Part 2 Rockrider

Her screams halted the German shepherd in mid-stride. He stared at the human with piercing black eyes. Leila thought the dog was a wolf; a wolf that could kill her with one leap and one bite, sharp fangs piercing an artery with ease.  She closed her own eyes for just a fraction of a second, and in that brief moment she saw the interior of the greenhouse. In her mind’s eye she pictured the walls and the floor. She saw every table and every plant. Since her husband’s death Leila had spent many idle, vacant hours in the greenhouse; allowing her to recall with great detail every crack and crevice. In that split second her mind’s eye found what she was looking for. She saw the pick-axe leaning against the heavy leg of the oak table, the front left leg. Leila opened her eyes and slowly reached behind her, feeling first for the table’s leg and then the hickory handle of the axe. She saw the wolf (dog) take a step closer. With the speed of a person thirty years younger Leila grabbed the tool and then with a fluid like motion raised the axe above her head preparing to swing with no aim at all, praying that she would open the head of the wolf before he opened her throat.

“Grandma, no!” Rockrider screamed against the howling wind.

                                                                                                                                                            

The voice of Leila’s grandson had immediate effects on the dog and the woman. The dog stopped his forward progress and turned his head towards the familiar voice. At the same moment Leila’s hand loosened her grip on the pick axe and it fell to the floor with a bang.

“Shiloh sit!” commanded the young man. Rockrider patted the dog on his head as he walked to where his grandmother was standing, “You okay, Granny?”

“I’m okay. Don’t call me granny. And where did the wolf come from?” Leila said with a rhythmic pattern that her grandson knew meant she was a little irritated.

“I’m sorry. He’s not a wolf, I think he is pure German shepherd, I named him Shiloh.”

“And where did you find him?”

“It’s more like he found me. I was trolling down by Cave Green and I fell asleep after climbing some rocks. When I woke up there he was, lying right beside me.”  Rockrider softly patted his thigh and the dog came and sat down beside him.

“He’s a great hunter grandma; he stalked a rabbit for over two hundred yards before pouncing on him. I thought he would eat it, but he didn’t, he brought it right over to me and dropped it at my feet. Thanks to Shiloh we are going to have rabbit stew tonight!” Rockrider smiled at his grandmother.

“He probably belongs to somebody. A dog doesn’t behave like that without someone having trained him, and that’s hard to do. Dogs are wild, they’re not pets. Not anymore anyway.” Leila glanced down at the dog.

Rockrider loved to hear his grandmother talk about how things were before the Day of Desolation. He was born two years after the Incubus first appeared which was almost two years removed from when the Intaha terrorist group first attacked the east coast of the United States.  Rockrider’s world had never included pets, fast food or peace. But sometimes his grandmother said things like ‘not anymore anyway’, when she did he thought she sounded sad, sad an angry.

“Well if he does belong to someone then Shiloh left them for a reason. He’s a hunter Grandma; he can help us have food, something other than cucumbers and carrots. Plus the canned goods supply is getting low. Let him stay. Please.”

To Leila her grandson’s plea sounded like it did when he was four years old, always asking for something that he couldn’t have or couldn’t do. Her love for him welled up inside like a geyser as they stood together inside the greenhouse. “Okay James, but he stays outside. I don’t trust him not to chew up the few nice things I have left.”

“Thanks granny! That’s for calling me James.” Rockrider laughed.

 
Rockrider had been named after his father, James Boyd. But like so many in this new world, he rarely used his real name. People knew that names lead to information, information about people you loved people that they would kill. “Rockrider” was more than a cover alias, it was what he was. He started

climbing before he was walking and he had never stopped. He would climb atop the biggest boulder he could manage and sit upon it pretending the stone was a rocket ship or a great stallion. Leila actually thought the name Rockrider was appropriate, but on occasion liked to remember her son by hearing his name.

“Are you finished watering the plants, Grandma?” Rockrider asked.

“I don’t know if I will ever be finished out here”, she sighed. “But I suppose it will do until this afternoon. Help me gather some carrots and onions first and then we will go back to the house. Rabbit stew for lunch sounds like a real treat.” Shiloh barked as if in agreement. Rockrider and Leila laughed together. 

