Strange Trouble

by Laken Cane

Her stomach heaved, trying to dislodge the revolting blood, but she swallowed hard and forced herself not to vomit.

  And for the first time, doubt showed in Damascus’s monstrous eyes.

  Rune backed away. Her sensitive ears caught the sounds of engines. Ground troops were coming to kill Rock County.

  Damascus smiled. “I came here to take back what belongs to me. To call him into my presence and spirit him back to my world. Back into my loving arms.”

  “Believe me, lady, I regret not handing him over to you.” Something had changed, and Rune was pretty sure she knew what it was. The witch was giving up. She wanted to go back to her world.

  But Rune didn’t want to let her go. Not alive.

  “I cannot defeat you,” Damascus continued. “Especially not with my blood inside you. Do you know that you are truly immortal?”

  “I’ve had my suspicions.”

  “My blood will not make you happy, my dear. But you have your greedy self to blame for that.” She took one step back, away from Rune. “You cannot defeat me, either. So to stand here and battle is a waste of time.

  “And I am a woman in love.” She grimaced, and for one brief second looked almost human. She sounded human. She tilted her head and was silent for a long moment. Calling Nicolas.

  “He does not answer. He has escaped me. Again.” She started to turn away, but hesitated. “Marta had the child delivered to me. So when you go on your hunt for Nicky, don’t neglect to punish Marta.” She giggled. It sounded more like a sob.

  Rune advanced on the witch, slowly, carefully. “I won’t let you take Stefanie. If you want to leave, you have to release her first.”

  The witch slid farther away, laughing as she went. “You can’t stop me from going.”

  But Rune, who had been inside the witch’s mind, knew otherwise. She grinned and leaped at Damascus. Before the witch could move, she forced her fingers through the sludge in her chest and grabbed her heart. Her black, swollen heart.

  And then she squeezed.

  Damascus screamed.

  “Your weak spot,” Rune said. “Release the child or I will burst your fucking heart.”

  She knew also if she killed the witch, Fie would die with her—but she’d kill them both if she had to. Better Fie die than to exist inside Damascus.

  She squeezed harder.

  “Oh,” the witch cried. “It hurts.”

  “Yeah. That’s always what hurts the most—someone fucking with your heart. Release her and I’ll let you go.”

  She didn’t want to, but she would.

  Damascus opened her mouth, her teeth parting as she dropped her lower jaw. And from the opening, a light started to shine.

  The witch’s body began to heave, as though she were going to vomit. And then she did—she vomited up the spirit of the child.

  Rune thought she might pass out. Dark spots grew and danced in her field of vision as she strained to follow the light, the light that was Stefanie Arco.

  She couldn’t breathe as the power grew, dimmed, then grew again.

  “Go,” she cried, and pulled her fingers away from the witch’s chest. “Go!” Please.

  “I know you,” Damascus whispered suddenly, her face filled with shock. “How did I forget?”

  Then the witch was gone.

  She did pass out then, and when she came to seconds or hours or decades later, the witch was gone and the world was full of sounds she didn’t at first understand.

  Motors and staccato gunfire, shouts and cries.

  Finally, she remembered where she was.

  Fie. She had to find Fie.

  She climbed groggily to her feet and looked around, but the light was no longer there. Maybe Damascus had lied, but she didn’t think so. She’d seen the light leaving her mouth.

  She’d seen the fear in the witch’s eyes.

  Maybe Fie had gone to find her body. Her broken body.

  Rune stumbled down the stairs, each stumbling, lurching step seeming to take an eternity.

  She flung open the doors and ran with a bit more strength to the side of the building where Fie had lain.

  But when she got there, Fie’s body was gone.

  There was only one small shoe, lying with sad abandon in the dirt, surrounded by the prone bodies of five motionless, rotting zombies.

  She had to accept the fact that Fie was gone. But her spirit, that lived on. Somewhere.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The sounds of screaming hit her brain, and she realized it was a sound she’d been hearing for a while—she just hadn’t processed it.

