Lucien's world had narrowed to three things: the horse beneath him, the walkers behind him, and the desperate search for somewhere to hide.
The alley he'd ducked into was barely wide enough for the horse to navigate. Brick walls pressed in on both sides, close enough that he could've reached out and touched them if his hands weren't locked in a grip on the reins.
The alley opened into what looked like it had once been a small park. Trees and overgrown bushes formed a green barrier that would have been pleasant in the before-times. Now it just looked like a good place to get ambushed.
It was still cover, though. The growth was dense enough that the walkers would have trouble seeing through it, and quiet enough that maybe, he could catch his breath.
Lucien pulled the horse to a stop and slid off its back at once. His legs nearly gave out when they hit solid ground, having been clamped around the horse's sides for so long that they were half numb. He stumbled, caught himself against a tree, and stood there for a moment.
His hands were shaking. His whole body was shaking, actually. Adrenaline crash hitting hard now that the danger had passed.
The horse was in rough shape too. Its sides heaved with each breath, foam flecking its mouth and neck. It had run itself nearly to exhaustion keeping them both alive.
"Easy," he murmured, moving to stand beside it. "Easy, you legend. You did brilliant."
The horse's ear flicked toward him but otherwise it just stood there, head lowered, breathing hard.
Lucien pulled the Invisibility Cloak from his pack. This thing had saved his life more times than he could count. Time to add one more to the tally.
He threw it over his shoulders and felt reality bend around him as the enchantment took hold. His body vanished from view.
The horse snorted and took a half-step back, ears swiveling in confusion as its rider disappeared.
"It's alright," he said quietly, keeping his voice low even though there were no walkers in sight. "I'm still here."
He reached out to touch the horse's neck, and it calmed slightly at the contact. It was still wary, but no longer panicked.
His wand was already in his hand. It had been there since he dismounted. He pointed it at a spot near the horse's feet and whispered, "Aguamenti."
Water fountained from the wand tip, pooling on the ground in a clean, clear puddle that looked nothing like the stagnant filth clogging Atlanta's gutters.
The horse noticed immediately. It lowered its head and drank greedily, and Lucien kept the spell going until the animal had drunk its fill.
"There you go. That's better, yeah?"
The horse raised its head, water dripping from its muzzle, and looked around as if searching for the invisible person who'd just given it a drink. One ear flicked forward, then back.
Lucien's throat felt tight.
This animal had saved his life. It had jumped an impossible height because he asked it to, run until its legs shook, and trusted him completely even when everything around them was trying to kill them both.
And now he had to let it go.
"Listen," he said, reaching up to stroke the horse's nose. It leaned into the touch, eyes half-closing. "You need to run. Get out of the city, yeah? Head for the outskirts. Find grass and water, and stay away from bloody corpses trying to eat you."
The horse huffed out a breath.
"I mean it. Don't come back here. This place is death. You deserve better than that."
He stepped back, pulling his hand away, and pointed toward a gap in the trees that looked like it led to more open ground. "Go on. Go."
The horse hesitated. Its eyes tracked to where Lucien's voice was coming from, and for a moment it looked like it might refuse.
Then it turned, tossed its head once as if in farewell, and walked away. Within seconds, it had disappeared into the undergrowth.
Lucien stood there for a long moment, listening to the sound of retreating hoofbeats fade into silence.
His chest hurt. Which was stupid. It was just a horse. He'd known it for all of a few hours. Getting attached to things in the apocalypse was a good way to get your heart broken.
But it had been his horse, at least for a little while. And now it was gone.
"Right," he muttered to himself, shaking off the melancholy. "Enough of that. Job's not done yet."
The walkers were still out there. He needed to get back to the department store before Rick and the others drove off without him. Which meant moving fast.
Under normal circumstances, he would have just walked. He would keep the Cloak on, stay quiet, and pick his way through the streets.
But these were not normal circumstances. Every minute he wasted was another minute Rick and the others were trapped in that store, surrounded by walkers, probably assuming he was dead.
