Within These Walls: Series Box Set

by Tracey Ward

  We rolled down the street right up against the bay, showing them that we were coming. They can see the majority of us, they can see the trebuchet. They’re watching us set up shop dangerously close to their gates at the entrance to their Pod and I take a little satisfaction in watching them scurry and scramble. They’re freaked and it shows.

  There’s an outer fence beside the gate—one nearly identical to the fence I climbed to get into the stadiums, razor wire and all. After that there’s a gate that connects to a wall. They’ve built a decent perimeter around the island. Alvarez said there are houses all over the place along with a warehouse, but I can’t see much other than trees and the odd patch of roof peeking through.

  “Why don’t the Vashons have a wall like that?” I muse.

  “They’re in deeper water. It’s a natural barrier against the zombies,” Trent replies instantly. “They’re also on an island. This is a peninsula. There’s land access to block.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “Also they’re paranoid nutjobs.”

  I chuckle, sneaking a glance at him. He’s smiling.

  “How long do you think we have before our shadows get here?” I ask, gesturing over my shoulder.

  Trent studies the crowd of monsters making their way steadily toward us. I imagine he’s using the feel of the wind, the direction of the sun, the height of the building—all of it together in his massive brain to come to a scary accurate prediction.

  He shrugs. “Eventually.”

  “That’s it?” I asked, surprised by the simplicity.

  “Assuming they don’t get distracted, yeah. They’ll be here when they get here.”

  “Distracted as in get ahold of the Vashons leading them and stop to eat?”

  “Yes. Meaning that.”

  “That’s pretty vague.”

  “If you want a more accurate ETA, you’ll have to go ask the zombies.”

  I scrunch my up my nose with distaste. “Pass.”

  Instead of running to my doom, I lean over the edge of the building to see around two hundred worker bees moving in the streets below me. Alvarez has ordered almost everyone to build barricades in the streets near our camp. Old cars, old furniture scrounged from inside homes, random debris from the streets—it’s nothing like the barricades the MOHAI had built up to keep the zombies in, but it should be enough to keep any stragglers from getting lost along the way to the Colony’s gate.

  None of us will be going anywhere near it. Well, no one but the unlucky few who have to guide the zombies there. The rest of us are either coming in underground with the cannibals, creating diversions to confuse and distract, or hanging back with the trebuchet to help Crenshaw cast his spells. The cannibal crew will come up inside the walls, place more explosives to weaken them from the inside, then run like hell back to the tunnels and back to base. From there, we’ll sit back and let the zombies do the dirty work, flushing people out of the bombed-out Colony and running panicked into the night. Then it’s ours. Easy.

  It sounds like a brilliant plan on paper, but something about it doesn’t sit right in my gut. I have an anxious, sick feeling that just won’t go away.

  “Do you see the docks?”

  “No,” I mumble, searching the shoreline.

  “That’s because there aren’t any on this side. They must have their docks on the other side, the one closest to Mercer Island.”

  I lower the binoculars sharply. “Then why did you ask me if I saw them from here?”

  “I was testing you.”

  “Testing me on what? Whether or not I know what a dock is?”

  “You didn’t know where Tokyo was.”

  I roll my eyes, lifting the binoculars again. “Let it go.”

  “I’m looking for a baseline on your knowledge. I’ll know from there where to start with your education.”

  “Dude, that was a joke. You’re not actually teaching me.”

  “Why don’t you want to know things?” he asks, sounding disappointed.

  “I do know things,” I snap.

  “Why don’t you want to know more things? You should always be looking to learn. That’s why I read.”

  “He is right, Athena.”

  Crenshaw. He snuck up behind us with his crazy light tread, but I wonder if Trent didn’t hear him coming.

  I lower the binoculars again but stow the sigh building in my throat. “He’s always right.”

  Cren comes to stand beside me and take in the sights. The view is actually really pretty with the setting sun glistening off the water that’s rolling gently in and out against the sandy shore. It’d be beautiful, maybe even peaceful, if you only removed the slavers shouting from inside their walls.

