The First Paladin (The New Earth Chronicles Book 1)

by J. J. Thompson

  I could follow this to the next station, she thought. Maybe the rain will have stopped by then. It will certainly be an easier hike than scrambling and climbing over ruined buildings.

  She examined the torch and estimated that it would last at least another half hour or so. Surely she would reach the next station by then. Her sword was still dark, so there was no indication that any zombies were nearby. Of course, that could change very quickly.

  Stay or go, she thought. Stay or go. Which shall it be?

  In the end, Liliana decided that it was foolish to risk the black unknown just to satisfy her curiosity. Better to face the rain and the ruins than wander the subway tunnels and take the chance of an accident, or worse, another confrontation with the undead.

  She felt relieved by her decision and turned around to began walking toward the escalators. And then stopped abruptly.

  From the direction of the stairs she heard a shuffling, sliding sound. It was coming from above but, as she listened intently, the sounds seemed to be coming closer.

  She cursed under her breath. It had to be one of the undead.

  Liliana listened again and this time heard a moaning sigh, along with a low groan. There was more than one of them.

  Well, it looks like I'm taking the tunnel after all, she told herself. But how many of them are there? I can handle a couple of them; they're slow and uncoordinated. But if there are more than that, I'd rather not take the risk.

  Unfortunately, it was too dark to see the escalators from where she was standing, and she was pretty sure that the monsters would spot her torch the minute they reached the bottom of the steps.

  No, better safe than sorry. I have to go.

  Her sword flickered for a moment as she turned away and then faded again. It reassured her that the zombies weren't too close.

  She quietly entered the northern tunnel, and then picked up her pace. The torch wouldn't last forever and she didn't want to be stuck in the middle of the tunnel when it went out.

  Her footsteps echoed strangely as she walked, echoing and re-echoing until it sounded like she was leading an entire parade. It was very creepy, but unless she tip-toed, it couldn't be helped.

  The tracks smelled of oil and soot and the air was stagnant. Her torchlight reflected off of both the tracks and her sword and weird shapes danced on the ceiling as she marched. It was, without a doubt, the creepiest experience that she had ever had.

  Liliana moved closer to the wall on her right. She felt exposed walking down the middle of the subway track. The wall was shiny with dampness and she could see thick mold growing in patches all over its surface.

  My home town is rotting from the ground up, she thought sadly. A sorry end for such a proud and historic city.

  After about fifteen minutes of steady walking, Liliana's torch started to burn out. She guessed that it might have another ten minutes or so of light left, and then it would be back to using matches again. That would not be good.

  She passed a narrow door in the wall and guessed that it was some sort of maintenance room. She would have explored it if her light wasn't about to expire, so she ignored it and picked up her pace.

  Not even a minute later, Liliana stopped abruptly. There were noises in the tunnel ahead and she spat several curses in a low voice.

  More walking corpses, she thought grimly. Well, I hope that I can get around them because I don't have enough time to go back to where I came from before my torch dies.

  She glanced at her sword, but it was still dormant; the zombies weren't too close yet.

  She walked forward slowly a few paces, every sense on high alert and then stopped again. What she was hearing wasn't the sound of heavy undead feet dragging across the ground; it was something else.

  A slow, rhythmic wheezing sound, like an old bellows inflating and deflating, was approaching. A scrabbling, tearing sound mixed in with the wheezing and Liliana frowned, trying to identify the noises.

  A machine of some sort? No, machines stopped working over a year ago. It was something else.

  Her torch flickered and shrunk and Liliana looked at it and shook her head. She began walking again. No matter what lay ahead, she had to get past it and back up to the surface.

  A dozen steps forward and her torch's light dimmed even more. Liliana almost began cursing again but was silenced when her sword burst into such a brilliant radiance that she was momentarily blinded.

  What the hell?

  She raised the sword and squinted through the glare. Something was moving up ahead; something big. She dropped her useless torch as it flickered and died and awkwardly slipped her shield from her back and secured in on to her left arm. Then she raised it between the approaching danger and herself and waited.

  The ground shook beneath her feet, once and then again and again.

  Footsteps? No, not possible.

  The tunnel was about twenty feet across and fifteen feet high at this point. Large enough for a subway train to pass through but not huge. What was coming that was so big that it could make the earth tremble and still fit in the tunnel?

  She soon had her answer.

  A wedge-shaped head appeared at the edge of the silvery light thrown by the sword and Liliana stared at it in confusion.

  Is it a drake, she wondered. Down here? No, it can't be. It's five times the size of those monsters. But then, what is it?

  The creature jerked forward, paused, moved forward again and she realized that it was so large that it was pulling itself through a space that was too tight for it.

  Yellow slitted eyes stared unblinkingly right at her through the bright light. The long, reptilian head rose up until it was mere inches from the ceiling and it opened its maw and growled. The sound was chilling.

  Liliana couldn't figure out what she was looking at. The light from her sword was still blinding her somewhat. The monster moved forward several more feet and she tried to make out more details.

