Free Alexandria by John Kaden

could be hurt… or worse.”
    Arana shakes his head dismissively. “No, I won’t.”
    “We should push south.”
    “He’s not from the south.”
    “It doesn’t matter,” says Keslin. “We don’t know what’s down there—and we should.”
    “I thought we were done with this business for a while.”
    “We may never be.”
    Arana narrows his eyes on Keslin. He disengages the subject and takes a long swallow of wine. “Tell me more about this settlement. What did they know?”
    “Very little, I’m afraid. These people didn’t have much. Seeds. No new kinds, but we brought back a few sacks. No animals, they were hunters. Few metals, mostly just rusted scrap. No writings to speak of, only a few hides written in their own poor hand, a few gravestones. We burned it all.”
    “And the weapon?”
    “Not working, but well kept. Would you like to see it?”
    Arana nods. Keslin leads him down the curved staircase, past his quarters to the balcony overlooking the vast foyer. They descend to ground level and steal away through a side door set back in the hallway and climb down more stairs to the antechamber outside the Temple’s keep. A musty compost smell emanates from the dank quarters, and Keslin and the King take up sconces to light the way. The stone walls are wet with fungus, and from the dark and foreboding corners of the keep comes the scurrying of rats and other unseen vermin. Trapdoors are set into the filthy floor, held tightly shut with thick wooden bars, low moans escaping from the subterranean cubicles beneath.
    Keslin withdraws a flat-toothed key from his belt and springs open a fat and creaking lock, slinking the chain through a metal loop and dropping it to the floor with a rattling clank then rolling back the heavy wooden door.
    “Wait here,” he breathes.
    He takes his sconce and moves around the perimeter of the secluded vault, igniting the torches that rest aslant in their mounts. Soft light blossoms throughout and illuminates a worktable cluttered with various dismantled assemblages, and at the forward end is the immense, oxidized machine gun recovered from Jack’s village.
    “It’s tremendous,” says Arana, caressing the worn stock.
    “The best we’ve found,” says Keslin, eyeing the piece with the same grave fixation.
    Scattered about are many broken down actions, brushed clean of rust and arranged neatly in order of their removal for easy reconstruction. Several parts gleam freshly, prototypes recast in iron at their own metalworks, evidence of their attempts at reverse engineering these antique weapons.
    “What I wouldn’t give,” Keslin laments, “to know what makes these beautiful machines work.”
     

     
    “You’ll have to watch your tongue around Ezbeth,” says Calyn. “About yesterday, I’m talking. She’s a good woman, but she does have a temper.”
    Lia juts her chin forward. “She’s mean.”
    Calyn laughs. “You’ll have a hard time convincing me she’s mean. It’s called tough love.”
    “Tough love sounds mean. And she doesn’t love me.”
    “Yes, she does, you just don’t see it. She’s pulling for you, same as we all are.”
    “Pulling for me to what?”
    “To fit in, Lia. To be happy here.”
    Lia stands next to the water trough, rinsing and scrubbing carrots. There is a mountain of vegetables next to her. “I’ll never be happy here.”
    “Honey, don’t say things like that.”
    “It’s true. I hate it here.” Lia throws the carrots down and tears up.
    “Oh. I see.” Calyn goes and puts a warm arm around her. “Now listen, I’ve had a lot of girls come through here over the years. I’ve seen a lot of sadness, Lia, and all I can do is try to help. But I will say this,” she says, squaring Lia’s shoulders so she is looking straight at her, “some of the saddest girls end up being the most happy down the road. I’ve seen it happen time and again. I had a young girl named Elise come through my kitchen, and I’d never been so worried