it had been a friend, and he was going to use his new situation to gain his strength and plan an escape. Things did not seem as hopeless as they once were.

Raissa put her hand on the old man's forehead, he did not even open his eyes at her touch, his pulse was fleeting. She sensed he did not have long. She sighed, heart heavy and pulled the crumpled blanket up about the waning man, that he might at least be somewhat warm.

"I'll watch him." Renard assured her in his quiet, confident voice. Raissa again smiled and she left sensing Renard was not like these other men, no he was nothing like them at all.

Sometime that night Father Andrew did indeed pass away without a word to any who might hear. The next morning he was buried next to Marcus on the edge of the forlorn garden patch where they had spent the majority of their days, with no one to read a few lines of comfort from his beloved book.

*****

The occupants of the valley were not the only ones fraught with worries. Stephan had many of his own, the cold had extracted a heavy price also from his rich farmland. Crops withered and died, as did much of the poultry, and the young calves and lambs.

Just as Father Andrew had there were some of the biblical amongst them expounding God's great demise for the sinners among humankind. Stephan heard it all from his advisors and as he walked his town in the bitter cold against the advice of his wife and his physician. However he felt it important to go and be seen amongst his people at this time, even at risk to his own health, he was their leader after all and he had to project an essence of calm.

It was well past midnight and even though Stephan was very tired he sat as he often did in his library by the light of a single candle. Of late he had taken to reading passages from the bible himself. Not that he might embrace the works of God, but that he might have the information to know and deal with his enemy if the need arose.

He was a Christian as most here were, and believed in all the Christian principles. However he could not stand for the few fanatics within his walls who sought to erase the calm and the good sense of his people. He had spoken at length to the Pastor on this topic and the man in his weekly sermons had done his best to stem the panic regarding the seemingly impending apocalypse. People being what they were, were very easily panicked, and only too eager to follow like sheep the few fanatics as they preached their offerings of doom to the populace.

He put the large tome down and it closed on itself with a loud thud, his eyes were sore from reading the tiny print in the poor light. Stephan even at sixty-nine did not want to admit it was also age that ailed his vision. He blinked into the dimness beyond the yellow ring of flickering light and heard the rasp of the branches against the window pane, idly wondering if he would ever see the great apple tree blossom again or yield its bountiful fruit to the children of his village. The rows of leather bound gold titled books silently hemming him in, storing the collective knowledge of humanity, and he wondered if his library was one of the only such existing places of this stored human knowledge? He hoped not, but he feared it may be so.

He rose slowly, reaching for his staff. Only a few short years ago he had not needed it at all, and now it was his constant companion steadying his every step.

He had not realized Anna had been watching him waiting for him to come to bed. She reached for his hand the gold of her wedding band caught the light and he smiled remembering that distant day, in that distant time the two of them had pledged their love in that beautiful garden on that fine summer's day. They did not exchange any words as she took his hand in hers. His wife of many years she knew his thoughts and did not need to. Anna, the love of his life was as arresting to him now as she was then, the one who kept him strong, his anchor on the world.

*****

The steel fortress squatted on the white windswept plains, a black blight on an otherwise unmarred virginal background. The black wolf on the red standard fluttered in the chill wind as the dying birds fell from the sky.

Victor Krosse stood on the gelid battlements his face into the frosty wind watching the last struggles of a dying black crow on the ice below him, reflecting on his actions of the past few days. Rationing had begun in earnest, and Lothar's long shelved nuclear war plans unfolded encompassing all. As with all cities even this fortress so carefully constructed had in times of plenty attracted many who were surplus to requirement.

Krosse and Lord Lothar had deemed it wise to cleanse the fortress of these individuals swiftly and quietly. The old, infirm, orphaned, and the unskilled, none were spared. They would not have anyone who did not pull their weight housed within the walls consuming the valuable rations and fuel. Unlike the uneducated masses who lived in the sparse, mean settlements they so often raided, the men here all knew what a nuclear winter entailed and it was not a pretty picture, the cull of citizens was ruthless and final.

The fort housed in excess of some two hundred souls and that following morning that very same two hundred now numbered only one hundred and fifty-eight, each essential to operations in some way. All knew what had transpired and all had turned a blind eye. After all the needs of the many far outweighed the needs of the few.

The wind was bitter, it was well below zero, treacherous ice had formed on the checker plate battlements, night was closing in. In spite of the severe cold and the gloomy surroundings Victor felt happy to be alone, and he often came here to ponder matters. In the last few days the entire world had fundamentally changed, he could hardly believe that after seven years and a minor nuclear confrontation someone, somehow, had managed to unleash yet more of the deadly arsenal.

With no communications, and no way to access the outside world he would never know how it eventuated. So like humans touting their cleverness to destroy their own world he mused, a crooked smile twisting his stark features.

His men returned from the lands to the south reporting what they perceived as a far off series of explosions, and they had witnessed the great dark clouds of smoke and debris that had tainted the atmosphere and blocked out the sun. So this was to be it then, devastating global climate change years after the initial war, that would at last attempt to wipe man from the face of the earth? Would he survive, would anyone?

The wind drove ice shards like splinters at the lone black clad man as he stood in defiance of the weather. Krosse felt the smooth kid leather of his gloves sticking to the frigid steel of the battlements, the crow had ceased its futile struggle to live far below, and was already being claimed by the shifting mantle of white.

There would be no war with Stephan now, there would be no more biodiesel. All that was left to them was to ration the fuel they had, and stay within the walls. Krosse turned and began to ascend the treacherously slippery walkway confident at least of anywhere he might have been this evening he was in one of the few remaining, best places possible.