The winds had died down to levels that were comfortable, no longer strong enough to drive the razor edged dust into their faces. They talked about the rabbit stew that would soon thrill their taste buds. Shiloh walked beside Rockrider only darting ahead when curiosity dictated.

Towering eastern white pines blocked the view of the cottage home from their current approach. Most of the smaller trees that had been on the outskirts, between the cottage and the greenhouse had been removed and used for firewood. The pines were too large and too elegant to even consider taking them down and Leila enjoyed the sense of security they provided.

 This morning the trees also prohibited Leila or her grandson from seeing the stranger standing outside the front door of the cottage.

Thirty yards from their home, Shiloh first saw the man standing there. The dog froze and emitted a low growl from deep inside his throat. Rockrider heard the dog’s snarl then instinctively reached out and stopped his grandmother’s steps.

“Shiloh, what’s the matter boy?” Rockrider knelt next to the shepherd, placing his hand on the back of his neck. Leila looked up from the path she had been following. She saw the small man standing there, wearing an oversized yellow rain coat and a bucket hat on his head, the soft white material stained with sweat and dirt. He looked as if he could have just stepped off the deck of a fishing trawler. The stranger looked up and saw the two approaching; he raised his hand in a friendly wave. Leila saw the man look down, spotting the German shepherd. Even from this distance she could see the smile spread across the stranger’s face.

“Titus!” bellowed the plump little man.

The dog tilted his head to the right as if trying to remember something. Then suddenly he was in a full run headed towards the little man in a yellow raincoat. It was Rockrider’s turn to bellow, “Shiloh!”

The shepherd didn’t even slow at Rockrider’s call. Leila watched as the dog bounded down the slope and then leaped upon the man. In horror she thought the dog would surely kill the man. And then she heard the man laughing and realized that Shiloh (Titus?) was licking the man’s pudgy little face.

Rockrider had run after the dog and arrived to the front door minutes before Leila. He stood there watching his dog, his new best friend, reunite with this stranger. A sinking feeling, one he had never felt before came over Rockrider. The little man and Titus finished their reunion just as Leila arrived on the scene.

“Hello.” Leila greeted him with a well-trained politeness.

“And hello to you,” he replied, “You found my dog, thank you so much.”

“He’s not your dog.” Rockrider responded.

 Leila placed a hand on her grandson’s shoulder, but remained silent. She was looking at the man’s face, looking for signs to trust or not trust. She had always been gifted with discernment but in the unusual way of reading facial features and expressions. It was a gift that rarely failed her.

“Oh but he is. Titus has been my companion since he was a puppy. He has never wandered off before; I don’t know why he did this time.”

“He had a reason.” Rockrider said curtly.

Leila watched for reaction and saw none. She thought it was time to say something, “My name is Leila, and this is my grandson, Rockrider. He isn’t always rude.”

With a laugh the man replied, “I understand, Titus is a very likeable friend, a rare find these days. My name is Savalli. It is my pleasure.” He extended his hand waiting for Rockrider to respond.

A moment passed before he did, prompted by a glance from his grandmother. He shook Savalli’s hand, “I called him Shiloh. He is a great dog, a great hunter.”

“Shiloh is a grand name!” Savalli smiled, “and a great hunter he is indeed.”

Far off thunder rolled through the darkening sky and the wind suddenly returned to the strength of earlier that morning. Savalli’s bucket hat flew off his head, but with unexpected reflex he grabbed that hat before the wind carried it away. In the brief moment that his bald head was revealed Rockrider saw a deep scar that seemed to run from his forehead to the back of his neck.

Leila raised her voice to be heard over the roar of the sudden wind, “Let’s go inside!”  The dog, regardless of his name or owner understood the word “inside” and bounded up the stairs in front of the three humans. Rockrider lead the way, followed by Savalli. The little man stood aside to allow Leila to enter before him. As she did she glanced again at his face, she thought “This is a man I can trust, I hope.”

