Dead Of Winter (The Beautiful Dead Book 2) (18 page)

John’s fingers fumble around a bit before suddenly I find him holding my hand. I glance down at our entwined fingers, feeling empty and far away. “We need to evacuate the city,” John whispers to me.

“The Chief would never allow it.”

“Helena will back us up. She is, after all, half the ruling power of Trenton. I can find Garden.” He squeezes my hand, shifts himself on the ground to get comfortable. “I didn’t think I’d need to pursue it again, since we had Trenton. If that green-eyed madman is going to invade anyway, then—”

“I won’t let that happen.” I’d told them everything that transpired at the top of that building. It already feels like it happened weeks ago. “Get some rest, John.”

“We should be home by now. That madman and his whole burning army could be—”

“We may not
have
a home anymore.” I release my fingers from his and climb to my feet.

He peers up at me. “Winter?”

“I need a moment.” When I see the look on his face, I lift a hand. “I’m alright, I’m fine. I just … I need a moment to gather myself. I’m fine.”

With that, I walk away. I would love nothing more than to curl up with John and cuddle in the middle of nowhere, but every dead part of me is revolting against the peace. I hear no further protests from him, so I figure I’m okay to wander the area a bit while the Livings rest.

That and I can’t stop the guilt from torturing me.

I kick a rock and listen to it skipping through the woods, finding a new home somewhere else. Likely what we’ll need to be doing soon. All this fighting we have endured the last six months simply to make Trenton habitable and harmonious between Human and Undead, and it’s all going to waste because Grim has some selfish vision he must fulfill. I’m so angry at him I feel like my whole body could burst into green flame itself.

The worst part is, I know how unhappy I’ve been. With the small and precious exception of our final day in Trenton, John and I were not getting along. Most of the Humans never got to trusting us Undead, preferring us to stay as far away as possible. In many of their minds,
we
were the ones who didn’t belong in the town, as Trenton was originally owned by Humans back in the time of the Old World … before our kind even existed. I can’t say for sure which faction I sided with, for all the bitterness that I harbor for my own kind.

I guess self-hatred doesn’t look pretty on anyone, no matter how you wear it.

My foot kicks into a dead tree branch. Peering down at it, I jump back and my eyes grow double. It is not a tree branch. For several seconds, I can’t even process what it is because I’m too busy telling myself that it isn’t what it looks like. Reluctantly, I crouch down to get a better look, still keeping plenty of distance.

It’s a three-foot-long insect leg.

I glance to my left, then to my right. I peer up into the trees, but there’s nothing there. No spiders, no spider webs, nothing. Without touching it, I check the—thing—again. It could be the leg to a cricket, maybe. A very, very, very,
very
large cricket. Or a cockroach, perhaps.

A very, very, very large one.

I tap it with a foot. Nothing. Tentatively, I kick it. The thing still doesn’t budge. I was pretty sure every ounce of my squeamishness in this world was dead … until now.

I hear a quiet skittering. I look up.

And that’s approximately when a tarantula the size of a human drops on my head.

The thing that bursts out of me to save the day is not bravery or courage, no sir … It’s a blood-curdling glass-shattering scream. The second thing is a desire to run like some wild forest animal, throwing my legs in whatever direction they care to take me while swatting blindly at the monster on my head. All I see is my own white hair and three dangly, nightmarish spider legs.

Quite suddenly I stop. That, or I just ran into a tree.

The spider-monster-thing flies off my head finally, landing heavily on the forest floor. For one wild minute, it’s like we’re facing off; me and my two terrified eyes locked onto the giant arachnid and its … six billion eyes. I feel like a warrior—without a sword.

Then I’m screaming again and running in the opposite direction. Quickly, I happen across the huge cricket leg thing, and I find myself picking it up by one end. Yes, this now becomes my weapon, and I brandish the huge cricket-leg-thing to battle the huge spider-eyeball-thing.

