Sly shuffled closer to Heather. “Me like Christmas. Alison didn’t give big prezzies. Said me didn’t need them. Steve used to give goodies. Remember that.”
Jim had heard about Alison Romero, Steve’s disaffected wife, from Kyle. Heard about the way she’d tried to hang on to Sly, though it didn’t seem as though she had an awful lot of love for the intensely lovable teenager. He wondered for a moment whether the woman had stayed up in Colorado.
“Old movies on TV,” said Heather, trying to sustain the memories.
“Relatives on the phone,” offered Carrie. “I can still remember talking to Mom an’ Dad, the time before they died. Christ, it’s only a couple of years ago. They were talking about the vacation they planned for their silver wedding. Revisiting some places from other trips. Yellowstone where…where they met that jackknifing semi… Glacier. Montana. Took me there. Many glaciers. The walk around the lake.” She was staring blankly down into the glowing flames, remembering. “Big dining room. Waiters and waitresses singing. The Grinnell hike. Grizzlies somewhere around.” She laughed. “Mom insisted on wearing a dozen of those bells around her neck to warn the bears that she was coming. Said it would be just her luck to get eaten by a deaf grizzly.”
Jim leaned back, his hand falling onto the cold butt of the Ruger Blackhawk Hunter. The sensation jerked him back from the worlds of Christmases past into the world of Earthblood present. And its menaces.
“Think we should post a guard, Carrie?” he said.
She turned slowly to him, her eyes not seeming to focus properly for several seconds. “Sorry, Jim. I was still walking those clean mountains with Mom and Dad.” She shuddered. “Wow, nostalgia’s a good country to visit now and again, but I don’t want to take out permanent residency there. Guard? Sure. Yeah, I guess we should’ve done that already. The smoke from this fire could bring anyone for miles.”
“Wind’s from the east.” Jim looked out. “Take the scent out to sea. And the snow’ll muffle it. But we can’t be too careful around here now after the shooting.”
In his heart, he’d realized that they hadn’t actually been very careful at all.
As they had stumbled along north, the flooded land behind them, his main desire had been shelter and warmth. Now they had both of those. But the person with the hunting rifle was still likely within a mile or so of them.
“Can I keep watch, Dad?”
“Dry out first. No going to see Doc Fenway if you get a chill out here.”
“I’ll go,” said Carrie. She stood up, running fingers through her tousled hair.
“Best we don’t stay here too long.” Jim also stood up and walked to peer from the doorway. The snow had eased, and there was only a gray drizzle.
It seemed as though they’d finally gotten away from the main area of quake devastation, and the hut looked out over an expanse of about a hundred paces of leaden mud and slime green boulders. Down to the sullen rolling breakers of the Pacific.
“Think he’ll come after us?” Carrie was at his shoulder, very close to him.
“Maybe not the gunman. But I just have the feeling that he wasn’t a casual local trying to discourage outlanders from coming calling.”
“Think he was put there by the Hunters of the Sun? They knew we stole the boat and knew that we’d be heading toward the north? Come on, Jim.”
“Maybe you’re right. Paranoia does real good business these days.”
“We pressing on?”
He turned. “To Aurora? Of course. What other kind of choice do we have?”
“None, I guess.”
Heather was huddled closer to the fire. The flames were bright gold and crimson, and Sly was staring into their heart as though he could see pictures wonderful beyond imagining. Neither of the young people was paying any attention to the conversation between Carrie and Jim.
“You don’t seem sure, Carrie.”
“Just that we keep running. Running through all the death. Seeing killing. Losing friends, close friends.” Her voice was trembling on the edge of tears. “Killing other people. Being shot at when you don’t expect it.”