Din Eidyn Corpus (Book 2): dEaDINBURGH (Alliances) by Mark Wilson

promise.”
     
    Joey hadn’t uttered a word and had begun rooting around in his rucksack which lay at his feet. Finding the items he’d been searching for, he smiled up at the grim-looking Shephards.
    “We’ll do better than that.”
    Opening his hands, Joey showed them three simple objects that brought only more questions.
    Alys lifted the items from her friend’s hands. Turning over the orange flash-drive she looked at him, scrutinising his smile.
    “You’ve accessed this?”
    He beamed at her and nodded. His eyes filled a little but he swiped the growing moisture away and motioned to the map Alys held.
    “I’ll tell you all about it later. Open that map up.”
    Jennifer helped spread the large map across the rug, filling the centre of the tent. It was a simple street-map, available for a few pounds in any filling station before the city fell. Most Rangers carried them whilst out in the city.
    Smoothing the map out, Alys noticed that it had been altered over the years with a variety of bright, fluorescent marker lines, loops, circles and keys, denoting routes, journeys, people and settlements that Joey and Jock had visited on their travels alone and together. She smiled as she noted the various communities’ borders that had been marked out.
     
    The Brotherhood
    The Gardens
    The Sick Kids
    Panda-Nutter
    Suzy Wheels
    Scarecrow Tony’s
    Jester’s
    Tricia Ferguson’s Allotment
    Green Zone
    The Beach
    Drum Wood
    The Exalted
    The Canongate Kirk
    The Haymarket Zom-Hunters
    Fountainbridge Sanctuary
     
    The list continued.
     
    As Alys and her mother scanned the various zones and communities, their eyes brightened.
    “Joey,” Alys said. “This will make finding people so much simpler. I can add at least thirty more zones and settlements that I know of and I’m sure the other Rangers will have places to add.”
    “Aye. And I’ll give the Rangers some information and advice on how to approach the individuals or zones that I’m familiar with. Hopefully, if we can dispatch them in waves over the next few months, we can get everyone who is willing gathered, before spring.”
    He gave her a nod, indicating the final object in her right hand. In her excitement at the information overload the map had brought, she’d completely forgotten about it. Opening her hand, she examined a small leather pouch, tied at the top with twine. The dark brown pouch looked familiar.
      It greatly resembled the pouch Joey had kept the Carrionite in but was larger and felt as though it contained a bunch of smallish heavy objects instead of the powder that had saved their lives in the south.
    She turned the pouch over a few times, scanning it from various angles. Her eyes raised as she remembered the last time she’d seen it.
    A wide-eyed smile at Joey.
    “You took this from underneath a cobble in the wall, beside the Castle entrance. It was the night you left The Brotherhood with Jock.”
    Joey raised his eyebrows and nodded calmly.
    “Saw that, did you?”
    She laughed. “Yeah, right before I cut your finger off.”
    Joey gave her his customary rude gesture with half of a middle finger.
    “Open it,” he said, nodding at the pouch again.
     
    The dusty leather pouch seemed to sigh and sag as Alys untied the twine from around its neck. Falling open, it exposed a peculiar-looking set of keys. Five of them.
    Three looked polished, modern. The other two were much larger and appeared to be ancient, like something from the book on medieval times she’d read as a child.
    Alys and her mother both looked up to Joey, questioningly. He pointed to the flash drive.
    “That and the place my mother left instructions for me to access will give us the information we need to know exactly where Somna and his tribe are. It’ll also help me get the bastard who placed my mother in here.”
    Joey took a moment to compose himself before pointing at the keys.
    “Those, quite literally, are the keys to the Castle. We won’t be using The Gardens as our