Thanatos might be the one who reinstated slavery, but apparently humans had jumped on that particular bandwagon with little argument. The crowd surrounding the platform had been large, the people had acted like it was a regular occurrence, laughing and jostling one another. Acting like they were bidding on a horse, not a human.

As we turned round the bend, a haze of thick black smoke rolled over our windshield. The air was filled with it. There was a small white church nestled between an old green house and a run down factory. There was another crowd here, slightly smaller than the auction had been. They were gathered around a large bonfire. This crowd was more subdued, and as we passed a few looked up, glaring at the jeep. I pressed my face to the window, and saw a frail looking old woman add another armful of fuel to the fire.

The books tumbled out of her arms and into the flames, and the pages curled, shriveled and blackened.

They were burning bibles.

“Holy crap,” Manda was leaning forward, pointing up at the sign above the church doors. “Look at that. The arrogant bastard.”

The sign had obviously been painted over, and there were fresh words printed on it, words that Manda read out loud in a scornful voice,

“Church of Thanatos. Hah.”

“Typical of a lesser demon,” Horace scoffed. “Puffing himself up like a God.”

We travelled onwards in miserable silence, and eventually we began putting the city behind us. As we entered the outskirts the road split into a wide double highway, and other cars passed us on both sides. I couldn’t help staring. It felt like forever since I’d been in actual traffic. Most of the other vehicles were heavy duty jeeps or trucks, all done up the same way as ours. I pressed my face to the glass and watched a light green pickup speed past us. There was something smeared on the back of it, a dark brown patch that looked like blood.

My stomach twisted, and I leaned back against my seat, fixing my gaze on something else. It probably was blood. They’d backed into something. Maybe a soul sucker. Maybe a human. Would there even be consequence for killing someone anymore? Obviously Thanatos’ men did whatever they wanted, including selling other humans and burning books. What was a little hit and run to these people?

Jai must have seen the look on my face, because he leaned over and asked in a low voice, “You okay?”

“I don’t think I like New Canada.”

Manda snorted from the front seat. “Nobody likes it here. They’re just here because there’s a higher survival rate, and food. The rest of the world is running out of food, and Thanatos just takes what he wants.”

Horace slowed the jeep down, muttering loud enough for the rest of us to hear, “Damn, I was afraid of that.”

I leaned sideways, trying to see what he was looking at. The cars in front of us were slowing, and up ahead there was a line up. There were two toll booths blocking the middle of the highway.

“We have to pay to get out of town?” I frowned. “How does that make sense?”

“Out or in, this way.” Jai pointed at the other side. “I’m sure Thanatos makes a good deal of money that way.”

“They pretend you don’t have to pay.” Manda said. “They say it’s just a check point, but that’s bullshit.” She leaned forward and yanked the glove compartment open. “Here, this might do it.” She tossed Horace something, and he caught it and held it on his open palm. It was a black velvet bag with a draw string.

“What’s this?”

“Diamond earrings,” Manda said. “Stole it off a dead woman a few weeks back. They were expensive looking, figured I’d hock them later.”

Horace pulled a face at her. “Desecrating the dead, are we?”

“Comes in handy, doesn’t it?” Manda glared at him. “Don’t go acting all high and mighty on me. The woman wasn’t in need of them anymore, and it wasn’t like I was taking them to wear ‘em.”

I leaned forward to look at the little black bag as Horace tucked it into the side pocket in his door.“You store you diamonds in the glove compartment?”

Manda shrugged. “Yup. Guns and diamonds.”

The jeep stopped at the back of the line, crawling forward slowly. The cars in front of us only took a couple seconds each to go through, and I noticed that the drivers all reached over to the booth and handed something over the partition. One was a bulky brown package, the other a flat black box.

“People don’t take money as bribes anymore?” I asked.

“Money is only good because it burns,” Jai said. “It’s useless now. Can’t eat it, can’t build a shelter with it. It’s worthless.”

“Doesn’t make good fuel for the fire either,” Manda put in. “I tried that awhile back.”

It was our turn now. Horace pulled the jeep forward until we were even with the window. The man in the toll booth didn’t look very official. He had a couple days worth of stubble, and a plaid jacket on. On the desk near his right hand there were a couple of crumpled beer cans. He eyes Horace briefly, and then his gaze drifted over to Manda and his eyes lit up. He leaned forward and looked into the back, and he locked eyes with me. His craggy face broke into a gap toothed smile.

“Well now,” he drawled. “Where are you folks headed to?”

“Thanatos,” Horace said shortly.

“Ah. I see.” The man leaned out of the booth, leering at Manda as he did so. “And you’re taking these two birds to him, are you? New girls?”

Horace kept his voice flat. “You got it.”

