I had little confidence that I would leave Pandemonia alive.
I held Adam snugly, feeding him his third bottle, while Eli and Anabelle loaded up everything they could fit in the car except what they’d insisted I carry in the bag Ana had packed for me.
“Okay.” Eli set the full backpack at my feet. “Remember, we’ll be traveling down old Interstate 70, toward what used to be Salina, Kansas. If you make it out of Pandemonia anytime in the next week, you should be able to catch us in a car. Adam will be waiting for you.”
“Thank you,” I said. Anabelle held her arms out for the baby, but I clutched him tighter until he began to squirm. “If you run into the rest of Anathema, tell them what we’ve figured out and how. Tell them where I am and why. But stay with the Lord’s Army, Ana. Promise me you’ll keep Adam with Eli and his people.”
She frowned. “But Maddock and Devi and Reese…They’re stronger and faster, and they’d do anything to protect us—”
I laid one hand on her arm to be sure I had her full attention. “The Lord’s Army fights demons when they have to. When evil brings the fight to them. Anathema will always belookingfor that fight. That’s what exorcists were born to do. But even if any of them knew how to take care of a baby, that kind of life isn’t safe for Adam.”
“But you’re an exorcist,” she pointed out. “All that goes for you too.”
“I’ll worry about that if I survive Pandemonia.” But the chances of that were slimmer than either of us wanted to admit.
“But…”
Eli stepped between Anabelle and me and pulled me into a hug, careful not to squish the baby. “Meeting you and your friends has been among the greatest honors of my life.”
Ana pulled him away from me by one arm, scowling. “She’s not going to die!”
Eli frowned down at her. “Life holds no such guarantee, and the odds don’t improve when you march into a city full of demons.” He turned back to me while Anabelle watched us through wide, worried eyes. “You’re going to need this.” He removed his cowboy hat, turned it around, then set it on my head, over my objections. “Sunscreen only goes so far. This will shade your face and protect your eyes from the glare.”
“Thank you,” I said when I realized he wasn’t going to change his mind.
“In about thirty miles, you might run into another division of the Lord’s Army. In the spring they like to harvest patches of spinach, radishes, and asparagus that grow wild a few miles north of I-70. Their elder, Brother Malachi, is my maternal grandfather, and our divisions share many relatives. If you see them, show them the hat and tell them I sent you. They will give you shelter and watch over you while you rest.”
“Thanks again, Eli.”
He smiled and began walking backward around the front of the car. “Go with the Lord, Nina Kane.” His words had the ring of a final goodbye, and my throat tightened at the thought.
I placed the baby in Anabelle’s arms as Eli slid into the driver’s seat, and when she got into the car and closed the door, I leaned in through the open window to kiss my nephew on the forehead. He smelled like wet wipes and formula, and I was sure that for the rest of my life, even if I lived to be a hundred years old, I would forever associate that combination of scents with grief, hope, determination, and the cruel suspicion that I would never again see any of the people I loved the most.
As Eli and Anabelle drove east on old Interstate 70, carrying with them my last living relative, I picked up the bag they’d packed for me and tossed it over my shoulder. I watched the car until it disappeared into the horizon, and then I turned and headed west, with nothing but the bag on my back, determination in my step, and my eyes on the goal.
Pandemonia.
Ready or not, here I come.
By my estimate, I’d been walking for eight or nine hours, not counting several stops to relieve myself, when I saw smoke rising into the sky to the north. I felt like I’d maintained a good pace, but since I had no watch and lacked Eli’s ability to accurately tell time by looking at the sky, I could only guess that I’d gone about thirty miles. Which meant I might be seeing smoke from a campfire built by the Lord’s Army’s sister division Eli had mentioned.
I left Interstate 70 to veer north, and after walking for another quarter of an hour, I realized that the smoke plume didn’t look right. It was too thick—more like a bonfire than a small hearth for each family unit. And the smoke was too dark, as if they were burning gas or oil rather than wood.
Something was wrong.
My pulse swishing in my ears, I pushed myself faster in spite of my aching feet and legs, and half a mile later the source of the smoke came into sight. It wasn’t a bonfire. It was the charred remains of a camper similar to the one Damaris drove while two of the Army’s young women held school for the children in the back.
On the ground next to the camper lay two dead horses. Scattered in all directions from the fire were other signs of violent chaos. Clothing stomped into the dirt. Dented pots and pans. Scattered piles of freshly picked radishes and unwashed spinach. Hand-carved wooden toys and homemade leather pouches. Cowboy hats, most stomped into the ground and stained with blood.
Eli’s sister division had been attacked, and other than half a dozen horses now grazing several hundred feet across a field full of knee-high wild grass, I couldn’t find any signs of life. But the closer I looked at the carnage, the more death I found.
Two bodies lay on the ground near the dead horses, one a young man about my age whose leg had been crushed by the fallen animal, probably only moments before his head was crushed by…something else. Something blunt and deadly.
Two older women lay near an unlit campfire, both twisted into unnatural positions. Their arms were covered with defensive wounds—one was obviously broken—and both had succumbed to gaping wounds in their chests. When my horrified gaze snagged on a gore-covered ax on the other side of the camp, I recognized the instrument of their deaths.
There were several more corpses scattered around the campsite, and as I inspected the damage I realized three things about the slaughter I’d missed by no more than a few hours. One: not one of the bodies was ripped open, which told me they hadn’t been attacked by degenerates. Two: most of the bodies wore soft leather sleep clothes, which told me they’d been attacked late at night or early in the morning. And three: assuming this division was at least the size of Eli’s, there were far too few corpses.
Most of the victims had been taken.
