Star Drawn Saga (Book 1): Death Among The Dead: A Zombie Novel (27 page)

‘You two coming?’ asked Tom, looking from Fran to Kai; a hint of amusement dancing behind the question. 

‘What? Oh, yeah, sorry,’ replied Fran, noticing that in the brief moments she had become lost in Kai’s gaze the old fisherman had already started to slowly lead the rest of the group away.

‘Where’s he taking us?’ she continued to say, brushing an errant lock of hair behind her ear as she forced herself to step toward Tom and away from Kai.

‘The harbour,’ Tom replied, his eyes following her as she purposefully strode past him, his answer seemingly unimportant.

Looking back at Kai, Tom gave the young man a knowing smile.

‘W…What?’ said Kai, his mix of embarrassment and annoyance making him sound too much like a petulant teenager for his own liking.

‘Nothing,’ smiled Tom, holding his hands up innocently as he stepped aside to let Kai stomp past him.

‘You just took your time, lad… that’s all,’ he continued, his smile broadening as he realised thanks to his promise to help Roy later he wouldn’t be playing gooseberry between the young couple who had only just noticed that which had been blatantly clear to everyone else; namely that they were both interested in each other.

***

‘Don’t mind them,’ huffed Frank White, leaning on his cane as he waved with his free hand to the various silent and guarded faces watching the small group go by, ‘they’ll come round soon enough. Here, Jack!’ he continued, slapping his hand weakly against his leg, suddenly switching his attention to the black and white collie chasing Peter and the Alsatian merrily back and forth like a dog half his age. ‘You calm down now, you hear! Stupid dog… you’ll do yourself a mischief, you will.’

‘I… I don’t suppose you get to see many new people, Mr White,’ interrupted Dave, after nodding a silent but barely acknowledged ‘hello’ to a drawn woman watching them from the shadows of her cottage doorway.

‘If you’re staying,’ the old man began to reply, assuming that the man with his small family had not only been offered sanctuary but had chosen to accept it, ‘you might as well call me Frank…. But to answer your question about new people, no we don’t, not really, not anymore.’

‘Ah,’ said Dave, glancing at Jane for help in befriending the old man.

‘Well, not that get to stay anyway,’ Frank mumbled, pausing against a low wall to catch his breath while he looked knowingly over at Max and Tom.

‘Oh?’ asked Jane, only just catching the old man’s words.

‘We get enough visitors from time to time, alright,’ began Frank, pushing himself away from the wall as Jack appeared by his side, a long pink tongue lolling enthusiastically from the side of his mouth from the unexpected exercise and excitement, ‘but that sanctimonious git sends most of them back out into… into that horror… and with nothing more than some bull shit rules he made up himself as an excuse.’

‘You don’t sound like you think much of Father Matthew?’ suggested Jane, looking nervously toward her husband.

‘He’s a nutter surrounded by nutters that think the sun shines out of his arse… that’s what I think,’ grumbled Frank, scratching lazily at his white beard. ‘But I’ll say this much for the man, he saved a lot of people when the shit was really hitting the fan, so I guess his heart must’ve been in the right place once… it’s just where his mind is now that bothers me.’

‘Mr White… I mean, Frank,’ continued Jane, pausing out of habit to briefly to glance over her shoulder to make sure Riley was still close by, ‘you don’t strike me as a man who minces his words, surely Father Matthew, Brother Gregory and the others they… they must know you what you think of him.’

‘They do,’ Frank simply replied, gesturing with a nod for them to follow along a small alley leading away from the row of small cottages.

‘And yet they let you stay,’ commented Dave. ‘They haven’t forced you off the island.’

‘I may be outnumbered by Father Matthew and his ‘God squad’ but I’d like to see the bastards try to force me out,’ barked Frank, the determined glint beneath his wild bushy eyebrows giving Dave and Jane a hint of the man he once was.

‘So would I, Frank,’ laughed Dave, slapping an unexpectedly carefree and friendly hand on the old man’s back. ‘So would I.’

