Chapter 14
By the time Daryl slammed on the breaks and careened to a stop just outside the circle of RVs and strategically placed fence panels that made up the perimeter of the RennFaire camp, he knew that he didn't ever want to try to make that trip in the dark again. Carol was pale and silent beside him, having said she was fine right up until the moment she drifted off to sleep and no matter how loud he yelled or how many times he shook her shoulder she wouldn't wake up. He'd been counting her breaths for the past two miles, and now there were weapons pointed at them and he didn't see Merle.
"Merle! Need your Doc!" He yelled, knowing it would draw the dead but hell, there were a half dozen armed people around, they could handle it. Weren't no herd behind him. He raised his hands toward the windshield, making sure they were in clear sight and obviously empty, then leaned his head out the driver's side window and shouted again. "Merle!"
Just a few stragglers stumbling down the road changed direction when he shouted, and he could make out the sound of a couple more shuffling around in the trees.
"Shush, you tryin' to kill us all!"
Merle's voice was rough and pissed off and familiar, and something inside of Daryl that had been spinning off its axis righted itself again. "Carol's hurt. Get your Doc."
The man was already there, leaning in the passenger door Daryl didn't recall anyone opening, and running his hands all over her. "Bitten?"
"Hell no. Bullet grazed her head. Kinda deep and it bled a lot, but she was walkin' and talkin' when we started this way."
"We'll take her inside —"
"It's her head."
"Daryl," Merle all but shouted, opening the door and reaching out to grab Daryl's upper arm, "Get out the damned truck. Get inside the perimeter. We ain't talkin' out here."
"You take her," Daryl said. He thought maybe he'd said that a couple of times. "I don't know this asshole. I'm comin'. Just gotta get my damned breath."
"The bullet in his leg needs to come out, the sooner the better" an unfamiliar voice said. The accent was off.
"I'm good. Ain't that bad. Had worse."
"Let me see your eyes, little brother." Merle was sober. He could tell, because a stoned Merle never got the look on his face that this Merle was wearing. Daryl sat there, breathing through the pain, and let him look. "Yeah, you good. I've got him, y'all take care of her."
"Truck's full of our stuff. Lots of stuff. Can pay for the Doc. Can trade some, even. Ain't need no charity."
"Nobody's touchin' your shit, Daryl. Know how you get over your bits and bobs. Probably done got a box stashed in the corner with Winter wrote on there in Sharpie and it ain't even good and spring yet."
"Shut up, Merle." He'd had plans for winter. He'd told Carol that there wasn't any point in counting on anything they did today being what needed done tomorrow, but they'd still planned. The big things.
They were going to have a garden. Build a smokehouse. Fix the fences.
He knew better. He knew better than to go thinkin' he'd get to keep anything like that.
Carol was laid out on a bunk inside one of the RVs, an actual IV stuck in her arm and a lanky man leaning over her, shining a penlight in her eyes. She squirmed, pulling away from him, and Daryl didn't realize he'd started to step toward them until the throb in his leg intensified.
"She don't like bein' loomed over or touched all of a sudden like that. And tell her who the hell y'are, even when she's asleep."
Merle made some kind of sound behind him that would probably come back and bite Daryl in the ass later.
"Hi there Pot, meet Kettle," Carol muttered. Her words were slurred, but she'd turned her head toward him, wide-eyed and blinking. "I passed out in the truck."
Daryl felt like his breaths were bringing in oxygen for the first time since she muttered something about a migraine and drifted off.
"She good, Doc?" Merle asked. He was so close that Daryl could feel his chest moving behind him. He hated that it made him feel calmer, and he hated that he hated it. Weren't nothin' he needed to ponder right at this moment, though, so he shoved it right back out of his head.
Doc made a humming sound in the back of his throat. "I'd like to keep an eye on her for a while. I don't like that she lost consciousness again, but everything appears to be fine. It's not been so long that I can't stitch the wound, as well. That will minimize any scarring."
"She's right here," Carol snapped.
Daryl grinned.
The Doctor sighed, but nodded, "You're right. I should ask you if you would prefer the scar. It may actually be quite impressive. A good three inches long, running up into your hairline."
"I can feel where it is," Carol said. Her tone had softened considerably. "I just don't appreciate being talked about like I'm not here."
Merle made a sound somewhere between a cough and a snort, "Yeah, I'm startin' to get it."
"You want me to stay?" Daryl asked.
"I want someone to look at your leg," Carol said.
Daryl shrugged, "That's gonna wait 'til your all fixed up. Ain't no hurry."
"I'll stitch up Daryl. Save the Doc some time," Merle said. Daryl stiffened.
"I can —"
"Come on, then. Best get it over with."
