My eyes scanned the area taking in the broom plants, no longer bright with yellow flowers but covered in seed pods, the distant cry of the ocean gulls and a figure of a man, half in, half out of the shadows. He stood about ten feet away with his gun pointed at me. The rough army clothes, the grizzled cigar hanging out of his down-turned mouth and the body covered in ammo. Dan.
The skin around my mouth was stretched into a grin I couldn’t repress. “Dan!” I said, waving my arm. “It’s me, Mara.”
He didn’t lower the gun but I stood up anyway, confident he wouldn’t shoot me. A crack, a puff of dust and a spray of pebbles all over me stopped my forward momentum.
“Dan. Please don’t shoot me,” I said, my voice cracking. “Remember I made you cookies?”
“They were burnt,” he said.
“I’d never used a wood stove for cooking Dan. I explained that when I brought them to you.” I kept my hands at my sides, not moving an inch. I had a feeling that if I did anything rash or tried to dive for cover, he would open fire on me.
“Dan, why are you shooting at me?”
“I’m not shooting at you. I’m shooting at them,” he said, gesturing with his gun behind me. Turning slowly I spun until I could see what exactly was behind us.
The pack had crept up, silent in their hunting techniques. At first I wondered at why they held back and then I saw them eyeing Dan. They seemed to understand what the gun meant, what it could do. My heart began to race as I counted the pack. There were twenty one Nevermores and instead of an Alpha male, they seemed to be following the lead of one of the females.
My breath caught in my throat at her dishevelled appearance, the beautiful Caribbean eyes gone under the Nevermore drug’s influence. Her body had hardened, no longer the soft teenager I’d met when we’d first moved to Fanny Bay.
Jessica snarled; I stepped forward. Sebastian was between us and I wasn’t about to let her have him.
“Woman, you can’t take the whole pack on,” Dan said.
“They can’t have Sebastian,” I replied, my mind trying to come up with a solution that would get us all out of here alive.
Sebastian, hearing his name perhaps, pulled himself up to the top of the ditch. Jessica snarled again, her body leaning towards us, and the pack shifted with her, their bodies pressing forward in a mass of yellow skin and hunger filled faces.
Sebastian’s eyes were hazy and I could see that he was sliding back under another round of with the fever. Crap.
“Sebastian. I need you to come to me,” I said, my voice low.
The pack started forward and Dan shot at them but didn’t hit any of them.
“Dan…” I started to say.
“If I shoot any of them they will attack. They’re protective of each other,” Dan said.
I nodded. Of course they were. Look at what Scout had done for us.
Sebastian started to crawl towards me, his movements slow and laboured. Jessica, and another female I didn’t recognize from the original pack, lunged forward.
I did the only thing I could think of. I jumped towards them, mimicking their movements, startling them both with my scream.
I landed next to Sebastian and yanked him to his feet, no longer trying to be careful—just trying to keep him from being eaten.
Jessica saw him clearly, perhaps for the first time, and I saw the recognition flicker over her face. She grimaced, sniffed the air and then a smile spread over her thin lips. This was not going to be good.
9
Dragging Sebastian with me, we half stumbled, half ran towards Dan. Our jerky movements set the pack off and they clamoured through the ditch and were after us in less time than it took to breathe out a curse.
Dan shoved us on ahead of him while he kept the pack at bay with well aimed shots at the ground.
“Up the driveway on your left woman,” Dan yelled; I didn’t dispute his directions, just turned to the left and pulled Sebastian along with me.
We ran as best we could, the trees hanging low over us creating a natural archway. The birds were singing once more, as if this was now just a part of everyday life. Breathing hard, Sebastian and I barely made it to the top of the driveway. There were two options: the house, which had been partially burned down—the thick smell of char still lingered in the air—and the barn.
“The barn woman, get to the damn barn!” Dan yelled, and again I obeyed.
We crashed through the large outer door. Dan followed and slammed a large bar into place, locking us in and the pack out. From there he hustled us up a ladder into the loft. The ladder was the hardest for Sebastian. The whole barn was on a weird slant and the ladder was no different. Instead of being straight up and down it leaned towards us at a sharp angle, forcing Sebastian to use his hands to grip the rungs. Although his hands had gotten better as his fine motor skills improved, it was still hard for him to hang on to the thin rungs…Not to mention he seemed light headed with fever, and swayed at each step.
