by Emily Reed
I blew dust off its gleaming wooden handle and checked to make sure it was still in order before placing it on my bed. Pulling out the smaller bow, I turned it. Really, it was more my size than the one my father had used, but its wooden-tipped arrows might not be that useful.
I placed it next to the larger one and looked down at them for a moment. The sun rose, casting a warm glow through the window as I stood there. I wanted to go back to the cemetery, find that Suki creature and ask her some questions. But figured I’d have a better chance of finding her at sunset than sunrise—that’s when I’d seen her before.
I put on yoga pants and a snug T-shirt, both black. I tied my hair into a tight bun.
I wanted to arrive at the cemetery as the day turned to night. I should rest. But my mind raced, and my emotions burned.
Reading Issa’s note again, I picked up my phone, but the lines were dead. I’d deal with him later…after I’d talked to Suki again. All of it was real.
I turned to my violin case, almost afraid to open it and find my instrument crushed. But there it was, its same gleaming self. Picking it up, I knew what would come out. I could feel the need to play; my hands shook, but they would steady against the strings. Pulling out the bow, its familiar shape helped to ground me.
Closing my eyes, I laid it to the strings and pulled, letting out a low chord, dark and sad. Back again, and I went up a chord, hearing the sound vibrating through the violin, into my chin, down my neck, and hitting me in the heart, echoing what I felt there. Then I was off, playing so hard that hair escaped from my well-placed bun, flopping over my face, dancing with the sounds that I made.
It was a song that Megan and I wrote soon after moving to Crescent City. It stayed a favorite not only of ours but also of our fans in the following ten years. I hadn't played it since she disappeared, but now it came out of me like water rushing over a fall, landing into a fathomless pond and bubbling against the shore.
The song ended with Megan a cappella, singing the chorus again. As I stilled my bow, I could almost hear her. “Father, forgive my sins, and let me in. Let me in.”
Chapter Thirteen
I left an hour before sunset, my father's bow and a quiver full of arrows slung across my back, my child size one bungeed to the rear of my bike. Using a leather belt, I'd fashioned a holder for two of our kitchen knives, one on each hip. Around my waist I'd secured a thick chain and lock.
I walked out to the balcony and looked up and down the street before heading downstairs. A grocery bag floated on the breeze, making the wind's whims obvious to me. The smoke from the fires was headed north, along with the white plastic bag. I took a deep breath, smelling that toxic mix of burning buildings and meat.
I pushed my bike out of the doorway, searching up and down again before climbing on. I stayed in the center of the road so that I could see into each doorway and behind every car. The bars that usually would be full of early drinkers sat empty, doors locked and windows boarded.
Were people inside? Hiding from the death that wandered the streets? Or perhaps they'd all been rounded up. Maybe they would be safe…
How many people would the vampires take to their camps? How many would be okay with it, and how many would fight? Would death by vampire feel as good as Megan's taking from me? Better?
I shuddered at the memory, a mix of want and revulsion clouding my thoughts.
A thud drew my attention. What was once a woman walked repeatedly into a door. I pedaled faster, trying to put distance between me and the zombie, my heart beating faster as my legs pumped. I turned and had to brake hard—about ten zombies swayed in the middle of the block. I backed up slowly.
One spotted me and started forward. It’s momentum built and speed increased. The others followed. I tore my eyes off of them and turned the bike, pedaling hard, fear pushing me forward.
I could hear them behind me, some of them moaning, all of them hurrying, their footsteps heavy on the pavement that I cruised over.
I took a sharp left and skid to a stop. Another herd of zombies hunched over a bloody pile. The smell coming off of them tickled my jaw, and I swallowed back bile. The moaning behind me was getting closer.
I took to the sidewalk and pedaled faster, standing up, pushing forward. I’d have to ride right by them.
I flew past with my heart in my throat and legs burning with effort.
Glancing back, I saw the group following me come around the corner and run into them—they fell, going down in a big tangled mess of bloody limbs and soulless eyes.
