Available on Pre-Order: Jacob's Vision, 2nd Edition
What's it About?
I left my friends to see if we might find refuge. I left them…and was taken by a second group who held the secret of Jacob’s past. Could I hope they also offered hope for the future he’d fought for?
How Does It Start?
The hill, with its footing of green-studded black, was the same as I remembered it. I stood at the top of the ridge looking out, seeing the city ruins, imagining the glow from its center at night.
I’d seen the ruins, and watched that glow before—with Jacob. It had always been his dream that we would return, that the beacon he had set would bring rescue, or aid in the rebuilding he had envisioned.
Sighing, I settled myself at the foot of one of the scarred and blackened statues, and set my notecase beside me. I took the hardbound notebook from the case, opened it and continued writing.
I had been telling of my fifth week with the Wanderers. It had been two days before I’d begun to seek Jacob’s vision in earnest, and it had been near dusk.
With another sigh, I lifted my pen to continue my recollections where I’d left them the night before.
* * *
It was close to dusk when we met and I looked from one face to the other. “We need to find out what’s in them?”
Kurt nodded.
I scanned their faces again. Ilya with one arm in dirt-encrusted bandages; Padraig, leg splinted from thigh to heel; and Allie whose bloused shirt hid the strapping across her ribs. They all watched me in return.
“All right,” I said. “I’ll go.”
Kurt smiled, and rested his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll meet you at Cone Hill.”
I couldn’t help but let my startlement show. “Cone Hill?”
It was their term for a ‘secret place’, an unscheduled reunion. We used it in case one of us was captured. When that one was questioned, as they invariably were, the others were safe. It hadn’t failed yet.
I sighed. Understanding, but disappointed all the same.
Kurt’s hand squeezed my shoulder. “You’d better get started,” he said. “It’s getting dark.”
I don’t remember how I made it into the sheds. I went under the fence through a dust-filled hollow, I think, then across the open space surrounding the buildings before the searchlights became effective against the dusk. What I saw inside made me feel sick to the stomach.
Where Do You Find It?
The stand-alone version of Jacob's Vision can be found in ebook form on a number of platforms: Kobo, Amazon, DriveThruFiction, Smashwords, and GooglePlay for a start, and other sites will follow. Check for a link to your preferred store at the following Books2Read link: https://books2read.com/u/3J1g0Q
Be aware that some links are still populating at the time of posting. If you can't see the link to your favorite store, check your store, anyway. It might already be there.
You can find an earlier version of this short story in A Collection of Battle and its Aftermath, along with more short stories, poetry, and flash fiction in links listed at: https://books2read.com/u/4EEAkM
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