Chapter Eighteen

I’d watched in awe as Kayla had fluttered out of the sky. She had landed softly, and I hobbled towards her and took her in my arms. At first we didn’t say anything, we just stood in the cold wind and hugged each other. Like me, she wore a grubby-looking hospital gown, and her face, legs, and arms were covered in grime.

“I’m sorry, Kayla,” I said.

“What for?” she whispered back.

“For not rescuing you,” I told her.

“I knew you would come for me,” she said, “even though it put your life in danger and you ended up being captured yourself.”

“It wasn’t just me - the others came in search of you, too,” I told her. There was so much I wanted to - needed to - tell her. Her mother and father’s death, the murder of Murphy. But now wasn’t the time.

“I’m sorry I didn’t believe you about Phillips,” she said.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I told her.

She pulled herself away from me, and over her shoulder I could see Isidor standing in the middle of the deserted road. Like all of us, his feet were bare, and he wore a baggy pair of striped pyjama bottoms. His body was deathly-white, and where I had once remembered a well-defined chest and stomach, I could see his chest plate and ribs almost seeming to poke through. The stubby-looking beard which grew from his chin was now long and black and the bottom of it nearly touched his chest. The black flaming tattoos covering his upper arms and neck looked as if they had been etched on the skin of a deflated balloon.

I looked at him and he met my stare.

Half-smiling at me, he said, “You look like shit, Kiera.”

“It’s good to see you, too,” I smiled, and it was then I realised I couldn’t remember the last time I had smiled.

Like I had embraced Kayla, I limped towards him, and threw my arms around his bony shoulders.

“It’s good to see ya,” he said and squeezed me so tight I thought my ribs were going to snap inside of me. Then in my ear he whispered, “She doesn’t know I’m her brother – she doesn’t know me at all.”

“Okay,” I whispered and squeezed him back. “I’ll leave that for you to tell her.”

“Thanks,” he said back, then pulled gently away.

Turning to face Kayla, I said, “Hey Kayla, this is Isidor.”

Coming towards us, her eyes wide and staring she said, “I’ve seen you a couple of times before - I think you tried to escape once, didn’t you?” she said to Isidor.

“I tried a few times,” he said, throwing his crossbow across his naked back, “not that it got me very far.”

“So how did you both get out?” I asked them.

“That wolf set us free,” Kayla said.

“Yeah, he came to my cell, just before dawn and said that if I wanted to escape than I should follow him. At first I thought it was some kinda sick joke,” Isidor explained. “Then I saw Kayla was with him, and he had my crossbow and rucksack. So before he changed his mind, we went with him and he told us to wait in the shadows by the entrance to the zoo.”

“I asked him what we were waiting for,” Kayla cut in, “and he told us that we would soon know. It wasn’t long before I saw you racing up that path towards us with Phillips and Sparky chasing you down. It was then that I realised that it was a breakout.”

“Why do you think that werewolf helped us?” Isidor asked, rubbing the tops of his arms in an attempt to keep warm.

I thought of Nik and how he had been cursed by his father. I could only imagine the horrendous crimes he had committed, but he had been true to his word and he seemed to be in search of redemption in one way or another.

“He had to do it,” I told them.

“Why?” Kayla asked. “Phillips will kill him for helping us.”

“Maybe that’s what he wanted,” I whispered, almost to myself.

“But, why?” Kayla pushed.

Then meeting her gaze I said, “Just like us, Kayla, I think that all he wanted was to be free. And maybe he has his freedom now.”

Cocking an eyebrow at me, Kayla said, “Whatever you say, Kiera. I won’t pretend to understand what you’re going on about and I’m too cold to be bothered to find out. Let’s say that we find ourselves some meat.”

Hearing Kayla say this, I gripped her arm and said, “What do you mean? What sort of meat are you talking about?” From the corner of my eye, I could see Isidor staring at the both of us.

“Whatever it was they were giving us back at that zoo,” Kayla started, “I don’t know what sort of meat it was, but it was delicious and I can’t get enough of the stuff.”

I glanced at Isidor and something struck me. He looked like a corpse that had been warmed-up – all bones and loose skin, and I looked pretty much the same. But although Kayla looked battered and bruised in other ways, she didn’t look undernourished. Kayla looked as if she had eaten well during her time in captivity at the zoo. And although my whole being craved for the red stuff like an agonising itch that wouldn’t go away however much I scratched it, Kayla was yet to understand that she was addicted to human flesh.

