The Bones of Valhalla (Purge of Babylon, Book 9) (25 page)

“I’m more worried about Lorelei and Jo.”

“Lorelei took it hard. She threw herself into helping with guard duty as a way to cope. I have Carly and Sarah and the others keeping a close eye on her.”

“And Jo?”

“Jo…” Lara pursed her lips. “I haven’t gotten around to telling her yet. How do you tell someone their sister isn’t coming back?”

“You want me to do it?”

Lara shook her head. “No. It’s my responsibility. I’m the one who sent Bonnie out there.”

“She volunteered. All three of them did.”

“That doesn’t matter.” She looked off at the setting sun in the distance. “First Carrie, now Bonnie. And it’s not going to stop. There are going to be more casualties before this is over.”

Keo didn’t say anything. He didn’t know what to say anyway, and the silence, with only the calming back and forth of the waves against the anchored
Trident,
was almost therapeutic.

Their peace and quiet was only broken when Elise and Vera and a couple of the other kids appeared along the railing two decks below them. The kids looked off at the island’s long stretch of beach, pointing and talking excitedly amongst themselves.

“They’ve been bugging me about going over,” Lara said. “I think they miss the beach we had back at Song Island.”

“Why haven’t you let them?”

“Because I can’t protect them out there. I can’t be everywhere at once. Neither can Carly nor Sarah. They’re safest here, onboard with us. For now.”

“You sent Riley’s people back there.”

“They’re not Elise and Vera.”

He nodded. “Pretty soon they’ll have company.”

“You know something I don’t?”

“Danny. He’s going to be a daddy, remember?”

That brought a smile to her lips. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around that concept.”

“That poor kid,” Keo said. “That poor, poor kid.”

Lara laughed, and Keo smiled.

“
Y
ou’re coming home
.”

No. Not home. It had stopped being home over a year ago when the world crumbled and the cities blacked out and he found salvation elsewhere. Home wasn’t a place of brick and mortar or cement. Home was her.

Lara.

“You belong here.”

The voice had grown in strength after that first night back on land, when he had to lead the black eyes away from Gaby and the others. He had only been partially successful and two of them—the slowest among the horde—had lagged behind. The woman died as a result of that failure.

That left two.

“You’ve always belonged here.”

He couldn’t let that happen again. Not with Gaby’s life at stake. She was one of the reasons he was doing this. The reason he was taking the fight to Mabry. Back to where it all began one cold, dark night.

“It’s good you’ve finally accepted it.”

He was the beginning and the end, the nothing and the everything. Nowhere, and everywhere.

“You didn’t think you’d be able to slip through unnoticed, did you?”

No. He never had any delusions he would be able to make it back to the city without being seen, felt, or sensed. Mabry had spied him through the black eyes as he led them away from the barn, into the woods, and out the other side. But they were slow things, dumb things, and he outmaneuvered them with minimal effort and destroyed the ones that got close enough to pose any danger.

“Or maybe you’re still lying to yourself.”

He wanted to answer, wanted to shout back in defiance. But he didn’t, because it was a trick, an attempt to lure him out of hiding. Once he exposed himself to the stream of consciousness that linked the brood to Mabry, there would be no secrets left between them. It was already difficult enough to stay hidden this close to the city, having to move in the daytime.

“Lying to them.”

The sun made him defenseless and weak and reliant on others. Unlike all the other times when he was here, in the darkness, when he was alone and fast, and though Mabry always knew he was close, he could never locate him.

“Lying to
her.
”

It wasn’t just Mabry out there probing, picking at the defenses he had erected to protect his mind and his sanity. He could feel them—the other blue eyes. The ones that had remained in the city to protect him. To protect Mabry. They were reaching out, too. Searching, waiting for him to make a mistake. Just one mistake so they could pounce.

“Come home.”

Home? No, not home. His home was wherever she was.

“I’ll see you soon…”

* * *

T
he desire to
come out of the suitcase was like an itch he desperately wanted to scratch, that continued to grow with every passing second. Finally, finally, Blaine unwound the layers of duct tape and pulled the zipper, and he emerged. He could have broken through—it wouldn’t have taken very much effort at all—but that would have damaged the transportation and forced them to repair it, and they might need it again for another day.

Blaine flinched at the sight of him—it would have been imperceptible to the human eye—and the big man’s heartbeat increased marginally, though they might as well be firecrackers to his hypersensitive ears. The clothing he wore helped to ease Blaine’s mind, but it would never be enough. Because whatever he did, whatever he hid underneath, he would never truly be the man they remembered. He wasn’t a man
at all anymore.

“Sorry about that,” Blaine said. “Had to take care of the prisoner first. Make sure she didn’t see you.”

He nodded, not that he cared if the woman saw him or not.

“Place’s secure,” Blaine continued. “So tomorrow we either get moving or run back to the shoreline, huh? I’m not sure which one I’m hoping for, to be perfectly honest with you.” An awkward grin. “Still waiting for word from Lara.”

The right response eluded him, so he chose to stay silent instead. It was difficult talking to Blaine and the others. They didn’t know him as well as Lara did. As well as Danny or Gaby. Or maybe he just didn’t care enough.

“What now?” Blaine asked. “We just wait it out?”

“Yes,” he hissed.

“I guess it’s gonna be a long night. Good thing the truck seats are comfortable. Not to mention warm. Not that you need warmth, right?” Another attempt at a smile that went awry from the very beginning. “Of course not. I keep forgetting where you’ve been spending your days.”

There was a slight quiver in Blaine’s voice, the uncertainty that comes with allying yourself with a blue-eyed ghoul. He understood and decided to take mercy on them both by leaving Blaine and gliding across the oil-slicked garage floor.