  It was scaled like a drake, but instead of being the color of rust, the thing's scales looked like they had been dipped in molten copper. It was shiny and metallic and almost looked like a statue brought to life.

  Something finally clicked in Liliana's mind and she gaped at the approaching creature.

  Surely it can't be a dragon? It's too small. Isn't it?

  The thing pulled back its head even further and sucked in a great breath of air.

  Oh crap!

  With an earth-shattering roar, a blast of flame shot straight at her.

  Instinctively, Liliana dropped to her knees and huddled behind her shield at the thick red flames washed over her. The air instantly became super-heated and she closed her mouth tight, afraid that she would burn her lungs if she took a breath.

  The blast of fire seemed to go on forever, but she managed to keep her body out of its path. And when it finally stopped, she didn't hesitate. She jumped up, turned and ran.

  Another roar followed her, but the dragon was too big to chase after her quickly. She could hear it struggling to pull itself along and risked a quick glance behind her.

  It wasn't that much slower than she was and she was running at top speed.

  I won't be able to keep this up for long, she thought in a panic. I have to find shelter somewhere.

  The door to the maintenance room came into sight and, without even thinking, Liliana altered course and raced straight at it. She might be trapping herself, but she saw no other recourse.

  She slammed into the closed door at full speed and fell through it as it burst open. She scrambled to her feet and slammed the metal door closed behind her, looking around frantically for some way to wedge it shut.

  There was a heavy steel cabinet against one wall in the small room and she moved around to the side of it and pushed against it until it tilted slowly and then fell over with a crash, falling across the closed door.

  Liliana wiped sweat off her face and stared at the entrance. She doubted that it would keep out that monster for very long. And what was a drag
on, even a small one, doing crawling around underground? It was insane.

  There was a loud smashing blow against the door and the room shuddered. On the other side of the metal barrier, the dragon bellowed in rage.

  No, Liliana thought. The door won't last for long.

  She looked around the room. It was about ten feet square and had only the one door. She was trapped.

  Piles of wooden boxes filled with tools and spare parts were leaning drunkenly against the walls and she began grabbing the boxes and tossing them on top of the cabinet to reinforced her barricade. It might slow down the dragon for an extra minute or two.

  She had moved about half of the boxes before realizing that some of them had been hiding a metal grate in the floor.

  A way out?

  She cleared away the rest of the crates as the dragon rained blow after blow upon the door, deafening her in the enclosed space. There was a handle on the grate that was flush to the floor and she split a nail as she desperately scratched at it, trying to get a grip on it and raise the trapdoor.

  It took a desperate minute to get the hatch open, but once she did, Liliana didn't hesitate. No matter what was awaiting her in the darkness below, it couldn't be any worse than facing an enraged dragon.

  She sheathed her sword, held her shield close to her body and jumped.

  The hole was deeper that she had expected and Liliana hit the ground hard, rolling instinctively to soften the impact. Her shield went flying and she heard something snap in the dark.

  When she pushed herself to her knees and drew her sword, its light a mere flicker now, she saw that her bow had snapped cleanly in two.

  “Damn it,” she muttered. “And I never even got a chance to try it out.”

  She unstrung the pieces and tossed them aside. She kept the bowstring and quiver though, hoping that she would come across another bow some time in the future.

  Standing up, Liliana winced as a stabbing pain almost made her left knee buckle. She leaned over and kneaded it gently for a moment and then let out a sigh of relief. It was just bruised. She had been afraid that something had been broken in the fall. Speaking of which...

  She held up the sword and looked at the ceiling far above her.

  Wow, was her first thought. The square opening of the trapdoor was about thirty feet over her head. Just below hung a section of metal ladder that was rusted through and had broken off a few feet from the opening.

  Liliana was standing at the bottom of a six-foot square shaft lined with concrete. There were four other shafts leading away from where she had landed, all of them waist-high. She crouched down and held out her sword to peer into one of the shafts, but all that she could see was thick dust and shadows. There was no way to tell how far the low tunnels ran or where they went.

  A bellow shook the air of the narrow pit and Liliana looked up at the opening far above her. She couldn't see anything until the hole was lit up with a burst of crimson fire.

  Well, I can't go back that way, she thought ruefully. Even if there was a way to climb back up. Which there isn't.

  She looked at each small tunnel in turn. There was no way to tell which one led north. In the end, she chose one at random, secured her belongings across her back and sheathed her sword. Its light was almost gone now and she resigned herself to using matches to light her way. Fortunately she had several boxes of them.

  She crouched down, struck a match and began to crawl forward.

  “This could be a long trip,” she sighed.

  The tunnel led Liliana in a straight line for a long, long way. She tried to keep track of how far she had traveled, but eventually gave up. It all looked the same, just gray concrete, spiderwebs and thick dust. The tunnel was so old and disused that there wasn't even a smell in the air; it just felt dead.

