Р. Смит - Land of the Beautiful Dead

“I’d rather get something to eat.”

He nodded again and shut the door behind her.

They went into the diner, past another group of kids, younger ones, racings rats in a crudely-constructed arena. The kids were all shouting, cheering, shaking their guns in the air, apparently oblivious to Lan and the ferryman. Lan would be very surprised if she didn’t find their grubby little handprints on the inside of the van when they came back to it, but if the ferryman was concerned about robbery, he didn’t show it.

There were only three patrons inside the diner—another ferryman, a young one, and his fares, either sisters or mother and daughter, sitting close together. The younger was whisper-arguing at the older one; the older one stayed quiet, but looked like she’d been crying. Their ferryman sized Lan up with an intent interest she did not trust.

“Tell me to touch you, okay?” she murmured as they sat down at a sagging table.

He didn’t answer, but took her wrist and put it firmly over his crotch. She made a point of looking unhappy about it, resigned but a little fearful, as if he were dangerous. Of course he was dangerous. He was one of them—not an Eater maybe, but still one of the dead. And this was more his world now than hers.

Soon, a girl came to their table. Not far into her adolescence, her body was taut and agreeably displayed, but her eyes were already old and tired. “We got coffee, whiskey, applejack and water. Goldslip only. No barter and none of that paper play-money.”

“Clean water?” the ferryman pressed. You had to ask. They didn’t always tell the truth, but if you didn’t at least ask, they’d screw you over any way they could.

The girl rolled one round shoulder in an angry shrug. “Boiled.”

“Coffee, then. Two. And dinners. How much are you?” Like questioning the water, he was expected to ask.

“Five for a suck. Fucks are twenty in a bed, ten against the wall,” she said, turning to flash her fingers at the man working the kitchen. Her father, he would be. Or her brother. Or both. Waystations were always a family business and those families got tight. “Ass only.”

“You a virgin?”

“What I am is a girl who don’t want another brat underfoot. Ass only. You don’t like it, use your hand.”

The ferryman pretended to consider while Lan massaged at his soft groin. “Maybe next time,” he said at last.

“Heart-breaker,” the girl sneered and went to see if the next table needed anything.

A different girl brought their food. Same face, younger model, with light curious eyes. For now, the ferrymen and their travels were exciting, but Lan thought that might change once her breasts budded.

The coffee was hot, but watery and bitter. Made with roasted roots, she guessed, and made damned sparingly at that. The dinner was hard bread and stew, also bitter and watery. The ferryman pushed it around some, watching the room. When Lan finished off her bowl, he slid his over. She ate it too, nasty stuff that it was, knowing it could be days before she ate again, knowing also that this might be her last meal.

The ferryman at the next table haggled the waitress into a crib, and as soon as they had disappeared upstairs, his two fares got up and came over to Lan’s table. “We’re going to Eastport,” the older one said.

“Headed the wrong way.”

“We’ll ride along until you turn around.”

“Then you’ll pay. No free riders.”

The younger girl reached into her jacket pocket and came out with a little brown bottle half-filled with powdery white pills. “Penicillin,” she said. “Thirty doses. Thirty more if we leave right now.”

Lan’s ferryman glanced at the stairs, where the muted sounds of the other man’s enthusiasm could be heard, and then at the window, where the charging light over his van had turned green. He fished out a few slips of hammered gold—the coin of Azrael’s realm—and tossed them on the table. “Come on then.”

The kids were back at the rat races when they stepped outside, pretending they had never left. The ferryman pretended to believe them as he passed by. Then he darted out with unexpected speed and caught one. Between the blinking of Lan’s eyes, he had a knife in his hand and then put the knife in the kid’s shoulder. The other kids scattered back with the first silvery scream, but didn’t run. They watched with cagey eyes as their captive friend squirmed and bled. “Put it back,” the ferryman said calmly, twisting the knife. “Put it all back.”

Little hands dug into pockets. Little feet shuffled out to the van and back. The ferryman dragged his hostage over to witness the returns and, apparently satisfied, pulled the knife out and gave the kid a shove toward the building just as the door banged open. The other ferryman came running out, belt and shirt hanging open, bellowing curses.

“Get in,” the ferryman said, watching the other man charge toward him.

The two women scrambled into the back of the van, but Lan lingered, one foot up on the runner, to watch.

The other ferryman had a knife of his own. Lan’s ferryman put his away. At the last instant, the other man leaped and slammed into his unmoving opponent. Lan saw six inches of steel punch down into the ferryman’s chest. Then she saw him reach, as quick and easy as he’d caught the kid, and twist the other man’s head around. The sound of his neck breaking was a loud pop over a low crunch. The ferryman removed the knife and folded it away. He rummaged through the body’s pockets, took whatever there was to find, and left the rest to the owner of the charging station. The kids were already at the ferryman’s truck, squabbling over pillage.

“Get in,” the ferryman said again, walking around to the driver’s door. There was a small hole in his shirt. There was no blood.

Lan got in the van.

The women rode in back and, stretched out on the mattress in the curtained dark, were soon both asleep. Lan and the ferryman rode in silence through the night and as the sun pushed up into a grey morning, the walls of Azrael’s kingdom were visible.

“Get in back,” the ferryman said. “Lie down. Whatever happens, stay asleep.” He raised his voice slightly. “Do you hear me?”

“Yes,” the older woman said. She kept her eyes shut although her arms tightened around the younger woman, who reached up, shivering, to clutch her sister/mother’s hands. “We’re not really going in, are we? We’re just going past, right?”

The ferryman chose not to answer. Instead, he said simply, “They’ll stop me and they’ll want a look at you. Remember what I said: Stay asleep, no matter what they do. I won’t protect you if you panic.”

Lan lay down crosswise on the mattress, her face close to the women’s feet, smelling old shoes and the dungy mud of the last waystation. She closed her eyes and listened to the road hum beneath the van’s tires, willing her body to relax. The younger woman sniffled for a few minutes, but only a few. Then they were quiet, all three, and still.

The van began to slow. She felt it turn and slow again. Someone outside called out to them. The van stopped moving. The engine died. The ferryman rolled down the window.

“Unlock your doors. By order of our lord, all vehicles are to be searched before entry.”

“I’m familiar with our lord’s laws,” the ferryman replied. The van’s locks disengaged. “Very familiar.”

The van’s rear doors opened. Lan felt the chill air of the outside world, rank with rot and rain. She did not move, not even when the hand gripped her face and turned her into the wind. His touch was cool and dry, unfeeling, like being touched by a glove.

“Your hands had better be clean,” the ferryman remarked.