by Aline Riva
“No, no... listen...” he gripped her tighter, pulling her down close as he was hit by the stink of sweat and unwashed clothing and a foul odour on her breath, “We are destined,” he repeated, thinking of his companions and the threat to their lives as his lips brushed hers, “I want you to have my children... raise them in the ways of darkness... I think our destiny is far greater than Shadowbone could understand. This is an unholy calling to both of us! Feel it, Raven, see the truth of it!”
She stared at him for a moment, still uncomfortably close, and as the look in her eyes changed to a strange expression of enlightenment, sweet relief that she had fallen for his bullshit made him want to laugh out loud – but that would have blown his cover, it was more than he dared to do, so instead he kept his gaze locked with hers as he gripped her shoulders tightly.
“Our destiny is shared!” she said breathlessly, gazing at him intently.
“Yes, it is. And that's why we must leave. I need us to go as soon as I'm over this drug and able to walk. I just need a gun in case anyone tries to stop us, can you find me a gun, my love?”
She lunged at him, covering his mouth with a bruising kiss that made him want to gag with the stink of her breath. As she came up for air as sharply as she had leaned in, she wiped away her smudged lipstick with the back of her hand.
“I can fetch your gun tonight, we can leave when darkness falls.”
His head was still throbbing but the plan he had formed was clear and what she had just said had blown a hole in it a mile wide.
“We can't leave until I'm rested. I feel very weak. I need the drug to be out of my system first.”
“That will not be until tomorrow night!”
“Then we leave tomorrow night,” he said softly as he reached up and ran his fingers through her greasy hair, “Now I must rest and sleep. I need my strength. I can't wait for us to start building our future together, away from here, away from everyone! You are destined to be more powerful than Shadowbone.”
She looked shocked as she parted her lips to protest but he placed a finger on them gently, silencing her.
“This is a secret handed to me by the lord of all things dark. This is why Shadowbone would not understand.”
She was held spellbound by his words as she looked down at him.
“Now let me sleep,” he told her, “Tomorrow we start the beginning of something great and powerful. But I need that gun. I must have that gun.”
She was nodding with a fanatical gleam in her eyes as she looked down at him. He gave a sigh and closed his eyes, breathing slowly and deeply and then as he felt the bed shift as she got up and walked quietly over to the door, he knew the plan was working.
As she left and closed the door behind her and then locked it, he opened his eyes again, breathing a relieved sigh, glad to be free of her company and her stench which up close, was really too much. He ran over the plan again, silently considering all the risks:
Raven would fetch the gun. Most likely his hand gun and not the machine gun left outside the fence... that would limit his firepower and his chances of getting the other guys out alive. He knew they were safe until the drug was out of their system because these crazy bastards liked human meat but they didn't want to eat it pumped full of sedative...
The feeling of nausea lingered as he lay there and he was sure it was not the effect of the drug – it was the sense of dread as he considered the fate of his companions – Parsons was a fighter but Christian was not, and even though he almost certainly now had a loaded gun guaranteed by Raven, it made no difference to the odds for the other guys who were outside and locked in a cage. He knew he would not have enough bullets to shoot his way through, get them out of the cage and shoot his way back to the boat. It was a sickening mathematical equation that had only one solution that he didn't want to think about:
He stood a chance of survival if he looked out for himself and fought his way out alone, it was the last thing he wanted to do, but unless he could come up with a better plan, he stood a slim chance of escape while Parsons and Doctor Wells stood none...
The sun was sinking as late afternoon arrived on the island of Wolfsheer. If any of the residents were concerned that Parsons and his crew had not yet returned, it was too early to voice it or to think realistically that there could be a problem. Many islanders looked to the sea as the sunset lowered, hoping to see a boat cut across the waves, but the sea remained flat and calm as it reflected the golden sunset with nothing to break the surface of the water.
