Lanherne Chronicles (Prequel): To Escape the Dead (15 page)

‘Well, the map shows a few buildings marked along the road. We’ll just have to see if any of them are still habitable…,’ said Charlie, scratching at his stubbly chin with the side of the covered knife on his wrist. ‘Hopefully there should be a lot less of the Dead out on the moors so we can get some sleep… even if it’s just in shifts.’

‘I hope this weather lets up a bit by then,’ mumbled Liz, watching the heavy downpour through a spyhole ricocheting off the rusting slide, the faded plastic seats of the playground swings and the crumpled wreckage of an orange Mini that had crashed into a lamp post. ‘We’ll be lucky if we hear them coming if it doesn’t…’

‘Hmm,’ agreed Charlie, craning his head against the viewing slit to look up at the dark cloudy sky, ‘We’ll just have to hope for the best…’

‘And expect the worst,’ finished Liz, arching her eyebrow at the saying Charlie was so fond of using whenever something out of his control turned up to upset his plans.

‘And expect the worst,’ whispered Anne seriously, wanting to be part of the adult conversion around her.

But such a tone coming from the young child added an unwelcome prophetic quality to the words and suddenly Charlie didn’t feel like smiling anymore. Looking from the two girls he loved as his own, to the small group of people that were effectively now in his charge, he hoped Anne’s inadvertent prophecy wouldn’t come to pass. Looking back to Anne, Charlie could tell she knew her words had somehow changed the mood of the group but she didn’t understand why.

‘Yep… We’ll expect the worst,’ he repeated forcing the smile to return as he reached over to gently nip her nose between his fingers. ‘Won’t we?’

With the sudden tension now dissipated, Anne scrunched up her face and using her little hands covered her nose from anymore of Charlie’s playful nipping.

‘Right,’ he said giving Anne a final wink, ‘the sooner we get going the sooner we can stop for something warm to eat.’

‘Do you want me to check everything’s OK with the other cart before we set off again?’ asked Michael, reaching for a heavy length of pipe.

Charlie turned and looked through the curtain of heavy rain at the countryside around them. With the river on their left acting as a natural barrier that only left the overgrown park with the playground on their right to worry about. He was about to say yes when he suddenly caught movement among a small group of trees at the far corner of the park.

‘Erm… no,’ he said, keeping his eye on the tree line as he gathered up the reins in his fist again. ‘I think we’ll put a few more miles between us and Tavistock first.’

Realising he must have seen some danger lurking beyond the safety of their cart, Michael didn’t even think to question Charlie’s decision but simply nodded his understanding.

With a jolt Charlie urged Star into action. As her attention returned to the world outside again, Liz watched the forgotten playground slowly pass from view. Looking from one dilapidated playground piece to the next, Liz knew this place would never hear the joyful laughter of children again. Never again would giggles of delight escape grinning mouths as they begged their parents to be pushed higher and higher on the swings. Never would a child feel the brief rush of wind through their hair as they slid toward the waiting open arms at the bottom of the slide, and never again would tiny fists cling with frantic delight to the rail on the roundabout as it spun. No, all of that was gone now and only death and the bones of rusting metal slowly being reclaimed by Nature remained. Liz tried to turn her thoughts from the children that had once played here and the loving parents that had fought so hard to protect them, knowing only a spiral of darkness awaited her there. But even as she tried to think of other things the cart drew alongside the wreck of a small orange Mini. The emaciated figures she saw behind the grime streaked windows caused her heart to sink. With its windscreen now a spider web of cracked glass the driver had been lucky not to have been thrown through during the collision, but that was certainly where any luck had ended. Liz closed her eyes and desperately tried to push aside the images of what had befallen the doomed passengers. But the horrific scenes would not be denied and even though she hated to think of it she could picture the mother coming back as one of the Dead in the wake of the crash, only then to rip into her terrified children, buckled and helpless behind her. 

