Novice Defender

by Marisa Chenery

  “Jerrica, you’d better be awake,” her mother shouted up at her.

  “I am,” she called back. She took the ladder out of the loft.

  Her mom had set a bowl of oatmeal on the wooden table that sat in the middle of the large room. A fireplace that had an oven built into the bricks on one side was considered the kitchen. It also had a couple of cupboards hanging on the wall above the wooden basin that had a hand pump attached to it. The opposite end was her parents’ bedroom. It was closed off by a curtain from the rest of the space.

  Jerrica sat then dug into her breakfast. Her next meal wouldn’t be until well past noon when food was brought out to the fields for the workers. She ate in silence as her mom went about cleaning the dishes. Her dad had left the cabin already, busy tending to their few livestock.

  Once Jerrica had finished eating, she brought her bowl to the basin for her mother to wash. With a quick goodbye, Jerrica left the cabin. She only stopped long enough to collect her bow and quiver of arrows that sat propped against the wall on the porch. The fields weren’t exactly the safest to work. The risk of an attack happening there was greater.

  She left her family’s plot of land and headed to the dirt road that would take her to the gates. The fields were on the outside of the high walls that protected the settlement from the creatures that roamed loose, always looking for their next victim.

  No one knew exactly how the first zombie had come about. Some thought a new kind of virus had run rampant, leaving those who’d contracted it undead, hungering for the living and passing the sickness on with a single bite. And others accused the governments at the time of testing a new chemical weapon that had gone horribly wrong.

  Jerrica didn’t care how it had happened. All she knew was zombies had been around for the last one hundred years, and they’d just about wiped out the living population. She’d grown up listening to her grandparents talk about the big cities that no longer existed. They’d been abandoned. Nature had reclaimed them. And she’d also heard about things like electricity, running water and the Internet, which she’d never experience. According to Grandma and Grandpa, they all now lived in a second Dark Age.

  Once she reached the gates, Jerrica waited with the other workers for them to open. A horse and wagon would precede them out, carrying all the tools they needed to work the land.

  She looked at a small group that stood a short distance away. It was a mix of boys and girls her age or a little bit older. A few of the girls laughed at something one of the boys said. Jerrica resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Could their laughter be any phonier?

  Jerrica had never been a part of that group, and she didn’t really think she’d missed out on anything. The only thing that drew her gaze was one individual—a boy, who, as far as she knew, didn’t even realize she existed. That didn’t stop her from foolishly having a crush on him. Austin Conrad was a year older and good-looking enough to have most of the girls in the settlement wishing he was theirs. He was tall and muscular. His brown hair always seemed to be on the longish side, and his equally brown eyes most times had a smile in them.

  She pulled her gaze off Austin before he noticed her staring. And she especially didn’t want any of the girls catching her. One in particular, Becca Mills, liked to take jabs at Jerrica whenever the opportunity arose. It didn’t happen as often now that they were older, but Becca still tried, now and again.

  Mathias McGregor, who supervised the work in the field and was in his middle fifties, called for everyone to quiet down. He came to stand just in front of the gates once he had all their attention.

  “All right, listen up,” Mathias said. “The vegetables in the lower half of the field are ready for picking. One group will be doing that while the other is watering the rest of the crops.” He looked straight at her. “Jerrica, I want you, in particular, on water duty. Out of this lot, you’re the best archer.” Once she nodded, he set his attention on the others. “Be extra vigilant out there today. The night sentries heard a fairly large-sized group of zombies outside the walls. They came pretty damn close. They moved off, but they still might be in the area. Now, let’s get to work.”

  Jerrica didn’t miss Becca giving her a dirty look because Mathias had singled her out. She ignored her and fell in behind the first of the workers to walk through the open gates. The horse and wagon had already gone through.

  Lugging buckets of water that she’d filled at the hand pump attached to the well was backbreaking work. While Jerrica did her share with the others assigned the same chore, she kept an ever-watchful eye on the tree line that ran along two of the borders of the tilled land.

  As she walked past some of the workers doing the picking, Jerrica was surprised to find Austin watching her. He smiled, which caused her to stumble, sloshing some of the water out of the pail she carried. At the sound of feminine laughter, she jerked her gaze to the front and continued on.

  “She might be good with a bow and arrow, but she can’t manage to carry a bucket and walk at the same time.”

  “Shut up, Becca,” Austin said sharply.

  A small smile played on Jerrica’s lips as Becca out an indignant huff. She doubted the girl had been put in her place very often and especially not by a boy. Becca always bragged about how she had most of the boys their age wrapped around her little finger. Jerrica didn’t think that was true, but there was no denying that Becca was pretty, and a lot of boys paid more attention to her than they did the other girls.

  From the exchange that’d just taken place, it showed that Austin wasn’t one of them, even though he tended to be part of her group. It just made Jerrica like him more than she had. And the fact that he’d actually looked at her meant he knew she was alive.

  The hours passed and as the sun beat down, the day grew hotter. Jerrica was sweating and more than ready for a break when another horse and wagon arrived at the field to bring the noon meal. She took a seat on the tailgate of the tools wagon so she’d be able to still see around the field while she ate. Most of the others took seats on the grass that edged the field, more interested in eating than watching for zombies.

