Broken World | Novel | Angus

by Mary, Kate L.

  The kid sniffed and nodded.

  Lila focused on Parv. “Do it. Now.”

  There was no point in arguing, both because there was nothing they could say and because the infection was already working its way through her. Lila’s eyes had gone hazy, the color had leaked from her normally olive complexion, and black veins had spiderwebbed from the bite and were working their way up her neck to her face.

  “I can’t believe this,” Vivian said between sniffs.

  She was still on the ground where she’d been when they walked up, and Angus offered her his hand, wanting to help her to her feet.

  She shook her head and turned to Lila. “I’ll stay with you until it’s over.”

  She’d taken her friend’s hand when she held it out, reaching for Trey with her other hand, and once all three of them were linked, she swallowed.

  As if she, too, were waiting for a blade to slice into her brain, Vivian looked up at Parv and said, “We’re ready.”

  Angus watched his wife step forward. Her back was straight, her hand steady when she put the hand not holding the knife on Lila’s head, but he hadn’t missed the way her lip trembled or how rapidly she was blinking. She was fighting back tears, wanting to stay strong until they were alone, but teetering on the edge.

  It was the knowledge that she was struggling that had made Angus reach for her hand—the one holding the knife. “I got this.”

  Parv tore her gaze from their friends, her eyes meeting his. There was relief in them, and gratitude.

  She’d let go of Lila and stepped back, and Angus had taken Parv’s place. Anger still surged through him over the position Lila had put them in, but it eased when he looked into her shimmering eyes. There was so much pain in them that he found it impossible to stay mad. She was a shadow of the woman she used to be, and even though he couldn’t imagine ever reaching the point where he wanted to give up, he could almost understand how she felt. The creatures were winning, and it was difficult—if not impossible—to imagine a scenario where that would ever change.

  Angus had swallowed as he lifted his hand, placing it on the top of Lila’s head just like Parv had a moment ago. “When you see Al, tell him we miss him.”

  Tears dropped from Lila’s eyes, trailing down her cheeks. “I will.”

  Angus nodded once, and she’d closed her eyes. He raised his knife, trying to focus on what he was doing and not who it was happening to as he positioned the blade beside her ear. He took a deep breath, let it out, closed his eyes, and plunged the blade in.

  He felt her body stiffen under his hand, but only for a moment. Then she’d dropped to the ground, taking his knife with her.

  Angus only took a moment to collect himself before opening his eyes. He did his best not to focus on Lila’s lifeless body as he pulled the knife free, but it was impossible to block it out completely. The sight cut at his already damaged heart, but it was nothing compared to how he felt when he’d turned to face Trey.

  The kid was crying. He was twelve years old and had been tough through all his losses. His aunt and grandfather, and his parents. This, though, was something no child should have to face.

  “It’ll be fast,” Angus had said, kneeling in front of the boy.

  Trey sniffed and wiped his nose, trying to look brave but failing when his lip trembled.

  Angus put his hand on top of the kid’s head just like he had a moment ago with Lila. “Close your eyes.”

  The child obeyed, squeezing his eyes shut as he clung to Vivian’s hand. She’d been sobbing, and he heard a few quiet sniffles coming from behind him, telling him Parv wasn’t doing any better, and Angus’s own throat was tight with emotion when he’d positioned the knife next to Trey’s ear. Just as Angus had done with Lila, he closed his eyes before plunging the blade into the kid’s skull.

  The boy had let out a wounded sound, his body jerking, and Angus felt a sob bubble up his throat. Had he aimed wrong? Was Trey suffering? His eyes flew open, terror gripping him, but the kid had already gone slack.

  Angus’s hand was still on Trey’s head, and he used it to cradle the boy so he could ease his body to the ground. Then he’d pulled the knife free and sat back, blinking his tears away. One fell from his eye and rolled down his cheek, but he couldn’t bring himself to wipe it away. He felt spent. Used up. Loss after loss after horrifying loss had worn him down until he felt on the verge of shriveling up. This world was cruel and unrelenting, but Lila hadn’t been right to give up. Had she?

