by J. L. Murray
Mathilde stood beside her.
“The blood of the Revenant is different. It is a miracle. It disobeys all laws of physics and biology. It is a living, breathing thing. Even the impotent ones.”
“A wooden stake?” said Sia. “I thought that was just a children's story.”
“Oh, it isn't just any wood,” said Mathilde. “It is wood from the most ancient of trees. Or from a tree that appeared in minutes where once a Revenant stood. Trees that we once thought were extinct. Joshua Flynn found one, and he is now making more.”
“Like the tree in the street,” said Sia.
“The very same. We remove them quickly so no humans will realize what they are. The blood activates something ancient in the wood, if it was not treated or burned. The wood grows. It animates. It thrives. But the Revenant is not so lucky.”
Mathilde reached up and touched her own shoulder, seeming to be grasping it, but whether out of pain or comfort, Sia didn't know.
“So if I shove this into him,” Sia said, motioning to the thing on the bed, “he'll turn into a tree.”
“Essentially, yes,” said Mathilde.
“That’s insane.”
“You must aim for the heart, though,” said Mathilde. “Otherwise the Revenant will remain alive.”
“Isn't that just as good?” said Sia. “A prison for however long he can survive, right?”
“Unless he gets out,” said Mathilde, and there was a strange note to her voice, loud and brash and truthful. “And you do not want Joshua Flynn to get out, Sia. You want him dead.”
“Do I?”
“He is vengeful. And he would not kill you. He would torture you for years if you do this thing to him. Better to end him.”
“So this is practice?” said Sia.
“Precisely,” said Mathilde. “Find his heart and plunge the stake through.”
“What if I plunge it into you?”
Mathilde laughed coldly. “You think there is only one of me?” she said. “Another just like me will take my place. And that one may not be so kind to you. Whoever it is will not care for you as I do.”
“That wasn't a lie,” said Sia.
“Of course I care for you, Sia. I hope to remain friends after this is all over.”
“You think I'm your daughter or something?” said Sia.
Mathilde didn't speak for a moment.
“Not a daughter,” Mathilde said breathily. “Something else.”
Sia walked over the Rev on the bed. The pillow was wet with saliva, the smell of feces rank. Sia wrinkled her nose in distaste.
“Find his heart,” said Mathilde.
Sia looked at the sunken chest, the skin pale like the underbelly of a fish. She touched his sternum, almost pulling her hand away at the clammy, waxy feel of the flesh, but forcing herself to continue. The closer she got to the heart, walking her fingers across, the warmer the Rev's skin was. For a moment, she saw a faint glow under his chest. He grunted stupidly and she felt his chest vibrate under her hand. Finally she was right on top of it, the beat so strong that it seemed to push her fingers up and down with the strength of it.
“You know what to do,” said Mathilde. “Don't miss. Don't ever miss. You will need all your strength to push through the cartilage, and you will need to be quick.”
Sia grasped the stake in her right hand, keeping her left on top of the heart. The Rev looked at her blankly, one dark eye and one gold. He almost looked trusting. Sia raised the stake over her head. Keeping her eyes on the spot, she wrapped her left hand over her right. She could see the pulse of the heart under his pale skin, as though the Rev had nothing but bone and gristle left on his body. Again, she saw a flicker of light under her hand.
Sia cried out as she plunged the stake down, into the helpless thing's chest. It sank into him too easily, and she had to pull her hands away quickly, lest she sink into him too. He didn't make a sound. Just a light wheezing rattling around in his lungs. It sounded like relief.
“Back away, Sia,” Mathilde said, pulling at her with gloved hands. “Back away now!”
Sia stepped back as another sound came from the Rev's body. Black blood was pouring out of the wound in his chest. His eye had gone unfocused. He was gone. But something was happening. A sound like something stretching was coming from his body. A leaf suddenly emerged from the end of the stake, and the body began to move, swaying this way and that, head lolling, raising a foot off the bed, arms straining at the locks on his wrists.
“What's happening?” Sia asked, though she knew. She remembered.
