CHAPTER TWENTY‑ONE

They stripped Cordie. Then two boys held her to the ground while another tried to mount her. She twisted and kicked. He battered her legs away, got between them, and clutched her thighs to hold her still. He thrust against her. The head of his erection prodded, missing, missing, then finding the split of her vagina and plunging in. She cringed, and closed her eyes tightly.

“Look at him, ” Lilly said. “They don’t like it when you shut your eyes. ”

She kept them shut. The boy pounded into her with quick, hard strokes.

“You’ll be sorry, ” Lilly warned. “It’s an insult shutting your eyes. You want them to kill you? ”

Cordie opened her eyes. The boy’s face was above her. He watched her with narrow eyes. His bloody lips were drawn back, baring his teeth. He grunted loudly with each thrust, blowing putrid breath into her face.

She turned away. Lilly was squatting beside her, next to the boy who kept her right arm pinned. Another girl, this one chubby but small breasted, stood behind them. Her pubic hair was shaved. As she watched Cordie, she rubbed herself with the knobby end of a bone. The bone looked slippery and fresh. Its end disappeared inside her. Cordie quickly looked away, back to the face of the boy gasping above her, then away.

The boy pinning her left hand was younger than the others. He watched her with eager, wild eyes. Behind him stood a slender girl with a stump where her elbow should have been. A small, dried hand hung around her neck on a thong, its brown fingers curled as if about to clutch something.

The boy was pumping harder now, about to come.

Cordie stared at the girl’s withered hand. She tried hard to concentrate on it, to figure out whether it was a left hand or a right hand, to keep herself from thinking about the boy grunting and sweating on top of her, dirtying her insides with his filthy cock his…

A left hand.

The girl’s left arm had the stump.

Therefore…

The withered horror dangling between her breasts–was it her own severed hand?

The boy suddenly thrust deep and stayed, tight against her, head thrown back and mouth wide, his body twitching as he throbbed inside her. Cordie was sickened by the feel of his jerking cock, the spilling seed. She gagged.

The boy pulled out of her. He stood, pointing at his shiny erection and making a comment in a language Cordie didn’t know. Then he stepped back, hands on hips.

The boy on her right let go of her arm.

Cordie whimpered.

“It’s part of the test, ” Lilly said.

When he was on top of Cordie, about to enter her, she clenched her fist.

“Hit him, ” Lilly whispered, “and you’re dead meat. ”

So she lay beneath him, her free arm tense but motionless at her side, as he rode her to a climax.

He stood. He pointed at his dripping cock, said something and stepped away. He stood at the side of the first boy, and folded his arms.

The one at her left released her other arm. Cordie glanced at Lilly, kneeling close by. Lilly was flushed and breathing hard. The girl behind her was writhing on the bone she held in both hands. The one‑ armed girl stood motionless, her bare skin glossy with sweat, her fierce eyes meeting Cordie’s.

Jealous!

She’s jealous, Cordie thought. Of me.

The young one climbed onto her. He pushed his penis into her. It was smaller than the others. His mouth went to one of her breasts. Sucked the nipple. Gnawed it. Wincing with pain, Cordie clutched the grass. Then the pain streaked through her. She grabbed the boy’s hair and jerked his head away.

He snarled like a raging dog.

Cordie heard a sharp laugh. She glanced at the one‑ armed girl, and saw a vicious smile on her face.

“You blew it, ” Lilly said.

The words struck Cordie with sudden, cramping fear. She pulled the boy’s face down to her mouth and kissed it. She darted her tongue into his mouth.

She stroked his back. She clenched his buttocks, digging into his smooth flesh, pressing him more deeply into her. The boy moaned with pleasure. She eased his head away from her face, and pushed his mouth to her breast. His teeth clamped it, chewed it. She cried out with pain, but kept thrusting against him, kept squeezing his buttocks, and finally pushed a finger into his tight sphincter. He shook with spasms, moaning and gasping as he came.

He looked haggard and pleased when he climbed off her. He pointed to his erection, spoke, and joined the other two boys.

Cordie sat up.

The three boys began to walk. They nodded. They pointed at her.

The one‑ armed girl suddenly shouted. She jerked her knife out of her skin belt, and flung it to the ground. Strange words spat from her mouth.

The boys nodded.

“Tough, ” Lilly said.

“What’s going on? ”

“Kigit says you’re shit. She doesn’t want ’em to let you in. Says you’re weak and yellow. Says she wants to fight you. ”

“Fight me? ”

“Yeah. She’ll get her way, too. She’s gurlaw, one of the honored. ”

“What? ”

“She gave an arm during the last famine. ”

“Gave it? ”

Lilly nodded. “That’s her own hand she’s wearing around her neck. A very big honor. Must’ve hurt like hell. You’d never catch me doing that, you can bet. ”

“Oh gees. ”

The boys were nodding, agreeing with Kigit. She turned away from them, and walked toward Cordie.

“You’d better stand up. ”

“I have to fight her? ”

“You better try. ”

Cordie got to her feet as the girl approached. Her legs felt very tired and weak. She hurt inside from the assaults. Wetness spilled from her, rolling like syrup down her thighs.

She backed away from Kigit. She moved past the side of the thicket, wondering if she dared to turn and run.

Kigit smiled strangely. She pointed behind Cordie.

