The Claiming

Chapter Twenty-Two

We follow the road and the guards through a narrow path lined with trees. It doesn't go very far, though. We eventually emerge through the woods onto a street lined with busy shops and businesses. People scurried about their daily lives and paid no mind to us. At the end of the road stands a large building marked "City Hall" above the stone pillars.

Every couple of blocks, the road branches off to little neighborhoods that I get a peek of through some trees behind the buildings on the main street.

We suddenly stop at the base of the street, and a tall old man approaches us. "Hello, my name is Leonard Vain, the sheriff of Winslow Wood. So you are refugees of Bayfell?"

Mr. Bentley nods. "Do you know of it?"

Leonard Vain sighs. "Unfortunately. They've attacked us a few times, but we've had to compromise and give them some of our supplies. They come back once a year to get a hefty stock of it. That's how we avoid war, but it takes a toll on us around winter when we need the medicine we had to give to them."

Mr. Bentley crosses his arms. "We managed to escape, and we have been heading into the Rocky Mountains."

"Well, you're here, friends." Vain opens his arms to present the city to us, and I look around in reply. It's chilly here, but not as terrible as Bayfell had been.

I glance beyond the trees and see mountains rising higher in the distance. We must be in a valley, because snow is covering the mountaintops far away.

None of us know what to say to the sheriff. Do we ask for food? Shelter? Medicine?

Fortunately, he answers everything in one sentence. "You all are welcome to live here as long as you'd like. I'll take you to Alice. She's our mayor, and she can get you guys settled into a house or two if you'd like. We have plenty of room here." His face saddens. "Our population is starting to dwindle. We had a deadly illness pass through last winter—highly contagious. But we're slowly recovering."

"Bayfell is dying, too," Mr. Bentley says quietly. "But we had a lot of people to begin with. I still don't know entirely what was going on."

Vain nods. "Almost every government is struggling, but what else can we do? There's hardly any unity anywhere. We're stuck in one place with nowhere to expand. I guess we could expand into the mountains, but it isn't safe outside these walls. There are bad people out there. I'm surprised you guys made it here unscathed."

I clutch Alec's hand hard, and his arm slides around my waist protectively.

We reach the City Hall at the end of the street, and Vain opens the door for all of us to enter. The entrance hall is quiet, our footsteps echoing eerily off the marble flooring and walls. The sheriff leads us up the large staircase in the entryway. At the top is a large window that overlooks a beautiful garden. On the right and left are doors that are both closed. Vain takes us into the door on the right.

A middle-aged woman sits at a desk writing in a notebook. Her long auburn hair is tied up in a messy knot on her head, and her cheekbones are hollow with stress. She glances up at the sound of our clan entering her office.

"Vain, what is this?" she asks worriedly. Does she think we're here to hurt her?

"These guys are refugees from Bayfell. They were passing through... and our city was in their way," he says with a light chuckle.

The woman's gaze softens and she sits back in her chair. "All right. Are you folks looking to stay here? We welcome anyone running from that dreadful place."

"We aren't sure," Mr. Bentley says for us all. "We were just on our way through to find a place to live, but this place is very nice and civilized... and one of our women are pregnant and we aren't exactly sure how to handle that..."