“Only nature,” said Mathilde. “Nothing more.”
They stepped away until their backs were against the door. Sia watched in fascination as green vines snaked around the body. They seemed to clasp the Rev in an embrace, more and more wrapping around him, until Sia couldn't see the Rev anymore, just the glimmer of gold from his false eye. The green vines matured in mere seconds, turning brown and thick. They continued to stretch, bursting with leaves and tiny green branches along the way, growing around the body that had once been a Rev. Sia couldn't help but be enthralled by the process. The brown, wrapping branches soon formed a trunk, and the leaves soon grazed the iron ceiling high above them. She and Mathilde had to step out of the way as the roots climbed the walls. All the while, the tree was stretching, growing, taking form, and Sia could hear it and feel it and taste it in the air and she laughed.
It was beautiful. Soft black petals rained down on them, and Mathilde watched wordlessly as Sia danced in them.
Fourteen
“I don’t trust him,” Dez Paine said, pacing the length of Mike’s threadbare carpet. Mike sighed and turned away from his typewriter. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.
“What the hell am I supposed to do, Dez?” Mike said. “So he seems a little off. Who doesn’t?”
“It’s those eyes. You ever notice? He’s got these little, squinty eyes and he's always watching. Always asking questions too, with this weird smile on his face. Something’s got to be done, Mike. I’m telling you, he’s one of them. I should know, I was too, remember? I can smell another Mover from a mile away.”
“What are you suggesting?” said Mike. He could feel the exhaustion in his shoulders. He’s been writing stories for the past seven hours and his brain felt like mush, his muscles cramped and sore. “You want to hit him over the head and drop him off in a gutter somewhere? Just because he’s a little shifty? What about all the druggies and alcoholics? They’re up all night long partying and then out all day grabbing intel.”
“They’re just kids,” said Dez. “But that’s the thing, Mikey. This guy doesn’t even fit in with this crowd. None of these kids even know him.”
“Wait,” said Mike. “Then how did he get here?” He blinked at Dez and put his glasses back on. He frowned as Dez stopped pacing. Dez fixed him with a smug look.
“I told you, Mikey. Kid is freaky.”
Mike leaned back in his chair and thought about it. They’d been putting out papers for weeks. Every couple of days supplies would show up on their doorstep. No one ever saw anyone deliver them, but they always had plenty of printing supplies, as well as food and coffee. The amount of paper delivered told them how many papers to print. Every delivery brought more and more paper, delivered in stacks, fresh and stiff and naked. The delivery that morning, Mike guessed, had brought thousands of sheets, stacked neatly in boxes and tied together with twine. They’d started with around a hundred.
What they were doing was a death sentence, Mike knew. If they were printing more papers because people were reading them, then something was different in the world. Something was different and it was all because of Joshua Flynn. Mike hadn’t seen him since he’d appeared in the basement and told them what they were meant to do. If this guy — Mike strained to remember his name: Craig? Kyle? — really was working for the Revs, then Mike couldn’t see any alternative… But he didn’t want to think that way.
“What should we do?” sai
d Mike.
“Mikey, I think we have to kill him.”
Mike shook his head. Even though he had the same thought, they couldn’t devolve into murderers. Not now. Not them.
“We’ll be just like them if we kill him,” said Mike. “It’s what we’re fighting here.”
“It’s self-preservation is what it is,” said Dez. He sat down hard on the bed. “Shit, man, what else can we do?”
“Lock him away,” said Mike. “Tie him up. Find out who he is, and if he is a threat to us.”
“Mike…”
“I know, but I just can’t,” said Mike.
“What about Flynn?” said Dez.
“Let him sort Chris out.”
Chris. That was the name.
“I don’t have any way to contact him,” said Mike. “It’s not like we have a Bat signal for him.”
There was a sharp rap at the door and Dez gave Mike a cold stare as the door swung open and Chris stepped in, smiling.
“Is this a private meeting?” he said, his eyes too sharp, too curious. Mike pursed his lips and looked away from Dez.
“Yeah, but we’re done,” said Mike. “What is it, kid?”