He needed speed. Which meant improvising.
He pulled his pack around and dug through it until his fingers closed on the skateboard he'd packed that morning. He dropped it on the pavement, tested its wheels with one foot, and nodded to himself. The bearings were still good.
He raised his wand, pointed it at himself, and whispered, "Wingardium Leviosa."
His body grew lighter. He stepped onto the board, pushed off with one foot, and started moving.
The city rolled past in a blur. He kept to the alleys and side streets, avoiding the main roads where walkers were thickest. Every time he heard moaning or saw movement, he'd drop into a crouch and let the Invisibility Cloak do its job.
Twice, he passed within arm's reach of walkers and they didn't even turn their heads.
The Levitation Charm made the ride surreal. He barely had to push. A light touch against the pavement sent him gliding forward, momentum carrying him far farther than physics should have allowed. Turning was strange too. Banking left or right felt like skating on ice.
But it worked.
As he moved, his mind started working again.
He had taken a massive risk today. He had split from Rick, drawn off the horde, and used magic in ways that Glenn had definitely noticed. Any one of those things could have gotten him killed or exposed.
But it had been necessary. Because being a kid in this world was both his greatest advantage and his biggest weakness.
The advantage was obvious. People were instinctively drawn to protect children. That instinct was hardwired into the human psyche and had only grown stronger in a world where so many kids had already died. The group would go out of their way to keep him safe. They would feed him first, give him shelter, and make sure he was okay before turning their attention to themselves.
He had seen it in the show. Carol kept searching for Sophia long after it stopped making sense. Lori insisted on having her baby even as the world fell apart. The group's protectiveness toward children sometimes bordered on irrational.
That protectiveness was his shield. As long as they saw him as a helpless kid, they wouldn't suspect him of being anything else.
But the disadvantage was just as real.
Nobody listened to kids. Oh, they'd smile and nod and pat him on the head, but when it came time to make decisions? To plan the group's next move or decide who lived and died? A kid's opinion meant exactly nothing.
Which was a problem, because he knew Shane would lose it eventually. He knew the farm was not safe. And he knew about Woodbury, the Governor, and all the other disasters waiting down the road. But he couldn't just tell people that, not without sounding insane or exposing that he somehow had knowledge he shouldn't possess.
So he needed leverage. He needed to make himself valuable enough that people would listen when he spoke.
Magic was out. It was too dangerous and too likely to get him locked up or dissected.
Intelligence and skill, though, were different. A knack for surviving situations that should have killed him was something people could accept. Especially in a world where survival trumped everything else.
Today had been about proving he wasn't helpless, that he could contribute, and that keeping him around meant more than just another mouth to feed.
Drawing off the walkers had saved Rick's life. It put Lucien in Rick's mind as someone worth protecting. And if Glenn's retelling was even half as enthusiastic as he suspected it would be, the rest of the group would be curious.
He wasn't trying to lead. What he needed was influence. If he played this right, he could guide them and nudge their decisions in safer directions. He could keep them alive when the plot tried to kill them.
It wasn't manipulation. Not really. Or at least, he told himself it wasn't. He was only stacking the deck in everyone's favor, making sure the group had the best possible chance to survive.
The fact that it also kept him alive and protected was simply a convenient side effect.
Lucien rounded a corner and had to throw himself flat on the skateboard as a small group of walkers shambled across the intersection ahead. He held his breath as they passed within ten feet of him.
When they were gone, he pushed off again and kept going.
The department store was getting close now. He recognized this area from the map he'd studied. Maybe another fifteen minutes and he'd be there.
---
Rick's entry into the department store had not been smooth.
Glenn had led him through a fire exit, and the door had barely closed behind them when someone shoved a gun in Rick's face.
"You son of a bitch!" The blonde woman's voice was shaking with rage. "I should blow your brains out right now!"
"Andrea, don't—" Glenn tried to step between them.
"Don't tell me to calm down!" Andrea's finger was on the trigger. "This asshole just rang the dinner bell for every walker in Atlanta! We're trapped because of him!"