I focused in front of me. I needed to get to the cemetery. I turned left, working my way toward it but a woman’s scream slowed me. "Help!" she begged, drawing my eyes to an open door. Behind me, a few zombies turned the corner, their arms outstretched toward me.
I couldn't ignore her plea and veered to the opening, riding right into the room.
The darkness blinded me.
A small man, or what was left of him, knocked me off my bike. I kicked out and he fell back, but only for a moment. He lunged again. My left leg was tangled under my bike, but I kicked hard with my right, sending him off me long enough to grab the knife from my hip. I held it up and the creature dove, stabbing itself in the eye.
I pushed him away with the hilt of the knife and stumbled to my feet, grabbing for the door.
A zombie, her face pale and bloated, reached out to me but I slammed it, leaning against the wood. The thud of her body ricocheted through to me.
I grabbed a chair and pushed it under the knob. Then I stepped away slowly, the door shaking on its hinges as the group of zombies pressed forward.
They don’t give up. Just like death.
I scanned the dim interior, my eyes more adjusted now. There was a low stage and just a couple of tables—I knew this place; it was small but got wild. Loud and raucous, it was an awesome place to gig…or it had been.
Legs stuck out from behind the wooden bar. I circled around slowly. I recognized a waitress—I couldn't remember her name, but she always gave me a warm smile and had an easy laugh.
Her throat was ripped out, now. She’d never laugh again. My stomach dropped. I had to pierce her brain. Couldn’t let her change.
I knelt down and felt for a pulse at her wrist. She was warm, but there was no heartbeat. Walking back over to the dead zombie, I pulled my knife from his eye and approached the body. I took a deep breath before plunging it into her. I’d want someone to do the same for me.
I went out the back door—it opened up to a deserted alley. Riding my bike slowly to the edge of the street, I peered around the corner toward the front entrance. Around twenty zombies pressed against the door of the bar.
I turned away from them and continued toward the cemetery. The sun hovered low in the sky now, and I wanted to get there before it turned the world pink and soft. Twilight seemed the best time to reach Suki—when the world was neither light nor dark but dreamy and filled with shadows.
I had some questions to ask that apparition.
When I rode through the cemetery gates, I threw my bike down, dashed back to the entrance, and, grabbing the two halves of the gate, slammed them together with a clang that echoed among the mausoleums. Taking the chain and lock from around my waist, I circled it through each door of the gate, the metal banging together, knocking off bits of the old black paint. I secured the chain with the lock and then turned back to my bike and the rest of the cemetery, pulling my bow off my back and raising it up to my eye.
Left, right, both aisles were clear and quiet. The mausoleums looked undisturbed, like no one had been here and nobody cared: crumbling walls, patches of grass growing everywhere they could. Life doesn't give up that easy. There must be some way to stop this madness.
I edged forward, moving around my bike, looking down the barrel of my bow. Reaching the next path, I pressed my back against the mausoleum to my left and listened hard. I could hear sirens far in the distance but nothing close.
One quick step out in the ais
le looking left—clear—spinning, crouching, looking right. A figure turned toward me. Its sandy blonde hair fell down its back to just above its shoulder blades. It wore a pink shirt with a collar and khaki shorts. The zombie turned slowly, its body leaning to one side, hunched and unnatural.
I waited for it to face me, sweat running down my back, my breath shallow. Its gaze was down, bangs hanging over it. As the dead woman raised her head to look at me, I saw her eyes glowing an eerie green in the half light. I pulled the trigger, and the zombie's legs buckled. She fell to the ground in a heap of limbs.
I checked behind me quickly, to my right and to my left, then approached it. Bracing my foot against her shoulder, I pulled out my arrow. It made a sickening suction noise as it slid slowly from her skull.
Placing the arrow back in my clip, I held up the bow again. The sun sank lower, the shadows growing darker as I cleared the rest of the cemetery. I worked my way back to Suki's resting place, stopping in the center aisle to look back at the main gate.
A single zombie stood there. When it saw me, the thing's arms stretched through the gate, fingers kneading at the air, a sob-like sound escaping from its bloated body. It probably died a couple of hours ago—its body was filling with gasses.