Dez stood up and walked past Chris, bumping him with his shoulder on the way out.
“What’s his problem?” said Chris, still smiling. He closed the door gently behind Dez and Mike sat up, suddenly sweating under his arms. He needed to be on his guard with this kid.
“Where you from, Chris?” Mike said.
He sat down on the bed, bouncing once or twice like he was trying it out. Mike gritted his teeth.
“Philly, same as everyone,” Chris said. He practically gleamed with those white teeth. Mike didn’t trust people who smiled all the time.
“How’d you know to come here?” Mike said, his voice soft.
“What’s the matter, Mr. Novak,” Chris said, smiling wider. “Don’t you trust me?”
There was a crash at the front of the house and Mike’s heart jumped in his chest. He stood up quickly, but Chris remained sitting on the bed. A girl screamed and there was more crashing, glass breaking, wood splintering, shouting. Chris stood then, slowly, still smiling, then, even more slowly, he eased himself down to his knees, hands in the air, and lay down on his stomach on the floor.
“What…?” Mike said, backing toward the door. He opened the door and looked out. Someone ran past, shrieking. There was a cacophony of screaming from the front room and Mike couldn’t breathe. He looked back at Chris, lying belly-first. The boy looked up at him.
“Time’s up, Mr. Novak,” he said. “Time to surrender.”
Mike couldn’t stop himself, he slammed the door and kicked the kid on his way to the window. He shoved the window open, paint chips raining down on him as he gave it a shove. Cold air blew in, smelling like snow. He looked back at the typewriter, then put his head out the opening.
“It doesn’t matter where you run,” Chris said behind him. “They’ll find you.”
The Mover vans surrounded the front of the house. He heard the heavy footsteps coming down the hall now, breaking down each door. He pushed himself out the window, toppling into the snow face-first, landing on a mixture of frozen potting soil and dirty snow. He crawled around the side of the house and almost lost his fingers to a set of tires. Mike looked up, his heart beating so fast he was sure this was where he was going to die. Then a familiar voice.
“Get on, you stupid git,” said Dez Paine, and Mike had never been happier to see the scruffy bastard.
“Can you drive a motorcycle in the snow?” said Mike, feeling stiff and old and awkward swinging a leg over the back, and wrapping his arms around his friend’s waist.
“We’re about to find out,” said Dez.
Mike was half-frozen by the time they got anywhere. No one followed them. Either the Movers hadn’t noticed the little bike peeling out off the side of the house or they didn’t care. The black vans stayed put and Mike and Dez rode off into the snowstorm.
The flakes were coming down thick and fat when Dez stopped at a lone clapboard house in the middle of a field. The paint was peeling, revealing a dingier shade of white underneath. Mike’s teeth were chattering.
“You shoulda worn a coat, mate,” said Dez, shrugging in his leather jacket. He was wearing gloves, too.
“How the hell did you have time to grab a coat and gloves?” Mike said, glaring at him.
“I knew that kid was no good,” said Dez. “Saw the vans pull up so I went out the back. I’ve had this baby stashed since we got here.”
“Just in case, huh?” said Mike.
“You’ve got a lot of brains, Mike, but you gotta look at the bigger picture. We’re outlaws, man. Outlaws from monsters. Be stupid not to have an escape plan. We’re essentially rubbing their faces in their failures with our little rags we’re putting out.”
“Where are we?” said Mike. The door opened and a woman came out to stand on the porch. She folded her arms across her chest. She was young, but not too young, and had a hardened look about her. She was not someone who had an easy life. Mike imagined that they all looked like that on the inside. But Dez lit up when he saw her.
“Hey, got room for us tonight?” he said, turning up the charm. He smiled, and Mike noticed that the corner of the woman’s mouth twitched.
“You better get the old guy inside,” she said, her voice just as hard as her face. “He’s going to freeze to death.”
“Old guy?” said Mike.
“Mikey, meet Delilah,” said Dez, affection in his voice.