The side door of the booth swung open with a rusty creak, and the man emerged, shoving his hands into his pockets. His eyes shifted from me to Manda as he approached us. I sank back into the leather seat, wishing Horace would just drive through and leave the guy in the dust. Horace didn’t though, probably because the toll booth would alert Thanatos about us.

“Well now,” the man drawled. “I reckon I should give these girls the pat down. You know…to make sure they got no weapons.” He leered at Manda again, and from where I was sitting I could see how tense she was. She was obviously  restraining herself from attempting to rip his throat out.

“Already done,” Horace said. “And I wouldn’t try if I were you. They’re both a little savage, and I ain’t helping you if one of them tries to scratch your eyeballs out of your face.”

Manda allowed herself a slight smile, still looking at the toll booth guy, and I saw him hesitate, changing course at the last minute. Instead he came around and opened the back door. My door.

He leaned in close and I could smell tobacco and body odor.

“What about you, darling? You don’t look savage. You got any weapons hidden away in that sweatshirt?” He reached out one hand, and I flinched. Jai’s arm shot across my body, and he caught the guy’s wrist and barked at him, “Don’t touch the merchandise. You want Thanatos to take your head off, idiot?”

“Owch, damn you!” the toll booth man yanked his arm away and stumbled backwards. He turned to Horace, clearly about to cuss him out. “You don’t even look like soldiers, mate.” He eyed us suspiciously. “Where are your uniforms?”

 Horace stuck his arm out of the jeep, and the black velvet bag was on his palm. “Take this and get back in your booth.”

The man’s eyes lit up, and he ripped open the drawstring. I could see the glitter of the diamonds reflected in his eyes. Either that or it was greed.  “Hey, alright.” He looked up from the bag and waved his hand at Horace. “Okay, you’re good to go. Move along.”

I shut my door hastily, both hands shaking, and then the jeep was moving again. “He didn’t check us for weapons…” I tried to pretend I wasn’t shaken by the confrontation. “I mean…he didn’t try to check you guys.”

Jai rolled his eyes. “He’s supposed to check the vehicles for stuff. Stolen goods or weapons or whatever, but the toll booths have pretty much just turned into bribery stations. You bribe them, they won’t tell Thanatos you’re sneaking in or out of the city.”

“Well, he was apparently very concerned that I had weapons.” I pulled a face, feeling sick at the thought of him touching me. “Thanks for stopping him, Jai.”

“No problem.” Jai gave me a weak grin. “Uh..hey, sorry about the…you know…’merchandise’ comment. I had to make it sound believable.”

“That’s okay.” I shrugged. “It was about a million times better than being frisked by that guy.”

“Still,” Jai said. “I feel bad. And Horace and I…we might have to act like that more later on. So…just know we don’t mean any of it.”

I looked at him nervously, then over at Horace, who nodded at me.

“We’ll have to act like soldiers,” Horace said. I noticed he looked over Manda and raised one eyebrow at her. “Which means acting like assholes. So please don’t punch me in the throat if I say something you don’t like.”

“I won’t,” Manda said cheerfully. “I’ll save up all my throat punches for later.”

“Awesome,” Horace muttered. “I’ll look forward to that.”

“Me too.” Manda grinned at him. “And don’t you forget it. I’ll tally up every remark you make as a soldier and it’s pay back later. This will be fun, like a game. When we get to the palace I’m going to surprise you when you least suspect it, and then wham! Throat punch time.”

Horace snorted and shook his head. I couldn’t see from the back seat, but I was pretty sure he was rolling his eyes. It had taken me until now to figure out they were actually flirting. Occasionally when they fought they seemed actually mad at one another. But this time they were flirting, for sure. I exchanged a look with Jai, and it was his turn to roll his eyes and shake his head.

I got the message, and nodded in agreement. Threatening bodily harm and bickering back and forth with one another was a really odd way of saying “I love you”. But I guess that was Manda and Horace for you…odd.

We drove on, and eventually Horace turned us towards the south, and we began to travel parallel with the lights, up a long winding hill lined with houses and thick green trees. There were more lights at the very top of this hill, and as we crested the tree line the silhouette of a huge house appeared.

No, not a house. A castle.

Horace turned the jeep off onto one of the side roads and shut the engine off. For a moment we sat still, all four of us craning our necks to look up at the towering castle. My ears were ringing in the silence, and fear was prickling the back of my neck. This was it. We’d come to the end of everything, hadn’t we?

Now that we were here, and now that I thought about the plan we’d made, it didn’t seem quite so air tight. In fact, it seemed foolish. So we were going to pretend to be captives and the boys were going to dress as soldiers and we would all waltz right in. Right.

The thought occurred to me that we might die. All of us.

Or, at least, they would. Maybe I’d just be captured by Thanatos…

I shivered and looked over at Jai. He seemed to know what I was thinking somehow, because he reached out and took my hand, squeezing it firmly. “Hey, we can do this.”

