Author's Note: I regret nothing.
'Til Kingdom Come
Chapter Nine
Cain
He would never understand why he'd agreed to do it.
They were getting close.
And there wasn't a single fibre of his being that didn't want to turn around and head back to Central City before he did something he was going to regret.
Otherwise, everything was fine.
If Cain was to be honest with himself – and only himself – he would have to admit, he'd never expected the trip to go as smoothly as it had. Exactly what he had expected to go wrong, storms or floods or wild Papay, Longcoat attack or stonemen invasion, it didn't really matter. Smooth, by and large, was not a term that Cain was wholly familiar with.
Trouble he knew, trouble he could manage, could deal with and move on to the next bump or bend or whatever the road had in store for him. It was the damn waiting for trouble, that's what he didn't like, the anxiety of it that gnawed with needle teeth, always at the back of his mind.
The route had been too quiet and too still, and the longer the world waited to come crashing down on his head, the worse it was going to be when it finally did.
That was only common sense, which, as it turned out, also appeared to be one of the very few things he shared with his companions.
The feeling of impending doom, that was, and sure as hell not the common sense.
If only.
Though it was of little comfort, Captain Lindsey seemed to have his own grim outlook of things. The young ex-coat had barely said ten words since leaving through the south gate, and his silence had only deepened the farther from the city they'd gotten. While Cain was hardly one to criticize such a pensive demeanour, the darkness that filled the captain's head was written clear across his face.
Before this damnable task had fallen into their laps, Cain could not have rightly said he'd gotten a proper measure of Carver Lindsey. Without the cloying opulence of Alta Torretta to colour his world-view with gilt and glass and forlorn hope, with only the broken promise of yellow brick winding its way through the forest of ancient oak and sentinel pine, Cain was seeing a different side of the young man who'd spent near to every council session glowering next to Azkadellia and throwing casual insults at his son.
Here was a soldier, cautious and weary, beaten and bowed. Here was a man, much further into manhood in mind than in body, who knew that the slightest shift in the political winds could bring about a swift rise or treacherous fall.
Cain could spare a little understanding for a man trying to find his footing in the changing world. Hell, he could spare more than a little. In a strange way, Lindsey reminded him of his own son – not exactly a sentiment he'd be sharing with Jeb, that was for damn sure, but it allowed for a little leniency.
As for the other –
The scout that Jeb had sent with them, Jeremy Hass, was a man of close to twenty-five annuals. His shaggy brown hair fell into dark eyes almost hidden behind a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. Central born, Jeb had said, and a fighter for no guild. Loyal only to the city and not to the crown, Jeb had called him keen-eyed and the best scout in his small, fractured faction, though how exactly Hass had come to fight for Jeb, his son had never said.
It seemed Cain was doomed to be surrounded by younger men, fighters who could scarcely remember a time before the famine, when the Zone had known bounty and prosperity and peace. Kids who'd gone to fight not for a royal house that could not protect them, or a kingdom that was falling to pieces around them, but for a bit of a meal and a dry bed and a chance to fight the Longcoats.
No hope for liberation, no dreams of a country rebuilt, a queen returned to her throne. Just a desire to fight against evil before it consumed everything and everyone they loved.
Not a one of them had expected victory, just as the Longcoats had not anticipated defeat.
Just as Cain himself had not expected freedom. Death had not come for him in that iron prison. Instead, hope opened the door, and turned her sky eyes on him, and belief had seen them through the rest, whatever else was thrown in their way.
He had thought he owed it to DG to stay, and rebuild. Pledge himself and his service to the house whose name she now bore. But out here in the southern wilds, the brick route but a crooked, overgrown track before him, he had to wonder if it had been the right thing after all.
His doubt had haunted at him all the first day. Anxiety settled heavy upon him.
When night fell, they made their camp deep in the woods, far off the road just north of the gorge, so close to the cliffs that the constant roar of the falls could be heard in the distance. They did not risk a fire; they did not set a watch.
Cain didn't sleep much that night, and the stiff rustle of the bitter wind through the pine boughs kept him miserable company. The grey of dawn and the songs of the sparrows did little to cheer him. An uneasiness had taken up inside of him, crept right into his marrow, unshakable.