As the time hit seven pm, Greg was opening up the main hall and setting up the bar, looking his usual best in a sharp suit as he had drinks and apologies ready for the fact that the alcohol was running out. As he greeted the first of the customers his thoughts were with the supply run team as he hoped Emma stayed safe – and hopefully stumbled across a stocked off licence on her travels...
While Greg was working at the bar, Zodiac was home with Vicki. He had just had a sandwich with salad and now he was back in the garden. The house felt strangely silent without Greg and Vicki missed him as if there was a crack in her heart. Her heart was also heavy as she thought of Stacy and that night she could never forget played over in her mind again:
Dead jaws ripped into flesh and blood spurted and gushed out and the creature kept on feeding in a frenzy, ripping skin from bone until her head was hanging off, held by bloody threads of tissue and exposed bone...
“Stop!” she whispered as she reached the back door and stood on the step where the dipping sunlight was mellowing to amber gold. The breeze was warm and shifted the leaves in nearby trees. She blinked and thought an oil covered corpse stepped out of the woodland beyond the garden, its dead hand reaching for Zodiac as he sat on the grass with his pencils scattered as he drew the sunset and started to shade it. She caught her breath, looking to the trees but then as the shadow fell darker she realised it had been a shift in perspective as the light has stared to fade out.
Then a hand rested on her shoulder. She glanced at it and saw the fingers were covered in blood.
“Got what you wanted, did you?” said Stacy.
Vicki was frozen to the spot as she struggled to breathe as terror made her blood run cold as her heart raced out of control.
“Go away...” she whispered as she broke into a sweat.
“You brought that fucking zombie here to the island! You and your pretty hair, it followed you and it gazed at you and it refused to harm you...So everyone thought it was placid. You told them a lie, Vicki! It's your fault I'm dead! Are you happy now, in my bed with my man?”
“Stop it!” she gasped, throwing her body forward to shrug off the dead woman's touch.
Zodiac looked up from his drawing with a confused expression on his face as he wondered why Vicki was yelling at someone, turning around to face them - yet she was alone in the kitchen... He put down his pencil and got up and ran over to the open back door and went inside. Vicki was standing with her back to him.
“It wasn't my fault!” she said as her voice trembled, “Stop blaming me!”
“Who are you talking to?”
As Zodiac asked that question, the bloody image of Stacy with half her throat missing vanished.
“No one,” Vicki said quickly, “I was... thinking... and talking to myself.. grown ups do strange things sometimes, just forget about it.”
His translucent eyes conveyed a look of confusion as he looked up at her.
“Sometimes when people are stressed they see or hear things that are not real. Visual and auditory hallucinations. That's a bit like flashbacks. My Daddy gets those sometimes, but in bad dreams about the day he was in the water. He said you remember that day, when your sister died? Daddy was pulled under by the monsters and they bit him. He still has bad dreams about it.”
“I didn't know that, he didn't tell me,” Vicki replied in a hushed voice, it was strange to be having a conversation of this level with a five year old, it was yet another reminder that Zodiac was not an ordina
ry child.
“Maybe you have bad dreams when you're awake,” Zodiac added.
Vicki felt awkward.
“I was just thinking aloud,” she replied.
The boy looked at her doubtfully.
“I don't believe you.”
“I'm telling the truth!” she said sharply, grabbing at a lock of her hair and twisting it around her finger. She gave a tug and twisted again.
Zodiac looked at her for a moment, then decided if Vicki was upset, he had done and said nothing to cause it, she had already been upset when he walked through the door.
“I think maybe you should talk to Christian when he gets back from Raven Isle,” Zodiac suggested, “He's a clever doctor. If you're not feeling so good he can help you.”
Vicki forced a smile.
“Okay, I'll do that if you promise you won't tell Daddy about this. Don't tell him I was upset tonight, okay?”
“And you'll go and see Christian when he comes back?”
She nodded.
“That's a deal,” Zodiac said, then he held out his small hand.