  “Are there inconsistencies in your education?”

  “Glaring ones,” Trent confirms.

  I smack his arm. “Not glaring ones. I’m not dumb.”

  “A lack of knowledge does not indicate meager intelligence,” Crenshaw scolds. “I have no doubt of your capacity to absorb knowledge, child. You need only to be presented with it. If the boy has offered it to you freely, you’d be a fool to deny it.”

  “You just told me I’m not dumb but then you called me a fool in the same breath. You see that, right?”

  “I said you would be a fool to deny it.” Crenshaw looks over my head at Trent. “Perhaps English should be your first lesson.”

  “I speak English!”

  “Yet you do not always comprehend it.”

  “Did you come up here to be mean to me?”

  Cren looks perplexed. “Who is being mean to you?”

  “She’s very sensitive,” Trent comments, jumping up to sit on the wall going around the edge of the roof.

  He’s precise as a cat on Ritalin, but the move still makes me sweat.

  “I’m sensitive because you guys are mean to me. I’m too fat, I’m too skinny, I’m rude, I’m a fool. Lay off me.”

  “I did not seek you out to be cruel to you,” Crenshaw says, his tone softening. “I came to speak to you about something very important. Something regarding the Hornet. I wish—”

  “Cren, you don’t have to worry about him,” I say quickly, knowing where this is going. I’m headed toward a lecture about the company I keep. “He’s not Hive anymore. He was, he was very deep in it, but he’s not now. He’s not a good guy, but he’s not a devil. I promise.”

  He doesn’t answer me. When I turn to look up at him, he’s looking at me heavily.

  “Perhaps your first lesson should not be English, but rather social etiquette.”

  Uh oh.

  “That’s probably a good idea,” I reply slowly. Cautiously.

  “You have a very bad habit of interrupting. And assuming. You would do well to listen a little more and speak a little less.”

  “Okay,” I mumble, looking away. I have been sufficiently shamed.

  Again, he doesn’t respond. Seconds slip by and I begin to understand that we’re all waiting on me. Reluctantly, I look up at him.

  He quirks a waiting eyebrow.

  No, I think glumly, this is the shaming.

  “I’m sorry, Crenshaw.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What would you like to discuss about the Hornet?”

  “I wish to speak to him.” He takes a deep breath. I watch his hands clench on his staff, the knuckles going momentarily white. “I would ask after my daughter.”

  He’s right, I assume too much. I did not see that coming. This conversation just got a whole lot of awkward and I’m suddenly wondering where Ryan is. Trent and I are not the right people for this.

  “Um, okay. Yeah,” I stumble. “He’s gone now. He went to the northern Colony to take it back.”

  “I know that.”

  “Oh.”

  “I should have spoken to him before he left, but I was hesitant. I waited too long. Now I worry.”

  “About your daughter?”

  “About time.” He pauses to take another slow breath. When he sp
eaks again, he doesn’t sound exactly like Crazy Crenshaw. He’s that weird mix I get now and then when reality creeps in and you can see the hairline cracks in his world. “I’m an old man. I have seen so many things in my life. I’ve had the great honor to be loved by a beautiful creature of grace and brilliance. She gave her life to give me the greatest gift a man can receive from a woman: a child. But then I lost her too. She was taken from me or she went, it doesn’t matter. She’s gone. Now with the world as it is, with the fighting and the upheaval, who knows if I will ever find her again? I should not have waited. I should have found her ages ago. I should have spoken to the Hornet when I had the chance.”

  “Cren, it’s not too late. Vin will still be there when this is done. Trust me, he’s too terrible to die. The devil doesn’t want him.”

  He turns to face me. When I see his eyes, I take a step back. They’re hard. Fierce. I’ve only seen him like this once before and that time he pulled a weapon on me. I may not be well educated, but I am a fast learner. I’m not getting stabbed today.

  “If you remember anything I’ve ever told you, child, make it this: there is never enough time. You may have years, you may have days. You may have a matter of seconds. No one knows, but no matter how much time you have, you’ll always wish it was more. Do not put off what needs doing.” He grabs my hand and squeezes it urgently. “Leave tomorrow for the cowards. Today you must be fearless.”