  She forced herself into a jog, her body groaning with pain, and headed toward the screams.

  Fucking Llodra.

  She would find him.

  It was just a matter of time.

  The screams faded and she ran faster, finally bursting through an open door in one of the squat, mustard-colored buildings to the left of the tower.

  Inside, the floor was littered with rotting bodies of zombies. Marta hadn’t lied about that—when the witch had gone, the zombies had crumbled to the ground and…died. The new zombies.

  The old zombies were still very much animated, and were eating cheerfully of the Others chained with silver to the walls.

  Stunned, Rune stood still for the second it took her to understand what she was seeing.

  Others.

  Chained to the walls.

  The Others who still lived seemed too weak to put up much resistance, but there were some who fought to shift even as they were being bitten.

  But the silver kept the Others from shifting, melting into flesh as they struggled.

  She didn’t see one wolf among them. Elliot was just like Marta. They couldn’t be bothered to help anyone who wasn’t pack or coven.

  Rune shot her claws out, destroying zombie brains before anyone even realized she was in the room.

  She started to kill the bitten Others before she realized that with the witch and her strange magic gone, the Others would not be infected. They’d heal.

  Except for the ones the zombies had injured beyond repair. Those she could not help except by finishing off.

  With the arrival of help, of hope, the Others who weren’t too far gone began to scream once more. The room became a thick, muddy mix of screams, pleas, and cries, and worst of all, the clacking teeth and sorrowful moans of the zombies.

  “Please,” a man begged. That was all. Just please.

  She pulled apart the blood-spattered chains, freeing the Others even as she continued to decapitate the few zombies that remained.

  “Is there a back door?” she asked, calmly.

  One of the Others, a woman with rusty red hair and half her face missing, nodded. She wasn’t capable of opening her mouth to talk, but pointed to the left.

  “Run,” Rune said. She raised her voice. “As soon as I free you, go out the back and don’t stop for anything. The military is here, and they’ll destroy you faster than the zombies will.”

  She drove her claws through a zombie’s brain and with her other hand, freed the last prisoner. Then the room was empty but for blood and rot and Rune.

  She heard the soldiers converging upon the building as she ran down the long hall and out the back, following the Others she’d freed.

  There were more buildings, and maybe there were more captive Others inside them. But she couldn’t allow herself to get caught by the military.

  That wouldn’t help anybody.

  She passed a huge, crudely built cage, set on a platform and wrapped in silver-laced screen. She knew immediately it’d been used for Otherfights.

  Fucking Camp. Fucking humans.

  She ran to the woods at the back of the compound, pacing herself to stay behind the Others. She herded them into the deep woods, where everyone split up at once. There were no words, just terrorized, injured people hoping like hell they could find a safe place to exist.

  It was there in the woods, as she closed her eyes and hid her face against t
he rough bark of a tree, that she remembered her cell.

  She ripped it from her tattered pocket, staring in disbelief when she realized it was dead. “Fuck!”

  The crew might have gotten out before the military came in, but where was Denim?

  She slid the useless phone back into her pocket and wrapped her arms around herself. She was cold. Her mind wanted to shut down and take a break from all it had witnessed.

  But she didn’t remember a time when she wasn’t cold. Or hurt. Or so alone she wanted to burst into tears like a fucking girl.

  With dry leaves and forest floor debris crunching under her boots, she began to walk. She was going home.

  Overhead, helicopters swooped, and she flinched each time one’s light grazed the area near her.

  But finally, the sounds of engines and machine gunfire and curses began to fade as she left the zombies to the military.

  The woods were vast and empty, filled with nothing but bare, shivering trees. The moon shone brightly down on the chaotic night, lighting her way.

  Her right arm continued to drip blood, slow to heal from the witch’s desperate scratches. The scent would most likely attract any zombies in the area.

  She almost hoped it would. The woods were too dead.

