Dead of Night: Book One in the Thorne Hill Series

by Goodwin, Emily

  I shake my head. “No. I’m not leaving my friends, and if I resurrected accidental zombies, I need to deal with it.”

  Something crashes through the woods, and the pungent smell of death fills the air. I whirl around, eyes narrowing. Lucas steps back, pulling me with him. He can see in the dark and sees the zombie staggering forward before I do.

  “Holy shit.”

  “You need to go,” he presses. “Because I think I’m wrong.”

  “Wrong about what?”

  He risks a glance down and locks eyes with me for a millisecond. “There are more than twelve.”

  My eyes go to the man sleeping on the forest floor. He has his wits together, well, kind of, but he’s more with it than I expected. If I can find his family, restore his mind a bit more, I can send him home.

  I can save him.

  “You have to take him back to my house.”

  “I’m not leaving you.” Lucas puts his other hand on my shoulder.

  “I can handle my own. Watch.” I step away, conjuring a bright ball of energy. It sizzles before us, crackling in the night. The light gets the zombie’s attention, and it picks up the pace, groaning as it moves through the uneven forest underbrush. I throw the energy ball and it hits the zombie smack in the chest.

  And it doesn’t even faze him.

  “Really? You can handle yourself?”

  “I’ll figure it out,” I tell Lucas, pushing him away. “Take him! If he wakes up and sees zombies, I’ll never be able to fix him.”

  “Callie, you can’t—” He cuts off when Nicole screams. All at once, a dozen or so zombies emerge from the woods, stepping into the clearing.

  “Go!”

  “I’ll be back.”

  I nod. “Get him inside. Tell my familiars to watch over him.”

  Lucas’s eyes narrow with worry. He leans down, pressing his lips to mine. “Just in case you die, I need something to remember you by.”

  “You’re an asshole,” I say, trying hard to look mad. “Now go!”

  He zooms forward, picking up the man, and runs at vamp speed back to the house.

  “What the hell do we do?” Kristy asks, stepping into the circle. My concentration has been broken and the circle no longer holds its protective barrier, proven when Lucas set foot inside. Technically, he’s dead. He wouldn’t have been able to come inside the circle if I had still held its walls.

  “Kill them.” I take a few steps back and pick up the athame. “Gotta get them in the head, right?”

  Kristy nods, fingers trembling. I bend my arm back and throw the dagger. Guiding it with magic, it hits one of the zombies right between the eyes. And the undead motherfucker keeps coming.

  “Okay,” I say, reaching for Kristy’s hand. “Time for Plan B.”

  “And that is?” Naomi asks.

  “Run!” I wave my free hand over the candles, magically putting them out. Kristy grips my fingers so tight it hurts, and we take off, running behind the twins. We’re not far from my house and have about a hundred yards of woods to get through before we get into my backyard. My house is warded against the unwanted, and with the four of us, I have no doubt we’ll be able to hold the line.

  But we can’t have an army of the undead wandering around Thorne Hill. The zombie apocalypse starts from some sort of science experiment gone wrong, not from a resurrection spell. A zombie lumbers forward, practically falling on us. Naomi shrieks and throws out her hand, pushing the zombie backward and onto the ground with a wave of energy.

  “There’s too many!” Nicole cries and I yank my hand out of Kristy’s.

  “Keep going!” I shout, coming to a stop. I conjure an energy ball. It won’t kill them, but it’ll distract them. I toss it up into the air, holding my hands out underneath it, feeding it more energy so it glows brighter and brighter.

  “Callie!” Kristy shouts, voice drowned out by the moans of the undead. “Come on!”

  “Go,” I yell back to her. “I’ll catch up!”

  “I don’t want to—”

  She cuts off with a scream. I whirl around, seeing a large zombie tackle her to the ground. I don’t think. I just run toward my best friend. The energy ball crashes to the ground, sparking as it explodes against the dirt.

  “Get off her!” I shout and throw my hand, telekinetically moving the zombie to the side. But instead of flying and crashing into a tree, he’s pushed aside maybe three feet.

  What the fuck?

