The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2)

by Sam Sisavath

  Josh pulled his legs back until he was almost curled on the bed. It was cold. Very cold. Which didn’t make sense because it was hot outside, rays of sunlight flitting in through white blinds over the window to his right.

  Josh pulled his head off the fluffy pillow and tried to sit up. It hurt, so he decided the smart thing to do was lie back down to catch his breath.

  I’m alive!

  He didn’t know how that was possible. He remembered standing up (That was stupid), then getting shot (Served me right for doing something so stupid during a gun battle), then falling. He remembered Will reaching for him, but Will must not have been fast enough, because soon Josh was in the water. Josh had never been a good swimmer, so he didn’t fool himself into thinking he had swum back to the island on his own and just didn’t remember it.

  So how did he get here? Wherever “here” was?

  Wet clothes clung to his body. Someone had slashed open his left pant leg and wrapped bandages around where he had been shot. That was nice of them. He saw blood on the bandages, but not as much as he thought being shot would have produced.

  Josh tried to sit up again. Slowly, this time, without any sudden movements. He managed to stay upright and looked around him. Transformers posters on the walls. Toys scattered about the floor. Transformers action figures. Fluffy dinosaurs. A plastic baseball bat and a small football designed for a kid’s hands.

  There was a sudden spark from his temple, and Josh lifted his hand to touch the wound. He felt gauze tape instead. Jesus. He remembered getting shot in the head. Okay, not really in the head, but close. It was just a crease. Still, it hurt like a bastard, so he stopped touching it.

  He went completely still when he heard the door across the room open. A lone figure entered and stood in the doorway, but there was too much shadow and Josh couldn’t make out a face or very many details. The figure looked in at him, as if trying to figure him out. Josh stared back, unsure about what to do.

  He was stuck here. In this room. This house. He could barely walk, much less run. And where was he going to go? Plus, he had to keep reminding himself that someone had saved him from the lake, so it didn’t make sense for them to hurt him now. Unless, of course, they had saved him only because they intended to do something unimaginable to him. He had seen plenty of movies like that.

  The figure walked over to the window and flipped the blinds all the way open. Josh saw the outline of a woman. She was looking out at a group of men gathered in the front yard of the house. The view outside looked familiar, but Josh couldn’t quite place it. There had to be two, maybe three dozen men out there, milling around a half-dozen trucks. The click-clack-snap of weapons being loaded, even though he couldn’t quite tell what they were arming themselves with from his angle.

  “Thirty men,” the woman said, looking over at him. “In case you were wondering. There are thirty men out there, waiting to kill your friends.”

  The voice sounded familiar. Josh tried to focus on the face, half-hidden in the shadows.

  Karen.

  He was in the two-story house, the one across from the marina. In one of the rooms along the first floor. The house looked different from the inside; it was darker, more cramped, and less inviting. Even with sunlight flooding through the window, it was too dark in here.

  “You’re alive,” he said. “How is that possible?”

  Karen gave him an amused look. “The tunnel underneath the island comes out on the cove. They were going to run a rail system to ferry supplies and vacationers back and forth, like a nature drive underneath the lake. You should see some of the blueprints. They were going to turn Song Island into a real attraction for the rich and spoiled. Not so much now.”

  So Will was right after all. The tunnel underneath the power station really did run all the way back to shore, and that was how the ghouls got on the island last night. He wondered how many of them were there now, hiding underneath the lake, waiting for their chance to come up again.

  Gaby. Gaby’s still on the island…

  “Josh, right?” Karen said. “I thought you looked familiar.”

  “You saved me?”

  “You sound surprised.”

  You tried to kill me last night.

  “A little,” he said instead.

  “Information is power. End of the world, post-end of the world. Still the same. Information is still king.”

  “Information about what?”

  “The island. More specifically, the people currently inhabiting it. The new ones that just showed up. Everything.”

  “I don’t know anything.”

  “Of course you don’t,” she said, with that same amused expression that told him she was two, three steps ahead of him every time he opened his mouth. “Your girlfriend. What’s her name. Gaby?”

  “What about her?” He didn’t like the way Karen said Gaby’s name.

  “I’ll let her live,” Karen said.

  Gaby…

  “I don’t understand,” Josh said.

  “The island, Josh. It’s mine. I want it back. It’s been good to me, and I don’t like the idea of losing it. Call me a sore loser. Do you see those guys out there, the thirty men with assault rifles?”

  “You’re going to attack the island again?”

  “Again? No.” She almost laughed. “The first time wasn’t my idea. A couple of idiots thought they could just ride their boats over and Will would just let them land on the beach. That didn’t work out too well. I’ve convinced them to try it my way this time. The smarter way. It’s what I do well. I solve problems, Josh.”

  Gaby’s still on the island…

  “It’s going to cost me half those guys out there,” Karen continued. “Maybe more. But hey, you can’t make omelettes without breaking eggs.” She looked back outside at the men standing around the yard. “It’s going to work, too. The question is, when it does work, is Gaby going to be one of the people I have to kill in order to retake the island? Or one of the people I hand over to the creatures after it’s all over?”