“Up, get up there!” Dan continued to bark orders at us.
“Going as fast as we can,” I said through gritted teeth.
The door of the barn groaned as Sebastian pulled himself into the loft and I looked down to see the pack burst through the old wooden slats as if they were made of popcorn, bits and pieces flying every which way.
“Move your ass woman!”
This time I didn’t sass him. I scrambled up the last few rungs and found myself in a haze of gold. The light streamed through the cracks in the roof, and the piles of old straw and hay—even the specks of dust floating through the air—seemed to glow golden. There was Sebastian, laying in a pile of hay, fitting right in, his skin still a dusky yellow even though the color had faded quite a bit. I shook my head and turned to find Dan taking in the same scene, his gun slowly lifting.
I put myself between the two men. “He’s not one of them Dan. Not anymore.” The sounds of the Nevermores trashing the barn below made it so I nearly had to shout to be heard.
“He looks enough like them for me to shoot him and not feel bad,” he said around the stub of his cigar. “Now help me pull up the ladder.”
We yanked and pulled, freeing the ladder and laying it out on the floor. That should be enough to keep the pack away from us.
“You should put that out while we’re here,” I said, motioning at the smoking cigar.
He grunted, spit on the floor and shook his head. “There is no cure, so how can he not be one of them?”
I quickly filled Dan in on what had been happening to us, Vincent, Donavan and the possibility of a cure. I pulled the vial out of my bra and showed it to him.
“This could change things Dan. This could bring people back.”
“Might. Might not.” He sat down on a bale of hay and leaned back against the wall.
“What do you mean? You weren’t there; look at Sebastian, he’s getting better,” I said. Something crashed below us and I tried to see through the cracks in the floor, but other than the hint of movement, I couldn’t see anything.
“Well, I don’t think he’s getting better. I’m inclined to believe in his current state he’s more likely to die than get up and shake my hand.” Dan’s words crashed in my brain, causing a complete malfunction of all thought processes.
In lurches and fits, I started to look at Sebastian’s condition as an outsider would. Sure, he might be showing signs of humanity, but everything else was falling apart. Fever, loss of muscle control, balance issues, sleeping whenever he could, erratic heart rhythms. Even now he lay on a bundle of straw and hay, his chest heaving for a few moments and then falling silent before picking up again.
I tightened my jaw. “No, he’s going to make it. I won’t let him die.”
Dan tapped his nose with a thick finger. “You might not get a choice woman. He might just die on you.”
The back of my throat was tight, but it was hard to be mad at Dan. I’d thought the very same things myself, but didn’t dare voice them. I didn’t want Sebastian to think I’d given up.
In desperation, I changed topics. “How long do you think we’ll be stuck up here?”
Dan shrugged. “Most likely overnight, the Nevermores seem to sleep right at dawn so we should be able to get out of here then.”
He stood and went over to a large tack trunk, flipped a horseshoe off the lid and opened it up. Inside was a variety of foodstuffs, several blankets, two milk jugs full of water and a pile of ammo.
“Did you put this all in here?” I asked, reaching in for a package of beef jerky, my mouth watering at the thought of salty meat.
“Got caught out hunting this way twice. So, I decided to set up some safe houses. Enough food here for a day or so,” he said, taking a swig of water before handing the jug to me. I drank down the tepid, slightly bleachy water. I turned and tried to pour a small amount into Sebastian’s mouth. He coughed and spit but it didn’t look like anything went down.
I put the jug on the floor and shook Bastian. “Come on babe. I need you to wake up. You need to drink.”
He let out a growl in his sleep, his lips pulling back over his teeth. I stared at him, my heart aching for what he was going through, for the simple fact he might not pull out of it.
Dan reached and took the jug back, had another swig, and then capped it. “Might as well settle down for the night. They aren’t leaving anytime soon.” He pointed downstairs and I nodded. Then he pulled a length of rope out of the box and started towards Sebastian.
“What are you doing?” I asked, standing up between the two men.
