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satchel from the ground. “They won’t fight us. Not with all this meat already dead. Why fight us when they can gorge themselves with no effort?”
    Huxley pulls his knife from its sheath. “I’m not sure they think it through like that.”
    â€œTrust me,” Jay says. “Let’s just walk away.”
    Huxley doesn’t know how much he trusts Jay, but he trusts him more than he did before, and he finds his feet following Jay’s as they slowly move out of the center of the massacre. The coyotes yap and bark at them, but none come close. They stay at the edges of the firelight until Huxley and Jay have given it up, and then they slink in, growling. They test the ox by taking a bite of it and then dancing back. Then another, and another. And soon a dozen brown and tan shapes are moving through the camp, grabbing at the dead oxen, grabbing at the human remains.
    By morning this whole scene will be a scattering of bloody bones and patches of skin and hair.
    Huxley moves backward and sideways, but keeps his eyes on the coyotes until they are so far away that the coyotes are not even paying them any mind. They are barking at each other, but they don’t fight for limbs. They are efficient. They don’t waste time when they know there is enough for them all to feast. They have that cold sort of intelligence about them.
    Huxley turns back into the night. Jay is a few paces ahead of him. He jogs to catch up and falls in step with the other man as they pick their way through the dark desert.

Chapter 5
    That night, Huxley dreams of the barley fields again.
    He is standing at the edge of them with his wife and daughter, as he always is in this memory. But this time his wife and daughter, they have no hair. It has been burned off of their scalps. Charity. Nadine. His beautiful girls. They look up at him. There is something off about their faces. Some little detail has been lost, like he cannot fully remember what they look like.
    It terrifies him.
    They look at him with their unfamiliar, undetailed faces, and their singed, bald heads.
    They beg him for water, but he has none to give them.
    â€œWater,” a voice says, but it is neither of theirs.
    This is a real voice, not a dream voice, and it pulls him through the membranes of reality and imagination … 
    He blinks. He is looking at Jay.
    Jay is standing over him. The sky is light with early morning. Jay looks angry.
    â€œWhat?” Huxley says, heart thudding.
    â€œI said, ‘Where’s the fucking water?’”
    Huxley leans up into a sitting position, trying to shake off sleep and nightmares. Jay backs up a step, but he’s still standing over Huxley.
    â€œIt’s in the … the …” Huxley looks around for the water skin.
    His eyes trace over Jay, and he realizes that the man is holding a knife.
    Huxley reaches for his own, realizes the sheath is empty.
    My knife. He’s holding my knife.
    His eyes go up to Jay’s. “What the hell is this?” His voice is stone-cold.
    Jay points at him with the knife. “Did you take the fucking water?”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI mean I went to bed with a half a skin of water and when I wake up it’s gone. Did you drink it? Just be honest. Be honest, Huxley. Did you drink the water?”
    Huxley lurches to his feet.
    Jay backs up another step, still holding the knife.
    â€œI didn’t drink the water,” Huxley grinds out. “Now you drop the knife or we’re gonna have problems, Jay.”
    Jay is not going to drop the knife. He opens his arms wide. “Well then where’s the fucking water? Where is it?”
    Huxley wants to put his hands around the man’s neck. “I’ve been asleep!” he snaps. “How the fuck should I know where the water is? You were the one that went to bed with it strapped to your body! I should be asking you the same question! Where’s the water,