Thicker than Blood (13 page)

The old man complied, his hands shaking with
age and fear as he attempted to locate the correct key. It took
several tries, each failed attempt causing the man to glance back
at Alex with wide, fear-filled eyes, until finally the doors were
unlocked. Pulling them open, the man tentatively peeked his head
out, looking both left and right before stepping back.

“The way is clear,” he said, swallowing hard.
“Though your conscience will not be if you harm Mr. Peter.”

Alex snorted. “I should kill him,” he gritted
out through clenched teeth. “I should kill you all.”

The old man swallowed again and shook his
head. “No, friend, you should be grateful for what we had
planned—for what the Lord had planned for you.”

“What is wrong with all of you?” I cried out,
looking from the old man to Mr. Peter to the crowd of people still
gathered together. When no one bothered to answer me, I shook my
head, feeling both sickened and saddened. “Alex,” I said. “Let’s
go. Right now.”

“Yes, go,” Mr. Peter snarled. “Get out of my
church, and take with you the evil you’ve brought into my home. Go
back to the vile cesspool the world has become, full of sinners and
whores,” he said pointedly, looking at Leisel and me as his face
contorted with disgust, his eyes burning with madness.

I was shaking, not with fear but with a
burst of uncontrollable anger, and as Alex shoved Mr. Peter
forward, just barely missing the elderly man, I found myself
releasing Leisel’s hand, raising my gun, and pulling the trigger.
My aim was wild and the first bullet sliced through Mr. Peter’s
shoulder, causing him to lurch backward and cry out in pain. Again,
I pulled the trigger, this time hitting him squarely in the chest,
piercing his most vital organ. He stumbled backward, his eyes wide,
and hit the wall behind him before his knees gave out and he
dropped to the floor in a heap.

Gasps and screams erupted from the
gathered crowd as the old man fell to his knees, his hands covering
the growing red stains on Mr. Peter’s shirt.

“
What have you done?” he screamed, his
voice shrill and thick. “You’ve doomed us all. You’ve doomed us
all!”

Alex, aiming his gun at the old man, let
loose a mouthful of spit, sending it directly onto the toe of his
shiny black shoe. “You’ve doomed yourselves.”

I was shaking, my gun still aimed at the man
I’d just killed, wanting to kill him all over again, wanting to
kill every last person inside this church. Though they deserved
worse than a quick death, they deserved the very same death they
nearly inflicted on us, and who knew how many other innocent
people.

“
The blood attracts the risen,” the old man
wailed, his words barely distinguishable amid his groans of grief.
“We’ll need an offering!” he cried, looking toward his
people.

Much to my horror, several of the
parishioners stepped forward. Their heads were bowed as they
silently offered themselves up at the old man’s request.

“
We need to go,” Leisel cried out as she
grabbed my arm and tried to pull me through the doorway. “Now, Eve,
now!”

The three of us ran through the doorway and
out into a dark and empty street. Though I didn’t stop running long
enough to get a good look at the place, I garnered from what
glimpses I did see that it was a quiet sort of neighborhood. It had
once probably been full of families, with children laughing and
playing, neighbors borrowing sugar, the sort of town where
Christmas caroling was a yearly event looked forward to by all.

We passed house after house, the windows
dark, no signs of people or of infected, but we kept running, not
wanting to stop until we were as far away from this place as
possible.

Eventually the houses were spaced farther
apart. The road was wider here, the trees larger and thicker, their
heavy branches blocking the moonlight. I slowed first, my steps
staggering, my chest burning from breathlessness. Leisel’s body was
pressed heavily against my side, and she smiled at me, seeming glad
for the reprieve.

“Alex,” I called out, my voice strangled, my
throat dry and sore from exertion.

Still jogging ahead of us, he turned, slowing
down when he saw we were unable to keep up with him. Nodding, he
circled back around to us, taking the place on Leisel’s right.

“We can’t stop yet,” he whispered hoarsely.
Sweat glistened on his forehead as he looked at Leisel. “Are you
okay?”

Leisel raised her head, her glistening eyes
meeting Alex’s. “I’m okay,” she answered, sniffling.

She didn’t sound okay, not even a little
okay, yet the fact that she was attempting to be strong given our
current situation made me almost smile. Almost.

