Page 51 of Rising

“He’s not wrong, but neither are you,” Seth decided, eyeing him from the corner of his eyes as they all faced me, awaiting my decision.

“Fine. You can go. But only because that means there’s a strong chance you won’t come back.” I threw him a fake grin, teeth shining, before flipping Riley and Seth off in response to ganging up on me.

I succumbed to the silence of the room as Seth met my eye. We were thinking the same thing. We needed a way to approach this mission without Alexiares knowing of Seth’s abilities.

He couldn’t get inside his head without him knowing Seth was there, and that was a secret we both weren’t yet ready to expose. Which made Alexiares a liability. Meant whoever else we sent out needed to be people we trusted completely, to study Alexiares and ensure he could be trusted. But we also had to make sure they were capable of doing a thorough job of investigating what was left of the site.

Seth groaned. “Ahh, fuck it. I’m in,” he said a tad too enthusiastically, like brother like sister. “I could use a bit of action right now. It’s been too calm around here, anyway.”

There was fear dancing in his eyes, but also excitement at the idea of violence. My stomach turned. I hoped I’d made the right decision for once.

Alexiares

“We go on foot from here.” I hopped off one of Seth’s horses outside of a few stables in Lake Tahoe.

I’d taken them on the longest route here, hanging wide to avoid the friction near Sacramento. That and they hadn’t bothered clearing any of the interstate this way. Most travel was that way now. The fastest way being the longest simply because the shortest way was the one everyone took when flocking out to wherever.

His horses and his men were well trained, covering about fifty miles a day, clearly bred for both speed and endurance. It was impressive. The horse he’d provided me with moved with preternatural grace and power. Each one of her strides hitting the ground with precision, never tiring. Her soft neighs and huffs indicating she was almost irritated when we stopped each night.

We’d pushed them hard over the last four days, riding as long as the sun would allow us to. There’d be plenty of days to rest once we’d made it here. Luck was on our side, each late August storm passing over us. Though the static in the sky suggested our luck had run out. Most of the ride had been easy going. We were able to outride most of the undead we’d come across, and Seth and his men easily blew through the more stubborn ones who stood in our way. Our pace was quick enough that sound wasn’t much of a concern. We’d be long gone once anything made its way to where we previously had pranced.

The sun had been relentless, beating down on us all day, but as we approached the lake near sunset, the air took a frigid turn. Seth’s red hair plastered to his head as he removed his cowboy hat and hopped off his horse. The word ‘idiot’ resonated with me when I looked at him. All of them. Sporting a long sleeve cotton shirt tucked into his slim fitting jeans, his riding boots made an impression against the bottom cuffs. Insisting the material not only protected him from the sun during the day, but also the cold air in the night.

He removed his riding gloves next, taking in our surroundings. “What’s the plan? Looks like it’s ‘bout to rain.”

The other men gathered their packs from the back of their horses. There were six of us. They’d decided that the smaller the party, the less attention that would be drawn. Large party or not, if someone wanted us gone, they’d figure out a way. Hell, the size of a party never stopped me from getting the job done.

“There’s an old campground not too far ahead. We can hole up there for the night. I found a tent with a … not so happy ending inside that had some canned goods, expired but edible. We can save what we got.” One of Seth’s men searched my eyes, lip pulling in disgust.

I shrugged it off, used to the judgment and disappointment and walked towards the trail. Most of the trip was ridden in silence. Seth didn’t talk nearly as much as his sister. Where Reina had been welcoming and forthcoming answering any questions, whether I asked them or not, Seth had been relatively standoffish. I noticed he did that a lot, stayed in the background. Him and Riley both did though the two of them didn’t interact much.

Seth rode next to me most of the way here, studying me. An unyielding gaze as he bore a hole into the side of my damn head. That was fine by me. I was watching him too. From what I knew, he’d only recently entered his current position, and despite the tension between them, he and Amaia appeared to be relatively close. Their tempers evenly matched, cut from the same cloth. He hadn’t fought in the last war as a lieutenant. But who was to say he was completely absolved from the sins of the past?

We reached the campsite just as night took over the sky. The storm had passed over us, stars now lighting some of our way. The orange and gray tent was only a few feet away from the convenience store near the main road. It was pretty clear what you would find if you entered the tent, which is why I’d assumed no one had ever done so in the first place.

“Ah, that reeks,” one of Seth’s guys said as he ran towards the road to throw up.

The smell of death smacked the air as I quickly opened the tent, reaching my arm in and grabbing a few cans without so much of a gander inside. There was no need to take a peek around. I’d seen all I needed for the first time. Someone who couldn’t take it anymore, and what remained of them was left splattered against the tent, their body dusted into a slump.

“Didn’t know you brought children with us,” I said, smirking at Seth as I zipped the tent back up.

Something about the way he watched me made me uncomfortable. Both him and his little girlfriend. While most conversations I’d had with her had felt unfocused, her eyes looking through me, the weight of his gaze was like ice, heavy and cold. As if he were looking right at me, seeing the core of who I was.

He opted not to entertain my comment. “Where are we sleeping?”

Man of few words indeed. “Yep, this way,” I said, leading them down the dirt path towards the lakeside.

* * *

Seth pulledout a map from his bag and spread it over the table inside while one of his men held a small ball of fire in the palm of his hand to light the space. The remaining four spread out inside and outside the cabin to secure the area. It was darker here now that the tall pine trees covered most of the night sky.

“We’re here”—I pointed to a spot on the map—”Camp Richardson.”

He nodded his head. “We should stick towards the water. It’ll give us easy access to a food source for a good leg of the rest of the way, not to mention give us a nice barrier. Less to worry ‘bout.”

“Or it traps us. Only way out is through the water,” I countered.

No wonder they were easy to compromise, their thought process was one-dimensional. Simple, easy to predict.

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