Facing North (The Drifts, #1) by Emily V. Webster

Author:Emily V. Webster [Webster, Emily V.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-07-11T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

I sit up on the bus, and turn from side to side, trying to crack my back after having laid on the floor for a couple of hours. I can tell from looking out the windows that it’s dusk. Darkness has finally fallen, and I hope it’s what I need to sneak inside the town.

Making sure my Colt is on my waist, and with my pack over one shoulder, I move toward the steps, and make my way down to the asphalt that would blend in with the darkness if snow didn’t cover it. I’m more careful to keep quiet than to not make any sudden moves. Without the pollution of light, I’m practically invisible out here. I look up to the starless sky. It’s too cloudy tonight for the flashlights in the sky to shine down on me.

Out here, mixed in with the pileup of cars, it’s all black. The town ahead is the only spot that stands out to me. There are lit torches all around the border of the outpost.

I stay close against the cars as I move a little farther up the road. The flames in the town are calling to me. Warmth. Gazing out at the fire dancing on the torches only make me colder, so I look away. I can’t waste my time imagining myself by a fire – the heat, the smell, how it reminds me of campfires before just about everything was destroyed. So, I move along, and then stop at an overturned motorcycle.

The light from the torches bounces off the metallic vehicles. There’s an area up ahead where it looks as if some of the vehicles have been pushed out of the way to either side. It looks like the opening is for the steam engine to pass through. Focusing hard on the area in front of me, I can see metal poking up out of the snow – train tracks.

I give my attention to the open space between me and the entrance to the town – a wide opening with only one guard posted. That doesn’t surprise me. They aren’t trying to keep people out, or even people in as long as they stay on the northern side. But if the guard sees me – a loner, someone who is strong enough to have survived for so long bouncing from place to place without a group – I’ll be captured, placed in the same predicament as Natalie.

I’ll be in danger when I enter the town, so I’ll have to blend in. It’s not a sure bet, but most of the time, people are taken outside of outposts. It’s easier for you to go missing without anyone wondering where you went. In this world, if someone goes missing, they’re most likely dead anyway.

I glance around at the cars near me, wondering if there’s anything I can use to draw the guard away from his post without causing too much of a ruckus that others will join him. I don’t want him to think it’s a sneak attack when he doesn’t find anything here.

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