  The energy ball didn’t kill them. Telekinesis hardly works on them. Are our powers useless? Then it hits me. It’s not actually the bodies of the zombies we’re fighting, but the dark magic reanimating them.

  “Go!” I yell. Naomi and Nicole are several feet ahead. They slow, turning and seeing Kristy on the ground. Nicole breaks away from her sister and rushes back, going to Kristy. More zombies barrel forward, mouths open. I come to a stop, planting my feet into the earth. I reach down, deep down, and summon up all the energy I can, and direct it toward my friends.

  It shields them, and the zombies bump into an invisible force field. Nicole pulls Kristy to her feet. Naomi holds out her hand, reaching for her sister. Together, the three of them run toward the house. Sweat drips down my forehead as I try to hold the wall of energy. The zombies clamber after them before realizing I’m still out here.

  I’m still alone.

  “That’s right, you undead dirtbags. Come and get it.” I drop the shield, knowing my friends have put enough distance between the zombies and themselves. I intend to invoke the same power around myself and then…well, I’m not sure.

  I’m a figure-it-out-as-I-go kind of girl.

  But then a zombie rushes forward with more speed than he should possess. His face is half rotted off, and bones stick out of the decaying flesh of his fingertips. He makes a dive for me, and I hold out my hand, putting up a shield of energy.

  He crashes into it, neck bending and snapping at an unnatural angle. It doesn’t slow him down. I stagger back, heart racing, and bump right into another zombie, who grabs me around the waist and wrestles me to the ground. I fall hard, whacking my head on a jumble of debris. Pain radiates through me, and it’s all I can do to keep the zombie from sinking its teeth into my flesh.

  The other zombie gets up, moving on all fours, and stumbles over. Thick brown drool oozes from its face, and bits of torn flesh on his cheek hang down, swinging as he moves. I conjure up another energy ball, hitting the zombie on top of me in the face.

  It sizzles through him, but it’s like he can’t even feel the pain. More zombies sense my struggle and start to make their way over. They’re immune to my powers. I don’t know what to do, but I won’t go down without a fight.

  I madly reach out, feeling the ground for anything to use as a weapon. All I find are wet leaves and small fallen branches too brittle to do any sort of damage. I bring my leg up, trying to get my knee under the zombie so I can push him away with my legs.

  It’s too strong. Too heavy. I turn my head, narrowly avoiding getting my face chewed off. The other zombie is right here too, and a bead of nasty drool lands on my forehead. It grabs my hair and tries to pull me away from the other zombie.

  And then a dark shadow moves through the woods, coming at me fast. It knocks the big zombie off me, sending the body flying several feet away. It rushes at me again, shoving the other zombie away.

  “Binx,” I pant as I roll over and push myself up. “What took you so long?” Feeling a little disoriented, I throw out my hands to gather my bearing. Binx yells at me to get out of the woods.

  “Not without you,” I tell him, and he shadows by me again, pushing another zombie to the ground. I lunge forward, grabbing a rock. It’s buried in the ground and is too heavy for me to pick up. Pushing my hair out of my eyes, I hold out my hand and use my powers to dig it up from the earth. It rises from the ground, bits of dirt and moss falling from it.

  Then I throw it hard into the big zombie’s face, smashing its head in. If that doesn’t kill it,
it’ll at least slow it down. Sucking in air, I turn, following Binx a few more feet through the forest. We’re almost to the edge of the woods when Lucas comes back, protectively picking me up and cradling me to his chest. I don’t protest. I hunker in and let him run us back to the house.

  He sets me down on my sidewalk and the first thing I do is look for Binx. His shadow sweeps across the yard and he appears as a black cat again, standing in front of me, growling.

  “What the hell is going on?” Nicole asks. She’s standing on the porch, clutching the railing.

  “Callie did the spell wrong, obviously,” Naomi snaps.

  “Not wrong,” Kristy says. “Too right. We were supposed to bring back one dead body, not a whole graveyard full of them.”

  “Where did they come from?” Nicole asks.

  “There’s a house,” I start, still trying to catch my breath. “Not far from here. It’s been abandoned for years and has its own family plot on the property.”

