A/N: Announcements: I've e-published a FREE short story on Smashwords entitled "Diary of a Dead Muse." The link to it is on my profile. It's only 2,000 words. Check it out. Rate it! Review it! Also, The Book of the Nine Ides has a new cover. Take a look!
Chapter 7
Broken Legs
The forest began to sprout back to life beyond the barren hills, back where the 80s now roam. Although the trees around me are still leafless, the underbrush here is thick with fresh grass shoots and tender saplings. Brown mushrooms sprout out from the trees and ferns are rising from the ashes.
A large swath of this foliage is spattered with blood; a long, dripping trail of red blobs.
Twil and I instinctively follow it, salivating at the promise of a wounded brahmin or gecko at its end. All we've had to eat for two days were mushrooms.
Instead of a wounded animal, the blood leads us to a girl. She is lying in a clump of tangled weeds, stained dark red with her blood.
I look down and see that both of her legs are broken; shattered to the point where they're unrecognizable.
It takes me a few seconds to confirm that the girl is really a girl. She's filthy; covered head to toe in blood, grit, and dead leaves. Her hair is tangled and matted. Her face and legs had been painted a bleach white that's now splattered with red streaks of blood. Where her shins should be, are two wads of exposed flesh with shards of white bones poking through them.
It looks as if someone has taken a sledgehammer to her legs. The pain must have been unimaginable. Now, her eyes are half closed. Her lips move slowly, mumbling to herself, feverishly, in some unfamiliar language.
I take in the grisly scene in silence for several moments.
"She's a White Leg." Twil says gravely. When she looks over at me, I can sense a glimmer of pain behind her dull, brown eyes. She kneels down next to the maimed girl and examines her legs.
The girl cringes at her touch.
"A dead White Leg." I mutter.
I draw my machete and take a practice stroke, cutting through the empty air with a whoosh. It's clear to me that this White Leg girl is in a lot of pain, and with both of her legs shattered, she has no hope of surviving in the wasteland.
In the legion, when a soldier or slave is maimed, their master is expected to give them a quick death. One swift strike to the neck is all it takes. All of their pain ends in an instant, and they die with dignity. Maybe even honor.
There's no evil in ending someone's suffering. How could there be? Even if the sufferer happens to be a young a girl.
Yet still. . .
I approach the girl with my machete drawn, steeling myself to do what must be done. Before I can, Twil notices the blade. The blood drains from her face. She rises to her feet and grabs my arm.
"No!" Twil knocks the blade away. "Put that down! What are you doing!"
"Look at her." I point at the pitiful little girl. "We should give her a clean death. Mercy."
"Mercy?" Twil hisses. Her body bristles. "Murder isn't mercy."
"Mata? Mata alya? Mata?"
The girl opens her eyes. They're glazed over with a mixture of shock, fear, and pain. She's younger than I'd thought at first. Very young. She's tall, but flat and shapeless, like a little girl who hasn't reached puberty.
I can't help but stare at the girl's shattered legs. The mess of blood, meat, and bone is one of the most horrific things I've ever seen, yet for a moment, I cannot look away.
"What did she say?"
"She's asking for her mother." Twil's voice cracks. "She's calling for her mother. . ."
Something about thatmakes the hair on the back of my neck tingle. I sheathe the machete and Twil rummages through her rucksack. She takes a small pouch of leaves out from the bag and begins to chew on them like cud. Once they've been reduced to mush, she smears the leaf-paste onto the girl's wounds.
The girl lets out a soft whimper but otherwise doesn't react. She's looking up at me with empty eyes. Hollow eyes; like those of a dying animal.
My stomach tightens. I feel like I'm falling into her eyes. Dead eyes.
I do not want to look at her any longer.
"That paint on her face and legs - is that why they're called White Legs? Do all of their women paint themselves up like that?"
Twil finishes with the leaf-paste, pulls out a small gourd, and washes the paint away with the last of our water.
"She's not a woman. She's a child. Eleven. Maybe twelve. White Legs are nomads. Anyone old enough to carry a weapon goes out with the raiding parties. She's a warrior. That's her war paint."
"She's a child." I say blithely.
Twil scowls and I look away, taking a moment to study our surroundings.
The forest is silent. Unnaturally still. I do not want to stay here. Something about this place is off. Evil.
"Mata? Mata alya? Mata?" The child continues to whisper.
I walk away from Twil and the little girl, leaning against a dead tree. The girl's cries are making me nauseous. I need to get away from her.
"Did the White Legs do this?" I trace the blood trail snaking across the ferns. "Or the 80s? They said they rode through here. . ."
Twil cuts through the girl's clothes with a kitchen knife. They're bloody rags now. She peeks between the girl's legs and looks up at me with a frown.
"If she'd run or disobeyed the White Legs, they would have killed her. She's been raped and maimed. Savage as they are, White Legs don't do that. It was the 80s. This is what they would have done to me. . .if you hadn't been there."
"Mata? Mata alya? Mata?"
The girl's moaning makes me clench my fists. I consider dragging Twil away from the little girl and ending her agony once and for all.
"If she's calling for her mother, her parents might be nearby. We should go. I doubt that she's out here alone."
"Her parents are dead to her." Twil sniffs. She takes her knife to the bottom of her robe and cuts off several thin strips of brahmin hide. "White Legs that can't walk have no use to the tribe. If they found her like this, they'd kill her, just like you would."
"What are you going to do to her?"
"I'm going to try to heal her. . . Just like I healed you." Twil says without hesitation. "That's my duty as a medicine woman. I swore an oath to Great Mother. A medicine woman must help anyone who's injured. Tribe doesn't matter. Legion, Yampa, New Canaanite, or White Leg."
