Shadows (Ashes Trilogy 2)

Tom, I’m trying, but what am I fighting for? Staying alive just to stay alive isn’t enough.

She felt a sudden, irrational urge to laugh. God, she was worrying about the meaning of life when she was probably going to wind up minced into sushi.

“Hey.” She looked up to find Sharon, the ex-biker queen, eyeing her. The woman clutched an MRE meal pack in one hand and was busy forking in cheesy noodles. “You all right?” Sharon asked, through a gluey mouthful of half-chewed pasta.

Sharon didn’t sound all that concerned, really. Probably hoping I keel over and then it’s just that much more food for her. That snotyellow goo on Sharon’s chin wasn’t doing wonders for Alex’s stomach either. The others were similarly stuffing their faces, and the listless, vacant looks they turned on her were incurious at best.

“Yeah.” Smearing away the wet with the backs of her hands, she pulled in a tremulous breath. She’d be damned if she cried in front of these people. Not one had offered to help her. No, all they were interested in was filling their bellies. “The shoulder just hurts, that’s all.”

“Hunh. Well, you know the old saying.” Sharon chewed, swallowed, used the heel of one hand to swab her chin.

“Which one?” Sharon seemed to be a font of meaningless homilies, and Alex really wasn’t interested. God, how can they eat after what they’ve seen? Maybe I’ll end up the same way—if I live long enough, that is. It’s like being afraid. How long can horror really last before you just numb out? “No pain, no gain? It’s always darkest before the dawn?”

“Naw.” Sharon sucked her hand clean. “No matter how bad you think things are now?” She forked up another mouthful of wormy noodles. “They can always get worse.”

They stayed put overnight that first Saturday, a delay she later learned was unusual. By twilight, the Changed normally moved on. Privately, Alex suspected that beating the crap out of Spider had something to do with the layover.

On Sunday, at dusk, they all set out again. The dense cloud cover choking the sky that afternoon hadn’t broken, and the night was black as pitch. With no stars, she could only guess at a bearing but thought they were still heading north or northwest.

Another thing: the Changed often used flashlights and lanterns, but only intermittently. While Alex and the others struggled and stumbled, the Changed were shadows, moving with relative ease through the forest. Like panthers, she thought, or wolves. She knew from high school bio that the eyes of nocturnal animals were different, though she couldn’t recall exactly how. This ability begged another question, too: were the Changed done Changing?

All told—going by Ellie’s Mickey Mouse watch—they walked until three Monday morning and managed maybe six miles before putting in at another campsite. No shelter this time around. Acne and Slash lashed them to each other and then a trio of stout oaks before heading out to hunt. Again clad in his wolf skin, Wolf led the pack. Only Spider stayed behind, huddled over a fire, while they burrowed into the snow and waited.

When the Changed returned at first light, they brought fresh faces: a doughy woman and a bluff man shaped like a fireplug who said, later, that his name was Otis. The woman was Claire, but it was Otis who told them her name. Not five minutes after the Changed returned, Wolf went to work with his teeth and then Claire was way past caring about little niceties like an introduction.

On Wednesday, Day 5, she thought she was done. By then, Spider had recovered enough to do the honors. Prowling through their number, she favored Alex with a good long stare. Spider’s hatred was so palpable you didn’t need spideysense to see it. Where the others withered at the slightest eye contact, however, Alex wouldn’t let herself waver. In fact, she rather enjoyed the view. Spider’s face was a mess. No perky little nose now, and all that good orthodontia gone to hell. Spider’s bruises were turning a sickly greenish-black. Her left cheek was so badly swollen that her eye was only a silver slit.

When they cut me loose, go for it. Alex tensed, rehearsing the moves in her mind. Run at her, get in under the knife, and . . .

In the next instant, that nip of resin stung her nose, and she thought, Uh oh. Her eyes inched left, and then her pulse skipped.

Wolf ’s face was a studied blank, though she saw the small muscles of his jaw twitch and that scar dance. The space around and above her head seemed to fizzle and spark. The air took on a scorched stink, like the lingering of ozone after an electrical storm. Spider’s back stiffened as the other Changed’s heads swiveled from her to Wolf and then back again.

Fighting about which one was going to have her, she thought. One way or the other, I’m done. The tang of desperation left her mouth puckery and parched. Having seen what Wolf could do— what he enjoyed—she didn’t see how she could get out of this. It was one thing to head-butt Spider and grab a knife. But those clashing jaws . . .

He’s heavier and I can’t outrun them. They’ll pin me down and then Wolf will . . .

All of a sudden, Spider faltered. A deep tremor rippled through the girl’s body, and her ruined lips twisted as that chemical nip— fear and rage combined—filled the air. Recoiling, the girl backpedaled several quick steps, then spun in a snap of wolf fur, marching down the line to stop in front of poor Otis.

My God. If she hadn’t just seen this, she wouldn’t have believed it. Wolf let me live. Wolf fought Spider, got her to back off. This, she figured, might not work out so well in the end, and for all sorts of reasons. Spider already hated her guts. And right backatcha, girlfriend. But Alex didn’t understand. Why was Wolf keeping her alive? Just so he could be the one to end her? Terrific. This might not be any more complicated than what you did with an ice-cream sundae. She didn’t know a single kid who didn’t save that cherry for last.

So how much longer did she really have?

Day 6: Thursday. A little before four that morning, Brian—the one Alex had pegged as the diabetic—collapsed. After all those miles struggling through deep snow, his feet were black with a creeping gangrene that macerated his flesh up to his knees and poisoned his blood. He was so out of it Alex thought he didn’t really catch on until, maybe, the third or fourth cut.

Then Brian began to scream. Ten seconds. Maybe twenty. Clearly tired of the fuss, Spider drew a vicious, backhanded slice. All of a sudden, Brian’s shrieks cut out as a drippy red smile stretched across his neck.

And then Brian’s head unhinged. Just opened up and flopped so far back that his startled eyes locked on Alex upside down. Chin on top, eyes on bottom, the back of his head resting between his shoulders as his blood spurted in twin red ropes. At the sight, her mind slewed and she thought, crazily, Just like that android in Alien.