dEaDINBURGH (18 page)

Chapter 22

Alys

“I think we should search the building in the morning, especially those lighted areas.” Alys felt her heart race a little when she mentioned the lights they’d seen. It was like a miracle. Electricity. But one that dripped with threat and confusion rather than wonder.

Joey didn’t answer right away. He was clearly not keen at all on going anywhere near the lit building, having insisted on them holing up for the night to plan their next move and tend to his wounded foot. He was also clearly choosing his words very carefully.

“I have a bad feeling about this place, Alys.” He subconsciously cracked each of his knuckles in sequence as he spoke. “How can they be running a generator? There hasn’t been any usable fuel for years. Why is the place empty of humans and of Ringed? Obviously most of the herd we fought through in Hawkshill Wood came from here. It’s so well-fenced, it’s obviously been set up to keep a large group of people in and any number of Zoms out. So where the hell is everyone?”

Alys shrugged.

“The only way to answer any of those questions is to search the place, Joey.”

He harrumphed to himself and sat in the corner of the tool shed, arms wrapped around bent knees.

Alys mirrored his pose against the opposite wall.

“Look, we came all this way, it’d be insane to leave without seeing what’s here.” Joey rested his head on his lap, avoiding eye contact. She picked up a little stone from the ground at threw it at the top of his head.

“Ow,” he complained, rubbing the spot she’d hit.

Alys ignored his protest and continued.

“Whether Bracha is really here or not, whether there’s really a cure in that building or just dusty old desks, beds and chairs, we’ll only find out by going in there first thing in the morning. Four hours or so, we’ll go slowly, carefully. There’s nothing we can’t handle in that hospital. Look at what we overcame on the way here.”

“Bracha’s more dangerous than any group of Zoms, Alys. You know that.”

“I agree,” she said. “Which is why we’ll take him on together. As a unit. He can’t handle both of us at once, no matter how skilled he is. If we come across him…”

Joey’s eyes went hard suddenly and bored into her. ”We’ll find him. There’s no way I’m leaving here now without finishing it with him.”

Alys swallowed.

“
When
we come across him, you have to trust me to go in and engage him at close-quarters.” She expected an argument but received a curt nod in agreement instead. Alys suppressed a smile and continued. “You hang back and take a position where you can pepper him with arrows every time a clean shot appears. That’s how we play this.”

“Only one problem, Alys.” Joey tipped his empty quiver upside-down, bringing a colourful remark from Alys.

“We either have to go back and retrieve some arrows or risk getting in each other’s way by both engaging him at close quarters,” Alys said. She didn’t look pleased with either option.

“I say we both go in for him. We’re a good enough team,” Joey replied.

“No. We’re not,” Alys said bluntly. “When we play to our strengths and work together, we’re good enough. Your bow and my hand to hand skills are how we work effectively... I’m sorry Joey, but as good as you’ve gotten, you just aren’t good enough to go up against a guy like Bracha. Especially with that foot injury. I’ve trained my whole life and even I’m not one hundred percent certain that I can take this guy alone.”

Joey accepted her assessment despite looking a little miffed. Alys rose to her feet and walked over to where Joey still crouched. Coming down to his eye level, she told him, “Joey, I’m scared of Bracha. I reckon he’d give my mum a run for her money.”

Joey’s eyebrows rose in response. He clearly didn’t think anyone was capable of giving Jennifer much trouble. He was wrong in this instance.

Bracha knew what he was doing; he was lethally clever, infinitely patient and supremely confident in his own skills. With his blades, Bracha used the simplest of weapons. Weapons that meant close-up action, and that he used with finesse. The golfer’s outfit and the silly club-twirling were all just a ridiculous act, contrived to make people underestimate him.

Even his accent was faked, designed to elicit trust in or disdain for him. Anything that would make his target drop their guard. He didn’t fight or kill to survive; he didn’t act to assert supremacy or dominance over individuals. He did it for the sport, to test himself.

Bracha lived for the kill. That he’d killed Jock whilst Joey slept beside him, doing so silently, skilfully enough that he hadn’t woken someone with Joey’s senses, told Alys everything about the man’s motives and his skillset. The act of keeping Joey alive so that he might pursue him to avenge his mentor told Alys that Bracha was an arrogant bastard who treated death like a game. That was his weakness.

Alys stood once more offering Joey her hand. Joey rose, bringing his face closer to hers than he intended. She was still marginally taller than him and looked down at his eyes as he stood less than an inch from her. He looked concerned, but resolved.

“Let’s get some sleep and make our way over to the edge of Hawkshill Wood in the morning. See if we can get you a dozen or so arrows back from where we fought today. With any luck The Ringed will have wandered off, or followed something else away from the ones we silenced.”

A resigned look fell over Joey’s face.

“All right, Alys. Let’s do it your way.”

Ten minutes later they were spooned against the bitter cold.

“Alys? You awake?”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve never told me what happened to your dad. Why did he leave The Gardens with all the other men?”

Alys stayed silent for a few minutes, trying to form an explanation. Finally she told him the truth.