  Chapter Twenty

  My favorite part about the plan for taking the southern Colony is that I’m not in it. Not really. We have over three hundred people here ready and willing to fight to the death to overthrow these pompous, pampered zealots, and we don’t need more than twenty-five of them to lift a finger. The rest of us are here only to make them sweat.

  Ryan, Trent, Bray, and Crenshaw are our explosives experts. They’ll work the trebuchet with a team of three other guys from the island who know how to use it. Give them a spot to hit and if it’s in the machine’s range, they’ll nail it. First try. The Vashons don’t play.

  Elijah, Andy, and seventeen of their people are going underground. They’ll get inside from the tunnels, somewhere I hope I never have to go again. Each one of them will be packing a bag full of explosives compliments of Cren and his apprentices, and I’m sure every one of them will be sweating bullets the whole way there wondering if they’re jostling that Bag-O-Boom too much. One false move, just a little too much pressure on the wrong spot, and BAM! We’ll remember you fondly. I’m sure you’ll make a wonderful BBQ for your cannibal buddies to doggy bag home.

  As the sun begins to set, we light torches up and down the shore. Trent says it’s sort of a filter. Even if we have more light behind the torches, it’ll be hard for the Colonists to see what we’re doing through the glare and smoke of the line of fire near the water. And what we’re doing is nothing. We’re wandering around, we shout to each other now and then. Sometimes a group will be sent running and yelling for no reason, going nowhere. It’s all meant to confuse the Colonists and keep their attention on us. They need to be frantic, on edge, always wondering what we’ll do next or how many of us there are. We don’t want them aware of the moles creeping into their home through their floor or the housewarming gift we’ve brought them that’s slowly making its way down the barricaded street toward the gate. That’ll be a fun surprise for them.

  “Athena!” Crenshaw shouts to me from across the camp. “It is time!”

  I jog toward him, making sure to keep up my routine of looking busy.

  “Time for what?”

  Crenshaw’s eyes are bright and wild with excitement. His face is flushed, his mouth pulled taught in a manic grin. He looks the maddest I’ve ever seen him and for some reason, I love it. Crazy suits him.

  “Magic,” he whispers dramatically, his eyes going wide.

  I chuckle, shaking my head. “I’m not in the magic show, Cren. Alvarez told me it was tunnels or crowd. I chose crowd.”

  “A wise choice. The tunnels are fraught with danger. Men will die in there tonight.”

  “That’s chilling.”

  “I wish you to join me,” he says, falling serious. His smile is gone but the light is still wild in his eyes.

  “Why?”

  “For protection.”

  I fight the urge to sigh. To roll my eyes and tell him I can take care of myself, that I don’t need protection from anyone or anything. It’s Vin pushing me behind him at the first sign of danger. It’s Ryan sleeping between me and doors. How does everyone so easily forget that I lived alone and survived for years without any help from anyone?

  No one but Crenshaw.

  And that’s how I manage to keep my eyes steady and my breathing even. I remind myself that Crenshaw has always been there for me. He took care of me when I was sick, he gave me medicine when I was hurt, he kept me company when I craved it and let me walk away when I couldn’t handle it anymore. And I didn’t realize it until now, but he let me take care of him too. He took meats from me, he listened when I warned him about outside dangers creeping close. He kept me talking when there was no one to hear me. He saw me when no one else could.

  Cren kept me from being a ghost.

  He kept me alive.

  “All right,” I agree with a smile, trying to bring his smile back. “I’ll stick with you. Thank you for protecting me.”

  I don’t understand it when he doesn’t smile like I hoped. In fact, he frowns, his face looking suddenly so long and tired that I worry I’ve made some serious social error. If I have, I have no clue what it was.

  “Come,” he says, turning to go and repeating softly, “it is time.”