She smiled as she accepted his hand and they shook on the promise.
“You're such a kind boy,” Vicki said sincerely.
“Can I play out until it gets dark?” he asked.
“Okay,” she replied, “But I want you in by sundown.”
“Yes!” he said joyfully as he gave a small jump, then with a big smile on his face, he ran outside to enjoy the last gasp of evening sunlight, leaving Vicki alone in the kitchen as she began to doubt what remained of her sanity. She tugged again on her hair, feeling a sharp pain as it broke away at the roots. The pain brought her back to the moment clearly and she looked down at the strands of hair in her hand, then took a deep breath, reminding herself the dead stayed dead unless they were infected corpses – and Stacy had not returned from the dead, she had been cold in her grave for five long years...
The drive along the motorway had been simple to begin with as Emma drove the lorry and Clare sat beside her and they followed Alex as his car went on ahead. At first they had weaved around a few crashes and old burned out wrecks, then hit a long straight run with nothing to block their path. The sun was setting now and the car and the lorry were the only vehicles moving on the road, their headlights bright and burning into the falling dusk as they went on their way.
Clare settled back in her seat as they drove on, giving a heavy sigh.
“It's going to be hard, going back without Adrian. I really didn't think any of us would die, I mean, it's a supply run, we were all good with guns, all had experience... even after the other team didn't come back, I thought maybe the chopper had crashed or they'd run into a horde...I never would have thought the living were to blame. I didn't want to think they were dead until Alex told us the truth.”
“This world went bad a long time ago,” Emma replied as she drove on keeping her sights set on the road, “Nothing surprises me any more. I sometimes wonder, out of all the people who have made it this far – how many of them are still sane? Maybe we got lucky because we have the island community, very little has changed there. It must be hell on earth for people stuck here on the mainland. What do you think that does to the average person over five years, trapped here in a world full of corpses?”
“I wouldn't like to think about it,” Clare replied.
Then Emma spoke again, her tone changing as up ahead, ugly shadows of burned out skeletal car wrecks loomed and Alex slowed his vehicle to a halt.
“Oh no! We can't get through that lot! What now?”
The engine was still running as Alex stuck his head out of the window.
“We can take that turn off,” he called back, pointing to a side road that led away from the motorway.
Emma waved, indicating she understood, then looked to the turn off where the road was clear. Alex drove down it and she moved the lorry onwards, following as the darkness grew deeper and the moon glowed and stars filled the night sky.
“Problem solved,” Clare said as they headed up the road, tailing the car closely for fear of losing sight of it on the unlit route.
Emma glanced at the dashboard, then gripped the wheel harder as she focussed on the car in front.
“Not exactly,” she said as dread crept into her voice, “We're in the middle of nowhere, we don't know when we will run into the next horde, and we're running low on petrol.”
“We'll manage a fuel stop soon, “ Clare replied, “We have to – there's bound to be a petrol station around here somewhere.”
“And we can refuel in the pitch dark, with god knows what creeping out of the shadows,” Emma replied, watching the fuel and then the road as she drove on.
Clare said nothing in reply, instead she shivered at the thought of the possibility of filling the tank in the dark, or even worse, breaking down on this lonely road where the undead could creep from the roadside at any moment. It was to terrifying to think about, but that petrol was running out fast...
Christian had finally woken in the cramped cage, lying on the floor on his side to see a sideways view of a large field and in the middle of it, a huge unlit fire. He struggled, realised his wrists and ankles were bound and then rolled sharply, finding himself face to face with Parsons, who had been awake for hours, lying there in silence as he had considered their fate.
“What the fuck is going on?”Christian said in terror.
Parsons kept his voice low.
“The tea was drugged. You drank the most, you woke up last. I don't know where Marc is, but Shadowbone put us in this cage and said they're going to kill us tomorrow night. They're cannibals.”
Christian struggled in vain against the tight bonds that held his wrists.