Suki's mausoleum was covered in sugar packets, pieces of gum, beads, cash, paper notes, and mini bottles of liquor. I wasn’t the only person asking her for answers.
I pulled out a sugar packet from the small pocket of my yoga pants and placed it on the ledge. Using a broken piece of brick, I scratched three question marks into the soft cement of the mausoleum. Please talk to me, I thought, closing my eyes, seeing the need radiating out of me behind my lids.
A clang at the gate snapped my eyes open, and I raised the bow with tired arms. I walked to the main aisle and checked the entrance. Now there were four zombies out there, all pressing against the metal. How many will it take to rip the rusted hinges from the aged cement forming the front wall?
I turned back to Suki's gravesite and lowered my bow. She wasn’t here.
Did I need to cry onto the sugar packet? Or maybe it was the time of day. It was almost dark now, the west horizon bright orange.
The smoke in the south looked like a black storm. The glow from the fire at its base made it almost look like there were two sunsets.
Should I sit down, the way I'd been last time she came? How could I risk resting with those things at the gate?
The sun slipped beneath the horizon, and the soft hues of dusk arrived, settling over the cemetery, making the shift to darkness feel slow and leisurely. Then the light winked out and the cemetery fell dark. With a whirl of electric current, the street lights buzzed to life, illuminating the sidewalks but not penetrating the depths of the cemetery where I waited.
Checking the gate again, I counted ten bodies pressing against it. As I watched, a small figure pushed through the legs of the others and reached its arm through, then a leg. A child. Its head got stuck.
I turned away, tears pushing at my eyes. No time for that now. How much longer could I wait?
"Hello.” I whirled around, bow raised. Suki wore the same outfit as the last time I'd seen her, all white with just the red embroidery on her head scarf. She frowned at me. "Lower that weapon," she said in a voice that seemed to vibrate the air around me. A loose brick in the mausoleum next to me fell, breaking into pieces when it hit the path. I lowered the bow.
Suki turned back to her gravesite, and I followed her. With her back to me, she reached up and placed a candle on the roof of the mausoleum. With a small wave of her hand, the wick flared and then glowed warmly, creating flickering shadows in the narrow space. "That bow is too big for you," she said without turning around.
"What is going on?" I asked. She didn't answer, instead picking up one of the mini bottles of liquor. She twisted off the cap and drank. "Emmanuel is dead." My voice hitched as tears caught in my throat.
Suki picked up my sugar packet, handing it to me. I dabbed at my tears. Her fingers waggled at me, and I handed it back. "Can I help him?" I asked.
She laughed, low and short—a sound that made it clear I didn't know anything—as she placed the sugar packet next to her candle.
When she turned back, a thin, yellow snake slithered around her arms in a figure eight, its corn-colored scales smooth and shining in the light. "You can't help him,” she said. "Or yourself."
She stepped forward, the snake speeding up, turning into a blur of light in her arms. "You're no good to anyone." She raised the ball of light and squatted, then pushing hard off her feet, launched the sphere over the graves.
It arched low, lighting the cemetery then dropped by the gate. A hissing started slow but grew louder. I covered my ears and Suki watched me, smiling.
"What are you doing?" I yelled over the sound. Her face darkened, eyebrows inching closer above narrowed eyes. "You're so powerful?” I pointed with one hand, letting the hissing sound batter against me. "What are you going to do about it? How are you going to stop this?"
"Get out!" she said, her voice even louder than the hissing, the buildings around me shaking. "Now!" Her voice knocked into me and I stumbled, hitting a mausoleum hard. “Go!”
I turned and ran to the center aisle. The hissing faded. There were no zombies at the gate. She destroyed them. How?
I turned to ask her, but Suki was gone—not even the smoke from her candle remained. Well that was super freaking useful.
Jogging down the path, I picked up my bike and looked through the gate, pushing my face so that I could see in both directions. No zombies, no snakes. Unlocking the chain, I wrapped it back around my waist, climbed on my bike, pushed through the gates, and pedaled as fast as I could away from the cemetery and toward the hospital.
