Molly - Part 1

Chapter 19

"Look."

Arta stepped towards the body and leaned down. He'd been a big man, and not far from him was what looked like the crumpled pelt of some animal.

"Those of the soil," Hurt said. "They will set fire to our houses because they are barbarians."

"You think too much in the old way," Arta said. "Your words are whispers when they should be loud."

"So what? Does anyone care about any of that anymore?"

Arta sighed. "No."

Red sparks flew from their hands as they traced up the side of a census building and drifted back down, falling into the city by vaulting against that same red light.

Hurt pointed towards a specific part of the horizon and Arta saw three more red lines coming to intervene. She checked her speed and gradually fell down alongside Hurt.

"Arta," Jose said. "Hurt. She is calling me."

Hurt turned to Arta. "We felt it too. We found a body. Pretty sure it was a sheep-man."

Jose lowered his head. "The tree cannot survive in these conditions. Our path is clear."

Arta came between them.

"Some things have to end."

"I will not accept that," Jose said, rubbing a part of his hand, blending the various slashing tattoos that covered his body.

Arta put a hand on his chest. "We cannot sing forever, Jose."

"That doesn't mean the tree should die," said Hurt.

"We might not have a say in the matter."

"Not while I'm here," Jose said, then nodded to one of his cohorts whose name Arta didn't know. Their order had been multiplying. The tree-mother was shrewd and quick in her work.

Then Jose was gone, the red light coursing through his veins and fluttering into existence, lifting Jose up and leaving behind glowing trails.

"We have to follow him," Hurt told Arta.

A dead morning for a dead city. But lo, there they are, the pole-lighters and their far-seeing eyes. They were trying to find something they'd never be able to find, their existence a joke. Jose avoided them. Guns could still kill; their love of the tree-mother didn't erase the fact.

They came to a garden trampled by boots. Something sparked on a wire going from one part of the street to the next. And now: the steam. It had been pumping out all month, that sickly fog that made people so terrible to one another.

Dogs. That usually meant monsieurs. Arta glanced at Jose but he seemed deep in thought.

"Jose."

He turned to her.

"The dogs."

"I am not afraid of them."

His tattoos brimmed to life as Jose came forth and entered the mist. The others followed, Hurt nodding to Arta as Arta took the rear.

The barking was getting closer, and louder. Arta thought she could see movement below but she wasn't sure enough to say something.

"Motherfucker!"

Hurt watched as Arta fell. The shotgun had completely blown her head off, a red paste now on the floor.

"No."

The monsieur laughed, coming up to the body and lifting his mask to spit on it.

"See? They die just like the rest of them!"