“I don't want to die like this!” the doctor said in panic.
Parsons spoke again, keeping his voice low and calm.
“Shut your mouth and listen...Don't make a sound, don't draw attention to us - they have guards posted nearby... They also took our guns. But they missed the leather pouch. I still have a meat cleaver.”
Christian felt the worst of his panic slip away as he looked into his eyes, understanding there was a plan. It might not be a definite promise of escape, but Parsons had a plan and was probably the best person to be trapped with – he had great faith in the leader of his community.
“What are we going to do?”
“Nothing yet,” Parsons replied, “I'm working on freeing my hands. There's sharp stones on the ground and I'm trying to work through the rope. You do nothing until I get my hands free, have you got that?”
Christian nodded.
“They are not planning to kill us until the sedative is out of our bodies. We have another twenty four hours. We can certainly try and make a run for it when they open the cage.”
“But what if they don't open it until tomorrow night?”
Parsons saw terror reflected in Christian's gaze but now was not the time to sugar coat the truth.
“We try and make a break for freedom,” he replied, “We try. We probably won't succeed, but the chance is there and we must take it.”
“And die in the process,”Christian said as his voice trembled.
“Maybe,” Parsons agreed, “But if this is my last day on earth I'm taking Shadowbone with me.” Then he fell silent, turning on his back as he worked the rope that bound his wrists against the stony ground beneath him.
Chapter 6
As the moon rose full, Marc felt trapped as Raven slept beside him. Her hand was on his chest, slipped inside his vest as she raked her fingers lightly at his skin, inviting the unthinkable. He had been reflecting on much since his capture and clearly, as attractive as some of the women were here on the isle, their personal hygiene was not a priority. Spending hours next to Raven filled the room with her unwashed body stench as the heat of the night grew sticky and as close as her as she lay beside him. He knew he could only use the excuse of sleeping off the drug for so long to avoid her advances, but thankfully tonight
she was sleeping deeply, thinking on her plans for the future she imagined they would share.
As he watched her sleeping, he wondered where she had come from and how Shadowbone had managed to gather so many people together and convince them to join his cult-like society. Perhaps he had showed no fear when all around him were fleeing in terror from the undead, maybe he had used his crazy beliefs to win them over... But the cannibalism was something he could not even think about – why or how it had come about in the first place was a question that remained unanswered. Maybe lack of food and desperation had led to acquiring a taste for human flesh. These were savage times and he didn't doubt insanity went hand in hand with that savagery as its lunatic companion.
Raven slept on as his thoughts turned to morning. He knew when the sun came up he would be desperate to have that loaded gun in his hand, but he couldn't show his desperation in front of Raven, this was a careful balancing act where he had to keep calm even though he was terrified, because if his cover was blown, all hope would be lost...
The petrol gauge was edging towards empty as Emma saw a petrol station up ahead. As they drew closer, their headlights making the trees at the roadside look like ghostly hands reaching out – or perhaps bringing to mind lurking undead hiding within – Clare shuddered as she straightened up in her seat. The lorry pulled into the petrol station and Alex pulled up in the forecourt away from the pumps, stopping the car and getting out with his loaded gun ready.
The place was quiet and ghostly with the lights out in the shop and the cashier's booth empty. There were cracks in the window of the shop, the door was half closed by the wind and jammed and buckled, a legacy of some earlier raid long ago when it had been kicked in. As Clare climbed down from the cab she heard relief in Emma's voice as the tank began to fill.
“Thank god it's not dry!”
Alex said nothing as he stood at a distance, turning left and right, slowly scanning the darkness for shadowy movement, but seeing none. Clare went over to the shop and peered through the window. Inside, shelves were on the floor, bottles were broken and empty food wrappers scattered about. The place had been picked clean. Then a face loomed close as an undead creature snarled and smashed its head against the cracked but toughened glass. Clare jumped back, reaching for her gun.