Read Online Mutation (Wildfire Chronicles Vol. 4) by K.R. Griffiths - Free Book Online
Authors: K.R. Griffiths
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the bus station where it all began.
Few things could hold a man's tongue as firmly as guilt. Darren kn ew that only too well. It was guilt that had driven him away from society decades earlier; guilt that condemned him to eke out a living in the mountains, where few ever asked him about anything at all, let alone whether he might have a wife and child somewhere. The mountains were a place to forget.
Once the six people that had escaped the bus station with him had made their way into Caernarfon and saw the astonishing bloodshed, Darren knew for sure that the world had gone. Or maybe he had died and finally gone to hell; it didn't really matter. As they stumbled through the narrow streets, Darren had not realised that he was leading them to the castle until they stood right in front of it, and only then did he see a foothold, and a way to keep climbing.
When they had secured the castle, Darren only allowed in those that he could see would be no trouble. There had been a few murmurs of dissent at first; pleas for an open border policy that Darren knew would result in chaos and power struggles. The protests finally died out when Darren had suggested that any one of the young mountaineers could leave if they wished and fend for themselves outside the walls. It had been as simple as that: staking a claim to leadership and seeing who baulked at it. None had been willing to meet the challenge he threw down.
After that, once Darren had set up the light to draw in survivors from the lands around the castle, he had turned several away if he saw that they were armed or if they looked remotely hostile, aiming weapons at them from the battlements until they decided to try their luck elsewhere.
Only once in the week that they had occupied the castle had Darren truly felt like their position might be under threat, when a large group that reeked of trouble had pounded at the gates insistently until Darren himself had taken the shotgun and blown a hole through one of them to show everybody that he meant business.
The other group had departed then, spitting and cursing and hurling threats about coming back for Darren, but he hadn't been unduly worried. The castle was all but impregnable, unless someone turned up with explosives. Even then, Darren had a plan that would ensure that nobody would take his castle away from him.
That first genuine murder had turned out to be the moment when everyone in the castle understood that Darren meant every word he said. He had not been questioned since.
But the guy with the knives made Darren’s skin crawl. The manner in which he had moved when Darren first approached him; the smooth way he had lined up the knife to throw at Darren. The guy was trained. Military, maybe. That would have made him the most useful of all, if Darren believed that he could be trusted, but there was evasion in his eyes; defiance and threat. Darren couldn’t abide threat. Not within his castle.
Darren thought he could find a use for the rest of them; the young woman and the children especially, but that one? John? Letting him inside the walls felt like a mistake, and Darren knew he could not afford mistakes.
John had to go.
5
Rachel awoke first and grunted softly as she stretched out limbs that had seized up in protest at yet another night spent on a hard floor. Cold seemed to have seeped into her bones and spread outwards like an ink stain, until every cell felt as if it had frozen solid.
Castles, it turned out, had been cold places in which to live. If she was to spend another night in one, she would insist that the large stone fireplace that dominated the oval room at the base of the tower be used for something other than decoration.
A bed would be nice, of course, but it seemed like beds had gone the way of electricity and safety and sanity.
And Jason.
The loss of Jason ached like a fracture, and the more she thought about her baby brother, and how ill-equipped he had been to deal with the way the world
Few things could hold a man's tongue as firmly as guilt. Darren kn ew that only too well. It was guilt that had driven him away from society decades earlier; guilt that condemned him to eke out a living in the mountains, where few ever asked him about anything at all, let alone whether he might have a wife and child somewhere. The mountains were a place to forget.
Once the six people that had escaped the bus station with him had made their way into Caernarfon and saw the astonishing bloodshed, Darren knew for sure that the world had gone. Or maybe he had died and finally gone to hell; it didn't really matter. As they stumbled through the narrow streets, Darren had not realised that he was leading them to the castle until they stood right in front of it, and only then did he see a foothold, and a way to keep climbing.
When they had secured the castle, Darren only allowed in those that he could see would be no trouble. There had been a few murmurs of dissent at first; pleas for an open border policy that Darren knew would result in chaos and power struggles. The protests finally died out when Darren had suggested that any one of the young mountaineers could leave if they wished and fend for themselves outside the walls. It had been as simple as that: staking a claim to leadership and seeing who baulked at it. None had been willing to meet the challenge he threw down.
After that, once Darren had set up the light to draw in survivors from the lands around the castle, he had turned several away if he saw that they were armed or if they looked remotely hostile, aiming weapons at them from the battlements until they decided to try their luck elsewhere.
Only once in the week that they had occupied the castle had Darren truly felt like their position might be under threat, when a large group that reeked of trouble had pounded at the gates insistently until Darren himself had taken the shotgun and blown a hole through one of them to show everybody that he meant business.
The other group had departed then, spitting and cursing and hurling threats about coming back for Darren, but he hadn't been unduly worried. The castle was all but impregnable, unless someone turned up with explosives. Even then, Darren had a plan that would ensure that nobody would take his castle away from him.
That first genuine murder had turned out to be the moment when everyone in the castle understood that Darren meant every word he said. He had not been questioned since.
But the guy with the knives made Darren’s skin crawl. The manner in which he had moved when Darren first approached him; the smooth way he had lined up the knife to throw at Darren. The guy was trained. Military, maybe. That would have made him the most useful of all, if Darren believed that he could be trusted, but there was evasion in his eyes; defiance and threat. Darren couldn’t abide threat. Not within his castle.
Darren thought he could find a use for the rest of them; the young woman and the children especially, but that one? John? Letting him inside the walls felt like a mistake, and Darren knew he could not afford mistakes.
John had to go.
5
Rachel awoke first and grunted softly as she stretched out limbs that had seized up in protest at yet another night spent on a hard floor. Cold seemed to have seeped into her bones and spread outwards like an ink stain, until every cell felt as if it had frozen solid.
Castles, it turned out, had been cold places in which to live. If she was to spend another night in one, she would insist that the large stone fireplace that dominated the oval room at the base of the tower be used for something other than decoration.
A bed would be nice, of course, but it seemed like beds had gone the way of electricity and safety and sanity.
And Jason.
The loss of Jason ached like a fracture, and the more she thought about her baby brother, and how ill-equipped he had been to deal with the way the world
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