Chapter 23
PUNISHER’S PRIDE
Dinner that night was delicious, consisting of rice and Asian-flavoured vegetable sauce, and yet I could not force myself to eat more than a few bites.
Dave, Josh, Kevin, and Amit were all engaged in lively conversation around me.
Only Monika was as silent as I was, her face blotched from crying, and her expression pinched nervously.
The fireplace provided soft, orange light, enhanced by candles spaced evenly on the tables. It was warm and cosy, the comfortable smell of wood accompanied by pleasant, companionable chatter. My heart squeezed tighter and tighter with each passing minute.
At the end of the meal, Einar stood up as he often did, but heavily that night, his eyes solemn.
In a calm, measured tone, he explained what had happened and why it put us at peril.
He held his hands up, his palms large and fingers long, the accompanying gestures he made with them unhurried and forceful.
He explained why we had to leave Ascu as fast as possible, presenting his arguments so calmly that he earned only a few protests and overall murmurs of agreement.
“It’s a sad reality,” he finished recounting the day’s events, “that in a fury-infested world we still mainly have to be afraid of other healthy people.”
He then laid out the plan in the same composed manner, as if he had days to come up with it, as opposed to only a few hours.
Jean-Luc would take his jeep and accompanied by a few guards, he would drive our supplies and equipment down to the ‘Rotunda’, a large stone hut a few hours from Vizzavona, located in the last cleared area.
With first light, people would begin departing on foot in groups accompanied by archers and march towards the Rotunda.
They would reach it in three days and camp there for a couple more, whilst we archers would clear Vizzavona, our new home.
Meanwhile, Russ would visit the other settlements and bring our new recruits to Vizzavona instead of Ascu.
I doubt that many people slept that night.
I certainly didn’t get a wink of sleep, busy as I was helping to pack.
The whole settlement buzzed with nervous energy.
I dozed off for a few hours on the couch by the extinguished fireplace in the dining hall, but I kept being woken up by restless dreams of hospital corridors, crowded with men who were obviously infected but also carried guns, and were closing in on me.
Jerking awake from the final nonsensical nightmare, I gave up.
It was the longest, most unpleasant night, and I couldn’t wait for the sun to rise, illuminating the way across the mountains, so that our people could finally depart for safety.
Einar slept even less than I did, marching around, directing everyone, helping with heavy lifting, imposing order on the chaos that would have reigned otherwise.
He wouldn’t let anyone see his fatigue, his mind sharp as always, his movements energetic, and his overall manner confident and calm.
But I saw him sneakily snack on chocolate bars stolen from our supplies, shoving them whole into his mouth, which I knew he only did when he was stressed.
Nor did the worried lines in his face escape my notice, though they may have slipped anyone else’s.
On the several occasions that our paths crossed during those endless hours, we embraced wordlessly, he bending to me so that his forehead touched mine, frozen together in something akin to a prayer.
“Just as long as they don’t come until tomorrow,” he whispered into my hair once. “Just don’t let them come until later tomorrow ...”
And then he was gone again in a flurry of activity.
Towards the morning, just as the deepest darkness began to ebb away slowly, I was hard on my feet and grateful for the cold air and the refreshing smell of dew to keep me awake.
I was swaying with exhaustion, depleted to the point of crumpling down, my senses slow and dull.
I was completely unsure just how I would be able to hike across the mountains the whole day.
People were emerging from inside now with their bags packed.
Einar and I would leave with the last group, I knew.
Hours and hours would pass yet before our own departure.
I sat down on an abandoned recliner near the dining hall entrance and closed my eyes.
My head throbbed and spun around. For a minute, I felt almost as if I could drift off to sleep.
But then I was rudely jerked awake by raised voices nearby.
“Albert, stop it, I vill valk like everybody else! Nobody else goes there in a car!”
“Nobody else is pregnant! Besides, Jean-Luc will drive Madeleine for sure.”
“Yeah, but she’s his vife! And she’s ill.”
