Donners of the Dead

Chapter Thirteen

I was back at River Bend, sleeping in Uncle Pat’s hayloft. It was dark outside—dark as sin, and the sound of crickets filled the air.

I slowly got to my feet and breathed in the familiar smell of hay and wood and manure. It felt good to be back, as if I’d never gone anywhere, as if it had all been a realistic dream about blood, snow and a man.

Monsters.

I was about to head down the ladder when a strange sound caught my attention.

I walked to the edge of the hayloft and looked over the edge.

All the animals in the pens were gone. The house was completely black. My mother stood with her back to me in the middle of the paddock, muttering the same phrase over and over again.

She was speaking!

I tried to call after her but my throat froze, keeping my voice inside. Now I was the mute one.

I found my way through the dark, climbing down the ladder, and stealthily made my way towards my mother. I didn’t want to scare her, and yet something deep inside told me to approach with caution. Perhaps it was the strange, sour smell that was growing more pungent by the moment.

When I was close to her I finally began to make out what she was saying.

“You need to find it,” she whispered. “What’s out there.”

“You need to go. You need to find it. What’s out there.”

“What’s out there.”

“What’s out there.”

She kept repeating this over and over again in ragged little whispers.

Finally I found my voice.

“What’s out there?” I asked.

My mother stiffened and fell silent. The straps of her bonnet blew in the breeze. I stared at her back then down at her hands. They were paler than snow and dripping with blood.

“Mother?”

“You know what’s out there.”

I shook my head, wanting to reach out for her but being too afraid. That horrible aroma was growing stronger and there was something so terribly wrong about all of this.

I eyed the dark house. “Where is Uncle Pat?”

“They’re all gone.”

“Where did they go?”

“They were consumed.”

I nervously wrung my hands together. I’d lost all feeling in them. “They got consumption?” I asked carefully.

She shook her head. “No,” she said.

She turned around to face me. Her eyes were blue and blank, her skin pale grey. Blood was smeared around her mouth. “I consumed them.”

She smiled, and instead of having teeth, there was a row of gleaming eyeballs like bulging white grapes.

I woke up with a jerk and had to gasp for my breath. It was dusk, with only a faint, grainy light before me. I heard a faint dripping sound and Jake’s steady breathing, and had to take a few moments to bring myself back to the present.

It was a shame the present wasn’t much better than my dream had been.

I rolled onto my back, feeling the ache throughout my body and stared up at the ceiling. We could have only been sleeping for about an hour since there was a bit of natural light left. As scary as the dream was, I felt sleep pulling me back under, my body and mind aching for solitude. I could only hope that I would find it in a dreamless state.

I was in a half-asleep limbo when I smelled it. I couldn’t figure out whether the odor was in my dreams or in real life, but from the way my skin prickled with gooseflesh, the way the hairs stood up and my chest felt full of ice, I knew to trust my body. It knew the difference between the dangers that were real and the dangers that weren’t.

The danger was real.

I swallowed hard and gently nudged Jake. He awoke quickly but fell silent the moment he breathed in. He could smell it too.

We looked at each other, our eyes shining in the waning light. He slowly sat up and reached for the axe that was beside him. I went for the rifle that was nearby, my fingers grasping the cold steel. We got up to a crouch and then waited.

At first there was only the smell, slowly growing stronger until my eyes watered and it was painful to breathe it in.

Then came the sounds.

Scratching on the walls of the cabin. A shadow passing by the window.

Faint snarls, conjuring images in my head of wet saliva and sharp teeth bared by pulled back lips.

The thin line between man and animal.

I started to shake with fear, the rifle jangling in my hands. Jake put his hand on my arm and gave it a comforting squeeze. His eyes told me everything was going to be all right.

His eyes were lying.

We were surrounded by the living dead—how ever could we be all right?

We waited. It felt like forever.

The scratching continued, nails being run up and down the cabin walls. I wondered why on earth they were doing that, why they didn’t just come in and take us. Were they trying to frighten us? Were they too weak, gone too long without human meat, and this was the best they could do?

It was driving me mad. The scratching, those depraved moans and snaps from drooling mouths. Jake and I were trapped, completely surrounded, and we never knew when they were going to attack.

Then finally something happened.

The door to the cabin slowly swung open. We couldn’t see who or what had opened it. There was a thump.

A pale, spindly arm reached through the open door, long clawlike nails dragging on the dirt floor.

I gasped as another arm followed suit. Together they pulled along the ground until a torso came into view. It carried the face of death—hollow cheeks, pronounced bones stretched across wrinkled skin, thinning white hair, and frozen eyes. It turned its head, staring blankly at us. It opened its mouth to show just a few teeth and let out a terrible cry that went straight through me like a slick blade.

I raised the rifle at it and took aim.

“Blow its head off,” Jake said gruffly.

I pulled the trigger.

The bullet shot out in a black puff, the force rocking me back, but I had prepared for it this time. It struck the monster right in the head, and at that close range, it practically turned his brains into mud—red mud that splattered on the walls behind us and plopped down onto the floor.

