Crossroads

Mara returned to find them cutting up chunks of meat. The butcher worked behind a hill of snow to spare the children their innocence. Beside him, a cook waited with an empty sack and an expression that discouraged conversation.Commander Saye had decided that there was no time to rest and ordered the caravan turned around. People leaned into harnesses alongside the surviving dogs, dragging the lead sledges through their own frozen tracks."No passage," Mara reported.Saye did not look at her. "Then we take the southern route.""It is eleven days away.""Nine, if we leave the heavy machinery."Tomas stood beside the damaged machinery sledge, tightening its repaired axle brace. He stopped working.Mara kept her voice level. "The southern road may be gone too.""I travelled that road in my younger days. It leads through higher ground.""It will take us back toward Blackharbor.""We are not returning to Blackharbor.""We will pass within twenty miles of it. You saw what happened there. Do you really think salvation lies on the other side?"That made Saye face her. Blackharbor was a name no one spoke, mostly because they were all trying to move on from it. The town they had all once called home was among the last to crumble beneath the long winter. The snow crept in and stood its ground as time slowly stripped the people of food and comfort. Disease took what was left. Eventually, the remaining three thousand people fought over supplies sufficient for half that number. Entire districts were set on fire during the final riots. Neighbour against neighbour, family against family, friend against friend. The caravan carried everyone who had escaped before the gates closed for good.Saye approached until the others could no longer pretend not to hear."You have another route?"Mara opened the map across the machinery sledge. The cold had made the paper brittle, so Tomas held down one corner with a wrench. She pointed northwest."There is a basin here. Three days away if the ground is passable."Jessa Marr joined them, wiping grease from her hands. She was strong and broad-shouldered, with a dark buzz cut."A town?" she asked."No.""Storehouse?""The survey map doesn't say."Saye let out a hollow laugh. "Perhaps the snow will feed us!""The map suggests this may be a hot zone.""May be?""The site was inspected forty years ago. The survey recorded geothermal heat."Mara showed them the faded notation. Tomas leaned closer."Why is it scribbled in red ink?" he asked."Perhaps the location was considered unsuitable for settlement," Jessa guessed."There," Saye said. "A problem solved by people wiser than us.""This map was made long before the Veil settled and began the long winter," Mara replied. "The needs of the Imperium would have been different."Everyone looked at Mara, so she continued."What would a place have needed to be considered for settlement back then?" she wondered aloud."They would have wanted farmland, timber, water sources, and access to the imperial roads," Jessa said. "A sheltered basin with no forests would have been useless then.""And now?" Tomas asked."If the basin's ridges are tall enough, they can protect us from the winds. The underground source of heat might save us from the cold," Mara said.Tomas traced the contour lines around the crater. "If they drilled an exploratory bore, there could be casing left in the ground.""After forty years?" Jessa asked."Good imperial steel could survive.""And bad imperial steel?""It will become our coffin," Tomas said.Saye pulled the map from beneath the wrench."We are not gambling six hundred lives on a note on a map.""We are already gambling them," Mara said. "The southern route costs more food than we have.""We will hunt.""For what?"No one had seen a living animal larger than a rat since leaving Blackharbor.Saye folded the map, badly, and pressed it into her hands."We march south."A murmur passed through the people nearest the sledge. They had been listening after all. Jessa looked past Mara at the waiting caravan."You should tell them what is being decided.""I have decided," Saye said."They are the ones pulling.""They appointed me to lead.""They followed you out of Blackharbor. That isn't the same thing."Saye's hand moved toward the pistol beneath his coat. It stopped short of touching the grip, but everyone saw. Jessa stepped closer.Mara caught her arm."Not here.""For once," Saye said, "your surveyor has judged the ground correctly."He ordered the scouts to mark a southern course and walked toward the head of the caravan.Jessa watched him leave. "Three days of fuel.""Less now," Tomas said.He bent down and opened the insulated compartment beneath the machinery sledge. Inside rested a cylinder of glowing amber crystal enclosed by bands of black iron. The ardent chamber was no bigger than Mara's forearm, yet six people had lost their lives bringing it out of Blackharbor's power station. A faint warmth rose from its surface.Tomas removed his gloves and held his hands above it."The casing is starting to cool," he said. "We lost another seal.""Can you repair it?" Mara asked."With resin, clean cloth, and several hours somewhere warmer than this."Jessa glanced toward the caravan. "We have one of those things.""Which one?""Cloth."The lead sledge took its place at the head of the southbound line. Its driver fired a green flare. Families began turning their sledges. Nobody argued openly, but Mara saw the questions passing from group to group.Three days.Eleven days.An ignored promise to the northwest.The fate of six hundred lives rested in Saye's hands. Nature was a cruel and indifferent force. It did not care whether his decision was right or wrong.A woman approached carrying a little boy whose face was wrapped in scarves. Mara recognized her from the sixth sledge but could not remember her name."Is there heat in the crater?" the woman asked."We don't know.""Is there food?""We don't know that either."The woman looked south."Is there food where he's taking us?"Mara hesitated."No."The answer travelled farther than she intended.By midnight, the caravan had moved less than a mile. Two more dogs collapsed. Tomas's repaired axle held, but the twelfth sledge split a runner and had to be abandoned. Its passengers crowded onto other sledges. Its cargo did not.Mara watched people choose what to leave behind: tools, books, blankets, a wooden cradle, a brass clock that had not run since summer disappeared. Objects were placed beside the road with care, as if their owners meant to return for them.Saye gave the order: "Rest."Sana found Mara near the last sledge."Scouts are asking about the basin," she said."What did you tell them?" Mara asked."That it exists.""That is more than we know.""It exists on your map.""Maps record mistakes as faithfully as truths."Sana considered that."The commander wants us moving before first light."Mara looked northwest.The land there rose into low ridges, black stone showing through wind-scoured snow. There were no telegraph lines or roads. Nothing suggested that another human being had made that journey.Their choice was three days into the unknown or eleven days back toward where they had come from.Behind her, someone began coughing beneath the canvas shelters. Another voice called for the doctor. A baby started crying and did not stop.Mara unfolded the map one more time. The red ink was almost invisible in the failing light.**Geothermal crater.**"Wake the survey crew," she told Sana.Sana studied her face. "Saye ordered everyone to rest.""He ordered us south. He didn't order us to be ignorant.""And if we find a route northwest?"Mara looked toward the commander's lamp at the head of the caravan."Then he will have to choose again."