“I’ve no idea. One day he was there, the next he was gone. And he never came back.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault, s’just the way it is. Go to sleep, Joey.”

“If we do find a cure, what can we do with it?” he asked.

Having spent her time focused on getting to the hospital, finding the cure, if it existed, and dealing with Bracha, she hadn’t really considered that outcome.

“I don’t have a bloody clue.” She laughed. “But, it would be a good problem to have, eh?”

Joey pulled himself closer into her back, arm over her side, hand resting on her abdomen. She could feel him smelling her hair.

“Aye, a good problem. G’night, Alys.”

Ten minutes after he’d replied, despite the discomfort of the stone floor and the cold, despite what lay ahead of them, they were both fast asleep.

Curled together in a warm unit they were unaware of the movement of shadows passing across the light breaking through the gap at the bottom of the locked shed door. The round handle turned clockwise then anti-clockwise, without a sound, and then stayed still until morning light sneaked under the door.

Chapter 23

James Kelly

Sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, James swore for perhaps the fifteenth time as he checked his watch once again.
Four a.m.
Despite the thermals he wore and two layers on top, the cold was creeping into his bones, sending nerve pain through the joints of his knees and stiffening his vertebrae. Bracha was two hours later than his message had stated. The sun would rise soon. James would give him another half an hour, then he was leaving.

James stood and began marching to and fro along the trail that had led him to the secluded clearing at the edge of Drum Wood in an effort to get his blood flowing. He’d slipped out from his little bungalow in the cul-de-sac that formed The Exalted’s camp after Somna had retired for the night, deciding that he’d rather not explain his trip unless he had to. Somna wasn’t exactly Bracha’s biggest fan. The meeting place Bracha had selected was far too close to The Exalted’s base for James’ liking, but Bracha’s message had insisted that it was urgent.

When he’d first arrived in the clearing he’d had to deal with a pair of Zoms. One male and one female. He’d crashed the end of his Bo-staff through each of their skulls, not bothering to perform the ritual expected of him by The Exalted’s dogma. The thought of Bracha catching him in the process of performing the ritual was unbearable.

He hadn’t seen Bracha for almost two years and would have preferred to keep it that way, considering the circumstances in which the bushy-haired madman had departed their community. They had been friends at one time, best friends actually, despite Bracha being perhaps the most dangerous killer (after Somna) amongst a community of killers, rapists and lunatics. James owed him his life and as such couldn’t ignore Bracha when he sent word that help was required, no matter the danger to him. If he didn’t appear soon, though, James would have to get back into Drum Woods before there were any questions, or worse, waiting for him.

Suddenly aware that he wasn’t alone, James reached for the Bo-staff he’d left by the fallen tree and spun around to face a grinning Bracha who’d slipped into the clearing.

“Never could sneak up on you, old boy,” Bracha grinned at him.

“Where the hell have you been?”

Bracha cocked an eyebrow.

“I do apologise for my tardiness, James. I’ve had a spot of trouble.”

James looked his former friend over. Taking in the relative stiffness of the movement of his right arm and the missing eye, he smiled and asked, “Finally met someone better with a blade than yourself?”

Bracha raised his nose into the air, giving a derisory snort.

“I hardly think so, James.”

He pointed at his lower and then upper arm.

“This was the result of a teenager from The Gardens’ skilled use of Sai.”

Bracha scanned his face for a reaction before poking a finger at his missing eye, the socket now filled with a brightly-coloured marble painted with a yellow smiling face.

“This, by a teenaged boy from The Brotherhood with a bow.”

This time James did allow his reaction to show.

“One of The Brotherhood? He left The Close and lives on the surface?” His surprise was genuine.

“Oh yes. And he’s quite skilled.” Bracha squeaked a finger across surface of his right-eye-cum-smiley-faced-marble.

Have you visited the city-centre?” James asked.

Bracha gave a non-committal shrug.

“Not really… but I plan to get acquainted with the lovely ladies of The Gardens in the near future.” Bracha pulled his stiletto blade and began picking at his nails with the tip. “You’ve been there, haven’t you?” Bracha said.

James shrugged. “Not really.” He was trying to antagonise Bracha, but didn’t really expect his ex-friend to rise to his attempt.

“And your master, Somna? So convinced that the city-centre communities were no longer there. Wasn’t it you who gave him that intelligence?”

James didn’t bother shrugging this time, rather he spent his concentration on keeping his facial expression indifferent.

Bracha picked away at the nails of his right hand, giving James a clear view of an arrow-tip-shaped scar through his palm.

Bracha caught him glancing at it.

“Oh yes, our archer. Quite skilled, as I said.”

He must be, to have injured you twice,
James thought.
But not as skilled as the girl, she had to have gotten in close to break those bones.

Relaxing his posture, James resumed his seated position once more on the fallen tree.

Bracha strolled over to where the pair of Zoms lay, one toppled on top of the other.

“These are very fresh-looking, James. Recent additions to the Tribe, perhaps?”

James ignored his questions.

“What do you want, Bracha?”

