Star Drawn Saga (Book 1): Death Among The Dead: A Zombie Novel (30 page)

Had Peter been able to think logically, he would have realised that the beam of light had not returned to pierce his cramped darkness for a reason and more importantly if he had just held back from looking he could have spared himself one more image that would surely stalk his nightmares. For even as Peter’s eye came level with the crack in the wooden panel the creature on the other side turned, displaying its horrific and brutalised visage for him to see. It was or had once been one of the island’s Brothers, his red tunic now torn and stained an even darker shade of red by his own spilt blood. His face, what was left of it, was twisted into a savage and tortured snarl; the look made even more horrific by the fact that not only had his lower lip and the skin on his chin been ripped away, exposing the glistening bone beneath but on the right side of his face there was simply a gaping hole where an eye used to be.

Despite the pressure against his lips, a whine of barely held in check panic managed to work its way past Peter’s fingers as he suddenly beheld the bloody figure before him. With a violent jerk of his head, the creature that had been Brother Christopher reacted to the unseen Peter’s pitiful sound; his movements sending a splatter of thick bloody spittle flying from his ruined mouth as he sought out its source. In his terror Peter pushed his fingers even harder against his mouth; pressing with such force that in places the skin on the inside of his lips broke against his teeth causing blood to flow and yet more heavy tears to fall. Yet he knew he could not cry out, could not give voice to his fear and pain. For his sister, Sharon, had taught him well over the last five years; stay out of sight, keep quiet no matter what happens and don’t move until she could come for him; do this and she promised he would be safe. Yet Peter knew she wouldn’t be coming to tell him the bad people were gone, she wouldn’t be saying that everything was going to be okay, not this time or ever again; he was alone, truly alone, and the bad people were here again, wanting to hurt him.

Brother Christopher’s corpse slowly tilted its head, its film covered eyes seeking the unseen living thing it knew to be so tantalisingly close, while its bloody and savaged mouth opened and closed rhythmically, as if in preparation for the warm flesh it was surely about to consume. Within the cupboard, barely a metre away from the cannibalistic cadaver, Peter tried to choke back his silent sobs while terrified convulsions threaten to erupt from him. But as if sensing the very presence of his warm beating heart, the thing that had been Brother Christopher slowly began to lean forward; focusing its cold hungry stare on the closed cupboard door before it. Luckily, unable to formulate its thoughts coherently enough to use the handle to open the cupboard, Brother Christopher’s cadaver simply lashed out a blood covered hand, slamming it violently against the door.     

Jumping from the sudden and disturbing rattle of the struck door, Peter at last moved his eye, still blurry with tears, away from the crack and then did what every child has ever done when the monsters came-a-calling, he screwed his eyes tightly shut and wished it away; for surely what he could not see, could not hurt him. Beside him, Bella, adhering to the rule of silence that Peter’s fingers on her snout still demanded, nervously lifted one front paw after the other, clearly anxious for her charge in the presence of such close and obvious danger. Yet even the soft clicking of her claws against the stone floor seemed to somehow reach Brother Christopher’s Dead eardrums, exciting him further and bringing another bloody hand lashing out to strike the door again. For the hunt was on and this hound of hell that had once been Brother Christopher, had the scent of blood in his nose, a scent he would pursue until he claimed his screaming and terrified prize.

But the Gods apparently had other plans for Peter and just as Brother Christopher’s fist slapped angrily against the door yet again, another door at the far end of the corridor was flung open, followed by the unexpected sound of a set of running footsteps skidding abruptly to a halt.

‘Christ!’ Peter heard a man gasp, as whoever it was took in the sight of the tortured corpse snapping its head in their direction.

Catching sight of this new arrival, the thing that had been Brother Christopher instantly abandoned its pursuit of whatever was behind the door in favour of the ‘out in the open’, ‘come and get it’,  living flesh that had appeared out of the blue surely to offer itself up for sacrifice.

‘No, No, No, No!’ Peter heard the unknown man beg, as if he too was wishing away the monster before him.

With a snarl, Brother Christopher’s corpse pushed itself away from the door and turned to face its new quarry full on.

‘No, please! Brother Christopher, please!’ the man pleaded, hoping against hope that the man he once knew still somehow dwelt within this bloody shell. ‘No, no I…’

But whatever further pointless words the man was about to say died unspoken upon his tongue, the sight of the torn and brutalised Dead man charging towards him forcing a panic-fuelled scream to suddenly erupt from his throat.

‘
Stay quiet, stay hidden
,’ Peter repeated over and over in his head as he tried to blot out the terrible sound of the screaming man now fleeing for his life.

Whether the animated body of the late Brother Cristopher caught up with his accidental and unknown saviour, Peter could not know for sure but moments later as the sound of door slamming loudly against the wall again faded away, the echoes of terrified screaming stopped with it; at least for a while.

***

Kasey edged silently along the cold corridor, her arms wrapped tightly about her chest as if only this action could keep the wildly thumping heart within the confines of her own body. With each ominous sound echoing from somewhere unseen in the castle, she would freeze, pressing herself tightly against the wall while her head snapped nervously back and forth in grim anticipation of the appearance of what would surely be the instrument of her death. For from the very first scream she knew the Corrupt had found their way onto the island. Their sanctuary had been breached, the walls of Jericho had fallen and the denizens of hell had spewed forth like a plague of walking death to claim the living.

‘Our Father, who art in heaven,’ she panted, her whispered words fighting against the rising wave of panic building within her. ‘Hallowed be thy...’