  “No,” he blurted out, instantly regretting it.

  “So tell me what I need to know.”

  I can’t…

  “And save Gaby’s life.”

  Gaby…

  “You love her, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” he answered quickly.

  “You don’t think she wants to live?”

  “Of course she wants to live.”

  “So why are you hesitating? You have to actually think about saving her life?”

  “What about me?”

  “What about you?”

  “If I tell you, and you spare Gaby, what happens to me?”

  “I don’t care about you. You and Gaby both. You’re just kids. Will and Danny are the ones I’m worried about. They’re the ones she wants.”

  “She?”

  “The rest?” Karen continued. “Neither one of us could care less about what happens to them. I just want the island back, and she just wants the soldiers. As for you and Gaby?” She shrugged indifferently. “You could stay on the island with us, or go on your merry way and see how long you last out there. I really don’t care. And neither does she. One or two more won’t make a whole lot of difference to them. They have bigger fish to fry, and they apparently need—want—Will and Danny for that.”

  He looked past her, at the men milling outside.

  Thirty heavily armed men…

  That was a lot. Will and Danny were soldiers. Great soldiers, from what he had seen. But could they really fight thirty heavily armed men? That was a lot to ask of them. Even with Blaine and his two friends there. That was what, five people total?

  Thirty against five…

  He liked Will and Danny. He liked Carly, Lara, even the girls. But he liked Gaby more. No, he didn’t like Gaby, he loved her. He had known her for most of his life. Worshipped her from across the street. And now, after all this time, she felt the same way about him. It was more than he could have hoped for, and
it was real. It was tangible. She had proved it last night when they made love.

  Thirty against five…

  Who were Will and Danny and the others, anyway? He only knew them for a few days. It wasn’t like he grew up with them, the way he grew up with Gaby. He liked them, but he didn’t love them, the way he loved Gaby.

  I have to protect Gaby…

  *

  She asked him what happened to Tom.

  “Will killed him,” Josh said. “That night.”

  She nodded. He wasn’t sure if he detected sadness or just acceptance. Maybe indifference. It was hard to read Karen, especially since she stood next to the window and was somehow still mostly hidden in shadows.

  She asked about Marcus.

  “Danny killed him. The same night.”

  Again, the slight nod that he couldn’t figure out.

  Then she asked him about Sarah, about Berg, about the others.

  He told her what he knew.

  Then about the shack at the power station, the one connected to the tunnel with the ghouls inside. He told her about the concrete wall Will and Danny had put over the door.

  Then, to his surprise, she smiled and said, “Ghouls? Will calls them ghouls?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. I guess they just looked like ghouls to him.”

  “It’s not a bad description, actually. I should probably start calling them that, too. Just not to their faces.” She smiled, almost as if she expected him to return it. When he didn’t, she continued. “Who is this Blaine guy?”

  “I don’t really know. He’s just some guy we met in Lancing, Texas. Then he showed up here later.”

  “And the two with him?”

  “Maddie and Bobby.”

  “Are they soldiers, too?”

  “They didn’t look like soldiers. The guy is a mute.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He doesn’t talk.”

  “Doesn’t talk or can’t talk?”

  “I don’t know for sure. Maddie just said he doesn’t talk.”

  Karen nodded. “What about the women? Carly and Lara. How good are they with weapons?”

  “They can shoot.”

  “Anyone can shoot,” Karen said impatiently, like he was trying to pull one over her. “The question is, how good are they with weapons?”

  He flashed back to last night, standing side by side with Carly as she calmly defended the Tower with a shotgun. He knew Lara had killed before. That man in the church back in Lancing, for one.

  “They’re good with weapons,” he said.

  “So that’s seven.”

  “I guess, yeah.”

  “But it’ll probably just be the five defending the beach. Lara and Carly will most likely be back in the Tower with the kids. Speaking of the Tower…Who is up there? The one shooting this afternoon?”

  “Danny.”

  “What does he have on that rifle? Some kind of high-magnification scope?”

  “I don’t know. Will called it an ACOG.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “I don’t know. Something Tom had in the basement. It lets him shoot farther and straighter.”

  “Tom had a lot of things in that basement, most of which he didn’t know how to use.” She waved a dismissive hand. “So they have a sniper. Danny. Four at the beach, because Will knows that’s the only place for boats to land. He’ll commit everyone there. It’s the smart thing to do. The obvious thing to do.”

  I should stop now…

  “What did you come back for?” she asked. “What was in the garage in the marina that was so important?”

  I shouldn’t tell her…

  “Tools,” he said.

  “Tools?” She gave him a sharp, suspicious look. “Tools for what?”

  “For making bullets.”

  “Bullets? There are plenty of bullets on the island, underneath the Tower.”

  Don’t tell her…

  “Silver bullets,” he said.

  Shit.

  “Silver bullets?” she repeated, narrowing her eyes at him, trying to decide if he was lying to her again.

  “Yes.”

  “Why does he need silver bullets?”

  “The ghouls. Silver bullets kill them.”

  Her eyes widened and her suspicion grew. “How do you know this?”