Rick kept his hands visible. "Ma'am, I understand you're upset—"
"Upset?" Andrea let out a harsh laugh. "Upset doesn't even begin to cover it."
The safety on her gun was still engaged. Rick noticed that immediately. She was angry, maybe even furious enough to shoot, but she wasn't going to pull the trigger. Not yet, anyway.
"Andrea." A man stepped forward, his hand closing over Andrea's gun arm. "Put it down. Now's not the time."
"Morales..."
"Now."
Andrea held Rick's gaze for another few seconds, then lowered the gun. "Fine. But I want him to see what he did to us."
Morales kept his hand on Andrea's shoulder as he turned to Rick.
"Come with me, Officer. Let me show you something."
He led Rick toward the front of the store, past racks of clothing and overturned displays. The others followed, keeping their distance but clearly on Andrea's side in whatever this was.
They stopped at the massive glass revolving doors that led to the street.
"You know what we're doing here?" Morales asked. He didn't wait for Rick to answer. "We're looking for supplies. You know how you do that and stay alive?"
"You keep a low profile," Rick said quietly.
"Right. You keep quiet. You move fast. And you don't draw attention." Morales pointed through the glass. "And you definitely don't ride into the middle of the city on a goddamn horse, firing your gun like it's the Fourth of July."
As if on cue, several walkers slammed against the glass from outside. Their faces were pressed flat, hands pawing at the barrier between them and fresh meat.
The group jumped back instinctively, even though the glass was holding.
"Jesus!" Someone hissed.
Morales turned back to Rick. "See that? Those things are here because of you." He shook his head. "We were almost done. We were leaving. And now we're stuck here until they lose interest or we figure out another way out."
"I was trying to reach a helicopter. I saw one flying overhead—"
"A helicopter," Andrea repeated flatly. "Sure you did. Were you drunk? High? Because there's no way—"
"It was real," Rick insisted. "I'm not crazy. Lucien saw it too."
"Who's Lucien?" Morales asked.
"The kid." Glenn piped up from the back. "The one who was with Rick! Man, you guys should've seen him, the way he rode that horse, and then when he..."
"There was a kid?" Andrea's expression shifted to horror. "You brought a child into the city?"
"He wanted to come. I told him it was dangerous, but—"
"But you let him anyway," Morales finished. "Great... That's just great."
"He's alive," Glenn interjected. "I saw him get away. He rode right past the horde like it was nothing. He even jumped clear over a bunch of walkers."
"Glenn." Morales held up a hand. "Slow down. What are you talking about?"
So Glenn told them everything. He described the horse jumping and the throws that knocked walkers out of the air. He explained how Lucien had drawn the horde away from Rick and gave him the chance to reach the tank.
The more he talked, the more enthusiastic he got.
"I'm telling you, it was like something from a movie! The kid knew exactly what he was doing. And those spike things he was throwing, I've never seen anything like it. The way they came back to him, it was almost like..." He paused, struggling for words. "I don't know. But it was incredible."
Andrea exchanged a skeptical look with Morales. "You expect us to believe a kid jumped a horse over a horde of walkers?"
"I saw it," Glenn insisted. "I know how it sounds, but I saw it."
"Must've been your son," Morales said to Rick. "That why you brought him? Teach him to survive?"
Rick opened his mouth to correct the assumption, then stopped.
If they thought Lucien was his son, they'd be less likely to... what? Abandon him? Hurt him? He wasn't sure what threat he was protecting Lucien from, but instinct told him that an orphan kid with no guardian was vulnerable in ways that a cop's kid wasn't.
"The apocalypse changes people," he said instead, not quite confirming the assumption but not denying it either. "He was just a smart kid before all this. But when you're forced to survive, you adapt fast."
"How old is he?" Andrea asked. Her voice was still hard, but some of the fury had drained out of it.
"Eleven."
"Eleven," she repeated. "And you thought bringing an eleven-year-old into Atlanta was a good idea."
Rick didn't have a good answer for that.