  Lifting his gaze, Angus focused on Parv and Vivian. They were sitting beside Lila’s lifeless body, holding each other while they cried, and the very sight of them made everything in him pull tight, almost like he was a marionette and they held the strings to his heart. No, he wouldn’t give up, couldn’t. It wasn’t in Angus James to roll over and die. Especially not when he had other people to look after.

  His gaze had moved past the two women, back toward the house, settling on Patty. She was still on the porch, standing in the middle of it and watching them with an expression Angus could read even from far away. Sorrow and grief seemed to radiate off her.

  He’d turned his focus back to the women. “Go on back to the house. Stay with Patty. I’ll move the bodies. We can take care of ’em in the morning.”

  Vivian sniffed and climbed to her feet, her hand still on Parv. Once they were both up, his wife turned to Angus, tears shimmering in her eyes. She’d swallowed, glanced at the bodies, then took one step toward him, wrapping her arms around him.

  “I’ll help,” she whispered in his ear. “You shouldn’t have to do this alone.”

  Angus wanted to protest, but there would be no point, so he’d said, “’Kay.”

  Parv released him and turned to Vivian. “Go take care of Patty.”

  Vivian’s head bobbed, she sucked in a deep breath as if gathering her strength, then she’d started walking toward the house.

  Angus had already moved to the bodies, kneeling first in front of Lila’s. Neither she nor the boy had been big in life, but he knew all too well what dead weight felt like, and he was thankful Parv had stayed to help. He didn’t want to have to shoulder the burden on his own.

  “We’ll put ’em in the garage,” he’d said, gripping their dead friend’s shoulders.

  Parv knelt, too, reaching for Lila’s legs, but she’d frozen when a howl broke through the air. Her head jerked up, her eyes wide as she looked around.

  Angus released the body and stood, pulling his knife, copying his wife and studying the area. Vivian was halfway to the house, and she’d started moving faster, glancing around as she ran. As if sensing trouble was close, Angus’s body began to buzz, and he moved to close the distance between himself and Parv, wanting to protect her.

  “Go inside,” Vivian yelled at Patty, waving her hand. “Lock yourself in the bathroom. Now!”

  The girl looked terrified, but she’d listened to her grandmother and turned toward the open front door, ready to go inside. Only it was too late, and Angus watched in horror as a creature streaked from the nearby shadows. Patty’s back was to the hybrid, and she didn’t have a chance to register the danger until the thing had slammed into her, sending her to the ground.

  “No!” Vivian’s agonized scream echoed through the night.

  She was running at full speed, waving her arms, sobbing. Angus had already started running after her, Parv momentarily forgotten in his haste to reach his sister-in-law. Footsteps pounded on the ground at his back, telling him Parv was on the way as well, but his focus had been on Vivian. He had to reach her.

  On the porch, the creature looked up from where Patty lay sprawled, its goal accomplished, and its sights set on a new target. Angus was already huffing from exertion, but he’d forced his legs to move faster. Vivian, in her anguish, had slowed considerably, her sobs making it too difficult to run, and he was gaining on her. He could make it. He could save her.

  The creature had let out a blood-chilling howl and leapt, flying down the steps
at a mind-blowing speed. Blood trailed down the front of its chest, between its nearly non-existent pancake breasts, bright red in the light from the moon. Its skin was so pale that the black veins looked painted on, and there wasn’t a strand of hair still clinging to its body. It was eerie, the stuff of nightmares, and a shiver ran down Angus’s spine as he’d charged toward it.

  When the creature was still five feet away, it pounced, launching itself through the air and slamming into Vivian. The impact sent them back, moving them closer to Angus, so that when they crashed into the ground, only four feet of space separated them.

