FOUR YEARS AGO

THE STRIKE TEAMS HIT AGAIN and again and again.

Brother Mercy discovered that he had a talent for planning these raids. He identified those reapers who were best at scouting, gathering intelligence, and fighting. He hand-picked a few to infiltrate the settlements—going in wearing wigs or hats to hide their tattoos and dressing in the ragged clothes of survivors. They would become part of the community while sending information back to Brother Mercy.

He was still not yet sixteen and was already one of the Night Church’s most effective strike team leaders. Mother Rose mentioned him in her sermons. Brother Peter praised him to the other senior staff. His own reapers bragged that they followed his knife. Saint John told him that he was beloved of Lord Thanatos, all praise to his darkness. It made him feel strong and accepted and useful. But it wasn’t what made him wake up with a smile on his lips. It wasn’t what lifted his heart over and over all day long.

No. That was her.

Sister Sorrow—Leafy—had been assigned to his strike team. He made her his lieutenant, though in truth he shared leadership with her. She was every bit as sharp as he was, and every bit as devious. Together they purified settlement after settlement, sending hundreds of sinners into the darkness.

He was Mercy. She was Sorrow.

He was in no way merciful.

She felt no flicker of sorrow.

They were in love, and the world opened its red mouths to shout in a collective chorus of darkness.

PART TEN THE ROAD HOME

When the world says, “Give up,”Hope whispers, “Try it one more time.”

—ANONYMOUS

40

A CITY SEEMED TO RISE like magic out of the earth, an illusion created by the quad rising to the crest of a rolling hill. And Lilah saw a road splitting off from the main highway that would take them there.

“Hold on,” she yelled, and then made a sharp turn. The wheels skidded with a shriek, but then caught and the machine shot forward. The side road was cracked and filled with weeds, but they were trampled down, the broken stalks pointing back toward the highway. Lilah figured a swarm had come from the direction of the town, which meant—she hoped—that there were no zoms left there. It was a crazy gamble, but she needed to find something to give them an advantage again. The screaming zoms were still following, and a couple of them were actually gaining on them. Maybe the maze of buildings would offer protection or concealment. Anything was better than a losing race on the open road.

Nix clung to Lilah with small, icy hands.

The city was a battered ruin, with many three- and four-story buildings burned to blackened shells long ago, and now choked with dense cloaks of ivy and kudzu. There was a sign that read WELCOME TO, but the rest was gone, scoured away by fifteen years of wind and rain.

Once inside the town, Lilah made a series of random turns, following nameless streets, careful not to cross her own trail for fear of running into the pack of killers. She passed failed barricades and makeshift shelters that were torn open and empty.

“I don’t see them,” said Nix, looking behind them. “I think we—”

Lilah made another turn and then slammed on the brakes. The quad’s wheels screamed in protest, sending plumes of rubber smoke up behind them as the machine and its trailer began to slew sideways.

Ahead of them, filling this new street, were zoms.

Hundreds of them.

They all turned toward the growl and shriek of the quad. Many of them were wrapped head to toe in kudzu, proof they had been standing there for years. As one they opened their mouths, and a great moan of sudden hunger bellowed outward from their dus

ty throats. The dead creatures surged forward, tearing at the vines that held them. Some fell as fragile bones broke from the force of their own effort to move after so long. Others collapsed beneath the mass of the dead behind them.

“Back, back, back,” cried Nix, but Lilah was already trying to reverse her course, to drive in a tight circle the way they’d come. There were so many zoms, though, and they were so close. The front rank was only thirty feet away. Several of them broke free of the weeds and stumbled forward, reaching with leathery hands. Nix had her gun in her hand, her finger curling around the trigger, but she hesitated. There were so many of them, and the runners had to be inside the city already. There wasn’t enough ammunition. Nowhere near enough.

Then the quad bucked and seemed to leap forward; the jolt caused Nix to clutch her hand in surprise, and her finger jerked on the trigger. The gun bucked in her hand, firing a shot that punched through the shoulder of one of the zoms, doing no harm—but worse, the jolt made her lose her grip on the weapon. It fell, bouncing hard enough on the asphalt to kick up sparks, and skittered away.

“My gun!” she cried, but Lilah was already moving too fast.

The quad burned along the blacktop toward the street they’d just turned off, but both girls screeched in horror as they saw the pack of running killers pelting toward them. Lilah jerked the wheel and took the right-hand street, giving the machine all the gas it could take. The mass of vine-covered zoms flooded out into the intersection seconds ahead of the runners. Nix twisted to look back, expecting to see all of them, fast and slow, chasing behind.

But that wasn’t what she saw.

Tags: Jonathan Maberry Benny Imura
Source: readsnovelonline.net