A flash of movement in the corner of her eye immediately stalled the prayer on her lips, transforming its words of comfort into a high moan of overwhelming despair. Yet even as her head span to confront the horror that awaited her, she found herself welcoming the choked back sob of utter relief that bubbled forth in its place. A victim of the whim of her own terrified imagination, she found herself still alone in the corridor and for now, still beyond the touch of the Corrupt and the bite that brought with it her own demise. For opposite her, a beam of light danced lazily across the pane of glass in a picture frame and it had in fact been her own movement reflected here that had caused her heart to skip and pulse to quicken.

‘Name,’ she at last puffed, forcing the word out with a shaky exchange of breath.

She was about to berate herself for allowing her own fears to play tricks on her mind when the tortured scream of a man coming from somewhere dangerously close by, reminded her that any and all fears were currently justified. Frozen in place by his terrible wailing, Kasey stood wide eyed and teetering on the brink of losing what little control she still had. Nervously her fingers stroked at the loose braid of her thick curly hair, willing the man, whoever it was, to stop.  Surely his cries would draw more of the Corrupt to him, to her and to anyone else unlucky enough to still be in the castle. But then suddenly his screams changed. To those blessed enough never to have experience such a traumatic death that was surely taking place, the changes may have been imperceptible but to Kasey and to all those who had survived among the Corrupt, the difference was as obvious as day and night. The screams within seconds had become utterly all-consuming for their maker. They were now wet, final and had become the embodiment of flesh tearing and a life ending. And then with the gurgling of blood surely erupting from a torn out throat, the screaming stopped.

She had to keep moving, she knew this. She had come up with a plan, she knew where she was going, she just had to get there. But unless she took control of her body and forced her feet to move again, it would be the end of her and it would be
her
fighting for her life in a hallway, screaming out her last.

‘
Move, move, mov
e!’ her mind screamed impotently at her stubborn and curiously disobedient legs.

Yet still her shaking body pressed itself against wall, unable to move on; condemning itself by its own inaction.

‘
Just move! Step away from the wall,
’ her mind continued to shout, her anger at her own fear and incompetence building. ‘
Just step away from the wall, Kasey! Step away and save yourself!
’

It wasn’t until she heard the sound of a door slamming somewhere nearby that she suddenly found her feet again and just as she had done on her initial cross over to the island, she placed her life in God’s hands and threw herself away from the wall into the churning abyss of fear that awaited her.

‘Thy kingdom come,’ she whispered, each word punctuated with a restrained yet anxiously urgent step further along the corridor, ‘Thy will be done..’

With each word she drew closer to her goal, closer to the refectory and her escape to the kitchens and the large walk-in-pantry that she knew could be locked from the inside.

‘…on earth,’ she continued, at last reaching the corner around which the large door to the refectory awaited her, ‘as it is in…’

What she saw as she finally turned the corner struck Kasey like a punch in the stomach, making her stagger backwards. For there, spreading out across the stone floor in front of the refectory door, was a pool of deep red coagulating blood. If this wasn’t bad enough, the scuff marks and smeared hand and footprints also told of someone or something slipping in the pool before making their way off down the hall, thankfully away from her.

‘…heaven,’ she completed at last, the final word falling from her lips barely audible to her own ears let alone the Divine.

If Kasey’s skin had been considered pale before, now, as the blood drained from her face in shock, it could only be described as almost alabaster in its translucency. Unable to help herself, she gaped wide eyed at the bloody scene, her gaze unable to rest on any one part of the devastation laid out before her. It was only as she flitted across a smeared handprint streaking low down across the wall to a lump of something that could have been the top of someone’s ear that Kasey’s body finally fully reacted to the carnage she was being forced to witness. With a violent twisting her stomach made known its protest, causing her to abruptly add her own hot vomit to the cooling red pool seeping ever closer to her feet.

Leaning against the wall for support, her hand unsettlingly close to a set of bloody handprints, Kasey spat the last of the acidic fluid from her mouth. Glancing guardedly at the tell-tale marks of violence, she purposefully removed her hand from the wall; irrationally fearful the close proximity of the blood from one those claimed by the Corruption could itself taint her very soul.

‘God, protect me,’ she whispered, crossing herself before subconsciously rubbing the palms of her hands against the fabric of her skirt.

Despite her revulsion Kasey knew she would have to step across the pool of blood and gore if she wanted to get to the large refectory doors. But as she geared herself up to take that first step she noticed one of the doors was actually slightly ajar, wedged in place by something small and whitish at its base. With sickening dread threatening to churn her stomach again, Kasey begged it was not, or rather had not been, part of whoever had once held the blood she was about to walk over.

‘Our Father,’ she started to say to herself again, the words of the prayer bringing distraction if not comfort as she placed a foot tentatively in front of her.

Looking down at her foot, now an island in a red sea of death, Kasey realised she felt no change inside of her. There was no demonic vice-like grip suddenly encircled about her soul claiming it for its own nor the cold chill of loss as her Saviour turned his back on her. No, she felt none of this, her faith and her God were with her, of this she was sure. So with only a brief and involuntary shiver running down her back acting as a warning to beware, she took another step forward and then another. Within moments the intricately carved wooden doors were but a hair’s breadth from her fingertips, calling out to her to make contact and push one of them open. But no sooner had her hand made contact, the pressure of which causing the door to move a fraction, than she heard a small ‘clicking’ sound coming from its base. Looking down she let out a held in puff of relief, for the blood splattered white object she had noticed earlier was not some torn free finger or section of bone but in fact was a single chess piece, the white Queen; the tip of which was now firmly lodged under the door.

Tempted to simply kick the chess piece free but knowing she couldn’t risk the noise, Kasey reluctantly bent down to wriggle the Queen free by hand.

‘Come on, come on!’ she grumbled nervously to herself, twisting base of the carved piece this way and that, trying not to get any more blood on her fingers than strictly necessary.

Then suddenly the bloody Queen was in her hand, free from her entrapment and the door was at able to swing open again.