Page 2 of The White Rider
They all crowded around me, and I peered out the window. It was pretty shitty. Well, the view wasn’t. I could see for miles. It was just the sheer level of destruction. It didn’t look like the bombs had hit this area that hard. No, this was all graffiti and smashed windows.
I could see tents and fires in the distance and small people milling about. I could just make out their guns.
“Is that his army of spare Bubbas? How does one go about collecting all the Bubbas left in the world after the Rage Mutation and World War Three? I’ve seen a lot of weird shit since I woke up from the coma, but this is fuckingweird.”
Dice chuckled and nuzzled my neck.
“Isaiah is a dick, and he’s using all those people. He can’t be bothered with their names. All the men are Bubbas, and the women are Marthas. Leonard is from before all this, so he got to keep his name.”
I stared at the sheer number of tents out there, and I just didn’t get it. This wasn’t simply people being loyal to their president. This was some cult-level shit!
“And people are actually okay with that? They are okay with following him and him not even bothering to learn their names? They are willing to die for him, knowing he thinks their name is Bubba or Martha?”
“Isaiah thinks this is something like the dark ages. The Marthas are nothing but property to the Bubbas. They cook, clean, and have babies. Only the Bubbas fight,” Aeron said.
What kind of horse shit was this? I already knew my father was a misogynist piece of shit, but why were these women carrying water for him? Why didn’t they rise up and leave? Us womenhad fought a whole civil rights movement so we didn’t have to deal with this kind of shit.
“Save your anger, Speedy,” Dice said, nuzzling my neck. “Asher is in contact with those on the fringes of D.C. They hate Isaiah, and they’ve got some badass women fighters. Asher trained them himself.”
“I guess the Horseman of Conquest has to have at least one redeeming feature.”
And he was fucking hot. He looked like some Fae king from a paranormal romance cover. Pre-apocalypse Ariel totally would have overlooked him being a dick and gone there in a heartbeat. Post-apocalyptic Ariel though? She had a good thing going with three angels and did not need to go fishing in the asshole pond anymore. Assholes were always great fucks, but you had to deal with the whole asshole thing. That was the case until I met Aeron, Dice, and Leif.
“Asher is a good guy, Speedy,” Leif said. “He wants you gone because he doesn’t want you hurt. Give him time and get to know him. He’s in your painting for a reason.”
Aeronpinched my ass, hard.
“I realize he’s being a dick right now, but please avoid beating him with Smurfette, even if he says something and has it coming.”
I tried to tickle him, but it wasn’t a huge shocker he wasn’t ticklish. I’ll bet Leif was, but not Aeron.
“Then who do you suggest I take it out on when he’s a dick to me?”
“Not me, or I’ll tie you down and spank you,” Dice said.
I pinched his nipple.
“You do realize I like that, and it’s not a deterrent, right?”
Dice yanked me to his chest and let out a little growl.
“I can light your ass up in ways youdon’tlike, little Nephilim.”
“And I’ll beat the shit out of you for hurting her,” Aeron grunted. “Save it, Ariel. Look at all those people out there. They are way worse than anyone we encountered on the road. A lot of their Marthas aren’t willing. Some of them are, but some were kidnapped and claimed. The wild game here is in short supply and what they can catch goes straight to your father and the people close to him. What do you think these people eat in their hamburgers?”
I wrinkled my nose. Sure, I’d been hungry on the road with Aeron, and some of those mystery cans weren’t appealing at all, but I never quite gotthathungry.
“I think I’d go vegetarian before I ate a person. I don’t need meat that bad.”
“They are just lazy,” Leif said. “There was a time when people made stew from rats. Now these assholes think it’s okay to eat people, but eating rats is gross.”
I felt a little sick to my stomach. I didn’t particularly like the idea of eating either.
“I’ll take dented cans of questionable origin any day. What exactly are we eating here?”
“Asher has been raiding our secret Costco. Nothing fancy, but we won’t go hungry.”
“What is the plan now that we are all together?”