It was only as they made the short walk to the harbour that Dave realised, despite everything, an unexpected sense of relief was settling over him. He had spent much of the previous night awake, his thoughts in turmoil, trying to decide what to do for the best but even as his mind raced back and forth for a solution he knew he had but one choice, to stay on the island with Jane and his son. Stealing a glance to the woman next to him, her gentle face still tinged with an underlying worry noticeable only to his eyes, he wondered how he could even dare contemplate the leaving her. She was his world and while she existed he would fight to stay by her side, to stay on the island. Once he had realised and accepted this, an unknown sense of resolve had grown within him, allowing him to garner the strength he knew he would need for the stand to come. A line had effectively been drawn in the sand dividing his life in two; on one side he stood with his brother, weaker and browbeaten, while on the other he was free of the belittling and the countless demons of his past. For as much as Dave knew to abandon Max would be a painful and traumatic loss, it was a loss he was now willing to suffer, a loss well overdue and if Dave was truthful with himself, one he had secretly longed for his whole life. So as Frank White told the small group about daily life within the small enclosed harbour, Dave’s mind raced to find the right words to tell Max he was staying and more importantly to finally tell Max, goodbye.

***

‘Well, I can’t just sit here. I need to be doing something,’ said Tom, slowly rubbing the palms of his hands together as if to distract himself from the need to feel them wrapped about the handles of his curved blades once more. ‘I’m going to go back up to the gardens, find that Roy bloke and check out the cliffs with him.’

‘Oh, okay,’ said Fran, using her hand to shield the sun from her eyes as she looked up at Tom standing over her. ‘Be careful and… you know.’

Even though her words of warning went unfinished Tom knew what she meant, it was that forever present unspoken embarrassment that hung between him and his traveling companions that she referred to; the voices that dwelled in his head or rather how they totally consumed him when he was under their influence.

‘Yes, Fran… I know,’ he replied, giving Fran a reassuring smile and a wink.

It was only as his gaze flitted to Kai, the young man’s worry clearly evident in his dark eyes, that Tom felt his smile begin to falter.

‘I’ll be okay,’ he continued, his words aimed at Fran while his eyes stayed with Kai trying to push the point home.

‘Oh, and Tom,’ said Fran, noticing the unspoken and not very subtle exchange happening between Kai and Tom, ‘we’re only going to be here for a few days… can you try not to piss off anyone else.’

‘Ah,’ replied Tom, at last breaking contact with Kai to look back at Fran. ‘Now you wouldn’t want me to make any promises I can’t keep.’

‘Tom, please,’ sighed Fran, knowing that whatever happened in the next few days trouble was likely to play a part in their short stay.

‘Alright, alright,’ chuckled Tom, backing away from the harbour wall where his two younger companions sat with their legs dangling over the edge, ‘I’ll try my best... is that good enough?’

‘You’ll try your best,’ echoed Fran, a raised eyebrow letting him know just how little she thought of his half-hearted compromise.

‘I’ll try my best,’ Tom repeated, his smile for Fran broadening as he shrugged his shoulders and took another two backward steps away from them, ‘promise!’

Laughing, Fran shook her head in exasperation.

‘If I get burned at the stake for any of your bullshit, Tom Butcher,’ she said, turning her back to him with a wave of her hand, ‘I’m gonna kill you!’

‘Well, I’ll see you both later in the refectory,’ Tom called back to them as she looked down at the gentle waves lapping against the side of the wall a metre or so below her feet.

Despite the soft hypnotic rhythm of the water Fran couldn’t help but notice in her peripheral vision Kai watching Tom’s departure.

‘He means it you know,’ she said, leaning forward slightly to run her fingertips across a cluster of small glossy black shells attached the wall just along the high tide line.

‘S…sorry?’ said Kai, at last letting his gaze drop from Tom’s back to focus on Fran.

‘Tom,’ she replied, turning her head to look at him and suddenly becoming very aware that they had been left alone, ‘he’ll… he’ll try his best not to lose himself.’

‘Try his b…best?’ said Kai shaking his head, his concerned gaze subconsciously dropping momentarily to her lips. ‘This isn’t s…something he can c…control, Fran. His mind is b…broken.’

‘Whose isn’t?’ shrugged Fran, her lips twisting into a soft yet sad smile as she felt herself slowly falling into the comforting inky blackness of the beautiful eyes looking back at her.