It was only the feeling of Anne’s small body leaning against her that finally allowed Liz to force these images from her mind. Opening her eyes, she looked down at her younger sister and as she gently ran her fingers through a riot of messy blond curls she could feel her dark mood begin to lighten. In a world where death and misery were common place she knew she could count herself one of the lucky ones. She had Anne and she had Charlie and as long as she had them both in her life she knew she was loved and would never truly be alone. Leaning down, Liz gave the top of Anne’s head a gentle kiss causing the young girl to look up at her.

‘What was that for?’ asked Anne, her large blue eyes somehow drawing what little light seeped through the spyholes to sparkle with life.

‘Nothing…,’ Liz replied, smiling as the image of her mother’s face shone through her sister’s eyes. ‘Can’t a big sister give her little sister a kiss now and again?’

‘You’re silly,’ grinned Anne, resting her head against Liz’s shoulder.

‘Tell me about mum and dad again…,’ she continued, twirling a curl of her hair through her fingers as her young mind painted pictures of the loving parents she had never known.

They had done this many times and as Liz smiled to herself she pulled Anne a little closer to whisper her way through a million and one treasured memories. With each detail Liz shared, Anne would wrap them about her heart, fleshing out the loving couple that had been so cruelly taken from her. But in her daydreams it was Anne and not Liz that her father carried on his shoulders through a park full of brightly coloured daffodils. It was Anne that curled up next to her mother as she knitted a tiny jumper for her unborn sister and it was Anne that laughed as she ran hand in hand with the two most important people in her small world, her parents. And so the ritual was repeated, Liz told tales of a life Anne could never know and just for a few precious moments the hunger, the fear and the Dead were gone and life was as it should be, full of joy, hope and love.

***

‘Well let’s hope the next one’s better,’ said Phil, shielding his face from the stinging rain as best he could while Charlie and Michael climbed back into their cart.

‘It’s only about half a mile down the road,’ replied Charlie, having to raise his voice over the howling wind that had risen to buffet the downpour this way and that. ‘This time Liz, David and Tom can join me to check it out, OK?’

‘No arguments here,’ said Phil, his hand hovering on the hatch doorway. ‘As it is I can barely feel my fingers in this fucking rain.’

It had taken most of the afternoon to finally leave the trials of Tavistock behind them and to find their way onto the road that would lead them across the bleak expanse of the moors. Each step of the way the dark rolling thunder clouds had dogged their progress but over the last hour the storm seemed to have eventually expended most of its energy, leaving only the deep bruise of clouds which continue to drench the land with their cold rain.

Just as Charlie’s map had indicated, the moor road they were on was indeed dotted, seemingly quite randomly, with lonely isolated cottages and as the afternoon was fast turning into evening they knew they would need to find somewhere for the night soon.

They hadn’t even bothered to check the first house they had come across. Little more than a burnt out ruin, its blackened husk would have left them wide open to the elements and the Dead alike. The second and third, which had been small cottages, hadn’t offered much more in the way of protection either. Even though both of these had been structurally sound in comparison, both unfortunately bore the long worn scars of attacks from the Dead. It was clear that in their eagerness to get to the living occupants the Dead horde had smashed their way through all the windows and doors. These gaping holes had exposed the interiors to years of the harsh ravages of Nature, turning the cottages into little more than damp sodden shells completely uninhabitable even for one night. The fourth building they had come across had shown promise though. Despite its crumbling fortifications, the small farmhouse had looked as though it may have served as some sort of gathering point. It had most of its windows intact and the roof appeared still to be in one piece, but with some unknown deity looking down on them, Tom noticed shambling figures through its grime covered windows just in time. These people, who had come together for comfort and protection, had inadvertently harboured a deadly Judas among them. They had unknowingly let the Dead within their walls and the ensuing carnage that followed must have been so swift that none had been able to escape. They had sought solace from the Dead in each other’s company but for just one concealed bite they had been sentenced to spend eternity decaying and entombed together behind faded print curtains and a peeling front door. And so Charlie had decided to leave them to their fate, hoping the next dwelling would offer the temporary sanctuary they needed to wait out the night.

‘I need to wee-wee, Lizzy,’ whispered Anne, rocking back and forth with the urgency of her full bladder.