  The wagon bounced a bit when someone sat beside Jerrica. She turned her head and saw it was Austin. He gave her a smile, which she returned. This was the first time he’d come that close to her.

  “Hey, Jerrica. You’re still keeping watch, I see.”

  She nodded. “That’s what Mathias wants me to do, so that’s what I’ll do.”

  They sat in silence and ate their sandwiches. Jerrica snuck looks at Austin as she gazed around the field. He seemed content to sit with her, as if they’d done it a million times before.

  Austin’s paying attention to her apparently hadn’t gone unnoticed, either. Becca marched over, and completely ignoring Jerrica, she stopped in front of him. “Don’t you want to eat with us? You must be bored sitting here.”

  “Hardly,” Austin replied. “I’m doing guard duty with Jerrica.”

  Becca sent Jerrica a disgusted look, then turned her attention back to Austin. “Why would you want to do that? I’m sure she can handle the job on her own. If anything, you might distract her.”

  Austin looked at Jerrica. “Am I distracting you?”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  He looked at Becca once more. “See? She’s fine with it. If anything, you’re the one who’s distracting her with your silly worries.”

  Becca narrowed her eyes at Austin then flounced away without saying anything more. She rejoined the girls she’d been sitting with before she’d tried to lure him away.

  Jerrica held back her laughter, but let it out after Austin let loose with his. Becca shot them both a nasty look, then turned her back on them. Jerrica laughed even harder.

  Once he brought himself back under control, Austin said, “I guess I’ll be in Becca’s bad book for a while.”

  Jerrica snorted. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve been in it for years. It’s not much of a hardship.”

  She met Austin�
��s gaze and found something she’d never expected to see in his eyes. He looked at her as if he liked her in the way she liked him. The heat rose in her cheeks. She was blushing.

  “You should smile more often, Jerrica.”

  Flustered, she jerked her gaze away from his face and scanned the area again. She went still as she saw a huge buck standing across the field, close to the tree line that bordered it there. He dipped his head and ripped up some of the grass, acting as if he didn’t care that humans were close by.

  “Look,” she said, as she pointed at the deer.

  Austin turned his head in the direction she’d indicated. “That would be a prize. Too bad we don’t have guns like they used to.”

  Jerrica wished she had one as well. Shortly after the zombie outbreak, when it had looked as if the human race was going to be snuffed out, the government had confiscated all firearms, deeming the military needed them more, since they were the ones who’d be actively working to take out the undead. Her grandfather had managed to keep one hidden and had used it until he no longer had any bullets. Ammunition like that didn’t exist anymore.

  She slipped off the tailgate and pulled her bow from her shoulder. There was no way she was going to let the buck slip away without at least trying to take him down. Meat wasn’t something they had a lot of. They couldn’t raise their cattle or pigs outside the walls, so the herds were kept small.

  “There’s no way you’ll be able to get close enough to make the shot before he runs,” Austin said.

  “Maybe…maybe not.” Austin stood then followed her as she headed in the direction of the buck. Jerrica stopped. “Stay here. If he sees the both of us, he’ll definitely take off.”

  “Just be careful.”

  Jerrica nodded then continued onward. She kept downwind of the buck as she approached from the side, keeping hunched over as she ran through the field. So far, he hadn’t seen her. He was too busy munching on grass. Once she was within shooting range, she reached over her shoulder and quietly pulled an arrow out of her quiver. With a quick look behind her, she saw Austin standing a good distance away, watching her, as were some of the other workers.

  She straightened to her full height, nocked the arrow and pulled back on the string. The buck took no notice of her at all. Jerrica took a deep breath, held it and let the arrow fly. It caught the deer in the chest, close to the heart. He tried to bolt, but stumbled and dropped to the ground. She quickly ran toward it, already pulling a second arrow out of her quiver to finish him off. She didn’t want him to suffer.

  The howl of a zombie was the only forewarning Jerrica had before the first creature burst through the tree line farther down from where she’d shot the deer. Acting on instinct, she changed her aim to the undead creature that ran toward her. She just had a few seconds to get a shot off. Zombies could run at incredible speeds, faster than when they’d been alive.

  Her aim true, she caught it in the eye, the arrow embedding itself straight into the monster’s brain. The male dropped like a stone and lay unmoving. Jerrica didn’t have time to catch her breath as five more zombies burst through the trees, their dead-eyed gazes searching for prey—her. She focused her attention on her targets and let loose arrow after arrow, each one hitting a zombie in the head with a sickening thud.

  “Jerrica! Run!” Austin yelled.

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  About the Author

  Marisa Chenery was always a lover of books, but after reading her first historical romance novel she found herself hooked. Having inherited a love for the written word, she soon started writing her own novels.

  After trying her hand at writing historicals, she now writes mostly paranormals.

  Marisa lives in Ontario, Canada, with her husband and four children.

  Email: marisa@marisachenery.com

  Marisa loves to hear from readers. You can find her contact information, website and author biography at http://www.finch-books.com.

  Also by Marisa Chenery

  Zombie World: Werewolf Defender