“ Cross, you are so smooth,” Graves laughed. Cross didn’t answer.
Time crawled by. They hoped to only be stuck in the Bone March for two or three days at the most, but that first day had already felt like ten. The March smelled like bad eggs. They crossed sluggish streams of greasy gray water and shallow fields filled with black lichen and swollen fungus-covered patches of ice. The temperature grew noticeably colder, and after a time the air was filled with a semi-translucent freezing fog.
They crossed fields of aged bones, yellowed by time and the excess of sulfur in the air and the iron in the water. The bones lay in piles, protruded from the ground like stakes, or they hung from the branches of dead white trees.
Those trees were numerate. They were skeletal white, so unnaturally devoid of color they were like an absence, a missed spot on a painting or a tear in a photograph. The snaky roots jutted from the ground like frozen serpents. Black husks of prune-like fruit that seeped sickly purple juices dangled from gnarled limbs. The ground around the bases of the trees was pitted, as if eaten by acid.
Navigating the Bone March took its toll on them. There was no shade or cover, and the absence of any notable landmarks had a disheartening effect on Cross’ psyche. The ground remained soft and uneven, and consequently was difficult for the horses’ already weary legs to tread. The squad rested their mounts often, noting the thick and foamy sweat that developed near the animal’s necks and chests in spite of the incessant chill. The air tasted like salt.
This is taking too long, Cross thought. We have to hurry, or we’ll never stop her in time. We’ll never be there in time to save Snow. But they couldn’t go any faster, he knew that, they all knew that. They wouldn’t be able to stop Red at all if they pushed themselves too hard.
They finally passed some ruins, and they saw the hollow remains of a large stone building, whose stone pillars and crumbling walls were all that still stood. There was a lonely well, its bucket still on the ground, whose shaft led down into a lightless pit of briny black fluid. There was a long-abandoned motorcade, the skeletons of cars left to rust and fade in the frozen heat. These landmarks were fleeting, momentary distractions from the great black and red graveyard that surrounded them.
This, they knew, was what had become of the old human civilization, and if the vampires won the war, places like the Bone March would be all that was left. The vampires would lay everything to waste, and they’d rule over the blasted lands from the confines of their graveyard cities.
They made camp just before nightfall at the edge of a bluff next to a steep path that led to a rickety wooden bridge. The bridge, which looked less than stable with its splintered posts and rotting rope bindings, stretched over a thin but deep gorge. They decided it would be better to try and cross in full light, or what passed for full light there in the Bone March.
Cross sat warming his hands by the fire, nursing a flask of water and an open can of beans, when they heard the howls of wolves off in the distance.
“ Hooray,” Graves said, and he tossed the remainder of his coffee into the flames. The fluid was strangely combustible, which about summed up the quality of their coffee.
“ They’re still a good distance away,” Cristena said. She huddled inside of a thick green blanket, shivering and holding a steaming cup of the same dangerous coffee. “But we’d better keep our eyes out for them. There isn’t much for them to eat out here, except each other.”
“ And us,” Stone pointed out.
“ How can they even survive out here at all?” Graves asked. The crackling flames cast them all in flickering shadows.
“ Not much lives here,” Cristena explained. “The March can trap you. It’s unnatural, and it’s easy for an animal to get lost here. Some things wander in from the borderlands, and they just never find their way out.”
Their camp swam in a sea of darkness. They might have been in outer space. Cross looked up at the sky. It was frighteningly vast and deep, so much that he felt like he could fall into it. Between the fathoms of space and the darkness of the March, Cross imagined his body plummeting, on and on without end.
He dreams of falling. He sees the woman again, the refugee from the mountain glade, but while he falls through a black sky, hers is white. He falls down, and she falls up.
Wolves woke him. Cross came to with a start. His head ached and his heart pounded.
“ It’s all right,” Stone said from nearby. He was on watch, and he had the M16A2 in hand. “They’re far away. Try to get some sleep.”
The next morning, as they drifted along the bleak landscape, spurred on by the fact that with any luck they’d be away from the Bone March by day’s end, they realized they were being followed.
A group of riders trailed them in the distance. The terrain had turned flat over the course of their morning travel, so there was no way for their pursuers to avoid being seen. It was impossible to glean any details about them at that distance, save the number. There were six.
“ Could they be nomads?” Cross asked. He already knew the answer. He wasn’t even sure why he’d even bothered to ask.
“ They’ve been tailing us for a while,” Stone noted. “They probably just stayed out of sight until we crossed that gorge. The terrain has been pretty flat since then, nowhere for them to hide.”
The squad carried on with an eye behind them. The riders didn’t quicken or slow their pace, but they kept a perfect distance, dangling right there at the edge of sight.
“ Should we just take care of this?” Graves asked after a while.
“ No,” Stone said, clearly wishing he had a different answer. “Not yet. There’s no way to get any sort of advantage over them right now. All we’d be doing is riding right up to them. I wish there was some cover out here.”
“ When we get closer to the Rift, the ground gets rocky again,” Cristena pointed out. “And hilly. We should be able to lose them then.”
“ Or gain the advantage,” Stone said.
They rode on.
Cross felt cold. He sensed whispers in the air, the touch of the spirits tied to the area. As they rode out of the open desert and into a region of hills and dead trees, the feeling intensified. There were voices in the air, dead whispers. Cross felt the breath of ghosts on his skin.
I shouldn’t be able to feel this. My spirit is gone, and I can never have another. What’s lost cannot be regained.
He sees the woman, falling into the sky.
Who are you?
Cross felt like he was losing his mind.
Dusk approached. They rode through a field of sharp stones, some as large as their horses. The rocks were black quartz shot through with red crystal veins, and the seared edges of the stone smoked like glacial ice. The dark soil underfoot was crystalline and coarse.
Bones dangled from dead trees, skeletons of those left to rot. Shreds of ancient clothing were blown by the dry wind from the north, which carried the smell of carrion and rotted flowers.
They were getting close to the Rift.
And after they’d kept their distance for over an hour, the mysterious riders suddenly closed in.
SIXTEEN
They rode fast, but it wasn’t fast enough.
The six riders, who had started at such a remote distance, closed the gap between the groups seemingly without effort. At the rate they approached, they’d be face-to-face before nightfall.
The howls of the wolves started in again, closer this time. Much closer.
“ Let’s put some distance between us and them,” Stone said. “Now!”
The terrain had become much more difficult to manage, particularly in the failing light. A scarlet filter had been draped over the sky. Thick patches of rubble lay in the path, which led to a high hillside at the edge of a forest of dead trees. The bloody haze of the sun was rapidly disintegrating. Cross peered into the trees, but his eyes were unable to pierce the thickets, and all he could see were more shadows.