For a second Kai opened his mouth to speak, searching for the right words to say. He knew his worry was partly born from his need to keep Fran safe, yet how could he voice such concerns knowing that she was well beyond needing what little protection he could ever hope to offer her. So as he held her gaze, his mouth slowly closing, he said nothing but simply offered a single nod in agreement.

‘Right,’ Fran said at last, pulling her legs up from the wall, ‘let’s go for a wander, shall we? See what St Michael’s mount has to offer.’

‘Okay,’ Kai replied, just happy to be spending some time alone with her.

Once on her feet Fran’s gaze followed the curve of the harbour wall round to where the sight of Dave and Jane Harper with Riley and Peter formed an idyllic and somewhat rare tableau in a world full of the Dead. The small family had survived an apocalypse that had swept across the globe and now that Peter was in an environment where his disability no longer put anyone in danger, Fran assumed the little family had just been increased by one more. For a moment Fran simply watched Riley engrossed with something his father was saying while Jane patiently knelt beside Peter showing him how to dangle his fishing line down the side of the harbour wall.  

‘We’re going for a walk!’ Fran at last called to Jane, waving as she caught the woman’s eye. ‘We’ll see you later!’

‘Have fun!’ Jane shouted back with a brief wave of her hand, just before she was forced to grab hold of Bella who seemed determined to leap off the harbour wall in pursuit of the scrap of bait attached to Peter’s fishing line.

Smiling as she watched Jane and Peter joyfully struggling to keep Bella on dry land, Fran turned to Kai, his own smile tainted by an unspoken sadness.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘They’ve been v…very lucky,’ Kai sighed, unable to tear his eyes from the scenic snapshot of the happy family.

‘Yes… they have,’ replied Fran, glancing back over her shoulder once more. ‘Come on,’ she said, shaking herself from the maudlin thoughts that threatened to consume her as she slipped her arm though Kai’s, ‘let’s explore.’

With both of them aware of the prolonged yet innocent contact between them as they walked, Fran and Kai made their way back along the row of small cottages saying hello to the few people they came across. At one point, just as they left the last of the cottages behind them, a small boy no older than ten years appeared from round a corner chewing noisily on an apple.

‘You staying?’ he bluntly asked, pushing a short mop of brown hair away from his eyes.

‘Well, we…’ Fran began to say, searching for the words to explain why they would abandon the sanctuary the island offered.

‘No,’ interrupted Kai, ‘w…we can’t stay.’

The young boy looked at Kai, his eyes narrowing as he took another purposeful bite of his apple.

‘Then you’re already as dead as the Corrupt,’ the boy replied, pausing to wipe his mouth on the back of his sleeve. ‘You just don’t know it yet.’

‘Well, he’s a cheery one,’ said Fran, watching the boy slowly walk back the way they had come, seemingly already dismissing the two strangers from his thoughts. ‘I wonder if he even remembers having a life not on this island.’

‘D…doubt it,’ answered Kai, suddenly conscious that at some point Fran’s hand had moved down to take his own in hers.

Looking down at the delicate fingers entwined in his, Kai said nothing, fearful to break the spell that had fallen over him. In the distance gulls screeched their raucous cacophony while a barking dog, perhaps Bella, let known its clear disapproval at something. Yet none of these sounds really registered to Kai, for in that moment every millimetre and nerve in contact with Fran’s hand screamed for recognition; drowning out everything else.

‘Let’s go this way,’ Fran eventually whispered, the gentle tug of her hand leading him towards an almost overgrown path heading away from the harbour and the cobbled streets behind them and up into the small woodland surrounding the castle.

Moving one foot in front of the other, Kai allowed himself to be led along the narrow tree lined path. At one time probably a well-travelled route for tourists, the path now lay abandoned and in bad repair, its surface broken and uneven as huge tufts of grass and weeds forced apart the remaining stones in their reclamation of the ground. With the movement of Fran’s thumb tracing a never-ending circle against the back of his hand consuming his every conscious thought, it was a miracle that Kai managed to make sure his feet found even purchase at all. Yet he did not trip or fall and even when Fran turned to smile encouragingly back at him, her hazel eyes dancing with a secret joy, he did not let himself stumble.