  “You brought back an entire family?” Naomi says and I can’t tell if she’s pissed or impressed. Maybe both? Hell, I’m feeling both at the moment.

  “I didn’t mean to.”

  “No shit. But how do we kill them? My powers seem useless against them.”

  “Mine too,” I admit. “And I stabbed one in the forehead and it did nothing.”

  “Try this.” Lucas speeds forward, yanking one of the zombies from the woods and bringing it into the yard. He twists its head all the way around, yanking it up until it snaps free from its body.

  The zombie’s torso flops down, and Lucas tosses the head to the ground.

  “That’s how you kill a zombie.”

  I swallow my pounding heart. “Could have told me that earlier.”

  He looks at me, fire burning behind his dark blue eyes. “I’m going on trial and error here. This might come as a shock to know I’ve never fought zombies before.”

  “I can’t pull off a head,” Kristy says, wrapping her arms around herself. “I’m not strong enough.”

  “No,” Lucas agrees. “But I am.”

  The zombies start to pour out of the forest. Pale moonlight casts dark shadows on the lawn, and the smell of death creeps up on us.

  “You can’t fight them all on your own.” I turn, looking at my friends. “Get inside and take him with you.” I point to the man we brought back from the dead. “He’s going to wake up soon.” Shifting my gaze to Kristy, I say, “Do something about his memory. And put a sheet down before he sits on my furniture.”

  She nods and takes one of the man’s arms. Naomi grabs the other, and Nicole opens the door. They drag him inside, and the screen door snaps shut behind them.

  “You can’t fight them with magic,” Lucas reminds me in case I forgot.

  “I know.” I take a few steps to the side, not taking my eyes off the forest. Gulping in air, I run to a toolshed on the other side of my house. I wave my hand, throwing open the doors, and conjure an energy ball so I can see. This space houses my lawn-and-garden equipment…and a few weapons.

  Because you never know when a resurrection spell will go terribly wrong and you have to fight off an army of the undead.

  I grab a machete from a shelf and race back to Lucas, who’s starting into the woods with his fangs drawn. Zombies emerge from it, death groans echoing through the night air. One of the faster zombies outruns the others, and I race toward it, brandishing the machete. I swing and hit it hard in the neck. The blade hits the spinal cord, and I jerk my hands back, yanking the blade from its skin. I swing harder the next time, slicing through the zombie’s neck.

  “Magic won’t kill them,” I say as Lucas zooms forward, twisting another neck of the nearest zombie. “But I made them. I have to finish them. I’ll put them back in the—oh for fuck’s sake. Not now.”

  A car speeds down the road, headlights coming into view long before they get close to my house. If they keep going at that speed, they might not notice a horde of zombies slowly making their way toward my house.

  But the car slows.

  And then pulls into my driveway.

  “Eliza,” Lucas comes to a dead stop, turning toward the car. He can sense her before he can see her. The car barrels toward my house, coming to a sudden halt, gravel crunching under the tires. Lucas turns back with a growl, and runs into the woods, getting another zombie.

  Eliza gets out of the car, along with Monica and another human. And then all hell breaks loose. Over a dozen zombies stagger forward, drawn to the scent of fresh meat. I swing the machete, hitting another in the neck. It falls, almost knocking me over. I jump back, and my fingers slip off the machete. The zombie drags itself forward, taking my weapon with it.

  “Give that back, asshole,” I say. I hold out my hand to telekinetically bring it to me, when another zombie grabs me around the waist. Binx shadows through the yard, crushing the zombie against the ground.

  “Thanks,” I pant and hold out my hand again. The machete flies into my grip. Someone screams, and I jerk my head around to see a fast-moving zombie coming at Eliza and the humans.

  “Get in the house!” I shout and swing the machete. This time, I get it clean through the neck. Rancid blood splatters my face, but the zombie drops to the ground. “Eliza, I invite you in!”

  Lucas tears through zombie after zombie, and I tighten my grip on the machete. Binx flies past me, going to the humans who are still too stunned to move. He tackles the zombie closest to them to the ground. The girls scream again.