  “I’ve seen it. Will discovered it months ago, when all of this started. He and Danny have been making silver bullets whenever they could ever since. They left the tools in the garage when we arrived because there was no room on the boat.”

  Karen seemed to mull it over. She didn’t know about the silver, that much was obvious. Josh wondered if that affected how she looked at the ghouls. Would she still work for them if she knew she could actually kill them?

  “Smart guys,” Karen said finally. “Too smart for a couple of jarheads.”

  Jarheads are Marines. Will and Danny are soldiers. Even I know that.

  But he didn’t say it out loud. He was too busy trying to justify himself to the traitorous feelings washing over him like some sick, disgusting bile rising from the very pit of his stomach and forcing its way out of his mouth, onto his tongue. The taste was hideous and made him want to gag.

  He watched Karen standing beside the window. She was looking off into a corner, and he could almost see her mind working, crunching the numbers. What was that Sarah had said about Karen? She was a politician; she bartered and made deals to save her own skin because that was who she was. She was the one who had struck the deal with the ghouls—with the blue-eyed ghoul in particular—to turn the island into a honey trap.

  “All right,” Karen said after a while.

  “So what happens now?”

  “Now I take back my island.”

  “What about me, I mean?”

  “You stay here. I might have more questions for you if this doesn’t go well. It will,” she added quickly, “but you can never be too sure. I always like to have a backup plan. Like the tunnel at the power station. I was going to wait for the blue-eyed creature—the blue-eyed ghoul—to show up before I let them in. My big ta-da! moment, to prove to her that I could be trusted with bigger things.”

  Jesus, she was using the island as a job application for a promotion. What a bitch.

  “You guys spoiled that,” Karen said, with a slight frown. “But that’s all right. Nothing worth having ever comes without a little hard work.” She walked across the room, opened the door, but then stopped and looked back at him. “One last question. I’m really curious.”

  “About what?”

  “Sarah woke you guys up, right? She was the one who betrayed us?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “I mean, yes, she betrayed you, but she wasn’t the one who woke us up. I did. I woke up first, then I convinced Sarah to help us.”

  Karen stared at him for a moment, again trying to gauge his trustworthiness. “You woke up first? How? No one’s ever woken up before.”

  “I barely touched the wine during the feast.”

  “Shit,” she said, and almost laughed. “I should have kept an eye on you. I told Marcus to pour you the Coke instead, that you’d probably never drunk wine in your life. But you looked older, and…” She shook her head. “Sonofabitch.”

  She turned back to the door.

  “What about me?” he asked. “Do I just…sit here?”

  “There’ll be someone outside. Try to escape and he has orders to shoot you dead. Got it?”

  He nodded mutely.

  “Good boy,” she said, and left, slamming the door behind her.

  *

  He managed to get up and walk over to the window in his wet clothes. The pain seemed to be easing the more he moved, which was unexpected. Still, he unconsciously favored his left leg, but even when he put pressure on it, it didn’t really hurt that much. Josh couldn’t wrap his mind around that, but quickly decided he didn’t care enoug
h to keep thinking about it.

  He peered through the blinds at the men outside. They seemed to be waiting for something, sitting on open tail gates and leaning against trucks, talking quietly, almost nervously, among themselves. There were open cases of weapons around them and in the backs of the trucks. A dozen or so of the men seemed to be drinking beer. Warm beer, of course. The island probably had cold beers. But not out here. Out here, it was go warm or go home.

  Thirty against seven.

  They can’t win. How can they win against all those men with all those guns?

  Josh looked up at the sky and right into the bright sun. What time was it? It had to be almost evening by now. He had left the island with Will in the afternoon, and God knew how long he had been asleep before Karen showed up.

  The door opened behind him, and a short man with a bad haircut came in.

  The man wore cargo jeans and Army boots. He had a gun belt and a rifle slung over his back. Despite that, he looked innocuous, especially since he was eating an apple when he gave Josh a bored look. “You hungry?”

  “Yes,” Josh said quickly. He was famished. He hadn’t realized how famished until his stomach growled.

  The man took another apple from a pouch around his waist and tossed it across the room. Josh clumsily caught it. “I found a whole tree on my way here. But don’t tell the others. They don’t know.”

  “Thanks,” Josh said.

  “I was the one who fished you out of the lake, you know,” the man said. He grinned at Josh, showing off a big gap where he was missing a front tooth. “Literally. There was this big pole—” he mimed it for Josh’s benefit “—with a hook at the end. I guess they used it to grab nets or some shit. I was never much of a fisherman. Never cared for the water, to be perfectly honest with you.”

  “Thanks. For saving my life.”

  “Sure. Happy to do it.”

  “Was I…dead when you pulled me up? I don’t remember anything after I fell in.”

  “Nah, you were still breathing. Mostly, anyway. I pumped on your chest a few times and you spat all the lake water out. Then you lost consciousness.”

  “Thanks,” Josh said again.

  “No biggie. Try the apple.”

  Josh bit into the fruit. It was warm, but the juices tasted good just the same. He took another bite and savored the flavor.