Read Online Forever the Road (A Rucksack Universe Fantasy Novel) by Anthony St. Clair - Free Book Online Page B

about its waving legs and antennae suggested a taunt, a threat. The other roaches were still, listening, waiting. An antenna waved and then so did the thousands of antennae of the assembled roach army. Jay stared back at the menacing roach general. “Point that somewhere else,” Jay said, blasting the roach off the toilet.
    The other roaches glared at him with revenge in their tiny compound eyes. Jay realized his ammo had run out. Zipping up, he retreated as tactfully as he could while walking backwards, not taking his eyes off the roaches until the door was shut.
    Jay lay back on his new bed and folded his hands under his head. “It’ll do fine,” he said, grinning as he slipped into a deep sleep.
    His body rested, but in his mind the travel never stopped.
    In his dream, the white alley glowed, but the dull red door looked like smeared blood. “Hope is inside,” Rucksack said. The small backpack that was his head slowly revolved on his neck.
    “Hope is dying,” Jigme replied. A turning backpack had replaced his head also. Around them, the white walls of the alley faded into a gray mist. Only the red door remained. The air smelled of ash and old fires. “Will you help?”
    “I don’t know how to help,” Jay said. “I couldn’t help anyone. I didn’t even know they were gone until…”
    “I can’t open the door,” Jigme said, his hands straining at the bolts.
    “I can’t either,” Rucksack said.
    “But it’s easy,” Jay replied, moving between them and touching the door.
    Blood cascaded down his feet. Jay was certain his t-shirt was ruined, but he didn’t look down. Where the red door had stood, an open doorway showed them the small room where the sick woman lay undecided between living and dying.
    Jigme pointed to the frail sticks on the bed and said, “Amma. Say hello, Amma. Please.” The sticks had been woven into the shape of a woman, but there was no skin, no breath; this woman was hollow inside. She had no mouth so said nothing. Though there were no eyes, the stick woman seemed to watch them.
    “What is her name?” Rucksack asked.
    “Asha,” Jigme said.
    “It means hope,” Rucksack said to Jay. “Where there is a mother, there is hope.”
    “But there is no hope here,” Jay replied. “She is empty. Asha is gone. Hope is dead.”
    Heat welled up in the air around them. The scent of fires grew fresher, hotter.
    “She has a fever,” Jigme said. “It burns.”
    Black and red flames flickered around the walls, eating the room from the ceiling to the floor. When the room burned away, the rest of the world stretched out around them. Where the white walls had gone, ash and rubble lay smoking. The sun had been eaten like an egg yolk. As far as Jay could see, a black world smoked.
    “There is nothing we can do,” Jay said.
    “Where there is a mother,” Rucksack repeated, “there is hope.”
    The flames gathered around the bed. “No!” Jigme said. “Don’t let them!”
    “There is nothing,” Jay said. “Nothing.”
    The flames gathered into a red-and-black crescent of shadow and blood. Sharp points stretched into a grin, then widened over the sticks that were shaped like a woman. The sticks moved. Organs and blood appeared inside. Wicker whitened into bone. Skin stretched over muscles. Eyes opened.
    Jade stared at Jay.
    “No!” he shouted, leaping forward as the fires lowered.
    Her scream went out in a whoomph as the mouth of black flames swallowed her.
    Jay reached for her, tried to leap forward, but Rucksack and Jigme pulled at his arms. “The moon told you,” Jigme said, pulling Jay away from the black mouth. Flames flickered like shadows.
    “The moon told you,” Rucksack agreed. “Oh, and now look.”
    Jay’s feet felt wet. He looked down at his shirt, reddened from the blood from when they had come in—only now the blood flowed fresh. Then the pain hit him. He staggered and his knees hit the dirt floor. He touched his chest. His fingers went inside.
    “You can