  “What the bloody hell is going on?” Eliza cries.

  Lucas speeds forward, stopping next to me. He has blood on his face, and body parts in his hair.

  “Do as she says, Eliza,” he demands. “Get the humans in the house. Protect them.”

  “Lucas!” Eliza protests. “What the—”

  “Now!” Lucas orders, and Eliza is forced to listen.

  “There’s two of us,” I pant. “And about a dozen of them.”

  Lucas tips his head down to me, raising his eyebrows as he smiles. “I like our odds.”

  Inhaling deep, I run forward, swinging the machete down hard on a zombie whose back legs aren’t working right and is crawling through the yard. Binx works along with me, crushing the zombie against the ground. I follow him, slicing off heads. We get five more before I dare take a second to stop and look around the yard.

  I’m covered in zombie blood. It’s thick, smells like day-old roadkill left to rot in a rancid puddle on the side of the road on a hot day. Lucas rips another head off and then stops, looking around.

  “I think we got them all—wait, never mind.” He zooms into the forest, appearing a minute later with even more blood on his hands.

  “Is that all?” I pant. My heart is racing so fast it hurts.

  Lucas tips his head up and inhales. “I think so. I’ll send Eliza out to canvas the area.”

  “Binx is on it,” I tell him, watching my familiar’s shadow disappear into the night. I let out a deep breath. “Fuck.”

  Lucas chuckles. “You got that right.”

  “I just…I mean…I don’t know what to say.” Dragging the machete on the ground, I start for the house and sink down on the first porch step. I really don’t know what to say. Or think.

  Because not only did I successfully bring a body back from the dead, I brought back every body within a three-mile radius.

  Chapter 15

  Lucas takes the machete from my hands and wipes the blade on the grass, getting rid of most of the solid parts and some of the blood. He comes back, setting it down on the wooden railing.

  “You’re not injured, are you?” he asks as he sits next to me.

  “I don’t think so.” I look down at myself, realizing just how disgusting I am. “Sick.” I find a clean spot on my leggings and wipe my hands. “These were my comfiest pair of leggings.”

  Lucas brushes my hair back and picks a chunk of rotting flesh from my braid, tossing it to the ground. I let out another deep breath, feeling
my heart start to beat at a normal rate again. There are bodies littering my yard. The smell alone is enough to alert the authorities, and if anyone were to drive by and see…I don’t even want to finish that thought.

  Binx comes back to the house, red eyes flashing for a brief moment before he takes on the appearance of a cat again.

  “Good boy,” I tell him, wiping my hands clean again before reaching out to scratch him under his chin. “Are they all gone?”

  Binx meows back, telling me there are no more zombies wandering through the woods.

  “You talk to him?” Lucas asks.

  “Yes.”

  “And he talks back. How does that work?”

  “I hear his voice in my head. When he’s in shadow form, he can speak out loud.”

  Slowly, Lucas reaches his hand out. Binx sniffs his fingers and then rubs his head against Lucas’s hand.

  “He saved you out there.”

  “I know.” I run my hand over Binx’s smooth, black fur. “Wasn’t the first time and I’m sure it won’t be the last time.” The blood on my skin starts to itch. “We should go in, make sure everyone else is okay, and take a shower.”

  “Together?”

  “No,” I say, though the thought of getting naked with Lucas makes me tingle. Even now. “Not together.”

  “Are you sure? I can make sure you’ve thoroughly washed all the hard-to-reach places.”

  I roll my eyes. “I’ve been washing myself for years now. I think I can handle it.”

  “I like the thought of you handling it.”

  “Is everything about sex to you vampires?”

  He shrugs. “Not everything. But you already know I want to be inside of you.”

  “You’re so vulgar.”

  “You’re such a prude.”

  “I told you I’m not.”

  In the blink of an eye, Lucas is on his feet, extending a hand to help me up. I take it, finding his cool skin to be comforting against mine.

  “You missed one,” Eliza says when we step into the house. She raises her eyebrow and motions to the man huddled in a corner of my living room. “Want me to rip his head off?”