Flesh Worn Stone Read Online Free PDF Page A

until she threw up, the water the only contents of her stomach.

    “We’ve got to find something to eat and a cleaner source of water,” John told them as he helped Amanda to her feet after she had finished.

    “Good luck here,” Darius said. “This place is nothing but filth. I don’t think anyone is taking Richard Nixon’s advice.”

    Steven sat Rebecca down near the pool and tried to clear away some of the grime and filth covering the surface, trying as best he could to get her a clean handful of water. She balked at first when he offered it to her, but took it eventually. A drop of water joined the flow of tears through the dirt on her face. He hugged her tightly to him, his arms wrapped around her.

    “When are you going to cry, Steven?” she asked softly. “The boys…”

    “I…I can’t cry right now. I have to worry about us, here and now. I’ll cry when I get us out of here.” That was optimistic, he thought. Some of the people in the crowds, eating, sitting around small fires, looked positively ancient.

    “They’re gone, Steven.”

    “I know.”

    “Do you smell that?” Darius asked aloud.

    “All I smell is shit,” John replied. “Shit and death.”

    “No, there’s meat cooking somewhere. I don’t know what kind of meat, but it’s meat.”

    The big man walked towards the smell, and the tendrils of smoke drifting near the cavern’s ceiling, wrapping the pirate ship in a haze. There were several large cooking fires surrounded by men armed with wooden clubs and spears. They were a ragged looking bunch, but much healthier appearing than their counterparts in the rest of the cavern. Steven also suspected he recognized a few from the frenzied beating of Cassandra. Looking well fed and ready for a fight, they formed a loose circle around the cooking fires, guarding the area where spits of meat cooked alongside large pots of some unidentified stew. Darius marched to the head of the line.

    “Get back to the end of the line,” one of the men said, a thick Latino with gang tattoos all over his body. He stood with a stone-tipped spear across his chest. There were three vertical slashes carved into his forehead, forming rough scars.

    “We just got here and we’re hungry.”

    “I don’t give two fucks when you got here. You can get back to the end of the line or you can go the fuck away. I don’t care.”

    Darius looked past the man where several other large men sat laughing and eating. One man in particular, a large Samoan, sat on a throne made of bamboo, wood, and bone, eating a meat Steven couldn’t readily identify from the bone. Skulls lined the base of the throne as well as its tall, arched back.

    “I bet they didn’t stand in line,” Darius said simply.

    “They’re three- and four-timers. Why in the hell would they stand in line?”

    Steven had no idea what the man meant by three- and four-timers, but Darius still wasn’t moved, “I don’t care. We’re hungry and we’re going to eat.”

    The spear tip was quickly at his throat. “It’s not against the rules to drop you in order to keep order, you know.”

    “No,” Darius shot back, “I don’t know. I don’t know what the rules are; I don’t have a clue where we are. Tell you what, chump, why don’t you take that stick and shove it up your ass before I do it for you.”

    The man looked back and forth at the large Samoan on the junk thrown, confused. He obviously wasn’t used to someone not backing down. He wasn’t used to non-submission. The Samoan looked at him with disgust and then stood, coming to them.

    “What’s the problem here?” he asked.

    The Samoan was at least, if not larger, than Darius. Steven was sure he was meaner. He, like the Latino, was covered in tattoos, though his looked more traditional Polynesian than prison, and instead of three marks on his forehead, he had four. A series of circles, lines, and dashes ran from his knees up his thighs, and up his chest. His black hair was