She entered every room but came away paler than before. Finally, she walked out of the building and stood by the doors as she surveyed the tents in the street. “Do you know where they took the dead?” she asked me.
“They’re still on the field.”
Her gaze went to where the smell of smoke still wafted on the night breeze. The houses blocked the fire, if any of it still burned. “How much time do we have before we have to go?”
I glanced at my watch. “An hour.”
* * *
Aisling
I tried not to breathe in the stench of death as we made our way through the bodies laid out on the field. It took all I had not to put my hand over my nose or run out of here vomiting, but Irefusedto let Hawk see me do either. If I couldn’t handle this, he might think I couldn’t handle the Wilds and leave me behind.
I’d be irate if he left me, but I hated to admit I would understand. I was at the wall because I was a soldier, and soldiers took orders. I listened to commands because it was for the greater good of the entire world. If he decided I couldn’t handle this, and therefore couldn’t handle the Wilds, he would make sure I was ordered to remain. And after being pissed at myself, him, and the world, I would get over it and continue to protect every innocent on the other side of the wall.
“Do you want a mask?” Hawk asked when we passed a station of supplies the workers had established in the middle of the dead. Along with containers of water, the table included masks, gloves, and soap.
“No.”
“You know, being able to handle bad smells isn’t a requirement in the Wilds.”
He stopped to lift a mask from the table and put it on. When he lifted another and dangled it from his finger in front of me, I took it and slipped it on. It didn’t block out the smell, but it helped ease it as I searched the faces of the dead for Sandy.
In a short time, they’d managed to separate a lot of our dead from those of the craetons and laid them out in rows that reminded me of a cornfield. Except in this cornfield, no green leaves would sprout from the ground as life bloomed and there was no sign of the green grass once stretching for acres across the land. I didn’t think it would ever come back.
I had no idea why I was doing this; there was nothing I could do for Sandy, but Ihadto see her if I could. I just didn’t know where to start. The bodies stretched out in at least twenty-five rows, and there were easily fifty people and demons per row.
Beyond these neat rows of the dead, the field remained cluttered with more dead. The bounce and sway of flashlights lit the night as people and demons picked their way through the bodies in search of more palitons. They would be out here for days, if not weeks.
I was starting down the tenth row when a woman with blonde hair caught my attention. My heart thundered as I rushed to her and knelt at her side. Biting my lip, I tried to keep my hand from trembling as I brushed the hair off her face.
Please.I pleaded as the last of her hair fell away, but through the blood and grime covering the woman, I saw she wasn’t Sandy.
“Ash?”
The sound of my name caused me to turn as two women made their way down the hill with a body between them. I blinked at the woman who spoke as I tried to sort the familiarity of her voice with the blood, dirt, and mask covering her face. Her reddish-brown hair hung in a limp ponytail against her neck as bloodshot, blue eyes blinked at me from over the top of her mask.
It took me a minute to realize her hair wasn’t naturally reddish-brown; blood and grime covered it. The woman lowered the legs of the body and stepped toward me.
“Sandy,” I breathed. Before I knew it, I was running to her, and we were hugging in the middle of one of the rows. “I thought you were dead!”
She sniffled. “I kept expecting to uncover your body.”
I repressed the sob lodged in my throat and ignored the stench of death clinging to her as I hugged her tighter. I didn’t know how much time passed before my grip on her finally eased and I stepped away. She pulled off the mask to reveal a circular section of cleaner skin around her mouth. I removed mine too.
“How did you survive?” she asked.
“I’m just that good,” I said, and she laughed. “What about you?”
“I was on the wall when the attack occurred. We shot a few of those flying assholes, but we were mostly out of the fight.”
“Good.”
“Were you on the field?”
“Yes.”
She squeezed my arm as she let out a loud breath. “That must have been awful, Ash.”