  She came upon a small, old graveyard. Even here, the earth was churned and disturbed where ancient dead had climbed free.

  George…she’d have to explain to Fie’s big brother that she’d lost the girl—if he came out of his stupor, or whatever it was.

  He’d be devastated. And alone.

  And that just sucked.

  “Your Highness.”

  She walked right by him before she realized he wasn’t a mirage. He was as real as she was, and he was standing in the middle of the woods talking to her.

  Gunnar the Ghoul.

  She stopped and stared, finally, still disbelieving. “You can’t leave Wormwood.”

  He gestured at the ground. “I can appear in any graveyard.”

  “You never told me,” she murmured. She reached out, ignoring the way he cringed as she touched him.

  She understood. She did the same thing when someone wanted to touch her—unless it was done in anger or with the intent to hurt her. That, she didn’t recoil from.

  He was real. Gunnar the Ghoul was there in those strange, too quiet woods, and he was as familiar to her as her own face.

  “I do not volunteer information about myself,” he said.

  They stared at each other for a long moment. She kept her hand on his arm, afraid he would disappear if she let go of him. “I was alone,” she said, for no reason.

  His sharp-featured face softened. Or maybe it was only a trick of the moonlight. “You are never alone, Your Desolateness.”

  “How did you do this?” At last, she let go of him. He didn’t disappear.

  “As I said. I can…materialize in any graveyard.”

  She sighed. “It’s good to see you, baby. You have something to tell me?”

  He nodded, and his long black hair slid over his bony shoulder. “But you will not like it.”

  Yeah. She hadn’t really figured she would. “I have no Baby Ruth candy bars. You’re not going to like that. But we deal with our little disappointments and move on, don’t we?” Maybe if she kept talking, she’d never find out what Gunnar had to tell her.

  “It’s about Llodra,” he said, his face carefully blank. “As you know, RISC freed him.”

  “No.” Her voice was hoarse. “I freed him. What did he do, Gunnar?”

  “He fed in a frenzy of madness before he left the—”

  “No. No.”

  “—building. I’m sorry, Your Horror. He slaughtered your people.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Rune had fled Gunnar and his bad news before he could tell her what else he’d wanted to tell her. He’d held up a finger and said “Wait, Rune,” as if she would. As if she could.

  She barely remembered the run back to River County.

  She’d left Rock County and its zombies and machine guns and had sprinted through the night like a shadow. Like a master vampire.

  Sheer hatred pushed her on, gave her the wings she needed. And for what? They were dead. They were all dead.

  Fuck me.

  The RISC parking lot was alive with cops and the media and angry, grieving, terrified people.

  Once again, she’d made a choice, and it had been the wrong one.

  Daylight came.

  The RISC building was a slaughterhouse.

  She’d slipped inside and when a cop had tried to stop her, she’d looked at him. Just once, silently. Recognition had lit his eyes and he’d backed away and left her alone.

  The walls were splashed with blood, the floors slippery with gore. Dark smears where Llodra had fed and then flung the bodies away.

  All dead.

  The bodies were gone but the spirit of horror lingered. She could feel it in the heavy air. Smell it in the coppery, overpowering stench of blood and vomit and shit.

  What have I done?

  She needed her crew.

  She leaned against a wall and put her fists to her eyes, trying to block out the sights of murder and pain. It wasn’t possible.

  Elizabeth. God, Elizabeth. Don’t be dead.

  “Rune!”

  She felt them coming, the two she’d made, and realized she’d unintentionally called to them in her need. I should have done it sooner.

  Levi, his eyes jubilant and grateful, followed reluctantly by Z, who could not help himself. She needed him. He had to come.

  Levi pulled her away from the wall and into his arms. “God, Rune. God,” he kept repeating.

  “Hi baby.”

  His arms tightened. She would have been forced to hurt him if she’d wanted to withdraw.

  “I told them you were alive,” he said, finally letting her out of his embrace. He smiled, a little embarrassed as he blinked away a tear. “I’m not sure they believed me.”

