Fear the Dead (Book 3) Read Free Page B

straight past Justin. It ignored an easy target and focused on
me, its black eyes staring at my face, the red flecks swimming in the whites.
It staggered across the bedroom.
     
    I held my
knife, counted my breaths. When it was close enough to lurch at me I
sidestepped and let it go straight past.  Then I span round and stabbed my
knife into the back of its head, breaking through the bone and piercing the
brain. It fell to the floor with a thud.
     
    Justin sat
on the end of the bed. His chest rose up and down as he struggled for breath.
His face was paler than usual.
     
    “Okay?” I
asked.
     
    He nodded. I
didn’t know why I’d even asked, of course he was okay. Justin wasn’t the one in
danger. For some reason it had completely ignored him and had chosen me. I bent
over and caught my breath. My heart thudded in my chest and my fingers shook,
so I squeezed them around the knife.

 
    3
     
    The day
slipped and the black of night closed on the sky like a casket lid. The
darkness folded on the fields and made them a featureless black plain. The
stalkers would be out soon, but the saving grace of this farmhouse was its
complete isolation. The wind rattled at the single-pane windows, tapping like a
visitor asking to come in.
     
    I found
Alice in the third bedroom. Ben lay in the bed, his eyes shut, and Alice tucked
him in. The bed sagged underneath her weight. I felt a pang in my stomach when
I saw the boy. His pale skin and sweaty forehead, his chest rising up and down
with irregular breaths. I’d pushed them to this. I’d made the kid walk much
longer than his little body could carry him, and now he was paying for it.
     
    The
floorboards creaked underneath me, and Alice span round. Her face creased into
a frown.
     
    “I’m sorry,”
I said.
     
    She looked
past me as though she didn’t hear me. Then she shook her head, snapped out of
it. “What?”
     
    I took a
step forward, felt the floorboards bend under my boots. “I didn’t mean to push
him so hard. I just can’t shake this feeling that the wave is going to catch up
to us.”
     
    Alice
nodded. “Come here,” she said, and patted the bed next to her.
     
    I walked
over, sat down. I looked at her and felt awkward. She grabbed my hand and put
it on Ben’s forehead. His skin felt like ice.
     
    “He’s
freezing.”
     
    “Yep.
Doesn’t stop him sweating though.”
     
    I swallowed.
“What’s actually wrong with him?”
     
    “His immune
system’s shot from exhaustion, and he’s caught a bug. Kids aren’t meant to hike
hundreds of miles through rain and snow.”
     
    I looked
down at the floor. The timber of the floor was scuffed, and splinters stuck out
from it. This wasn’t a welcoming home.
     
    I turned to
Alice. “Would you rather we take our chances with the wave?”
     
    Alice pulled
the covers over Ben’s neck and up to his cheeks. “I’d rather leave you guys
than put him in danger again. You’re driving us too hard. When Ben’s better, we're
going.”
     
    ***
     
    Lou was
taking inventory in the kitchen. There was a dining table in the centre of the
room, and Lou had laid out anything she thought would be useful. Various knives
used for cooking, a few pans for boiling water. Lighters. Water bottles. Plenty
of utensils. It was handy stuff, but not what we needed.
     
    “No food?” I
asked.
     
    She picked
up a knife, held the blade close to her face.
     
    “Blunt as
hell,” she said, and dropped it to the table. She turned to me. “No food, aside
from the vegetables from earlier. We could make a stew if we had spare water,
but I think we’re better just eating them raw.”
     
    “Sure. I’ll
leave that to you.”
     
    I pulled a
chair from underneath the table and sank into it. The faint whispers of Justin
and Melissa drifted in from the living room. Outside, the wind moaned. On
ground level, the darkness of the fields outside looked even more foreboding. I
expected a stalker to be slinking through the grass, sniffing