He hurried the others that day, eager to get their bad business done. There was no route patrol that far south, and the bridge was unguarded. That did not, however, mean that it was not being watched. By the southern guild or the renegade Longcoats, or hell, even by a few wayward bandits hoping to make an bit of easy coin harassing travellers. They met no one, however, and crossed the gorge unhindered.
A few hours north of Finaqua, they reached an unmarked crossroad and left the brick route to head west, deeper into the lake country. Hass left them to ride ahead. This deep in the south, Cain's only worry was the guild and its leader, Bowen Reid, a man as arrogant and unpredictable as the Longcoats he hunted and hanged – without trial, it was said, before crowds of jeering guildfighters.
The road narrowed, and the trees closed in. The terrain began to seem familiar to Cain, and then all too soon, it was familiar, and he knew what lay beyond the next bend, and the next.
Hass was waiting for them in the clearing that had once been Jeb's camp.
"It's all clear, sir," said the scout. He'd taken his rifle from its sheath on his saddle and slung it across his back. "The suit is still where you said it'd be. Didn't get too close, can't say for sure if –"
Cain held up a hand to silence the scout, and then dismounted. He drew back his duster and unbuckled his own holster, a simple precaution but one that always soothed him just the same. He gave his horse an affectionate pat before he tethered her securely to a nearby paper birch.
They weren't going to be long, one way or another.
Hass and Lindsey followed after him on foot. He knew the way, though there was no path to follow. When he found the old tree, a gnarled and ancient beast of a thing, he had to force his legs to keep moving. If the men at his back noticed the falter in his step, he hoped to hell they'd pass it off as a stumble over an unseen rock or root.
He was no coward, but he'd never intended to come back to that damnable place. He'd been willing to pass justice into the hands of those whose duty it was to administer it, and had thought himself a better man for the acceptance.
But here he was, hand-picked by Azkadellia herself to fetch this prisoner that was of such great importance to her, no matter the past, no matter the hate, no matter the swallowed pride.
He climbed the short embankment, and there it was, the iron suit, down in its little hollow. It was if he'd stepped away only for a moment, as if it were the same cold morning when he'd brought Jeb to see just what he'd done – but no, it was different as well, warm and still, the glare of the afternoon sun dancing off the burnished shell of the suit now, no pale morning light and dew still fresh upon the grass.
"Let's get him out of there," Cain muttered, mostly to himself.
"You're not worried he'll try to run?" asked Lindsey, his dark brow furrowed.
Cain shook his head. "He won't run," was all he said. There was no need to elaborate.
He made his way down into the hollow, crashing noisily through the undergrowth, announcing his presence. He hadn't made it halfway there before the banging started up, frenzied from the first, and some truly awful choked and ragged shouts.
He motioned for the others to stand back before he removed the bolts and let the suit swing open.
The overpowering stench of rust and sweat rushed out, and Cain barely caught sight of Zero's eyes, all whites and wild panic, before he slumped to the ground. He didn't bother to try break his own fall, his face pressing deep into the damp leaves and needles that covered the forest floor, his arms and legs folding beneath him like a rag doll. For one hellishly long moment, Zero's great, gasping breaths were all that Cain could hear.
With a grumbling sigh, Cain hunkered down. There was no sympathy in him, only an empty pit where once his vengeance had burned. He gave Zero's filthy shoulder a hard shove.
"You know where you are?" he asked, his voice carrying an edge he rarely found the need to use.
Zero coughed violently, and rolled onto his back. His eyes focused sharply on the face above him. "At the feet of a hero," he said, cords rasping with disuse. "How's that boy of yours?"
Instead of answering, Cain grabbed Zero by the back of his tattered shirt and stood, hauling him to his knees. Zero spat on the ground next to Cain's feet.
"Never mind your boy, how's the girl doing, Cain? Now what would the wife say abou–"
The next time Zero spat, it was a mouthful of blood and a bit of broken tooth through a split lip.
"Tie him up," Cain said to Hass, turning away. He stalked off toward the clearing, his fingers still twitching, his knuckles still numb.