  “Where’s George? How is he?”

  He shook his head. “Still out of it. He’s in the hospital.”

  Z stared at the wall, his arms crossed, and refused to meet her gaze. “Z.” She heard the plea in her voice and winced, but there it was.

  He looked at her then, his lip curling. “What? What, Rune? Do you want me to kneel down and kiss your boots?” He gestured, his smile mocking, his eyes full of grief and rage. “Say the words. I must obey.”

  Levi shoved him. “Shut the fuck up, motherfucker. She saved your life. She didn’t set out to make you a fucking slave.”

  Rune rubbed her eyes. “Listen to me, both of you.”

  Immediately they stilled and stared at her.

  Shit.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I made you…” She motioned helplessly. “But I’m not sorry you’re standing here with me, alive.” She looked at Z. “So you deal with it, Zeveriah Kader. When everything calms down, we’ll figure shit out. But right now, I need you to be Shiv Crew. I need you to—” Fuck if her voice didn’t break. “I need you to be my Z.”

  He spoke as though every word were a splinter stabbing his throat. “I don’t know how to be the man I was. But I must obey.” He clenched his fists. “You should have let me die. I can’t forgive you for forcing me back. For changing my fate. It was mine, not yours. I won’t forgive you for that.”

  “I couldn’t let you die.”

  He grimaced. “I was dead, Rune. I was already fucking dead.”

  Later, she would give in to the need to feel sorry for herself. She closed her eyes in a long, slow blink, then shook off the guilt and did not reply. He was right. “Levi. Where are the others?” She gestured at the blood decorating the floors and wall. “Who…who did Llodra kill?” She couldn’t come right out and ask if Elizabeth was dead. She couldn’t.

  He took her arm and urged her down the hall.

  Z followed behind them, and for the first time since she’d known him Rune felt a little thrill of fear with
him at her back.

  “Almost everyone in the building was killed,” Levi said. “A few of them lived but are in pretty terrible shape. Jack, Ellie, and Raze are in the break room.”

  “The rest of the crew?” Then finally, she forced out the words. She had to. “Elizabeth?”

  “She’s in the hospital,” he said.

  She stopped and grabbed his arm. “She lived?”

  He nodded, but his face was grim. “So far. But…”

  “It’s enough. She’s alive.” She put a fist to her mouth and pushed down the cries that wanted to escape. She hadn’t killed Elizabeth.

  Not yet. They continued walking.

  “Owen and Lex are with her,” he said.

  His eyes were too sad for her to look into. She watched her feet instead.

  “You didn’t find Denim,” she stated.

  “No.” He shuddered.

  “I’m going back, Levi. I have to find Llodra and Marta. And I will find your brother. I swear it.”

  He nodded, but looked away. “Strad wouldn’t come back with us, Rune. He’s patrolling the borders of Rock County, waiting for you.”

  She thought her heart would explode with the effort it took her to control her emotions. “Give me your cell.”

  Strad answered on the first ring, his voice tight when he spat out one agonized sentence. “Did you hear from her?”

  She smiled, even though a quick sob managed to escape her control. “It is her, Berserker.”

  His silence hurt her ears, it was so heavy. Finally, “Rune.”

  She nodded. She couldn’t speak, not then.

  He understood. “You’re in River County?”

  His voice was shaky and she knew it was because he was running. Running back to his truck. Running to her. “Yes,” she whispered, cursing the changes in her, the vulnerability, the fucking need. “Hurry, Strad.”

  “I’m on my way, sweetheart.”

  Wordlessly, she handed Levi back his phone.

  At last she stood in the break room doorway. Jack, Raze, and Ellie sat at one of the tables, huddled in a little circle of grief and rage, staring quietly down into the black depths of cold coffee.

  “Somebody grab me a cup,” she said.

  Ellis yelled something unintelligible and climbed across the table, throwing himself against her so hard she would have been knocked into the hall had Z not been at her back to catch her.