“Nice shot,” Jake commented, one brow cocked. “I knew you were a natural.”

I smiled uneasily but there was no time to take pride in it. Though the scratching and moans stopped momentarily after the gunshot, they quickly started up again, louder this time and more menacing.

I looked at Jake, wishing I had more courage. “I have a feeling that the others won’t be so easy.”

“Well they obviously know we’re in here. What do you want to do? I don’t reckon we can hide in here forever. Something’s got to give. I’ve been in enough standoffs to know that.” He took the rifle from me and quickly began to reload the muzzle.

My body felt numb with fear. I wanted to close my eyes and wish the situation away. I wanted to be anywhere else but in this cabin, surrounded by creatures who wanted a taste of my flesh for their own attempt at immortality. I thought about Isaac and wondered if it had been worth it. If it had been worth it to kill Tim and eat him in hopes of living forever. It hadn’t worked for him—he hadn’t eaten enough of the stew to become fully monstrous even though he had been a monster to begin with. I wondered about the beasts outside, if they had all turned because they wanted a chance of survival, or if they were like Hank and Isaac and wanted a chance of being something more than human. Something completely inhuman.

He handed the rifle back to me then brought out the revolver from his holster, the axe in his other hand. We were a poorly armed ragtag team, but if the rest of the monsters were as decrepit as the last one, if there weren’t that many of them, then maybe we had a chance in hell.

I made a move toward the door when Jake stuck his arm out and held me back. He nodded at the fire. “When all else fails, I believe fire will work just as well.”

“I can’t exactly hold a torch around all this gunpowder, can I?”

“That’s why I said, when all else fails.”

I took in a deep breath. If we failed, we failed. There were no other options when you’re dead. Well, unless you wanted to become a monster. I know I certainly didn’t, even if it did mean a way to prolong my life.

All of a sudden the moaning and the scratching stopped. We looked at each other in wonder. I breathed in. The stench was still there, still pungent. There may have been no noise but they were definitely still outside the cabin.

Waiting.

I took in a deep breath, tightened my grip on the rifle, and walked toward the door. I had to know. I had to get this over with.

In unison, Jake and I stepped together into the doorframe, weapons drawn.

The sight took my breath away and replaced it with pure primal fear.

There were over a dozen monsters standing outside the cabin, staggered about, all of them facing us with expressions of hunger and mindless hate. Some were as close as ten feet away, close enough for me to note the glassiness of their eyes, the way their hair was falling out of their heads, the way their bare, blue cold feet shriveled in the snow. Their mouths were open, drooling, with grey tongues lolling around beside black gums.

All of them wanted to eat us.

We didn’t even get to make the first move.

The closest one lurched forward, long, spindly hands clawing for us beneath a snapping mouth.

Jake stepped in front and to the side of me, and with a war cry, swung the axe like a bat. It cleanly sliced the monster’s head right off so that it flew backward into the snow.

There wasn’t a moment to appreciate it. Now the monsters were staggering forward toward us, some faster than others, some looking more human. All were terrifying in their depraved addiction.

I screamed as one lunged for me and pounced at my feet, grabbing hold of my leg and trying to bite it. It felt too dangerous to shoot him without blasting my own leg off so I kicked him in the head with my other boot until he let go, his fingernails digging so deep into my skin that he ripped away the hem of my dress and the bottom of my pants.

Meanwhile, Jake was trying to take on two of them that had leaped for him at the last minute. He lobbed one head off but was tackled to the ground by the other, and in too close to properly swing the axe. I was wondering how risky it was for me to shoot and hope not to hit Jake when he managed to get an arm free and shoved the barrel of the revolver in the monster’s open mouth. He grinned at the beast before he pulled the trigger, and his head exploded in a red rain shower.

The zombie came back for my legs but Jake was able to throw off the decapitated one and get a good swing with the axe, chopping the monster right in half, intestines spilling out like ribbons. Unfortunately, it did nothing to slow the monster down, and it kept on going for my leg with its angry teeth and nails.

Jake reached down and pulled the monster back by its wiry white hair so its wrinkled grey-white throat was exposed. Before I realized what he was doing, he’d brought out the sharp Bowie knife and started slicing through the neck, spilling crimson rivulets of blood.

I looked away from the sight just in time to see another monster coming for us. With shaking hands, I brought the rifle up to my line of sight, but the movement from the monster at my legs was putting me off balance. If I missed, it would take time to reload and we may not even have the chance to.

The monster was right at us, its dead, leering eyes fixated on Jake. Just as it was about to reach him, Jake finished slicing through the other monster’s head. He turned and threw the knife at the attacker, getting him right through the eye where it remained lodged. I was free to move, and it gave Jake enough time to get back and swing the axe. This time the axe went right down the middle, splitting the head and brain into two neat halves.

We watched, our breaths in our throats, before the monster fell to the side, dead.

All victories were short-lived. The monsters kept coming, still about a dozen of them. Jake did what he could with the axe and I tried to save my shot for when it really counted. After he beheaded three more and still more came after us, he threw a crazed look back to the cabin.