Gaby was in the office at the back, and he slipped through the open door. She looked up from the desk where she had placed her disassembled rifle on white rags and was running a toothbrush through the metal parts. She was biting down on a small flashlight to see with, and she removed it now and placed it next to her.

A flush of pride at how much she had grown, proof that what he used to be—
who
he once was—had mattered. But the unwanted emotion was only temporary and quickly diffused by the large amount of exposed silver on the desk. He wrinkled his nose and wanted to spit out the taste, like knives against his tongue.

“Blaine’s still nervous around you; that’s why he’s blabbing so much,” Gaby said. “It’s going to take him a while to get used to it. The others, too.”

“I know,” he said.

“Haven’t heard back from Lara yet, if that’s what you’re going to ask.”

He nodded, even though that piece of information was unnecessary because he could hear everything while inside the suitcase.

“But I think it’s going to be good news,” Gaby continued. “Lara can be pretty convincing when she needs to be, but I probably don’t have to tell you that.”

“She’ll convince them,” he said. “She was born to lead. She just didn’t know it until now.”

“I hope you’re right, because there’s a lot of bad guys out there for us to take on all by ourselves.”

“We wouldn’t have been alone.”

“I know. We’d have help. Still, I’d feel better about this mission if there were a couple of tanks and Warthogs lending a hand.”

“She’ll convince them.”

“I hope so.” Gaby stopped what she was doing and turned around in her chair. Green eyes fixed on him and he saw no traces of fear or hesitation. “Regardless of what happens with Lara, or on Black Tide, when you get right down to it, it’s all going to come down to you. So you better be right, Will. After what we went through to get this far…” She stopped short before continuing: “You better be right.”

He nodded.

“Then why do I keep getting this feeling you’re not telling me everything? That you’re holding something back? Not just from me, but from Lara too?” She stared at him with none of the reluctance or apprehension that Blaine still couldn’t overcome, and might never be able to. “Tell me you’ve told us everything, Will. Tell me the truth.”

“I’ve told you everything,” he lied.

“Everything,” she repeated.

“Everything,” he lied again.

She nodded and sat back in the chair. “So what now? Sit here until Lara radios back with news?”

“Yes.”

“I hate waiting. Have I told you that?”

“Maybe…”

“You don’t remember?”

He shook his head.

“I guess it’s not important. You only remember the important things, right?”

“Yes.”

“That makes sense. Everything else is just a pain in the ass.” She swiveled around to the desk and picked up the pieces and continued working. “Do you remember all those times on the island?” A smile creased her lips. “When you and Danny taught me all of this? Those were still some of the best days of my life.”

The memories weren’t there. Not in their entirety, anyway. There were flashes, visions that came and went. Some were more cohesive than others; but many were just fragments, reminders that they served no purpose other than to cloud his mind and divert him from the truly important things.

“Danny wanted to come,” Gaby was saying. “You know why he didn’t, right?”

“Yes.”

“You do?” she said, unable to hide her surprise.

He knew, because he could hear everything on the boat even while shuttered away inside the cabin below deck. If not the actual sounds that made up the conversations, then the vibrations that resulted and traveled along the ship’s hull. It was one of the many talents he had developed very early on after his transformation—to hear without actually hearing. But he didn’t know how to put those things into words, just like he didn’t know how to explain the hundreds (thousands?) of other things the change had bestowed upon him—the gifts that came from the curse.

So he only hissed, “Yes.”

“I keep forgetting how different you are from the run-of-the-mill ghoul. Are all the other blue eyes like you?”

“Not like me.”

“You know what I mean. I know they’re not like you. Thank God for that. I meant in terms of everything else.”

“Yes.”

“What about Mabry? He’s blue-eyed too, isn’t he?”

“Yes…and no.”

She gave him a quizzical look. “What’s that mean?”

“He’s more.”

“More how?” she asked.

He’s the everything, and the nothing. The nowhere, and the everywhere.

The beginning…and the end.

* * *

T
he town was
empty as he made his way through it, slipping around buildings and up and down rooftops. He could see and smell evidence that they had been here many times before, doing what they did best—searching, always searching—but there wasn’t a single black eyes in the area tonight.

The humans were gathered along the highways that led into the city. A dozen here, another dozen behind them, and more still that he couldn’t see, on the other sides of the city. The stink of fear clung to their pores underneath their black uniforms, trails of sweat behind the gas masks despite the cold. Anxiety radiated off them, the knowledge that they had been summoned here to take up positions against…something.

“You’re close now, aren’t you? Yes. You are. You’re very close.”

Like all the other times, he didn’t answer. Instead, he glided through the night underneath, over and around the highway. It would be so easy to reach out and kill the human traitors, but he resisted the urge.

Not here, not now.

Besides, they didn’t matter. Only the plan mattered. The mission.

Plan G, as Danny called it.

“That’s everything?”
Lara had asked him, back on the boat.
“That’s the plan? All of it?”

“Yes,”
he had lied.

The city loomed in front of him now, its buildings dark and proud under the moonlight, like sentries watching for signs of his encroachment.

“You’re so, so close.”

The voice had gotten stronger, more insistent. It took everything he had to quell it as he scaled down the side of the building. He expected the blue eyes that guarded the city to come out in search of him, but they remained where they were.

In there, with Mabry. Always with Mabry.

“Come closer.”

It didn’t take him long to reach the edge of the city, even taking every precaution. He didn’t worry about the humans and concentrated on the overwhelming presence of the brood before him. He could feel their unease, taste the uncertainty in the air around them. There were so many, packed into one place. Every building, every home, every office. The side and back streets were empty when they shouldn’t have been, but the emptiness was a lie, an obvious ploy to lure him in.

They knew he was coming, because Mabry knew.

Thousands. Hundreds of thousands.

Millions…

He retreated. Slowly at first, then faster.

And faster still…