“Bastien!” I shriek, reaching for him even as the vision fades. I fight against my husband’s hold, clawing to be free.
“Illyria, stop! It’s just me.”
I fall still, in utter disbelief. “You’re… you’re here? But you…” I close my eyes as the room begins to spin. His arms tighten around me, drawing me into his lap. I let him cradle me, needing to be held.
“What did you see?” he asks softly.
My eyes widen as the fear returns with such swiftness it startles me. My first vision of Bastien’s death was over a year ago. The sharp reality of it had faded over time, but this vision was longer, more detailed, yet utterly the same. “You can’t go to Calisted. Please… promise me you won’t go.”
Bastien looks sick. His ashen face dulls the color of his eyes as he looks down at me with regret. “I can’t.”
I sob, nestling against his chest. “I can’t lose you… not like that.”
I tug at his cloak, hating the feel of it under my fingertips. It is rough and the fibers matted.
“What did you see?” He repeats his earlier question. This time his voice tenses with unspoken fear.
I shake my head. “Please don’t make me tell.”
My lower lip begins to quiver and I can feel hysteria simmering deep within my chest, taking root. “Shh.” He soothes, running his hands across my back. “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not!” I pull away from him, pleading with him to understand. “What do I have to say to get you to believe me? I’ve seen your death. It’s horrible and it’s…” I hang my head. “It’s my fault. Everything is my fault.”
Bastien draws up my chin so he meets my gaze. “I won’t go, okay? I’ll stay behind if it really means that much to you.”
I sniffle and dry my eyes. I can see how much this statement costs him and I love him all the more for it. “Really?”
He uses the hem of his cloak to dry the tears from my cheeks and smiles ruefully. “Don’t I always give you what you want?”
His words have a sobering effect on me. “No.” I shake my head. “Not always.”
Thirteen
I didn’t expect him to want to speak to me as we emerge from the church and catch our first real glimpse of the town in the rising dawn. A brilliant sheen glistens over the iced ground as we descend the church steps.
Up close, I can see this place took a bad beating, although it’s hard to see if it was from the initial invasion or scavengers traipsing through since then. There is extensive damage to nearly every building within sight. Brick homes laid waste, nothing more than crumbled heaps. Wooden clapboard-sided buildings show extensive scorch marks. Roofs torn off or collapsed in. Mailboxes melted and disfigured. Play sets torn apart and rusted, rising from lawns filled with waist-high wild grasses.
There are signs still hanging over some of the buildings on what I would guess used to be the main street. The lettering is almost completely rubbed out. Everything is faded and broken, left to rot in the elements.
The sidewalks are cracked and pockmarked. Remnants of cars, smashed nearly flat, line the streets. “What could have done that?” I ask, staring in dismay as we pass.
“Tanks.”
I turn to look at him. “Human weapons?”
He nods. “They rolled over this town and kept right on going by the looks of it. We aren’t too far from an old military base. My guess would be that this place was evacuated before they bulldozed it to the ground.”
A shudder worms its way through me as I spy a small foot sticking out from the tall grasses. Too small to be human. I wrap my arms about my waist, realizing some little girl left behind her toy.
“Illyria.”
I turn at the sharp edge to his tone. When I do, I come face to face with a woman and a charged laser gun. Bastien calls out a warning, but it’s too late. I instantly drop to a crouch and knock her feet out from under her.
I’m rewarded with a cry of pain as she lands on her tailbone, her gun clattering away. My knife is in my hand and I’m dipped low by the time she leaps back to her feet. She is tall, shapely, and quick on her feet.
She moves with the grace and ease of a panther as she matches me step for step. I would think her olive skin and silky chestnut hair to be stunning if she weren’t trying to take my head off.
The instant she glances toward her gun, I lunge and slam my shoulder into her torso. We sprawl to the ground and her legs wrap around me, tightening against my knife arm. I buck and land punches into her side, but she doesn’t relent. The muscles along her neck cord as she fights to loosen my grip on my weapon.