Daryl was back outside and following Merle across the camp before he knew he'd decided to cooperate.
"You swear it's okay to leave her alone with that guy?"
"Don't get your panties in a bunch, he's a good guy. Prissy as all get out and whines a lot, but a hell of a lot better in a fight than you'd expect him to be." Merle had stripped out of the worn denim jacket he was wearing and spread it on top of the picnic table. He pounded his fist against the table in a familiar gesture.
"I ain't dropping my pants in the middle of the damned camp, Merle."
"Should hope not. Set your ass down, I'm just gonna cut what of your jeans I gotta. It still in there?"
"Told Carol it was a graze. Ain't in deep. Think I just caught a ricochet, but I ain't looked yet."
Jerry appeared with a joint in one hand and a bottle of booze in the other. "Pick your medicine."
"What'll they cost me?"
"It's on me," Jerry said. "But for future reference, we are in the new economy, where all things from before they stopped making things are worth more than anything that grows in nature. But this really is medicine. Doc catches anybody recreating they'll kicked out for wasting vital resources." The words sounded oddly rehearsed, and the big man was making some kind of face, his eyes darting toward Merle every few seconds.
Wait a second. "You tellin' me the Doctor is the King these days?"
"He's tryin' to tell ya that I ain't the only one around here that likes stuff a little too much, and we all decided that most of it has more important uses, anyway."
"Yeah? What use the Meth got?"
Merle stiffened, then nodded as if to himself and said very quietly, "Ain't none of that shit anywhere near here."
"Shit, I knew that the second I looked atcha. Ain't what I'm askin'."
"I ain't lookin' for it, neither," Merle said. "Now, your turn. You got anybody ridin' up behind you?"
"Not that I know. Killed two. Left the third hogtied in the hall with a pack of Walkers closin' in."
Merle froze, then shook himself and leaned over Daryl's leg. "You taking a swig, or we doin' this without anesthetic?"
"Dammit, Merle, at least dip the damn knife in the alcohol or somethin'!" Daryl grabbed for the bottle and took a healthy swig. It burned something fierce going down and he fell into a coughing fit. "Damn."
Merle was gaping, "Y'ain't done that since you was twelve."
"Damn twelve-year-old shouldn't be fuckin' drinkin', Merle."
"You was the one what did it," Merle said, chuckling. He gave their companion a look, the one that Daryl had known deep down was coming but had been putting off thinking about.
Jerry had disappeared the booze and the pot when Daryl wasn't looking, and right on cue he laid himself across Daryl's chest, grabbing for his wrists while he did it. And, just like every other time some asshole held him down while Merle did what had to be done, just as soon as the weight was on top of him, before his hands were even restrained, Daryl was somewhere else.
He fought.
It hurt like a son of a bitch, too, but Merle was quick even if he weren't gentle, and by the time he was finished digging around in Daryl's thigh the Doc was there with his needle and thread and bandages.
"I got this, Doc," Merle said, reaching for the supplies.
"Now you're a nurse?" Doc said, sounding put upon.
Daryl gave the guy credit for not asking what the hell was going on. He was pretty sure he'd yelled something fierce on top of everything else.
"Fuckin' wet nurse to this one. Damn kid kicks like a mule, too, best you let me handle it."
"Shut up, Merle. I say shit?" His throat was sore and he was having a hard time catching his breath.
"You're cool, Daryl," Jerry said, grinning. He was rubbing the side of his head, though, and Daryl thought he saw a bruise.
Still, it may not have been too bad. His chest was on fire, and he was still breathing hard, but no one seemed too disturbed.
"Get away from him." Well, almost no one. Shit. The thing was, she didn't even sound upset. Her voice was soft, almost quiet, but the gun she was pointing at Merle wasn't even shaking a little. "I killed somebody I didn't even know over toilet paper and pickled beets. What do you think I'll do to somebody who hurts Daryl?"
"Hey, Carol, it's fine. It's okay." He tried to make their sign for safe, but he hadn't really caught his breath yet, and everything seemed frozen in amber. It was Carol. And Merle. And a gun.
"Hope like hell you'll kill their ass, too." Merle said. Daryl couldn't ever remember him sounding gentle in the way he was sounding right now. Probably thought Carol'd lost her senses or something. "I ain't hurt him none, lady. Had a bullet in his thigh. Took it out. Gonna have to hold him down again to stitch him up, but I ain't hurtin' him. Not really."
"Daryl?"
He swallowed hard. "Rather you didn't kill my brother for fixin' me up. Besides bein' a waste of a bullet, I kinda like him. Sometimes."
"You — you made this sound."
"Hurts less if you yell, yeah?"