"Are you going to poison her too?" I mutter. "Have a snake bite her? Maybe that would put her to sleep and keep her quiet for a little while."
Twil stands up from beside the broken girl. Her face is twisted in contempt. Her nose gurgles. I can feel her anger boiling.
"I healed you before I poisoned you. And I apologized. The venom was medicine. I would let a rad-snake bite her if I had one, but I let the one that bit you go."
"I was joking."
"Cam. Cam tu? Awhoool yo?"
Whatever herbal remedy Twil used on the girl seems to have had some effect. Her face has regained a bit of color. She paws at the ground with grubby hands and tries to sit up.
She shrieks when she looks down at her maimed legs.
I bite my tongue.
Twil gently eases the girl back down.
"Shhhh." Twil presses her finger to her lips. "Amasa lobe. Dikata. Sa. Shhh."
The girl squirms for a moment and then goes still. She's not looking at Twil anymore.
Her eyes are locked on me.
I shudder.
"We should go. She can't walk. She won't survive, no matter what kind of leaf-paste or healing powder you give her. We need to keep moving."
Twil glances up at me. I recognize that withering glare. It's the same look she gave me outside of the yao guai cave, just before she fired the shot that nearly took my ear off.
"Where are we going?"
"I don't know yet. I haven't decided. But it'll come to me. Let's go."
"You go." Twil turns her attention back to the girl. "I said I'd guide you to Ogden. Now you don't want to go to Ogden. You don't want to go anywhere. You're a wanderer. A wanderer doesn't need a guide. What good is a guide unless you have somewhere you want to get to?"
She's right, but I won't admit it. I have nothing to do. No aim. No destination. No goal.
What is left for me?
"Take me to California. Take me to the NCR."
"No." Twil shakes her head. "I agreed to guide you to Ogden. I don't know how to get to Galiforna. I'm going to gather some sticks to make splints for her legs. If you're going to go; then go. If not; help me."
I do neither. Instead, I sit down on an old, gnarled stump and watch Twil dig through the tangles of weeds and underbrush in search of straight twigs.
The little girl is still staring at me. I can't tell if she's really looking at me or past me. Maybe she's intrigued by my uniform. Maybe she can't see me at all. Her empty eyes look like death. Her murmurs cut into my soul.
Twil has gathered up a handful of sticks. She uses the strips she's torn from her robe to lash them around the little girl's legs. The girl screams as her legs are set back in place with the sickening sound of bone grinding on bone.
I grit my teeth and turn away. I hate screams. Girl's screams in particular.
"Do all legionnaires have such a weak stomach?" Twil mutters.
"No.. . .Why do you think the 80s broke her legs?"
"I don't know. Maybe just to be cruel."
"Are you any less cruel? She's still going to die. Her legs won't heal for months, and if they do, they'll heal crooked. The wasteland is no place for cripples. You're prolonging her suffering. She's better off dead than a cripple."
Twil has no retort. She cradles the little girl in her arms. The girl whimpers at first and then snuggles up against her.
"Where are you taking her?"
"Back to my village. White Tree." Twil licks her chapped lips. Her fingers are soaked in the little girl's blood. She rubs them off on her robes and delicately picks up her rucksack.
Twil is petite and her rucksack is heavy. I doubt that she'll be able to carry it and the girl for more than a few miles.
Twil is stubborn though. She'll stumble forward until the little girl dies in her arms. A sad fate, but stupid.
"You said you couldn't go back to your village."
"I can't but maybe she can. When the Mormons came to White Tree, they brought along a healer. They call him doctor. Maybe he'll heal her. Maybe he'll give her food and a bed. Maybe he won't, but there's nowhere else for her."
"If Jethro sees you, won't he kill you?"
Twil shrugs. "They still might keep the girl. I'm tired of being an outcast, Io. I'm tired of being alone."
I watch silently as Twil begins to walk off with the maimed girl, plodding through the forest. I feel a strong urge to follow her, although I don't know why. I do so at a distance, the same way Twil had followed me, as I blindly fumbled my way towards Ogden.
Unlike me, Twil never looks back. She talks to the girl in the White Leg's tongue. Sometimes I think I can hear the girl mumble back.
Eventually, Twil stumbles on a tree root and falls to her knees. The little girl wails as her broken legs smack against the hard ground.
The noise makes me cringe.
I walk over to Twil, nudge her aside, and pick up the little girl. The girl's sobbing now, but she goes silent at my touch.
Twil looks like she's about to say something but holds her tongue.
I cradle the girl in my arms as best I can. She's very light. I can feel blood trickling down my arms and dripping down my elbows.
"I'll carry her. You lead the way to White Tree. You'll wait outside of the village so no one sees you, and I'll take her into town."
Twil nods.
It's a day's walk to White Tree. I spend most of it looking down at the little girl. Her eyes are closed, but she's still mumbling to herself.
I ask Twil what she's saying.
"Please don't hurt me."
She is still in shock.
The longer I walk, the hotter the girl feels against my skin. Maybe it's a fever. I'm not sure. When I wrap her up in my robe, she sweats bullets, but when I remove it, she shivers.
I didn't want to carry this little girl. I'm still sure she's going to die, yet I carry her anyway.
I didn't want to follow Twill either, yet I did that too.
I suddenly realize why I wanted to leave the girl behind. It's the same reason why I wanted to leave Twil behind. I didn't want to get attached.
Life is so much simpler without any attachments; but it's far too late now.
I've already given the little girl a name befitting of a tribal.
Broken Legs.