“As blunt as ever, I see. I suppose that’s why you succeeded me as
his
number two. Not much cunning about you, is there, James?” Bracha placed his stiletto back into whatever concealed place it had been drawn from. His injuries hadn’t dampened his speed… much.

“The archer and his little girlfriend...” Bracha flexed his stiff right arm subconsciously at mentioning her. “They’re in my way.”

“So what? Kill them then,” James said without disturbing the passiveness of his expression.

Bracha smiled that cold smile of his. The one that showed off his perfectly straight, very white teeth, one of the few signs of the wealth and privilege he’d been raised in that he still wore.

“I’m not really up for that right now Some help would be appreciated.” He indicated his injured arm.

James shook his head. “No. If you have a problem with those kids, fix it for yourself or just leave them alone.”

Bracha sighed. “They’re at the hospital.”

James’ heart sank. “Then they’ll be dead soon enough.”

“Actually, the entire compound has been shut down, at least at the moment. Has that ever happened before?”

James thought for a moment.

“Maybe, around six years ago. It went dark for twelve hours, nightfall to sunrise, and then back to business as usual. Somna got word of it beforehand and was instructed to discourage anyone who might see the closure as an opportunity to scale the fences.”

“Instructed by whom?” Bracha asked.

James shrugged. “You know who. The Corporation.”

“Somna still receives supplies, medicines and intel from them in return for keeping the hospital’s outer perimeter clean of intruders?”

Another non-committal shrug from James.

“I didn’t see any of your people anywhere in or around the compound. Obviously this close-down wasn’t planned.” Bracha smiled.

He pulled his coat tightly and drew his golf club, twirling it playfully around with his left hand. It was a sign that the conversation was over and he was leaving.

“I’d best get back before my little love-birds wake up. Do I have your word that you won’t inform Somna of my presence? I promise that I’ll be long gone by midday. After I’ve seen to my young city-centre friends.”

“Why don’t you just leave them to it? Wait until you’re healed before you engage them?” James asked.

Bracha’s face darkened. “You know what’s in there, James. I can’t let them find it.”

“The cure?” James asked. “That’s a bloody myth, Bracha. You can’t honestly believe in it.”

Bracha gave no answer. Instead he turned and melted into the dark foliage.

James sat, staring into the dark woods for a few moments.
A girl from The Gardens, a boy from The Brotherhood.
The words replayed through his head.
A fighter. Expert with Sai
,
an archer.

James was on his feet one minute after Bracha departed, sprinting for Drum Woods and Somna’s bungalow.

Chapter 24

Joey

Eyes glued shut from sleep-snot, Joey reached up with his left hand and rubbed some of the graininess away. The right arm he didn’t budge. Now able to open his eyes, he peeked through the murk looking at Alys sleeping peacefully, her back to him, head resting on his right arm. Despite his arm having gone numb hours before, Joey couldn’t recall ever feeling so comfortable.

Lifting his head a little he noticed that a thin frosted dew covered their clothes, boots and hair. They’d best get on the move… in a moment. As he grinned to himself and settled his head back down, a thunderous rattle echoed through the shed from the locked door.

“Little Pigs, Little Pigs… Let me in.” Bracha’s mocking voice was full of amusement.

Instantly on their feet, they drew their weapons, Alys choosing her two blunt Sai and blinking the blurriness from her eyes. Joey drew his blades too, not that he had any choice. A quiver-full of arrows lay two hundred yards into the woods. They may as well have been on Jupiter.

“You go first, crash the door and step aside. I’ll see if it’s clear to move out,” Joey whispered.

It was a horrible position to be in. If he’d had his bow, getting both of them through the door safely would be a whole lot simpler, but that wasn’t an option.

Alys quietly unlocked the door and shoved it out, rolling her right shoulder along the wall to leave the open doorway clear. Nothing came through so Joey dived outside. Tucking into a roll that brought him up onto his feet in a ready stance a metre away from the shed, he called to Alys.

“Clear.”

Alys shot through the door taking position so that they stood back to back. All of Joey’s senses were on maximum, but it was a shrill state of alertness. He wasn’t at his best in full daylight and found it difficult to blink his eyes into full focus.

“You see him anywhere?” Alys asked.

Before Joey could answer, a fire exit door swung open from a building further down the street on which they stood. Bracha’s red hair came through, followed by the rest of him. He’d clearly expected Joey to be armed with his bow and hadn’t hung around outside the tool shed. They’d caught a lucky break.

Bracha greeted them like old friends.

“Kids! How delightful to see you both.”

He stood grinning manically at them for several long moments, waiting for a reply he wouldn’t get.

Standing in the middle of the road, arms and hands spread to his sides, he began to take a few slow steps towards them.

“Of course, you really shouldn’t be here.” He indicated the hospital compound as he took several more steps. He was assessing them, deciding if he could engage both of them. He thought that he was in control.

“How’s the eye?” Joey called, straining to make out what Bracha currently had sitting in his right eye socket.

A flicker of something dark passed over Bracha’s face for a moment but was quickly replaced by his jovial, kindly uncle expression.