This is happening.

It leaps at me. I shriek and swing the leg like a baseball bat, but I miss completely and hit a nearby tree instead. The spider circles me and I swing again, grazing two of its legs ineffectively. You’d think I were trying to gently massage the thing for as clumsy as I am handling my improvised cricket weapon. To be fair, cricket-weapon swordsmanship is not a skill I include on my resume.

The thing scuttles to the left, to the right, surveying me with all its gross little eyes. With sudden and psychotic conviction, I charge at the spider and thrust my weapon in a glorious arc, clubbing the spider squarely on its head. It bounces, lurching expertly to the side. My weapon, being a hairy, thorny cricket leg-thing, I find it exceptionally uncomfortable to hold, and suddenly I’m doubting the effectiveness of it at all. The spider is still dancing around me—the subtle sound of its giant feet brushing and playing at the crispy, gritty ground is all I hear. The thing neither hisses nor squeaks … only tittering and clicking.

I throw my weapon aside. Why not. Casual reminder: I’m Undead. I lunge at the spider because my next plan of attack is, apparently, to grapple it into submission.

Yes,
this
is now happening.

The enormous spider-thing definitely makes an effort to evade me, but after three quick attempts at grasping its prickly—
ugh, never again
—legs, I get a firm grip and pull it toward me. I can’t arm myself against it, so I figure my best technique is to disarm
it
. Literally. I wrestle with the critter as it wriggles, fighting my attempts at pulling off its arms. It strikes its massive pincer-like teeth into my arm, then pulls off again—retreat, jab, retreat, jab. Finally I hear a snap, managing to dislodge two of its legs. I toss them into the air like boomerangs I pray will not return.

Then the spider gathers some unseen strength, and without warning it launches up my body. Suddenly it’s managed to topple me over. On my back now staring at spider legs, huge pincer-teeth-things and thirty-hundred eyes, I’m screaming again—less out of fear and more out of a mad, wild-woman attempt to right myself and get this ugly thing off me—while it passionately tries to make a lunch out of my face. With my hands occupied in keeping its teeth far enough away so that it doesn’t
actually
eat my face, I have no spare hands with which to shunt it off.

I hear a sudden thrum, a sound cuts through the air, and then there’s an arrow through the spider’s head.

The thing ceases movement instantly. Partly proud and partly disgusted, I thrust the enormous dead spider carcass off of me like a dirty bed sheet I want nothing to do with, then awkwardly climb to my feet. When I look for my hero, I find Gunner standing atop a rock, sweaty and focused, crossbow hanging at his side.

“Thank you,” I tell him.

He nods slowly, though I can tell even
he
is horrified at what he just witnessed, then killed.

“Evolution,” I explain unhelpfully, then stare down at the enormous spider, whose legs have very slowly curled up in just the same way a tiny spider’s might, with two of them missing … the two I rudely plucked off.

“You okay?”

I look up at Gunner to tell him I’m alright when I notice something else far, far in the distance. Half a woman, it looks like, somehow suspended in the air. She’s so far away my thumb could more than cover her.

I just said half a woman.
Half a woman suspended in the air.
The sight inspires a silent scream from me. That is, a scream that I prepare my mouth for, but don’t actually let out. What am I looking at?

WHAT. AM. I. LOOKING. AT?

She’s staring at me too. I’m so confused about where her other half is until finally I notice the scorpion legs below her. I’m almost relieved until I realize … scorpion legs?
SCORPION? LEGS?

Suddenly, she scurries off. Even from this impossible distance, I hear the tiny shift of leaves and twigs beneath her enormous insect legs as she scuttles out of view.

“Did you see that??” I exclaim.

Gunner looks where I’m looking, screwing up his forehead and squinting. “No.”

