Amidst this sort of chaos, there will always be displaced individuals, wanderers unable to find anywhere they can easily settle, who are wary of everyone and anyone they come across.
Such people are like pack animals, travelling in small groups for protection and companionship.
~
The two girls sleeping in the comparative shelter of a well- the only thing visible for about three miles- are half of one such group. Adrianne, the older of the two had honey coloured curly hair, and a womanly figure. The younger of the two looked about fourteen. Her hair was jet black and straight, her body was hard and wiry, and her forehead was wrinkled into a frown even in her sleep, a hint to her disposition. They travelled with two younger girls, Lara’s younger sister with whom she shared no resemblance, and Marie, an angelic looking eight year old with blonde curls who still hadn’t found her sound.
They travelled together not because they wanted to, but because they needed to.
Because without each other, the world was an even more lonely, even more dangerous place.
~
Ava and Marie came back from exploring the surrounding area to find Adrianne and Lara still lying in their sleeping bags on the hard, scarred ground.
“Do you think we should wake them?” Ava asked the mute Marie. Marie stared back at her with cool, indifferent eyes. “To tell them about the town. Or should we let them sleep some more?” Ava sat down on the ground next to her sister, running her hands through her short black hair and across her creased forehead, trying to smooth out the deep-set lines.
“Let’s wait,” she said, answering her own questions. “If I wake them up now, Lara will be angry at me again, but maybe if she gets some sleep she’ll be happier, right?” Ava looked beseechingly at Marie for some affirmation that this wasn’t just wishful thinking, and Marie, who spent all of her time listening, nodded.
Marie had noticed what Ava hadn’t: that Lara wasn’t permanently angry due to lack of sleep, but for some deeper reason that no on else but Lara could understand.
~
Lara woke up first, to find Ava gazing adoringly down at her, fingers still entwined in her sister's hair. For a moment, in her just woken confusion she looked lost and helpless, but that lasted just a moment, and then the frown invaded her face and took up residence once more.
“Get off. What the hell are you doing, just sitting there, staring at me like a creep? You could at least make yourself useful. Light a fire or something,” she said, sitting up and shaking Ava’s hand off. Ava looked crestfallen, but then perked up.
“Me and Marie found a town. Over there. We were thinking maybe we should stop there, get some food and water or stuff.”
“No. We should carry on to the spring, the town is probably occupied.”
“Um, I asked around-” Ava began, but was cut off by her sister.
“You idiot! You don’t go round asking. You shouldn’t even be going into a town without Adrianne or I. Have I taught you nothing?” Ava bit her lip to stop herself from crying. Adrianne woke up from her sleep.
“Lara, why all the shouting?” She asked, her voice muffled.
“This brat found a town and went into it, asking people if it was occupied!” Lara cried, incensed. She rounded on her sister once more. “I’m ashamed to even call you my sister. Use you head once in a while, it would make life a whole hell of a lot easier for the rest of us!” Ava blinked back tears.
“Sorry Lara. But it seemed safe, and… I couldn’t see any military around so I just thought…” her sentence withered and died in the face of Lara’s glare.
“Ava,” Adrianne cut in, her usually gentle voice made even more soothing from the contrast it struck with Lara’s. “You have to understand that people like us don’t fit anywhere. People don’t like us; they’ll run us out for no reason. You’ve got to try and give as little away as possible. Asking questions like that is just going to get us exposed. I know you were trying to help, but you should have waited till either Lara or myself could have come with you. Towns are dangerous, especially when you’re alone.”
Adrianne had intervened partially to stop the shouting, but more to prevent Lara from saying something that she should regret. Not that she would.
Lara never regretted anything she said.
“Sorry Adrianne, it’s just… I haven’t seen a town like that, with people, and a well in so long- the streets even have cobbles,” Ava’s eyes filled with tears.
“Don’t cry, you idiot. Crying won’t solve anything,” Lara said, rubbing sleep from her eyes.
“But… I’m so sorry. You and Adrianne… you’re right… I’m really, really sorry-”
“If you were that sorry, you’d stop sobbing when we’ve just woken up and you’d start a fire and put on something for us to eat.”
Lara stood up, and her sleeping bag fell away, revealing a thick cotton robe dyed a rich scarlet colour. It was finely embroidered in coloured silk thread, and it was obviously not the clothing worn by the average traveller.
“I’m going for a walk. I want food when I get back,” she said, and walked off before anyone could say anything.
The remaining three, entranced as always by Lara’s grandeur, watched her leave for all of three seconds, and then Adrianne shook herself out of the spell.
“Well, I guess we better get cooking. After all, we can’t disappoint our knight, can we now?”
~
Lara lay on the ground, her eyes shut, the frown still fixed to her face. Her mind was blank. It was a skill Lara had picked up over the years, a way to escape the permanent headache, and the overwhelming, baseless rage that often gripped her.
It was the way she saved lives.
~
When Lara finally returned to the group, food had been prepared, and was set out.
“Have you guys eaten?” Lara asked in a voice so low that it could barely be heard.
“No, we were waiting for you,” Ava replied, smiling.
“That was stupid! Who told you to do that? Hurry up and eat, so we can get moving,” she said sitting down and filling her mouth with food. The others did the same, and silence reigned.
Lara’s headache crept back as she chewed. The only respite from this headache was when she blanked out her mind. Even when she was sleeping, she was aware of it. She’d grown so accustomed to the pain, she barely ever noticed its presence, but even so the silence was a blessing.
