Page 74 of Ember Rising

“You think my wife and daughter didn’t die gory deaths?” he asks.

The room is quiet now. I’m sitting straight up, not eating. I wish Donovan hadn’t said anything. I knew what they did every day when I agreed to join them. Not only is it not a secret, but they want everyone to know how savage they are.

This brotherhood of fifteen men was formed long before the virus came. They were a coal mining crew, working and living at a site in Alaska with a bunkhouse. Cut off from technology, they were still working twelve-hour shifts, seven days a week while the world—and their families—burned.

When the plane didn’t arrive to take them back after their six-month-long stint, they found out what had happened. Their families were all dead. Led by Justin and Donovan, they vowed to take revenge on everyone who had anything to do with the virus.

Their vengeance has spread, and lately they’ve been killing anyone they see as privileged enough to have survived the virus. They’re killing the families of people in power, justifying it by saying those people murdered their families, too.

When Donovan told me about finding his wife and their two young sons dead from the virus in his home, letters to him from them on the kitchen table, I wept for him. For them.

It’s too horrible for me to even imagine. I’ve never been married, and I don’t have children, so I can’t imagine the depth of the loss these men feel.

“I don’t want to start anything,” Donovan says.

“Too late.” Justin crosses his arms over his chest. “Donovan, it seems like you just want to spend all your time trying to knock up your new piece. You’ve forgotten about Layla, Ryder, and Ross.”

I look at my lap, Donovan stiffening beside me.

“Go to hell,” he spits at Justin. “You have no idea what I do or don’t feel for my family.”

“It’s pretty fucking clear.”

Donovan stands, his chair flying out from behind him. Justin is on his feet a second later, other Deadmen jumping out of their seats to hold the two men back from each other.

“He’s not the enemy,” a man named Paul tells Donovan. “We can’t turn on each other. We’re family.”

“He’s a piss-poor family member, talking about Alice and my family like that.” Donovan is straining to get out of his hold.

“She’s made you soft!” Justin yells, his face flushed with anger. “You forget where you came from!”

There are three men holding Justin back, because he’s massive. He’s six and a half feet tall, with the burly build of a Viking.

Paul steers Donovan toward the other end of the room from Justin, Herrin coming to Donovan’s other side.

“Come on, man,” Paul says. “We’ll walk it off.”

I get up and follow. I’m afraid to be around Justin without Donovan. I never told anyone here that I’m an archer. As far as they know, I have no special skills or talents. And I plan to keep it that way.

I love Donovan. He’ll never be the man he was before he lost his family, but he holds me and listens to me and tells me I’m the angel who saved him. I was so lonely before meeting him.

Once we’re outside, I go to him, sliding my hand into his.

“You okay?” I ask.

He nods, but doesn’t say anything. I know him well enough to know what Justin said will put him in a dark place for at least the next several days. He won’t want to talk about it.

This broken world is filled with broken people. I see the good in him. I don’t think killing people ever brings peace, and he’s been doing it for years.

Sometimes I wish I could leave the Deadmen—with or without Donovan. I’m tired of death and destruction on a bone-deep level.

No one leaves the Deadmen, though. They made that clear when they asked me to join. This is my life now, and I have to make peace with it.

24

“Three more safely evacuated. We need to move slowly. Everyone go silent for the next six weeks.” – Amethyst, Mallory Network founder

Pax