Free Outpost by Ann Aguirre Page A

far, but since most food had to be grown outside the walls, it seemed like a monumental undertaking to those who spent their lives within the safe confines of Salvation. They had marveled that four young people could survive in a wilderness filled with Freaks, wild animals, and heaven knew what else. Heaven was a new concept to me, like that of a soul, the place where people supposedly went after they died. Sometimes I wondered if I’d see those I’d lost or if the blind brat I’d failed to save would be waiting for me with a swift kick. It didn’t seem like the sort of thing I could rightly ask my foster mother. But I wouldn’t be going there anyway because only people who followed all the rules got into heaven.
    The gates opened with a tormented squeak, doors gaping to let the convoy out—thirty-two guards, plus nearly as many growers. Such a to-do for the annual planting, but as far as I could tell, this was customary. The surrounding land was bleak as it had been the first time we passed through, but the promise of spring had kindled greenery on the trees. Likewise, the brown grass was coming back to life, but nothing on the horizon gave me hope that there were other settlements nearby. In its way, Salvation was every bit as remote as the enclave had been down below.
    Since the mules couldn’t set a fast pace, we walked alongside the wagons, alert to trouble. Twin plaits struck my back gently as I moved. There had been Freak presence in the area for some weeks, since well before our arrival, and this would be their first opportunity to strike at settlers outside the walls. If the Freaks were smarter, they’d figure out a way to get inside or to attack the town fortifications; it was as well for us that they weren’t clever enough to strategize.
    I smelled the monsters long before I saw them. In daylight, my vision was never the best, but it was impossible to mistake the stench carried on the spring wind. It reeked of dead and rotten things, of hopes irreparably lost, and the torment of endless hunger. In Mrs. James’s history lessons, she said mankind held the responsibility for the creation of these monsters, something to do with hubris and meddling with matters better left to God. It was the first time I had heard the word “hubris.” Ordinarily I didn’t speak up in class, but that day, I raised my hand.
    “What’s hubris?” I’d asked.
    The class tittered.
    Mrs. James didn’t quiet them, and her smile took a sly turn. “Excessive pride or self-confidence. Arrogance, if you will.”
    I could tell she thought the word applied to me, after our conversation where I said I didn’t need to learn anything she could teach. I’d hunched my shoulders and wondered what humanity had done to fashion the Freaks. When I got time, I intended to ask Longshot or Edmund about the origin story.
    “They’re near,” Fade said then, loud enough for the rest of the guards to hear. He already had his knives in his hands, and it gave me a thrill of pleasure to see his lean body tense, ready to fight.
    Our fellows cocked their weapons, a clicking noise that prompted the growers to terrified whimpers, and one of them whispered, “Perhaps we should turn back. The planting doesn’t have to be done today.”
    “And what day will be perfectly safe?” Longshot asked in disgust.
    I could understand his impatience … and why he chose to go off on the long, lonely trade runs. The townsfolk he protected were as timid as mice, hiding in their walls. I much preferred having the enemy within reach of my blades, where I could see an end to the battle before the next one began.
    Longshot didn’t wait for a response. “Keep those mules moving. We’re almost to the first field.”
    They could not have expected trouble in the degree we encountered it, a few straggling Freaks, perhaps, survivors of the last run at the walls. But a veritable host of them swept out of the trees, loping toward us with their monstrous gait. Inhumanly