  Vivian fought, punching and kicking, her knife in her right hand hacking away at the creature. It had howled and slashed its claws, managing to rip into her shirt, but from where he stood, Angus couldn’t tell if it had broken the skin. At that moment, the creature reeled back almost dramatically, as if putting on a show for Angus, and had opened its mouth. Its milky eyes were focused on its target, its teeth red with the blood of its last victim, which the moonlight seemed to highlight, once again making Angus feel like the whole thing was a stage production set up just for him. Vivian would be his final failure in his promise to his brother. The only person he was supposed to have watched over still alive, and Angus would have a front row seat to her death.

  “No,” he’d growled as he threw himself forward. His knife out.

  There was less than two feet of space separating them when he flew through the air, his focus on his target as he thrust his knife forward. He felt like the whole thing played out in slow motion, his knife going into the creature’s open mouth, his body slamming into the thing that had been ready to take Vivian from him, the two of them flying through the air. They’d hit the ground only a second later, and he felt his knife cutting through the hybrid’s skull and sticking in the dirt from the force of the impact, pinning the creature to the ground.

  It was still alive, the blade lodged in its brain as it thrashed, trying to break free. Angus was on top of it, though, and he hadn’t wasted a second. He yanked his knife free and slammed the blade into the hybrid’s chest, right into its heart, and the thing finally went still.

  He was panting when he rolled off the now motionless creature and turned to face Vivian. She was on the ground still, Parv with her, and even though they had both been crying, right away Angus could tell his sister-in-law was okay.

  “You all right?” he’d asked anyway.

  Vivian turned her tear-filled brown eyes toward the house where her granddaughter sat. Even from there they could see the blood. “No. But I’m not going to die.”

  She’d almost sounded disappointed.

  Angus allowed the tension to leave his body, his shoulders slumping, a sigh ripping its way out of him. His heart was thudding twice as hard from the altercation, and despite the fact that they still had to take care of his great-niece, a sense of relief settled over him. It was stupid considering what they’d lost and what they still had to face, but he couldn’t help it. He’d saved at least one person, and that was something.

  “We need to go to Patty,” Parv said, “then we can take care of the bodies.”

  Vivian let out a choked sob even as she’d nodded.

  “I’ll take care of the dead,” Angus said, his focus on his wife. “You take care of the girl.”

  “Angus,” Parv said, her tone firm. “Not alone. You can’t—”

  A howl broke through the air, far away but no less threatening, and another followed. There was too much blood, too many bodies, and there had been too much commotion. Every creature in the area was probably on their way to the settlement.

  Angus had let out a deep sigh, knowing what needed to happen but also knowing Vivian and Parv wouldn’t like it.

  He dragged himself to his feet then reached down and grabbed each of the women by their forearms, hauling them up as well. Then he’d started walking toward the house.

  Parv tried to pull away, but his grip was too firm. “What are you doing?”

  “Gotta go in. Now. Others will be comin’.”

  Vivian, like his wife, had tried to pull free. “We can’t just leave them. You know what will happen!”

  Angus didn’t slow, but he had looked first Vivian’s way, then Parv’s. “It’s gotta happen.”

  His wife opened her mouth to protest, but the words died on her lips when another howl broke through the air. It was followed by others, and they were closer this time.

  “He’s right,” Parv had finally said, her voice shaking, her bottom lip trembling. “If we stay out here, we’ll be next.”

  “I ain’t gonna let that happen,” Angus said, the words coming out like a growl. “We’re goin’ in. Now.”

  No one protested this time, and they didn’t stop until they’d reached the porch. That was when Angus released the women. Patty was still sitting on the floor, crying.

  “Go in,” he said, “We’ll be right behind you.”

  Parv and Vivian obeyed as he’d knelt and scooped the girl up. She clung to her uncle, her eyes wide and so like Megan’s that the terror in them seemed to slice into his heart.

  “I don’t want to be one of them, Uncle Angus,” she’d said as tears streamed down her cheeks. “Please don’t let me turn into one of them.”

  “I won’t,” he said. “Promise.”