“A woman-spider-scorpion thing,” I explain, riled up. For as revolted and terrified as I am, I’m equal parts intrigued and curious as hell. I hurry forward in pursuit of the strange half-scorpion-half-lady thing, Gunner trailing me without question. Twice I nearly trip myself, but nowhere is she found. Even when the trees grow sparse and all I hear is Gunner’s heartbeat somewhere behind me, there’s no sign of her.

“We can’t stay here,” Gunner says, firm yet quiet.

Unsettled, I reply, “We should never have stopped.”

When we return to the others, John, Megan, and Helena are already set to go. John studies me, clearly observing that I’ve suffered some kind of scuffle. “Where were you?”

“Sightseeing,” I spit back.

Gunner slings the crossbow over his shoulder. “Let’s head home. Can’t stay here. Things lurking.”

“Things?” mutters John.

“Lurking?” mutters Helena.

“I will
carry
you if I have to,” I say, exasperated. “But we are not spending another second here.”

A question or two more are asked, but I’m already marching ahead of everyone, ignoring everything except the clear path ahead of me, my feet determined not to stop until I’m crossing through those cold iron gates of Trenton.

The men flank us as Helena and I walk together, Megan holding my hand. She’s clutching a tiny knife, her lips playing on it like a chew toy, and twice she asks how much longer it is until we’re back. John keeps his eyes peeled for anything edible as we walk, but we’re all plenty aware that there is literally nothing growing out here except doubt and despair. I know the Humans must be very hungry, considering we didn’t get our promised wagon of food. Benjamin had brought a backpack full of things when we set out, but seeing as he’s no longer in our company, I cannot make use of them. Even a source of water can’t be found in these parts.

Soon, we break into the far edge of the Whispers, and I feel deep, unequivocal relief. We’re almost home.

Longingly, I tilt my head toward Helena. “Aww, Hel,” I say, a smile finding my face. “This is where we met! When I was first Raised, long ago … you were sweet … I was screaming …”

Helena gives a sneer. “It wasn’t
that
long ago.”

“Feels like yesterday,” I murmur. Considering we Undead don’t sleep and our existence feels like one endless day, my remark carries a hint of humor.

She misses it. “Longer ago than yesterday. But not long enough to inspire any sense of nostalgia, forgive me. Or don’t.” Helena huffs irritably. “We’re all doomed no matter, forgiven or not.”

For a second, I want to disagree and encourage her with a hopeful word or two. Instead I say, “I know.”

Megan’s grip on my hand is tighter. When we finally make it across the vast stretch of nothing that is the Whispers, I hear John and Gunner muttering something about how we went a different route and missed the old Human’s camp, but Megan hears it too and cuts them off with: “There’s nothing left there but ghosts.” That puts John and Gunner to silence.

The Whispers give away to the familiar Dead Woods, and then to the wrought-iron gates of Trenton. When we attempt to open them, however, they’re bolted shut.

Someone inside shouts: “No one’s permitted in!”

I blink. Are they serious? “It’s Judge Helena, John, Megan, and Gunner!” I slap my hand against the gates, annoyed. “And
me
. Let us the hell in!”

“By order of the Chief, no one’s permitted!”

I’d love to know what idiot we’re talking to right now.

Helena steps forward, her patience lost. “Great. And by order of the
Judge
, I command you to let us in!”

“Sorry, Judge. Orders were strict:
no one
permitted! Not even the Judge.”

Helena glares, nostrils flaring. I look back at John and Gunner, who appear equally as dumbfounded.

It’s Megan who quietly suggests, “Why don’t we go in the way you snuck out, Winter?”

Helena throws me a look. I pat Megan on the head, owning my little act of defiance that, until now, has gone unacknowledged, and whisper back: “Splendid idea.”

With John muttering angrily about the arrogance of the Chief, we circumvent the city and come upon the Burned Quarter where not even walls protect Trenton. Really, if the Chief took such an effort as to secure the gates and prevent entrance, wouldn’t he have done something about our little “weak spot” in the city walls? I’m certain he’s aware of it.