Cordie didn’t look. She continued to step backward until her bare foot slipped on a patch of wetness. She took a quick step, trying to catch her balance, and tripped on an obstruction.

She fell onto her back. Sitting up quickly, she found herself in the midst of severed human limbs. They were scattered all around–legs, arms, two mauled torsos. The kids, she realized, had been feasting before they found her.

Kigit picked up a glob of loose meat and tossed it underhand at Cordie.

She screamed as it landed on her belly. She rolled. The thing slid off her. Then she scrambled to her feet.

Kigit picked up a severed arm. She held it to her own stump and waved it in a parody of her own missing arm.

Cordie turned and ran. She heard the girl behind her, drawing closer. She lunged sideways. Leaped over a dead trunk. Darted through bushes that flailed her skin. But Kigit kept getting closer.

Where were the others? The boys? If it’s just this girl, this one‑ armed girl…

Cordie plunged forward as Kigit shoved her from behind. She landed hard, facedown, twigs and thorns tearing her flesh. As she started to get up, Kigit pounded on her back. The weight drove her down. Kigit’s arm crossed her throat choking off her wind. Using both hands, Cordie forced the arm away.

They rolled, but Kigit came up on top. Straddling Cordie’s chest, the girl shot a punch between her upraised arms. The fist felt like a hammer smashing Cordie’s nose. Her arms dropped heavily. Kigit’s knees pinned them to the ground. One blow after another crashed against her face. Finally, they stopped.

Though she kept her eyes open, Cordie was too dazed to struggle. She watched the girl above her, grinning down, then leaning forward so the withered hand dangled above her face. The hand lowered. Its dry fingers dragged across her forehead.

Cordie whimpered at the touch of the clawlike hand. She felt the scrape of its fingernails along her cheek. Kigit used her living hand to guide it toward Cordie’s mouth. The fingers hooked her lips. She kept them tightly shut. The fingers pressed, working between her lips, tearing them. She tasted blood. She felt the nails against her front teeth.

Lilly knelt beside her, and she suddenly realized that the others had caught up. They stood in a close circle around her, watching in silence.

Suddenly, Kigit jabbed the dead hand at Cordie’s right eye. She jerked her head sideways. The fingers raked the side of her face. Twisting frantically, she worked her arm out from under the girl’s knee. She grabbed a breast and wrung it. Kigit cried out, falling sideways as Cordie pulled. Cordie kept her grip. She climbed onto the writhing girl, whose single hand battered her arm, trying to free the tortured breast. Turning, she dug her elbow into Kigit’s throat. She put her weight on it. Something crushed, and her elbow punched deeper. The girl bucked, eyes popping, mouth agape, arm swinging wildly. Cordie blocked it. She crawled off the convulsing body, and got to her knees.

Everyone watched Kigit until she died.

Then a boy, the one who’d been first to assault Cordie, spoke.

She turned to Lilly for an explanation.

“He says you’re okay, but you’ve got to pick up Kigit and bring her along. ”

Cordie crawled to the body. She tore the thong away from the neck. She held it up, the severed hand swaying below it, and flung it into the bushes.

The chubby girl ran after it. She came out of the bushes holding the hand. She sniffed it. Then, dropping her bone, she tied the hand to her knife belt so it daisied between her legs. As she began touching herself with the curled fingers, Cordie turned to the boys.

“Get going, ” Lilly said.

Cordie clasped the dead girl’s arm, and pulled her to a sitting position. A fecal odor filled her nostrils. Holding her breath, she worked her way around to the girl’s back. She reached under the armpits and hugged the chest, locking her hands just below the breasts. She started to lift. The body felt leaden.

“Do you want me to help? ” Lilly asked.

Cordie nodded.

“I get the head. ”

“Huh? ”

“You killed her, so you get first tibbies. So take the head. Everybody does, ’cause the brain’s the best part. So you take first tibbies on the head, and give it to me. ”

“Okay, ” Cordie muttered.

“It’s a deal? ”

“Yeah. ”

“Okay. First off, don’t try picking her up. Too hard. We’ll each take a leg, and just drag her. ”

Cordie nodded. She stood, spreading her tangled hair away from her face. Her fingers touched a cheek. She glanced at them. The tips were shiny with blood. Her face felt numb and swollen. She hadn’t realized it was bleeding, though. Looking down at herself, she saw that much of her body was scratched and bruised, and streaked with blood.

“Look at me, ” she mumbled. “Jesus, look at me. ”

“Look at her” Lilly said, nodding toward the body. “Come on. ” She picked up Kigit’s right foot.

The boys started walking away. The chubby girl followed them, her dimpled buttocks jiggling as she walked.

Cordie picked up the left foot. She and Lilly leaned forward, and the body moved. They began to walk. It skidded along behind them.

The boys led the way back to the thicket. They picked up part of the bodies.

Cordie lowered her eyes, unwilling to look at their cargo of arms and legs.

God, how could any of this be!

Have they done this to Mom and Dad?

Maybe Mom’s alive. Maybe they raped her and let her join, like me, and we can run off together. But we’d have to find Dad, first. If he’s alive.

If he’s alive. But how could he be?

It’s possible, she thought.

Anything’s possible. None of this makes sense, so anything is possible, even Dad coming in with the National Guard and slaughtering all these bastards.

The body caught on something.

Without looking, Cordie jerked fiercely. It pulled free.

“How far to the village? ” she asked Lilly.

“A ways. ”