  He leads me through the camp until we stand at its edge underneath the long shadow of the trebuchet. It dances over us as the fire from the torches flickers in the wind. It’s cold here by the water. I pull my coat tighter around myself, my hand accidentally slipping through the rip in the sleeve—the one I got when a wolf nearly took a chunk out of my arm thanks to Ryan.

  He’s there on the other side of the machine. He, Trent, Bray, and the Vashons helping them work the thing are standing patiently, watching Crenshaw and I approach. They’re waiting on orders from the wizard.

  My wizard.

  “Gentleman,” Crenshaw greets them heavily. “Are we ready?”

  Ryan bows slightly. “We wait on your signal, Master Crenshaw.”

  Cren nods slowly, looking at each of them. I expect him to give a speech or offer some words of wisdom or encouragement—something about courage, bravery, honor, intelligence, peanut butter. Anything. But they get nothing.

  “Load it.”

  I watch as the guys snap into action. I lock eyes with Ryan for a small second, and while he smiles at me confidently, I feel cold inside. The sick feeling that’s haunted me all day is back with a vengeance, slipping under my skin and chasing away the warm fuzzies I was just feeling a second ago. I don’t know what’s changed. Maybe the wind shifted or I’m registering the magnitude of what’s happening. I don’t know. All I know for sure is that I’m grateful Crenshaw asked me to come here with him.

  You cannot be separated, Athena. To succeed you must remain together. It is how I have seen it.

  Seen what?

  The End.

  Do I believe Crenshaw can see the future? No. I’m not nuts. But do his ominous words sink into my brain and make me nervous? Maybe even paranoid?

  I wish you to join me.

  Why?

  For protection.

  Yeah, they sure as shit do.

  I watch Ryan closely as he works with the other men to prep the weapon. His hands move quick and strong as they bring the arm down to the ground, a large net of bulky stones rising into the air across from it. He’s slow and gentle as he helps load a small, dark ball of deadly into a basket at the opposite end of the arm. As I watch him handle the explosives my sight goes fuzzy at the edges and I can see my pulse vibrating my vision. I realize I’m holding my breath.

  I let it out in a
loud burst of air, gasping a little after.

  “Are you okay?” Trent asks, looking genuinely concerned.

  I nod. “I forgot to breathe.”

  “Maybe biology will be our first lesson?”

  “It’s beginning to sound like I’ll be going to school for the rest of my life.”

  “It’s not unlikely.” He gestures to the trebuchet standing between us. “Do you want to know how it works?”

  “I’ll wait and see.”

  “Seeing something is one thing. Knowing the mechanics of how and why it does what it does is completely different.”

  I shrug. “I don’t know why it rains but it still does. The world is doing fine without me poking around in its underwear drawer.”

  “Ready!” a Vashon cries loudly.

  I take a few steps back from the machine. Trent is right—I don’t know how it works and I’m suddenly worried I’m about to get my head snapped off.

  “Fire!”

  There’s a sharp snap! followed by a groan. I watch the net of stones drop rapidly, forcing the arm to shoot up into the air. It drags a long rope behind it, arcing it up and over the machine. At the end of the rope is the bag of explosives. It swings out high above us. At the tip of the arc, I watch in amazement as a small, round shadow flies out of the bag and soars far down the shore. It’s headed straight for the gates.

  I lose sight of it in the dark. I’m worried it missed its mark and hit the water, but then I find it again. I catch it for just a split second as it’s haloed against the lights around the Colony gate. I don’t even have time to process that I’ve seen it when it explodes.

  It’s immediately very clear that these are not flash grenades.

  The night lights up in a blaze of angry red and orange, but it doesn’t fade out immediately the way the grenades did. This is meant to burn. It’s meant to destroy and it does its job. They haven’t hit the gate. We’re waiting on that. We’re drawing them out and bringing them running the way we did with the stadiums to make it easier for the cannibals to do their job on the inside. This was their signal. Right now they should be running around like the phantom ninjas they are, slipping through shadows and leaving behind lit fuses at every corner of the Colony. They’ll destroy a lot of buildings, but the important thing is that they’ll send people running into the open. Then they’ll disappear back into the tunnels, blowing the exit behind them and heading home.