We traveled without speaking for what
seemed like miles, the sound of our footsteps accompanied by the
trilling of crickets and the breeze rustling through the top of the
trees. My feet were sore, aching with a tiredness that they hadn’t
felt in a long time. It was the sort of pain that reminded me of
the world before the infection took hold.

Strangely, it felt good.

Good, only because it reminded me that I was
finally free.

Leisel

We walked all through the night and straight into
morning, not stopping for anything other than bathroom breaks. We
walked until my feet were numb, and my legs and arms were aching
with fatigue and strain. And then finally, when I wasn’t sure I
could go any farther, when I had begun to sway from exhaustion,
growing dizzy with hunger, Alex finally stopped walking. He stopped
so abruptly, I almost slammed into the back of him.

“What?” I asked, looking around. I saw
nothing, only the heart of the forest we’d been traveling through
for miles now. Nothing but trees, a veritable color wheel of
leaves, and the dirt beneath my feet.

“We can sleep here,” he said, gesturing with
his gun. My eyes followed the barrel of the weapon to a nearby
tree.

“Oh,” I said, sighing happily.

The small hunting platform looked quite
rickety, obviously unused in some time, and weathered by the
elements. The rope ladder hanging from it was tattered and heavily
frayed, but I couldn’t have cared less. I was dead on my feet and
would have passed out right there on the ground if it would have
been safe to do so.

The past couple of days were finally catching
up with me. The exertion, the trauma, the heartache, and everything
that went along with it all. My body was thoroughly exhausted,
hardly a drop of energy left inside me, as was my mind. But it
wasn’t safe down here, and we didn’t have the luxury to sleep in
shifts. Neither Evelyn nor Alex had slept since leaving
Fredericksville, and what little sleep I’d gotten on the road
hadn’t been nearly enough. This was the perfect place to catch a
few hours of shut-eye without having to worry about any stray
infected happening on us.

“I’ll go up first,” Evelyn offered
quietly.

I looked over at my friend, searching her
dirty, bloodstained face for a reason behind her recent silence. It
wasn’t like her to be so quiet, and yet for the past several hours
she’d hardly said more than a few words.

“Hey,” I said, reaching for her. Threading my
fingers through hers, I pulled her several feet away from Alex,
attempting a semblance of privacy. “Did something happen?” I
whispered, purposefully brushing a lock of her hair out of her eyes
in an attempt to gain her full attention.

Her head raised and she finally looked
directly at me, her beautiful and poignant features twisted with
pain, her big blue eyes so full of sorrow. Seeing this, seeing her
so openly hurting and vulnerable was so unexpected, so unlike
Evelyn, that I had to catch myself from taking a startled step
backward. She seemed so broken, even worse than before.

“Eve,” I said, my voice cracking. “What did
they do to you?”

It hadn’t occurred to me until now that
something else, other than being sacrificed to an infected, could
have happened to Evelyn.

“Other than having to endure mass at gunpoint
and terrible singing?” she joked, attempting a smile. But like her
words, her forced happy expression fell flat.

Her false smile fell away and she sighed,
giving my hand a squeeze. “I thought you were dead, Lei,” she
admitted in a small voice. “And there was nothing I could do. And
all of this…” She shrugged and looked away, her eyes scanning the
forest. “This would all be for nothing then.”

I felt a prickly sharp sensation in my chest,
not unlike pain, but at the same time the feeling went deeper than
any sort of physical pain could.

“I’m not your responsibility,” I told her
gently, rising emotion causing my eyes to fill. “And you’re not
mine. We’re in this together, Eve, because without you, all this
would still be for nothing.”

“Seems sturdy enough,” Alex called out,
drawing our attention up into the tree. Standing on the platform,
Alex peered down at the two of us and kicked at the rope ladder.
“Welcome to Hotel de la Zombie.”

My eyes widened with surprise. Had Alex just
made a joke? Emotionally spent, half delirious from exhaustion and
physical exertion, I couldn’t stifle the giggle that slipped past
my lips.

“Ooh,” Evelyn cooed, nudging me with her
shoulder. “Mr. Strong, Silent, and Sexy has jokes.”

My eyes widened in her direction, my giggle
falling away as my mouth fell open. “Sexy?” I whispered, frowning.
“You think Alex is sexy?”