He could see her throat work as she swallowed back something that he wished like hell he didn't know was a fuckin' memory.
"Okay, then." She lowered the gun and took an unsteady step toward them. She still looked pale, and there was a thin line of stitches that started on her temple and disappeared into her hairline, but she was on her feet and lucid and damned if she hadn't just held a gun on Merle because she thought he hurt Daryl. And she meant it.
His brother was staring at her with an expression that Daryl couldn't identify but was one hundred percent certain he didn't like.
"Get your ass over here, girlie. Gonna show you how to sew a hole. This one collects them. Don't get too close, though, he'll kick ya in the face if I lose my hold." Merle nodded at Jerry, and it started all over again.
The yelling drew Walkers, but not as many as it could have. There was an advantage to taking the things out with bows. Fighting them off didn't make enough noise to draw more toward you. Daryl was only vaguely aware that they'd posted more sentries than usual, but eventually he and Carol found themselves seated at the table with Merle, Doc, and a man named Ian.
"Three of 'em," Daryl said. "Thought at first we surprised them and they was just lootin', but then one of 'em grabbed Carol and — man, he just started ramblin' on about takin' her to a place where she could live her old life or some shit."
"A community?" Ian said. There was something in his tone that bothered Daryl a little.
"I didn't get the impression it was optional. A community what ain't optional didn't sound like somethin' I wanted to know any more about."
"I do," Doc said, softly.
"The hell?"
Merle was nodding, though. "Yeah. Could be them."
"Could be who?"
"Someone has been systematically cleaning out the area. Collecting anything and everything useful. We haven't found anything in quite some time, but we started out with more than most because of the situation," Doc said. "I would very much like to know exactly where this so-called community is located. Whether we want to interact or not, we need to know who they are, where they are, and what their reaction may be to us." He pinched the top of his not inconsiderable nose. "If we have to move, best to do so now, in the early spring."
Daryl nodded, then tried to catch Carol's eye. When he did, he didn't have any doubt that she agreed.
"Don't know what'll be left of the place we had. It's took a hell of a beating, and we left one alive. Thought we'd go back, maybe, after he told his people that we took everything worth a shit and headed out. Take the RVs? All this shit? Could set up there, reinforce the fences. We was just about to get started plantin'."
"They know where you are, though. And we still don't know where they are."
Carol coughed, then said in as clear a voice as he'd ever heard her use, "But how often do they go back to a place they've already cleared out? I mean, you've seen all sorts of places they've been, but have you ever seen them there?"
Merle was frowning. "They just wanted her? Didn't ask you if you wanted to join their little club? 'Cause that's a whole different level of bad than what we were thinkin'. One thing to go out collecting people and things. Somethin' altogether different to go grabbin' women folk away from they people."
Daryl shrugged, but found he couldn't look his brother in the eye. "Didn't hear much, really. Had his hand around her neck, and I just kinda — didn't have a conversation with him, Merle."
"Tell me every damned thing you remember, Darleena."
Carol stiffened next to him, and Daryl whistled out a signal that everything was good.
Daryl walked them through everything he could remember, from the first sounds that told him a vehicle had passed them by and going out to walk the fences to their return to the house and the eventual discovery of two men looting their cellar. They split up, so that when they confronted the men, they would have them surrounded.
"There was a third man," Daryl he said around whatever had lodged itself in his throat. "Shoulda thought about it. Never shoulda —"
"Oh." Carol whispered. She'd gone pale again. "I couldn't remember. Not that part."
"Anyway, weren't no more conversation than I said. Not that I remember anyway."
"He said he was going to —" Carol stopped in the middle of her sentence and swallowed hard. "There were threats other than my old life."
"They figured out that part a while ago," Daryl whispered. No one at the table seemed surprised that she'd referred to her old life as a threat. For that matter, no one seemed to have been surprised that he'd reacted to it like it was a threat, either. He moved his leg over a little on the bench, until he feel the warmth of hers next to it and he knew that she could feel his own body heat.
"Get a good damned idea what he said he was gonna do," Merle agreed. "Worthless piece of shit, it sounds like. World's better off without that one in it."
Because Merle was an asshole and a drug addict and very frequently a jackass, but he didn't put up with rapists or people who beat on their families.
"Woodbury," Daryl said, frowning.
"What?" Carol was frowning. "That sounds familiar.
"It's what the asshole called it. Said to that other one, 'when we get back to Woodbury'. Or it sounded something like that, anyway. Woodbury."
Doc said, "I suggest that we've done what we can for now. Merle, find your family a place to rest. Wake Carol every hour just to be sure that you can and that she can answer a few basic questions. Come get me if there are problems. In the morning, which is too few hours from now, we'll figure out how we're going to approach Woodbury."