‘Soon Anne,’ Liz replied, strocking Anne’s hair, ‘I promise... Perhaps at the next house we’ll be able to get out…’

‘I could also do with a… wee,’ added Carmella, looking at Liz for confirmation she was using the word correctly. ‘The baby is in an uncomfortable position…’

Nodding, Liz shifted in the cramp confines of the cart so she could stand behind Charlie.

‘How much further, Charlie?’ she asked, laying a hand on his shoulder. ‘The natives are getting restless…’

Looking over his shoulder at her, Charlie raised an eyebrow.

‘I know…’ Liz sighed, replying to Charlie’s unspoken comment.

They both knew it was foolish to put lives at risk simply so they could empty their bladders in private. But Anne was only a child and shy about such things and even if there was room to hold her up they could hardly ask Carmella to squat over the bucket in her condition.

‘Shouldn’t be long now, Anne,’ said Charlie, glancing from the map to the bleak road beyond the viewing slit. ‘There should be another house coming up soon… we’ll be stopping just round the next corner… you can wee then, OK?’

‘OK,’ Anne replied, knowing there was no point whining about it.

With an achingly slow gait, Star pulled them closer and closer to the curve in the road and as Liz looked over Charlie’s shoulder she watched the rain drenched countryside slide slowly by. Looking out at the austere and windswept landscape Liz wondered why anyone would choose to live in such a remote and lonely place. Yes the wide sweeping hills, which seemed to almost bubble and roll with great mounds of moss, bracken and flowering heather, had a stark beauty to them but to Liz the isolation here was a palpable and oppressive thing. Like the vast expanse of dark clouds overhead, which seemed to stretch on forever, it pushed in on them as if resenting their very presence. Their group had unwittingly intruded into something that Nature had ruled to be both timeless and untouched by Man and the sooner they left the better.

As Star finally pulled them over a slight hump at the corner, Liz and Charlie could at last see the house they hoped would offer them sanctuary for the night. Set slightly back from the road, the small house was built from the lichen spotted grey stone common in the area and thankfully seemed to be still in one piece. In the small overgrown garden leading to a weather worn front door, a large twisted oak tree grew. The almost leafless branches had been tortured into bizarre gnarled shapes by the vicious gales that swept across the moors and as they were buffeted they creaked ominously, as if threatening to fall at any moment. But Liz could see this was no empty threat for even as Star pulled them closer she noticed a huge branch had indeed broken free at some point and now lay through the smashed roof of a ramshackle looking shed nestled between the side of the house and the low boundary wall.

‘What do you think?’ she said, chewing her lip as she took in the various details of the small house.

‘Front door still intact,’ Charlie began, pulling Star to a halt alongside a wooden gate flapping back and forth in the wind. ‘Only two small windows on the ground floor this side of the house, one of which is still shuttered and the other still has glass it in it…’

‘Hmm,’ said Liz, weighing up the possible dangers lurking within, ‘Upstairs windows aren’t broken either, Charlie… no obvious signs of a Dead attack…’

‘No there isn’t,’ he replied, looking over his shoulder at her, ‘but we’ll take it slow anyway, making sure it’s safe, room by room… No one else gets to go in until we’re sure it’s all OK.’

‘No sign of the Dead behind us,’ said Cam, looking through a spyhole drilled into the back wall of the cart.

‘Sides are clear too,’ added Michael, moving awkwardly around Carmella and Fran. ‘You’re good to go…’

‘Right… let’s do this,’ said Charlie, tying off Star’s reins and slipping free one of the ice picks from its channel on his recently acquired vest.

With the smell of the wet peaty earth of the moors in her nostrils, Liz jumped down from one of the side hatches. Immediately having to turn her face from the stinging rain that assaulted her, she saw David and Tom walking towards her from the second cart. Much to Charlie and Phil’s annoyance they had decided as a group to share the risk of checking out the dwellings they came across, the only people left out of this rota being Carmella, Paul and obviously Anne. This time it was to be Liz, Charlie, David and Tom who left the safety of the carts and from their initial observations of the house they may have been given a lucky break.