“Stash your bike in the back,” she ordered. “Don’t want them nosing around here for you. That is why you’re here, isn’t it, British?”
“Aw, Lila,” Dez said. “You knew I’d come back.”
“Piss off,” she said and lit a cigarette, blowing the smoke in his direction before turning and going into the house, kicking the screen door on her way.
“She’s real sweet once you get to know her,” said Dez.
“I bet she is,” said Mike.
“Just, er, don’t mention Flynn around her, okay? She’s a little touchy about the Revs.” Dez lowered his voice, even though they were alone. “They took her kid and two brothers after the Annex. In the Dark Days, yeah?”
“The Blackout, you mean?” said Mike.
“Blackout, Dark Days, doesn’t matter what you call it,” said Dez.
“The Blackout was hard on everyone,” said Mike. “And the rest of the days haven’t been kind, either.”
“And yet,” said Dez, “we’re still here.”
“That we are,” said Mike. “That we are.”
Mike spent the night on a dusty, scratchy orange sofa, but Lila gave him enough clean blankets to stay warm in the chilly house. Mike slept more soundly than he had in a month, even with Dez’s moans drifting through the door of Lila’s bedroom. In the morning Mike woke to sounds in the adjoining kitchen and found Lila making coffee in a percolator. She nodded at him when she saw him folding up his blankets.
“So you live out here all alone, Lila?” said Mike, conversationally. Lila stared at him and Mike wished he could take it back. Dez’s words floated through his foggy morning head and he cursed himself for being so thoughtless. Lila had lost a lot of family.
“It suits me,” she said coldly. “Revs don’t bother country folk too much. I can take in boarders if I need supplies. I’m not stupid, if that’s what you’re thinking. I sleep with a pistol under my pillow when strangers are in the house.” She raised an eyebrow at Mike and he smiled, embarrassed.
Lila put a steaming mug of coffee in front of him.
“No milk, you’ll have to drink it black,” she said.
“Thank you,” Mike said. “It’s been a long while since I’ve had a good cup of coffee.” He sat down at the scrubbed little kitchen table with mismatched chairs and Lila joined him. She wore a shabby cardigan over her dressing gown, the bottom of her nightgown wet from snow over her boots. She’d already been outsi
de this morning. Her hair was down and fell around her shoulders in soft waves, her face prematurely lined, though it lessened when she didn’t know anyone was looking. Mike frowned. She must have been so beautiful before all this, he realized. The hardships they endured turned everyone thin and drawn.
“So what did you do?” Lila said.
“I beg your pardon?” said Mike, torn from his thoughts. “What makes you think I did something?”
She laughed, a light, pretty sound that didn’t match her Grapes of Wrath face.
“Mike, come on. No one comes here who isn’t running from Revs. So what happened?”
“I decided to tell the truth,” said Mike.
“Well, that wasn’t very smart,” she said, taking a sip. “Who’d you tell?”
“My editor.”
“Newspaper man? Should have pegged that from a mile away,” she said. “You’ve got that look. So you’re the guy who’s been putting out those little papers, huh?”
“You’ve seen them?” said Mike.
“Oh honey,” she said, surprised. “You don’t know?”
“Morning,” Dez said from the bedroom doorway, scratching his head. His hair stood on end.
“What don’t I know?” said Mike, ignoring Dez, who stumbled in and poured himself a cup of coffee like he owned the place.
“Everyone’s seen your papers,” Lila said, leaning back in her chair and surmising him. “Everyone in Philly and probably half the state. Maybe more. It’s all anyone talks about. You know, when the Revs aren’t around.”
“People are reading it?” said Mike. He looked at Dez, who shrugged and slumped into a chair drinking his coffee.
“More than reading it,” said Lila. “People are doing something about it. How do you not know?”
“I’ve been stuck in that house,” said Mike.
“Well, I tell you what,” said Lila, leaning forward again, conspiratorially. “The Revs are pissed.They put flyers out offering fifty grand for information about you. And anyone who works with you. That’s a lot of money, especially in times like these.” She looked at Dez and smiled. “Want some breakfast?”