  Once they were inside, Parv had shut and locked the door, and Angus set his niece on the floor in the foyer. There was no point in moving to a couch when they would need to put an end to things.

  Vivian had knelt beside Patty and threw her arms around the girl, her shoulders shaking. “I’m sorry. I should have stayed with you. I’m sorry.”

  The girl’s bite wasn’t visible, but Angus could tell where it was thanks to the blood soaked into her shirt. It was on her stomach, near her bellybutton, which had been a small blessing. It gave them a few more minutes before she turned.

  He’d watched the girl closely as she and her grandmother said their goodbyes, noting the stages of transformation as they happened. Her skin paling a little at a time, the black veins snaking out from the neckline of her shirt, moving up. Her green irises clouding over and turning milky.

  When the veins had reached her cheeks, Angus finally put a hand on Vivian’s shoulder. “It’s time.”

  She sniffed and gave her granddaughter one final kiss on the cheek. “I love you.”

  Patty seemed to be trembling too much to respond.

  Vivian scooted back, but she didn’t release Patty’s hand, and she squeezed her eyes shut when Angus had knelt beside his niece. He felt like he’d been in this position hundreds of times before, and he had the sudden urge to punch something. Instead, he tightened his grip on his knife as he raised it, his knuckles aching and turning white. He focused on the knife, a jolt going through him as he thought about who it had belonged to. Axl. Angus had stolen this very knife from his workplace—a hole-in-the wall bait and tackle shop that had also carried an assortment of survival gear—and given it to his brother for his fifteenth birthday. How had it survived all this time when Axl hadn’t?

  Angus swallowed as he placed his hand on Patty’s head, positioned the knife at her ear like he’d done so many times before, then squeezed his eyes shut.

  “I’m sorry.” He took a deep breath. “I shoulda been there.”

  The room was as silent as a graveyard when he plunged the knife in.

  Unlike Lila and Trey, Patty didn’t react to the blade cutting through her brain. There was no jerk of her body and no whimper. She’d simply gone limp and fallen to the floor, taking the knife with her.

  Angus didn’t open his eyes before sinking back, leaning against the wall. They were still closed when Parv wrapped her arms around him, still shut tight as Vivian’s sobs echoed through the house. Outside, the howls grew louder, closer and more insistent, and he could imagine Lila’s and Trey’s bodies being ripped apart. There would be little left by morning—probably not even enough to bury. It made his stomach lurch, but he’d been
too worn out to vomit. So, he’d just sat there, letting his wife hug him, holding on to her as grief swept over them like a wave.

  They’d moved Patty’s body to the garage before turning in for the night, the three of them sleeping in one room, in the same bed, and clinging to each other for comfort. The next day, they buried his niece, but like he’d thought, there had been nothing left of Lila and Trey.

  Chapter Sixteen

  It rained that night, giving Angus and Naya the chance to collect more water, but other than the ping of the raindrops on the roof of the cabin, the forest was amazingly silent.

  “It’s quiet out there,” he said to Naya.

  She was sitting on the couch, her foot propped up on the table, while he rested in the chair. He’d moved it closer to the fire once night had closed in, hoping to ease the chill in his body, and they were now directly across from each other, only the coffee table separating them.

  “It’s been that way every night since you killed that one. I don’t think there are any others in the area.” She frowned like the thought upset her. “Maybe you didn’t need to kill it. If there aren’t any other creatures around, it couldn’t have drawn others here.”

  “Don’t matter,” he said, giving her a shrug. “Eventually, they woulda come.”

  Naya’s shoulders sagged, and it felt to Angus as if she were accepting some kind of horrible truth about this world she’d been denying up to that point.

  “We’re gonna be okay,” he said, quickly and firmly, wanting to reassure her even though he had no clue what she was thinking.

  “How?” she asked. “How will we be okay? I keep telling myself the shelter still exists, that my entire family didn’t die for nothing, but it’s getting harder to believe. Especially the more you tell me about your past.”