Knowing that this wasn’t the time to explain to her what the Vampyrus and Lycanthrope had been feeding her, I dreaded the moment when I would have to tell her everything that had happened while she had been held prisoner. With my heart sinking in my chest at the thought of that conversation, I put my arm around her shoulder and said, “C’mon, we should find somewhere to hide until we can figure out how we get Luke out of that place.”

Supporting me as I limped down the country road, Kayla said, “Kiera, why are you limping? Have you got something wrong with your leg?”

“It’s a long story,” I said back, “I’ll tell you about it later.”

“Okay, sure,” she smiled, happy enough with my reply. Then, she added, “Hey did you meet my father at the zoo?”

“Uh-huh,” I said, not knowing what to say.

“I think he musta escaped like us,” she smiled at me.

“What makes you think that?” I asked her, knowing that by now he was probably dead.

“Because he stopped coming to see me,” she said, and looking into her eyes, I wondered if she actually believed that.

I glanced back over my shoulder in search of Isidor, another person to join in the conversation, so I wouldn’t have to answer all of Kayla’s questions. But he walked several feet behind us, his head stooped low and I guessed he could hear all of Kayla’s questions and he was wondering how he was going to tell her that he was her brother.

Chapter Nineteen

The track leading away from the zoo carved its way through dense areas of woodland. I was grateful for the trees that climbed high above on either side of us, as they offered a natural camouflage against any of the Vampyrus that might still be searching for us high above. But all the while I kept heading east, towards the town that Nik had called Wasp Water.

When the trees thinned out along the roadside, I ushered the others towards the bushy hedgerows to avoid being seen, just like Murphy would have told us to. Thinking about him, I put my hand into my coat pocket and brushed his tiny silver crucifix with the tips of my fingers. We made our journey in silence, all us looking paler and weaker by the minute and I knew that like me, Kayla and Isidor were fighting their cravings for the red stuff. My stomach continued to cramp, and even though the morning air was bitterly cold, hot beads of sweat streamed from my forehead. Kayla’s fiery red hair lay matted to her brow and cheeks in damp clumps and Isidor staggered along the uneven road, cradling his feverish body with his arms.

I don’t know for how long or how far we had walked, but the meandering track that we had been walking on widened and we found ourselves on a road, which had signposts and markings on it. I prayed that we were nearing the town and hopefully some help.

A small cluster of houses appeared ahead but I could see no signs of life anywhere. The world seemed eerily silent, only broken by the sound of crows squawking from high up in the trees. As we drew nearer to the houses, I could see that some of them looked as if they had been smashed down, like buildings that had been bombed during the Second World War. Now all that was left was mountains of rubble, with the foundations protruding from the ground like twisted limbs. Even through the pain of my cravings, itching skin, and agonising thirst, that voice inside of me, the Kiera that was pushing me on, told me that something was terribly wrong. But my thoughts of searching for help – for Potter – nagged away at the corners of my mind and I knew that we must keep on going. We needed to find food, water and some clothes.

A bath would be good too! I thought to myself.

So we passed the deserted homes to the left and right and I walked towards the town. As we grew nearer we could see more deserted houses. The world seemed so quiet, only the sound of our bare feet could be heard smacking off the tarmac. Looking down, I was shocked to see that the road surface had split and cracked in places, leaving wild and untamed weeds and plants to sprout from them. Nearing the town, I noticed a sea of lights twinkling on and off up ahead. As we drew nearer, it became clear to me what these lights were. It was the glare of the pale winter sun glinting off the cars that lay strewn across the deserted road.

We walked slowly towards the cars. The wind blew amongst them and I could hear the creak of a car door as it swung open and closed. I took my hand and covered my mouth and nose as a rancid stench wafted towards me. A gasping sound came from behind me and I spun around to see Isidor doubled over getting sick. His sense of smell was far greater than mine and Kayla’s, so the stench must have been overwhelming for him. Going to him, I rubbed his back, and his flesh felt burning hot.

Brushing my hand away, Isidor straightened himself and whispered, “It’s okay, Kiera, I’ll be fine.” Covering his nose and mouth with his hands, he walked on.

Passing amongst the rows of cars, I dared to glance into some of them and then looked quickly away. There were people in them – dead people. Their faces were bloated and purple in colour. Black crusty lumps of blood had dried in streams around their noses and mouths. It was obvious they had been running from something – trying to escape the town with the people that they loved. I saw the broken windshields, the scratches running across the hoods of the cars, the hanging bumpers, the upturned faces of the dead, the desperate fingers forever frozen as if clutching the air. I could see the black tire tracks on the road and then my head was thrown back as if invisible hands had grabbed at my hair. And, closing my eyes against the glare of a cold winter sun, I could see what had happened to these people as if being played out like a movie on the inside of my eyelids.