Part 1 Leila

The wind carried the sand through the mountain air scarring everything in its path. Mixed with the sand was a fine concrete dust, all that was left of the tall buildings pulverized over twenty years ago. The strange blend of particles turned the morning sky into a deep orange canvas with long wispy streaks of gray crossing the horizon as if an angry god had dragged his dirty fingers across the opus.

Leila covered her face with the wool scarf but the wind carried dust found ways to penetrate the fabric, stinging her face over and over.

She held her eyes shut tight as she bent forward against the mighty wind, making slow progress across the barren land. Leila didn’t need to see to get where she was going, she had traveled the short distance hundreds, no thousands of times since the Day of Desolation. She wouldn’t need to see until she was in the old greenhouse. Inside, sitting on a small oak table was the only thing she longed to see.   

They hadn’t bothered to destroy her home or the greenhouse when they had demoished everything else. Built by her husband the greenhouse was half the size of her home,a graceful tudor cottage. The greenhouse was his place of refuge, a hideaway from the corporate world of international finance. He developed the green thumb of a master gardener. The final years of his life were spent loving his plants, caring for them.More care than he had shown his own children. Of course he saw the nursery dwellers more than his children, his world travel had consumed the early years of their childhood, leaving Leila to raise them alone. She didn’t complain; his career provided everything she needed or wanted. More than eighty acres of land in Roanoke, Virginia just east of the Blueridge, a splendid home that was more than a hundred years old and the solitude she had always longed for. All this the results of his relentless drive to succeed. But none of it mattered now. Land has no value, money no purpose and solitude is everyone’s way of life.

Russell had died fighting to protect their home, that was before they came, before the desolation. Leila never imagined her husband as a fighter but he had stood his ground when so many others ran away. She remembered her husband's last words as he lay dying in her arms,  “Nellie”. He spoke with his dying breath about a plant instead of about her or their children! At first this had bothered her greatly, until she began to care for the Nivellie Myrtus, Nellie; then she understood.

The Nivellie or Saharan Myrtle was the most beautiful plant in his green house. Russell had smuggled it back into the United States after a trip to Tassili ‘Ajjer, Algeria. He had spent three weeks in the Saharan Desert trying to convince two very rich Egyptian businessmen to invest in his company. All he walked away with was a plant. Russell believed there was something special about this very rare myrtle. It was the only plant he would ever actually give a name to,” Nellie”. He had even rebuilt the greenhouse, upgrading it all because of Nellie. Special lighting and irrigation systems were added. A solid oak table built just for the Nivellie to sit upon. Leila thought she should be jealous, but constantly reminded herself that it was just a plant.

That was more than twenty years ago, the plant should have been dead by now. But it wasn’t. So every day, in the morning and then again at dusk Leila made the trip to the greenhouse to look at the plant and remember. She pushed open the reinforced door to the greenhouse and entered, quickly closing the door behind her to keep the wind out. She opened her eyes for the first time in almost twenty minutes; they adjusted slowly to the low light of the room She lit the small lantern she always kept by the door, electricity a thing of the past. Most of the plants in the nursery had died many years ago; the ones that were still alive were planted by her or by Rockrider over the last few years, as a source of food. The irrigation system had been operated by electricity, now it was nothing more than a tangle of empty tubing, so Leila would water each plant by hand, saving Nellie for last.

She stood before the table (it reminded her of an altar), looking at her husband’s prized possession. The plant looked as it had the day Russell had brought it into their home. The sessile leaves were a dark green, the single bloom a brilliant white, surrounded by small black berries. The air was filled with a sweet fragrance that could be bottled as an expensive perfume. The myrtle was three feet across but only stood eight inches high. Russell had thought it may be some rare dwarf variety, but Leila had researched the library and the Internet and never found any evidence of a dwarf species of the Nivellie. The plant was simply beautiful and strange.

“No wonder he loved you so much” Leila spoke to the empty room.

The door behind her flew open; wind carried the hostile dust into the room covering everything in its path. Leila dropped the watering can and turned to close the door.

She screamed.