“I can’t keep this up,” he said breathlessly. “We need to get my revolver reloaded. There are paper cartridges in the pack inside. If we bar the door, perhaps we can buy some more time before we take the rest of them out.”

He didn’t need to tell me twice. We turned back into the cabin and slammed the door behind us. There wasn’t much in the cabin to prop against it, but Jake ripped up a loose wooden plank and stuck it between the handle.

As soon as he did that, the door began to shake and blue fingers appeared under the door, wiggling at us, taunting us. It was only a matter of time before they decided to come through the window.

Luckily Jake was fast. He loaded up all the chambers of the revolver and then spun it around. He kissed it quickly and gave me a shy look. “It may not take someone’s head off but it’ll help. The Texas Navy made this gun. They’ll never let you down.”

“There’s no time to rhapsodize about your gun!” I admonished.

“Even after last night?” Jake asked with a wag of his brows.

I narrowed my eyes.

“Pine Nut,” he said quickly, “nothing wrong with a little joke before victory.”

“You better be certain about that,” I said just as the glass on the window shattered with a monster trying wildly to climb in.

Jake took aim and shot the monster in the head. The bullet barely did anything but it was enough to get him to pull back. Unfortunately, he was replaced by another monster.

At the same time the boards on the broken window—the one the first monster had crashed through all those nights ago—began to groan and splinter from the deathly hands pulling from the other side.

It was followed by a clunk above us and the frantic sound of the roof being ripped apart. They were mad and through with waiting—they were coming in.

It happened all at once. The door broke down, the windows were busted through, and a jagged hole appeared in the ceiling above us, two blue eyes peering down at us with hunger. We staggered backward toward the far wall and Jake started swinging.

I really thought he was going to kill them all. Despite his injury, he swung that axe like a god, his muscles great and straining, his strength seeming to be too large for the cabin to contain. He managed to decapitate nearly all of them, their heads and lifeless corpses scattered about.

He almost made it.

But it just wasn’t enough.

The monster from the ceiling dropped onto his back just as the two others went for his legs. He fell to the floor, collapsed under the weight, the axe under him and immovable.

“Eve!” Jake screamed. The terror in his eyes was unmistakable as they clawed their way into him. “Leave! Get out of here! Go!”

But I wouldn’t do that. I aimed the rifle at the monsters, trying to get a good shot, but it was nearly impossible.

“Eve, go!” he yelled again, fighting back against them with kicks and punches the best that he could. “Please leave, I can’t keep you safe if you’re here! Go, NOW!”

But I couldn’t.

“You promised me!” he bellowed in anguish.

I took aim at the one on his back, the strongest one, the one doing the most damage.

I pulled the trigger.

The gun blasted with a puff of black smoke.

And I missed. The bullet went flying into the door instead.

I couldn’t believe it.

I missed.

And that was the only shot I had.

Jake was screaming again. I gave him a sad look.

“I am so sorry,” I whispered, unable to process that we were going to lose this battle. I was going to lose him before my very eyes.

“I can’t lose you too!” he cried out as he flipped onto his back and punched the monster in the face. “I won’t lose you. Please go!”

I found strength somewhere deep inside me, coiling around my heart and guts like a steel cage. I could do this. I could save him.

I looked down into the flash pan on the rifle, still full of gunpowder.

I ran over to the fire, picking up a lit log.

“Jake!” I screamed. “Cover yourself.”

Jake figured out what I was going to do. He managed to punch the monster in the face enough so that he was able to crawl away a few feet.

I threw the rifle at the monsters. It landed at their feet. One even picked it up. I couldn’t have asked for better than that.

As the monster stared down the barrel in demented curiosity, I threw the flaming log over at him.

It collided with the rifle.

And everything exploded.

I went flying backward, landing on the ground in a heap. My head spun, wasting precious seconds while I tried to get my bearings. Once I did, I was up on my feet and making my way over to the wreckage.

Two of the monsters were fully engulfed in flames, writhing on the ground, while the other had exploded into charred crisps.

Jake was twitching, face down, his arm on fire.

I screamed and ran over to him, throwing off my cloak and wrapping it around his arm to put out the flames.

He groaned and I knew he was alive.

“I take it all back,” he said, his voice cracking in agony.

“Take what back? Jake, Jake are you going to be okay? Oh God.”

He tried to sit up, his eyelids fluttering. “I take it back, that you’re a good shot. You’re lousy. And you’re right stupid. You should have run.”

“I’d never leave you,” I told him, trying to get him to his feet.

“Don’t let that be your downfall,” he said.

“Can you get up?” I asked, still holding the cloak around his arm. The fire was out, but now I was afraid to look at the damage underneath.

He nodded and got up, clearly in pain. “I do think we need to get out of here. There’s no telling if this was all of them.”

“I sure hope it was.”

“I never saw Hank,” he remarked grimly.

I swallowed hard. “Neither did I.”

We exchanged a heavy look. It wasn’t over yet. We had no choice but to keep running.

I grabbed the pack and the weapons, and we left the bloody, smoldering massacre behind.