The Road Sharks by Clint Hollingsworth Read Free Book Online Page B

die.”
    There wasn’t much he could say to that. He had seen such an amazing amount of death since the Die-Off, much of it brutal, and he realized he had become callous to most of it. If this wolf woman could show a little kindness to a long-dead child, the least he could do was help. He bent over and picked up the shovel, but a wave of dizziness overtook him.
    “Stop that, idiot!” she barked at him. “A day and a half ago you were crucified on a makeshift cross. Don’t try to do any heavy labor, you’ll just hurt yourself again. What’s wrong with your head?”
    “It seems to be very,… spinny,” he replied, sitting down carefully under an old pine tree. “Please, carry on.”
    He watched her begin to shovel dirt into the makeshift grave.  
    “So, this Clan of the Hawk, I’d guess not an original native group then?” he asked.
    “It is a group of all races, who do not hold with the technology of the twenty-first century. They believe the Die-Off was caused by the makers of that technology and have decided to have a simpler life. The only ones who use the new tech are the members of the warrior society.”
    “And your scouts are part of that society.”
    She stopped digging for a moment. “No. The scouts, with the exception of a few items, make most of their equipment from nature.”  
    “But why? There’s still a lot of perfectly good stuff lying around rusting or rotting. Why would they do that?”
    “The rationale is that the scouts should be able to be left anywhere out in the world with almost nothing and still be able to thrive. It’s the philosophy of the scout society, and while I’m not saying the rules are never bent, for the most part the scouts try to stick to that credo. I personally think it might well be the reason I’m still alive.”
    “Oh?”
    “Yes. We are tested before we leave our apprenticeship and we are tested hard.”
    She took off her strange hybrid coat and a deer skin blouse to reveal a sleeveless hemp undershirt and even feeling dizzy, he was well aware that she had a very fine figure. He also watched the muscles of her upper arm, corded like metal cable when they flexed.
    Strong one, this girl. She’ll need to be, out here, all alone.
    She looked like a good candidate, but he was hesitant to say anything about inviting her to be part of his own Mountain Folk. She had, after all, been banished from her own group and there had to be a reason for that. Maybe it was just some sort of religious persecution, there sure as shit were plenty of weirdo cults out here since the Die-Off.
    What if she’s one of those strange ones, predisposed towards chaos and craziness?
    He didn’t think so. She was cool and calm in dangerous situations, and his conversations with her told him she was very intelligent. But the thing that really convinced him at a gut level was happening right before him. Ghost Wind was trying to give a little dignity to a long dead-child in a world where most people were used to stumbling over and ignoring skulls and bones.
    She had just tamped down the earth of the grave, then added a little more, tamped that down. He watched her take paving stones from the garden and lay them in an oval around the grave, then put the remainder over where the child’s body lay. She finished by stacking the last few at the head of the grave.
    “Go, little one,” she said, lowering her head. “Leave this sad place and be with your people. Do not stay here, go where the light is.” He saw her eyes glimmer with tears, and after all these years, even with all the bodies he had seen, he felt his own sting a little.  
    Jesus, have I really become this unfeeling? To forget this simple emotion?
    Ghost Wind started toward the house, shovel in hand and he called after her, “You don’t really need to put that back, Ghost Wind, these folks are done with it.”
    She looked down at the shovel for a moment, “Someone may need it someday. I find it… offensive to leave a good tool