“Lara, we have to stop by in that town after all,” Adrianne said quietly, after the meal as they rolled up their sleeping bags.
“What? Adrianne, we definitely can’t go now that Ava went round asking questions.”
“Lara, it’s not like I want to go to this town either, but we hardly have any food left. And even with the map, we don’t know when we will reach the next town. If we run out before that, then what will we do?” There was a silence, in which Lara savagely rolled up her sleeping bag and tied a string around it like she was trying to strangle it. Then she finally spoke.
“Fine, I’ll go alone. You guys wait for me here, and then we’ll carry on. If I don’t get back by tonight, go on to the spring without me.”
“Lara… are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. It has to be done, doesn’t it? Or would you rather starve Adrianne?”
“Of course not! I’m just worried about you. If anything happened to you in that town, I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself,” Adrianne said.
But Lara just shook her head and handed her sleeping bag to Adrianne. “Here, take this. Where’s the money?”
Adrianne took the sleeping bag and reached under her skirt for the money pouch secured round her waist. She handed it to Lara, with a worried expression. The pouch was dangerously light. “We haven’t got much left,” she warned.
“Oh well. We’ll deal with that when we need to. You guys stay here. If anyone comes, start walking towards the town. Ava, where’s this cobbled town of yours anyway?” Lara asked.
Ava beamed because Lara had asked her something, and pointed in the direction she and Marie had returned from a few hours before. “I’ll take you there!”
“I’ll take myself there,” Lara said scornfully, setting off in the direction of Ava’s pointed finger. “You stay quiet, and please, for the love of God try not to do anything stupid.”
For the second time that day, Adrianna, Ava and Marie watched Lara walk away.
“Adrianne,” Ava asked when Lara was out of earshot. “Is it really OK to let her go alone?”
Adrianne smiled, three parts fond, one part sad, at her friends retreating back and nodded. “You know her. She’ll always be okay. Nothing can hurt her anymore.”
~
Lara reached the town by midday. Ava and Maria must have been walking all night, instead of keeping watch like they should have been.
It was quiet, and Lara had the feeling that all around her, people were peeping through doors left ajar and the cracks between pairs of old, cheap curtains. Other than that, the place seemed okay. It wasn’t a poor town, but it certainly wasn’t rich either.
She found an open shop that was selling dried supplies. Lara knew from experience that shops this far out didn’t insist on ration coupons. Anything was good enough for them. The shopkeeper was a young girl, who smiled nervously from behind the counter.
Lara allowed herself to relax marginally. It was clear that the town was occupied; the atmosphere was too peaceful. And she doubted that it was one of those army funded towns either, those generally reeked of opulent, arrogant, army bastards, and coupons were mandatory.
She paid for the supplies she picked up, left the shop, and was promptly affronted by a rich looking young man with a smirk smeared across his face.
“Is it wise for a girl to be unescorted in an unfamiliar town? Especially one of your stature- and beauty.”
Lara looked at him for the briefest of seconds, then turned away and carried on walking. The man walked alongside her.
“We can provide you with an escort, or if you wish to rest, residence.”
“I want neither,” Lara snapped curtly. “Refrain from following me.”
The last had been an order, and it clearly rankled with the young man who had, up until that point, trying to woo her. “I’m sorry ma’am,” and he spat the word, “but no matter how great your social standing and wealth, I resent a woman talking to me that way. You should know your place.” He pulled her closer to him, and parted his lips to speak once more, but Lara’s free hand rose and slapped him. She didn’t consider it to be particularly hard, but the man recoiled.
“I know my place. You should know yours. Dirty male pigs have no right to touch women,” she said stiffly, quickening her pace.
She noticed, too late, the crowd that had gathered.
“How dare you touch the landowner’s son like that?” a beefy man said, detaching himself from the crowd. “How dare you speak to him that way? You may be fine, but here you are a worthless-” he never finished that particular sentence. Lara silently brought her knee up as soon as he was within reach, and it hit him in the groin. He doubled over in pain. Another man came forward with the intention to attack.
Lara smiled grimly and slipped her hand into a pocket that was concealed by the folds of her robe.
When it came out, it was encased in a shining set of real metal knuckledusters. Lara knew she fought well; she had to. Her movements were quick and precise, and none of her aggressors noticed the knuckledusters until it was too late. And then they were sprawled on the ground; unconscious or wisely faking it.
An old woman watching from the doorway of one of the houses shouted at her. “You monster! What have you done? You witch! A plague upon you, and your children,” she cried, her curses undermined by the frailty of her voice.
“What they got was nothing more than they deserved,” Lara replied. But the old woman was no longer cursing. She was not even looking at Lara, but instead at a point somewhere behind her. She spun around just in time to kick the landowner’s son in the gut, but he still managed to hit her with the butt of his rifle. She heard a snatch of their conversation before she blacked out.
“Why didn’t you just shoot her?” the old woman wailed.
“She’s too interesting to be shot,” was her reply. “Besides, what a waste of such a pretty girl.”
And then, she was gone.
~
“She hasn’t come back yet,” Adrianne stated needlessly, trying to keep the nervousness from showing in her voice. “It’s almost sundown.”
“She’ll come back. She wouldn’t just leave us here, would she?” Ava was crying once again. It was the seventh time since Lara had left. Adrianne didn’t answer her question. Instead she said:
“We’ll leave at sundown. If Lara’s not here, then we’ll just have to go on without her.” On her face played a brave expression, but in the pit of her stomach, guilt and fear were already gathering.