She lifted one shoulder, letting it fall, a
halfhearted shrug. “Sure, if you like pretty boys who are
constantly brooding and moody.”

I stared after her, wondering how she could
go from nearly crying to making jokes so quickly. She grabbed the
frayed end of the rope ladder, and I watched as she deftly swung
herself up, taking her only moments to climb to the top.

“Mints on the pillows, Lei,” she said in a
singsong voice. “Very ritzy!”

Blinking and feeling strangely like crying, I
shook my head and took a step forward. Pain shot up through my feet
and into my calves, causing me to wince, and I found myself moving
faster, despite my pain. After all, the sooner I got myself up
there, the sooner I could sleep; and the sooner I slept, the faster
I would heal.

As for the rest of it—what I’d done back in
Fredericksville, my close encounter with becoming an infected’s
dinner, Evelyn’s strange shift in moods, and the human deaths that
were quickly piling up at our feet, either by my own hand or
because of me. Well, I’d deal with it all later. Or never.
Whichever seemed easiest.

• • •

A cold breeze swept over me, waking me and causing
a wave of goose bumps to pebble my skin. Along with it came the
delicious aroma of cooking meat. Turning on my back, I stretched
languidly, wincing as pain in both my wrists and ribs flared to
life. My head hurt as well, a dull pounding that only grew, drawing
me further out of sleep and into full consciousness.

Opening my eyes, expecting to see a brightly
lit forest, I blinked in surprise. The sun was nearly gone, only
slivers of the fading light peeking through the heavy canopy of
branches and foliage. Alex was seated across from where Evelyn and
I lay beside each other, his legs crisscrossed in the small space
allotted him. In front of him was what looked to be a large coffee
can, and inside it a rather impressive fire was raging.

“Squirrel,” he said, lifting a small dark
shape out of the flames. On a stick, the ends whittled to a sharp
point, was speared the small body of a skinned and thoroughly
cooked squirrel. My stomach growled again, this time louder,
catching Alex’s attention and drawing out a smile.

Groaning, I pushed myself upright, trying to
ignore my body’s protests. I was sore everywhere, more so than
before. Everything that had happened over the last day or so—the
beating I’d taken from Lawrence, the stress, the blow to the back
of my head, the fight with the infected, our long trek on foot into
the middle of nowhere—it had all caught up to me.

To make matters worse, I smelled awful, the
most predominant odor being the urine coating my pants. Despite
having dried, the urine had developed a bitter stench, as well as
left the material stiff. Shifting uncomfortably, I folded my legs
beneath me and hoped Alex couldn’t smell me.

“How?” I whispered, so I wouldn’t wake
Evelyn.

He shrugged. “Found this can and some snare
wire on another platform. Set a few traps and got lucky.”

“Wow,” I breathed out, significantly
impressed. Give me a coffee can and some wire and I could have
possibly potted a plant. Catching squirrels never would have
occurred to me.

“Eat up,” he said, holding out the squirrel
kabob in offering. “Plenty more where that came from.” He gestured
to a small pile of squirrels beside him. I counted three more
little bodies, already skinned, and all appearing to have had their
necks broken.

“Thank you,” I said, taking the food, my
chest near bursting with gratitude toward this man and all of his
unexpected kindness. “Thank you for everything.”

Alex’s eyes shifted upward, and he loudly
cleared his throat. “There’s a creek nearby,” he said, sounding
suddenly uncomfortable. “Decent place to wash up in the
morning.”

He was purposely changing the subject,
obviously uncomfortable with my gratitude. I didn’t understand it,
but neither did I push it. Instead, I blew on my hot meal, simply
grateful to have one, grateful that my very best friend was alive
and safe and sleeping beside me, and forever grateful to the man
seated across from me who’d made all this possible.

We ate in silence, the only sounds from
our continuous chewing, the bird calls from the hidden life within
the depths of the forest, and Evelyn’s soft and peaceful snoring.
Then, when my belly was full and exhaustion once again crept up on
me, I lay back down beside Evelyn on the hard and uneven wood
planks and closed my eyes. Only this time, before sleep could
overtake me, I felt a light touch against my fingertips. Jerking, I
opened my eyes to find Alex had moved closer to me, his hand barely
touching me.