Their prisoner put up no resistance in the end. Even with only four weeks in the suit, he was as weak and unsteady as a newborn colt. But Cain had a sense there was more to it than that. The truth of it was, a man like Zero wouldn't run off blind into the woods even if his legs could carry him.
There was no doubt in Cain's mind that Zero had peered through his tiny, dirty window to see the world go dark the day of the double eclipse, and saw, too, the light wash over his hollow of isolation once again. He'd have known every first sunrise and every second sunset since. Maybe he'd even managed to keep track of the days.
Zero would already know the sun schemes of the Sorceress had failed. That didn't mean the war was over, not to a man who'd been locked up with nothing but a porthole and a patch of primal forest to watch over. No, for Zero, everything would still be very much hanging in the balance.
Cain really hated to be the one to break it all to him.
The shadows of afternoon were growing long before they were back on the road again, heading north. None of them were looking forward to spending another night in the forest, this time with a prisoner to watch over, but at least they could make it back to the brick route before dark. Cain hoped he could push them to make it as far as the southern edge of the gorge, even if it meant a little travel by moonlight.
The hours and the afternoon passed, and the road slipped away behind them. The scout Hass rode ahead, while Captain Lindsey brought up the rear, trying to keep a decent distance between himself and the prisoner.
Maybe it was the fresh air or the dusky sky, or perhaps the verdant forest that did it, but Zero began to grow bolder, even bound as tight as he was. The reins of the horse that carried him were tied to Cain's own saddle, but it didn't faze Zero in the least. The cool breeze seemed to invigorate him, sharpening his senses – and his tongue.
"So how flies the Shining City?" he asked casually, as if he'd only enquired after the weather.
"Central City is free," Cain said, not bothering to spare a look back. "Lavender sits at the head of the Silver Council."
"But not on the throne," Zero said, quickly catching that Cain had used no title. He laughed, derisive and ugly, and Cain clenched his teeth against the sound. "And what about the Sorceress? Your little slipper finally stop playing nice, get that business taken care of?"
"Azkadellia's army surrendered at the tower after the machine failed," Cain said, and it was all truth with none of the complicated detail – he didn't know himself how much history Zero was aware of, or how close he'd truly been to the Sorceress. Honestly, it wasn't something he wanted to know.
Zero snorted, and stared off into the trees, sullen and white-faced. "She never got her hands on the emerald, then," he said, breaking what had been a few solid minutes of blessed quiet.
"Matter of fact, she did," Cain said, allowing himself a smile that no one would see, "and it never made a lick of difference."
Silence fell over their party then, uneasy and thick, and to Cain, there was nothing sweeter than listening for a while to the trilling birds and humming insects, the sounds of hooves beating against the hard-packed dirt track, and the rush of the wind through the trees.
It was peaceful.
It didn't last.
He should have known trouble was coming, but he had somehow been under the misguided impression that he'd tied his troubles into a saddle and shut it up with cold truth and that he'd be able to pass it all off soon enough to someone whose soul didn't burn with regret and sorrow.
He should have been ready, on edge and prepared, so that when the pounding of galloping hooves came tearing through the cadence of his peacefulevening stroll, it wouldn't have surprised him in the least.
It was Hass riding toward them, all speed and no stealth, kicking up a cloud of dust behind him. "There's a blockade at the crossroad ahead, sir," he said, completely out of breath for all that it was his horse who had done the running.
"Calm down, kid," he said, pulling his own horse to a stop, and frowning as she gave what he took to be an indignant snort. "Who are we dealing with here?"
By that time, Lindsey had ridden up to them, still giving Zero a wide berth. "A blockade, you say? Are you sure it's no ambush?"
Hass scowled at the ex-coat who outranked him. "They aren't exactly laying in wait. Looks to be southern guild, sir. Twenty or so. General Reid is with them."
Cain raised an eyebrow. "You know Reid to see him?"
"Unfortunately, sir."
With a sick feeling settling quick and quiet inside his gut, Cain looked wearily around, first to his companions, grim and ashen, and then to Zero, a doomed, heartless husk of a man, and it was with little dismay and much relief that he found he had neither the will nor the desire to fight this fight.
"Right," he said slowly to himself, his eyes and his thoughts lingering on Zero. "Well, I guess we'd better go say hello."
