Phantoms of the North: An Alice in Deadland Adventure (Alice, No. 6) Read Online Free Page B

no shortage of Biters in these parts. Let’s give the Phantoms what they
want and get our Dreamweed. They also told me that they’d give us some AKs if
we got them a couple of healthy humans.’
    The man he was talking to smiled
at that prospect. They had all been convicted killers, serving life sentences
before The Rising, Bilal having been a professional contract killer for the
land mafia in North India. So killing and surviving had come naturally to them.
They had looted police stations of their handguns and old bolt-action rifles,
which had been more than enough to terrorize settlements out in the Deadland,
but they were no match for the kind of firepower Alice and her people seemed to
have. Getting a few assault rifles would help even that balance, and then maybe
that yellow-haired Biter witch would think twice about stepping into their
territory.
     
    ***
     
    Alice heard the low growls and
knew that Bunny Ears had not failed her. He emerged out of the undergrowth,
followed by at least three dozen new Biters. The moment the Biters saw Salil
and the other humans, a couple of them bared their teeth and began to charge
them. Bunny Ears swatted one of them down to the ground and pushed another
away, growling to let them know who was in charge. Then Alice stepped forward.
The Biters stopped on seeing her, unsure as to what she was—human or Biter? A
couple of them came closer and sniffed the air, going back to their comrades
with a whine, wondering what this was.
    Alice strode into their midst,
taking out the old book from the bag at her side. She had done this many times
now, but every single time she was reminded of how she had followed Bunny Ears
down a hole in the ground and come face to face with Doctor Protima, the Queen
of the Biters, and had come to know about this book, the last remaining book in
the Deadland. A book which supposedly foretold Alice’s role in fulfilling the
prophecy of humans and Biters uniting to overthrow the tyrants who had brought
about The Rising in their quest for absolute power.
    She no longer cared whether the
prophecy was true or not. Doing what was right did not require a prophecy or a
special book. It required the courage to go with one’s convictions and to be
willing to make the sacrifices needed. She had learned more about that from her
father and others she had met over the years, people like Satish, Vince and
others who had given their lives so that their hard-fought freedom might be
secured, than from any book.
    Still, she knew the importance of
symbols for humans and Biters alike, and the book in her hand had become such a
symbol for Biters. She held aloft the book and spoke to the Biters as Salil and
the others watched on.
    As the new Biters knelt before
her, Alice spoke to them in a soothing voice.
    ‘Not all humans are bad, and not
all of them will hurt you. It is possible for us to live together, and if you
help us get rid of the evil men in these wastelands, you can see how we are
creating a new world, one where we all live in peace.’
    Then she got up, and turned to
look at Salil.
    ‘Now, let’s go tell these slave
traders that their days of doing business in these wastelands are over.’
     
    ***
     
    Most of the eight men in front of
Bilal were already too stoned to focus. This was the part of his job that he
despised more than anything else—having to lead dimwits like the men in front
of him.
    Before The Rising, he had thought
of himself as a predator, a natural hunter of men, and that skill had made him
a very rich man with the thirty hits he had carried out on behalf of his
clients. When he had been betrayed by a jealous associate and jailed, nothing
much changed. Two men who challenged him in prison were found dead, their necks
broken. He was the alpha male there, the one other inmates served, and the one
even the cops didn’t get too rough with. He had counted on not staying in
prison for more than a few months, since many of his clients were very