How did she get rid of those zombies? I hadn’t seen any bodies. She’d made them disappear.
I came around a corner and skidded to a stop—zombies filled the street in front of me. The stench of rot and death made me gag.
I turned around, pedaling back the way I'd come, but I’d been spotted.
They filled the space between the buildings, pouring around stopped cars, knocking into pillars, some falling and others climbing over them. A chaotic, determined mob of bloated corpses. They hadn't been dead long. It all changed in a moment—hints of disaster, then an explosion of chaos.
I pedaled madly, taking the first turn I could—a zombie stumbled out from behind a car directly in my path. I smashed into it, falling off the bike. It was on me instantly, biting hard into my leg, ripping a scream from me. No, no, no.
I should have become a fucking vampire.
The rest of them were right there, stumbling around the corner. Seeing me on the ground excited them. Their quarry was injured.
I pulled my bow and killed the one on my leg. I stumbled to my feet, the pain in my calf numbed by the mass of adrenaline pumping into me. Backing away from the herd, I pulled arrows from my quiver in a smooth motion, firing as I went. My arrows found their mark, and I killed two before another reached me.
It grabbed at the bow, and I fired through its mouth. Another latched onto my arm, and its teeth sank into me. I dropped the bow and pulled a knife, thrusting it through the thing's eye. My quiver ripped from my back and teeth sank into my shoulder. Another was on me, my forearm between its teeth. I’m dying.
The zombie’s head exploded, and I sucked in a breath of surprise. A blur of motion spun through the mob, sending them flying, heads popping, bodies hitting the surrounding buildings hard enough to crack plaster and break windows.
An arm wrapped around my waist, and wind rushed in my ears. We landed on a roof and I looked up—Dimitri laid me down, the black tar still warm from the sun.
Liquid heat pooled under me as I stared up into the dark sky. The stars were falling away from me. I was bleeding to death. But Dimitri would kill me before I became one of the undead.
The strangled, guttural sounds of frustration from those horrific, plagued creatures re
ached me from the street.
"Darling." Dimitri held my face, his hands cradling me. His eyes flashed gray as I breathed in. Color rose in his cheeks as I felt that tie between us. He brought his lips to mine. His energy passed through his skin, warming as it passed over my lips and into my bloodstream, searing through my veins, and healing me. Curing me. Feeding me. Saving me.
Chapter Fourteen
Dimitri’s kisses, his whisper-soft touch, and bridled strength—the connection between us—pulled me back together, rid my body of disease, filled my veins with fresh blood…cured me.
I don’t know how or why, but it happened.
The rough tar roof scraped against my back. I wrapped my legs around his waist and took and took and took…power coursed through me. The night came alive all around me. The energy’s intensity grew—I pushed, rolling us. Dimitri held my hips, his eyes black and fangs long.
I rode him, my head thrown back. He played with me, making me crazy and wild. Blood thundered in my ears, and there was nothing but him and me and the heat between us. I lost it. Lost everything… but me.
I collapsed against his chest, my fingers running into his hair, pulling his mouth to mine. Taking even more.
He groaned, his hands diving into my long locks. "I'm not done yet," he growled. "I may never be done with you.” His voice softened, and he cupped my cheek, looking into my eyes. The predator was there but so was a man…a living being. “I wonder if eternity is long enough." Dimitri’s voice faded as he stared into my eyes. Then he leaned forward, kissing me gently, his hips moving slowly under me until I whimpered against him.
He put me on my hands and knees. The uneven texture of the roof felt right, painful almost, against my sensitized skin. "So beautiful," he whispered against my flesh. His hands roamed down my legs. "Your wound," he said. "It's healed."
His palm wrapped around my calf where I’d been bitten. "Yes," I said, my head still light from the force of my pleasure, the loss of blood, and the adrenaline that had overcome me while under attack. I looked down at my forearm. It was healed as well. "You heal me," I said. "Don't stop."