“She’s not.”
“For months she have no thyroid medication. She is ill.”
“And you’re pregnant! You will get in that jeep, and that’s the end of this discussion.”
“No, I don’t vant special treatment. No, stop, vhat are you doing. Albert that hurts!”
“Why do you always have to argue with me?!”
I shot up from my seat, pulsating with angry blood that raced rapidly through my veins. My mind was still fogged with sleep-deprived haze, but I was no longer sleepy as such, just unable to force my thoughts into a semblance of order.
They were by the vacated vegetable patch.
Albert’s hand was burrowed in Monika’s hair, twisting it, forcing her to tilt her head.
He was yelling at her, his grotesquely galled face inches away from hers.
The spare bows we had were laid by the gate on a sheet of plastic, readied for collection when Jean-Luc would next arrive.
In my exhaustion, it seemed so clear what to do .
.. my head almost empty, my thoughts no longer spiderwebs of possible outcomes and consequences but clear lines, as if only one action and one outcome were possible.
I crept up towards the gate inconspicuously. First, I grabbed a crossbow but shook my head, laid it back down, and chose a bow instead. I was better with bows. I picked up a quill, nocked one arrow to have it ready, and rushed towards the quarrelling couple.
“Hey, Albert. Let her go!” I ordered him.
His ovoid head turned towards me, and his ferret eyes narrowed in rage as he saw me aiming at him.
I vaguely realised that people around me were stopping in their tracks to stare.
As if for dramatic effect, the sun finally rose over the edge of the eastern mountain shield, and the first rays of sunshine hit the ground on which we stood.
“Mind your own business, you stupid cunt,” Albert spat and shook Monika, still holding her by her hair.
She whimpered, tears in her eyes.
“She’s my friend, and that makes this my business. I said let her go. Now!”
Finally, I understood what people meant when they said they saw red.
It was as if the blood vessels in my eyes exploded, flooding my sight and my mind, until everything was crimson, including my thoughts and feelings, even the urge to screech and rush towards him.
I wanted to hurt him, wanted to claw his face with my nails, wanted to obliterate him.
“Or what?” He looked at me with a poorly feigned nonchalance. “You’ll shoot me? How do you think that will go for you? Killing me?”
“I don’t have to kill you. Just hurt you enough,” I pointed out coldly. “For the last time, get your filthy hands off her!”
“You wouldn’t dare ...”
I fired the arrow, and it landed a hair’s breadth away from his left foot. Nocked and fired another, this time piercing the loose fabric of his shirt. The final one flew between his legs, almost grazing his crotch.
He stood there, frozen in what I saw with nasty satisfaction was genuine fear.
He finally comprehended that if he didn’t meet my demand, the next arrow wouldn’t just damage his clothes.
He was afraid of me. Having been released from his grasp, Monika crouched, crying soundlessly, her whole posture somehow reminiscent of a rain-soaked hen.
I slowly became aware of my surroundings and of the murmur all around us, agitated and disapproving. As well the indignant shouts in what I recognised as the Hungarian language.
“You’re a fucking psycho!” Albert squeaked in my direction, encouraged by his peers.
I couldn’t find it in me to disagree with him. I had broken an unspoken yet sacred pact: I fired at one of our own.
I was wholly unsure what to do as the small, faceless crowd seemed to come closer and closer, its noose tightening around me. Then, powerful, unmistakable hands grabbed me from behind, pried the bow out of my grasp, and tore the quiver off my back.
“Einar ...”
“Be quiet!”
He was white as a sheet, the muscles of his jaw rock-tight and his eyes dark.
He tore me from where I stood. I would have stumbled on the stairs except that he practically carried me up. I could feel bruises forming on my upper arms by the time Einar roughly pushed me into the apartment.
“Stay here,” he ordered me, thunderstorm brewing in his eyes. “Don’t you even think about trying to go anywhere, is that clear?”
It was beyond clear.
Turning on his heel swiftly, he left, but not before locking me in.