  The sounds of the raging dragon faded behind her and Liliana crawled on, occasionally lighting a match to check the path ahead. Most of the time she moved on in complete darkness, moving on her hands and knees and feeling ahead and to each side cautiously as she went.

  And then Liliana's hand met empty air instead of the walls and she stopped abruptly in surprise.

  Another room?

  She lit a match and looked around. Just inches ahead, the tunnel opened up into another square shaft identical to the one that she had jumped into to avoid the dragon. She crawled out of the low tunnel and stood up. She winced at the pain in her aching back, but pushed it aside and held up her match so that she could examine her surroundings.

  This landing looked less dusty and disused than the last one had. It too had a ladder attached to one wall, presumably leading up to another trap door, but this one was intact.

  Oh please, let it be a way out, Liliana begged silently.

  She grabbed a rung on the ladder, dropped the match and began to ascend. After she had climbed ten rungs, she lit another match and looked up. She had been right; there was a hatch about fifteen feet above her head.

  She threw away the match, climbed up and pushed against the metal plate. With a squeal of rusted hinges, the trapdoor opened grudgingly and she moved upward until she could grab the edge of the hatch and pull herself up to the floor above.

  Liliana lay on her back for a moment and then sighed wearily and forced herself to stand up. Her body was aching and she was exhausted, but wherever she was now, it was definitely not a place that she could risk taking the time to rest. Certainly not now that she knew that the underground was infested with both zombies and a dragon, and God knew what else. No, she had to get outside and seek secure shelter before trying to sleep. And that might be a challenge.

  She lit a match and examined the room around her. It appeared to be a supply room. There was a large, steel tool box against one wall that was sealed with a heavy padlock. Several other boxes and dusty plastic bags were stored here and Liliana was tempted to search through them for anything useful, but she didn't want to stay trapped in the darkness any longer. It was time to get out.

  She unlocked the deadbolt on the metal door and carefully pulled it open, wincing as it squeaked slightly. Before lighting another match, Liliana listened closely. Was the dragon still back at the spot where it had lost her? Or was it even now creeping toward her through the shadows. She could hear nothing but unidentifiable sounds in the distance.

  She shivered in nervous anticipation and lit a match. With some surprise, Liliana realized that the storeroom wasn't on the subway tracks. Instead, she was looking up and down a long, sloping hallway built with rough cement blocks. It smelled damp and moldy, but she ignored that in her relief. There was no way that the dragon could fit into the narrow passageway. And if some undead monsters met her down here, they would only be able to attack her one or two at a time.

  Excellent, she thought, feeling almost cheerful. I can deal with that.

  She drew her sword, entered the hallway and followed the ascending slope to the right. It remained deathly quiet. She heard the plop, plop of dripping water, but there were no sounds of shuffling feet or dragons and she became cautiously optimistic that the worst was behind her.

  Eventually the passage led to a staircase that climbed back and forth until it ended at another locked door. Liliana unlocked it, took a deep breath and opened it. When she looked outside, she almost cheered. She was looking at a Metro station. The small building was choked with wreckage, but she could see bright sunlight beaming down through holes in the roof a dozen feet away. She had finally reached the surface.

  Never again, she promised herself. I am never going into the subway again.

  Liliana put away her sword and forced her way through the junk and debris and out into the sunshine. A quick look around and a scan of the skies showed no threats and she sat down heavily on a slab of broken concrete. Setting aside her shield, she opened her pack, pulled out her canteen and drank deeply. Then she pulled open the tab on a can of beans and began to eat hungrily.

  She checked the sun's position in the sky as she ate and guessed that sh
e only had about an hour of daylight left. She would have to find a safe place to wait out the night. The darkness was obviously more dangerous now, but she knew that she was too tired to stay awake all night.

  But wherever I hole up, it won't be underground, she thought wearily. Not again.

  In the end, Liliana found a secluded nook on the second floor of a low office building. She had had to climb over and under a maze of girders and heavy cement blocks to find the alcove and she doubted that any of the clumsy undead would be able to do the same.

  Her sleep was deep and uninterrupted and she woke up refreshed and ready to continue her trek across the city. She had decided that, if any survivors had returned to Moscow since the initial dragon attacks, they would probably have remained on the outskirts of the city rather than journeying downtown where it was not only unsafe with all of the fallen buildings, but infested with zombies too.

  If any had ever come here, she thought as she made her way out of her shelter, then, sadly, they had probably been killed by the undead anyway. Either way, this entire trip across the city has been a waste of time.

  Liliana pushed away any regrets. She wouldn't brood on her past mistakes. Her task now was to stay alive until she was away from the midtown area and then search for any refugees living along the outskirts of town. If there were any.

  She reached the main street and turned north again, walking over and around the wreckage in her way.

  And what do I do if it turns out that no one survived?

  That was a question that Liliana hadn't actually asked herself until now, because it was something that she refused to believe. Surely so many millions of people couldn't all have died. Could they?

  No, it was impossible. If no one was alive anywhere in the city, it was because they had decided not to return. There were survivors somewhere out there. There had to be.