“You don’t know he’s cured woman. The last thing I want is to wake up with the big boy on top of one of us, having a midnight snack.” He shoved past me and set to tying Sebastian’s hands. A few knots later, Bastian was tied to one of the beams, his hands clasped as if in prayer. Through the whole thing he hadn’t stirred once. I didn’t try and stop Dan; he needed to feel safe, and I had to admit, he could be right. Sebastian could very well revert.
The daylight began to fade and the golden haze that filled the barn slowly dissipated. I lay beside Sebastian, staring at the cracks in the roof, the distant twinkling of stars caught here and there. Dan was snoring within minutes of closing his eyes and the Nevermores below us seemed to have calmed down. I took in a deep breath, the tang of ocean, the distinct smell of the old hay and dust vying for my senses. I ran a hand over my face, my thoughts too tangled to sleep.
I sat up, hay poking at me through my clothes, and pulled the vial out of my bra. This one little jar could save the world from this madness we plunged ourselves into. Was I really so naive as to believe that it really was a cure?
Sebastian lay on his side, his breathing irregular. I ran my fingers through his lovely dark hair and for a moment I let myself believe it would be okay. That we would make it out of here, to the mainland.
Shaking those unrealistic thoughts away, I let myself see the true reality of our situation for the first time. We would have to cross the Georgia Strait, somehow navigate our way close to the airport, and then go overland to get there. The sheer number of people surrounding, and within, Vancouver would mean that the Nevermore population would be massive, nothing like our single pack here in Fanny Bay, or the few packs in Nanaimo.
No, Vancouver would be a bloody death trap. But, I had to try. I had to be able to say that we’d done our best; we’d made all the effort we could.
Tears trickled down my face at the enormity of the task ahead of me because, who was I kidding, in Sebastian’s current condition he was just along for the ride.
I lay back down and stared up at the sky again. Sleep didn’t take me that night, despite my desire to escape the waking world, if even for only a few hours.
So I lay there, thinking of all the obstacles, the challenges and the impossibilities until my mind was numb and I stared in a blank haze at the night sky.
Just before dawn, when I could see the miniscule light change within the barn and the morning birds began to sing in the trees next to the barn, the Nevermores began to jabber at one another. Grunting and snarling. A low growl here and there. I rolled onto my side and peeked down between the floor slats to see the pack split into three groups, each group positioned against one of the support columns that held the loft up.
“Oh shit.” I leapt to my feet. “Dan, up, we’ve got problems.”
The barn swayed underneath us and Dan let out a curse as he rolled out of bed, hay in his hair.
“Wondered when we were going to get to this point.” He strode over to Sebastian and sliced through the ropes with his knife.
I crouched on the floor, nothing to hold on to, my body swaying with the rocking of the building. “What do you mean?”
“They seem to be getting smarter. Figuring things out,” he said, as he loaded his gun and shimmied towards me.
The barn groaned and the loft slipped sideways as one support beam went out, sending us all to one corner of the rickety old building. Sebastian sprawled out, limbs flopping as if lifeless.
I grabbed at his arm and felt the smallest flutter of a heartbeat under my fingertips, just as another column gave way, smashing the loft into the trees that grew beside the barn, slowing our fall. The floor of the loft slipped further towards the ground, but it was still held up on one end by the remaining column. It groaned as the pack pushed it and, finally giving way, the loft collapsed down with it.
I think I screamed, but the noise of the building coming down around us muffled any noises coming out of our mouths. Dust flew up everywhere and boards smacked me all over. I curled around my stomach, protecting the baby as best I could. I tumbled, but not as far as I thought I should have, landing against some loose bales of hay. There was a sharp sting across my back and warmth trickled down my side.
The silence was the first thing I noticed. I thought the Nevermores would have been on us in a flash. But the silence held, and then a few groans. From underneath us. I looked around to see Sebastian curled in a tight ball and let out a sigh of relief when his chest rose and fell in a decent rhythm.
“Stupid bastards pulled the damn barn down right on top of their own heads,” Dan grumbled, as he pulled himself up out of a pile of boards and debris. He had a gash over one eye, blood trickling down his face, and his right arm was hanging limply. That was going to make it difficult for him to shoot to say the least. Crap.