I swallowed and nodded, not trusting myself to speak. To my surprise he didn’t let go of my hand, and we sat there in the back of the jeep, in the dark, holding hands.

It was weird, and scary and thrilling all at the same time.

“We should wait until morning.” Manda seemed to have forgotten that she was angry at the guys. She was rubbing her fingers over the wooden stock of the shotgun, twisting her hands anxiously. “Joe said that Thanatos parties late at night and sleeps until late the next day. If we go early in the morning it’s a good chance he’ll be in his bed chambers and too…busy, to bother with us.”

I grimaced, thinking that Thanatos sounded more like some kind of arrogant rock star than a fiendish demon bent on taking over the world. Although, rock stars didn’t put out wanted posters for people…

My fingers found their way into the pocket of my blue jeans and I wrapped my fist around the crumpled wanted poster, crushing it even further. Manda had handed it back to me when we got in the car earlier, like I should keep it for later or something. Maybe when we were all safely…wherever... we could laugh about it. Joke about how the artist had made my nose too big, or something. Maybe draw mustaches on me. Yeah.

That’s what I told myself. Really I hung onto it because it reminded me that all of this was real. Soul suckers were real, and these people really were my guardians, and I really was wanted by some crazy demon lord…

It was still surreal to me, but there it was. The weird drawing I’d found in Bruce’s house had jolted me into a kind of strange realization that I really was Lady Time. So that meant I had powers, right? That meant that Thanatos thought I was a threat. So maybe I really would be okay. Maybe I’d be able to fight him somehow.

Right now though, as I huddled in the back of the dark jeep clinging to Jai’s hand, it didn’t feel like it.

“Okay,” Jai said. “We’ll try to get some sleep tonight. One of us will stay awake at all times, we’ll do a rotating lookout. As soon as the sun comes up, we’ll get into our disguises and hopefully your friend will meet us.”

Manda nodded. “I told him to wait three days and then unlock the back door each morning at dawn. He should let us in through the kitchen. Says he’ll make up some bullshit about a surprise for the master.”

“Oh, it’ll be a surprise alright.” A smile crept across Horace’s face, and the three of us stopped and stared at him. In the few days that I’d known him I hadn’t seen his expression change that much, or show any excitement, but his eyes were glittering now, and his smile had a savage edge to it. It reminded me of the way Jai sometimes looked.

The guardians clearly couldn’t resist a fight.

I didn’t sleep well that night. Hardly at all, actually. The times I did drift off, I found myself in and out of dark and disturbing dreams. There were flashes of Horace and Jai, and Manda’s voice was loud in the background, telling me something. Giving me orders I couldn’t hear.

I woke up with a gasp, virtually the minute the first ray of light slipped over the mountains. I sat straight up in the backseat. Every muscle ached, and I groaned, massaging my neck.

“You okay?”

Jai was staring at me. He didn’t look as though he’d just woke up. True, he had dark circles under his eyes, and his shaggy hair was pretty tangled, but he looked wide awake.

“I’m fine.” My voice was raspy. “Did you sleep?”

“A bit.” He shifted his gaze to the front, where Manda and Horace where both still snoring. “Took the last shift before sunrise, so I’ve been up awhile. You look stiff.” He frowned. “You were in kind of an awkward position. I would have woken you, but you probably need all the sleep you can get.”

I stayed silent, nodding. The thought that he’d been staring at me in my sleep…well, maybe not staring. But he’d looked long enough to think about waking me up…it made my cheeks feel hot. Had I been snoring?

Horace stirred, then sat up with a groan, moving his head side to side so that his neck cracked, making me grimace. “Guess we should get a move on.” He looked at Manda for a second, and his face stayed blank. Then he reached out tentatively and poked her in the shoulder. “Wake up, sleeping beauty.”

Manda swatted at him, mumbling colorful words under her breath, but after a minute her eyes flew open and she rubbed them vigorously. “Ugh, I feel like I was sleeping on a stack of bricks.”

“We can get you a nice feather bed later,” Horace said. He turned around in his seat. “Jai, can you grab the duffel bag out of the back? It has our costumes in it.”

Our costumes. Hah. That almost made me want to laugh. Like we were just going to a dress up party or something. It was all just a joke.

Jai hauled the black duffle bag out from behind his seat and tossed it at Horace, who unzipped it and yanked out a pair of camouflage pants that looked like they would fit a giant. “Ah, those are mine.”

“Those might be too big, even on you.” Jai frowned. “Think they’re gonna buy it?”

Horace shrugged. “They aren’t really the army any more. Their uniforms are worn out and mismatched anyways.  We’ll fit right in.”

“Alright.” Jai took the uniform and darted a look at me and Manda. “Ah, you ladies mind looking the other way?”