Feast of Weeds (Books 1--4)

by Jamie Thornton

  Of course. I cringed at the tongue lashing I deserved to get from Spencer, but he said nothing, except, “Good luck finding your person.”

  I looked at him for a long moment, seeing someone only a few years older than me with aged skin who was even more wise and experienced in the crueler layers of the world than me. “Good luck biting your officer,” I said.

  He nodded.

  I hugged Maibe. If she hadn’t been there for me to take care of I knew I wouldn’t have made it this far. But she couldn’t go where I needed to go next. If any of us survived this, it had to be her. At least her.

  “Stay safe,” I said. “I’ll be back.”

  “You too,” she said and let go.

  I nodded a goodbye to Gabbi, who returned it. I didn’t know how, but I had earned a little respect from her. The rest of us walked as a group down the trail, behind the Vs, careful to stay far enough back to prevent triggering them with either our sounds or smells.

  Finally, we rounded the trail’s corner and Spencer pulled out a flare gun, I thought maybe a token stolen from Officer Hanley before the world had fallen apart. He lifted the gun, aimed, and shot it into a tree outside the Cal Expo perimeter. The flare brightened, then disappeared for a moment in the fog. Then the fog lit up, red. Then everything went blinding white. Cal Expo had turned the lights on and made it impossible to see, but it drew the Vs to this new sensory input like Spencer had said it would. Did they follow the white light at the end of the tunnel? Did they look for relief?

  The fog muffled the first shots.

  Leaf shoved something into my hand. I looked down and reflexively tightened my grip. My chef's knife. I blinked. It wasn't my chef's knife, that one had been lost long ago, but rather a pocket knife.

  “It’s time,” Spencer said. The three of them drifted into the fog, disappearing, leaving me alone.

  I felt a memory-rush brush the edges of my brain, tendrils of state fair exhibits brought in on the fog. I began to run.

  I focused on breathing steady and deep and went to where the light shined brightest. A lone V crossed my path and I dodged him. My feet sunk into the wet weeds, my pant legs became soaked to the knee. I lifted my feet high above the vegetation, waited for my knee to pop, but it felt fine. There was no pain. I leapt over a fallen tree trunk. I swerved away from another V sprinting in my direction.

  I couldn’t see the line yet.

  I hoped I had been right. I hoped Spencer and the others had found the gap in the fence. I hoped there still was a gap in the fence. But if not, I coached myself to jump and climb and sacrifice my hands to any barbed wire.

  A snuffling sounded on my right.

  A big, middle-aged man with vacant eyes and a torn, red plaid shirt ran faster than I thought possible. To me.

  I froze.

  A loud crack sounded, and then his head exploded. He was there, and then he wasn’t, and blood drops were suspended in the fog for a horrible moment before everything dropped to the ground. I lost my footing, stumbled to the ground, my knees and hands and forehead falling into the wetness that was part water and part middle-aged man. Metallic, swampy muck hit my nose and mouth. I snapped my mouth close, held my breath, and crawled to the fence. Panic increased my speed.

  Before I covered ten feet, something grabbed my shirt and hauled me up. I fumbled for the knife at my waist. I hoped it was Spencer or Leaf or Jimmy.

  Hot breath, stinking like fermented cheese. A dirt-smudged face, crazy long brown hair, a gaping mouth with two broken front teeth. She was taller than me, impossibly tall, and she gripped my clothes like a vice.

  “Let go!” I screamed.

  She shook her head, as if throwing off my words like I was a bee that had buzzed too closely. She pulled me against her. I saw the bits of grass and blood and dirt stuck in her gums.

  Her face bobbed to the side, out of sight. Her teeth punched through my clothes and the skin of my shoulder. The same shoulder that had already been wounded once. As if she had smelled the wound, the weakness, and went straight for it. The pain burned like fire through my body. I screamed and plunged the knife into her chest. The Vs flesh resisted and then gave way like I was carving a roasted chicken.

  She remained latched to me. I feared backing away might tear my skin to shreds. I pressed into her instead. A sucking sound filled my ears as I drew out my knife. This time I aimed higher.

  She growled into my neck. I pulled and twisted and plunged the knife into her cheek. She released and sent me spinning backwards. She fell to her knees, clutched her cheek. I swear she looked at me with clear and horrified and knowing eyes. I ran away, into the oblivion of the fog, not sure of my direction now, only knowing that it was away from her and that human look in her eyes, that look that said she realized what had happened to her, she realized what she had become.

  My shoulder throbbed and shot waves of pain up and down my body. The bloody knife slipped out from my hand and was lost in the weeds. I was lost in a white tunnel to hell.

  I couldn’t stop running. If I stopped running the memory-rush would come—it was here. Time and place disconnected. Running after Dylan, running from those school girls, running from the Vs, running from the Vs, running from the Vs.

  I tripped and fell to the ground. Water soaked my upper body. Whiteness encapsulated me in a cold glove.

  I was nowhere. There was nothing. I was going to die without ever seeing Dylan again.

  There.

  A faint gleam of light reflected off metal.

  I crawled forward.

  The fence.

  No Vs, no guards in sight. Just me and an uncut fence, and a hint of luck—no barbed wire. My shoulder felt paralyzed. I used my one good arm and two good legs and climbed over the damn fence.

  The fog revealed a rusted truck—a place to hide, to tie up my wounds, to fight back the fever that was going to come. I scooted underneath the bed, ignoring the wetness on my back, grateful for the smell of rust and oil to replace the other smells of muck and rot and blood.

  I tore a piece of my undershirt for a tourniquet, wrapped my shoulder. Everything went blazing white with infection. I never hated a color as much as I did in that moment.

  The memories tornadoed in.

  The parts of my body I could still feel seemed frozen from the cold. My face and hands and feet I could not feel at all. There was no way to know how long the memory-fevers had kept me numb. I knew at least that something had disturbed me enough to interrupt the fevers.

  My eyes focused on the truck’s pipes, barely illuminated. They were crusted in dirt and rust and mineral build-up. The truck had sat abandoned for some time.

  I tried to see outside the border of the truck, but the fog, the dull, gray fog, no longer lit up by artificial lights, obscured the view. I breathed through my mouth and then regretted it as ice seemed to touch the back of my throat. My tongue felt heavy and coated in a layer of grime. I shifted and pulled away from the foliage. The weed’s succulent leaves and stem spread web-like across the ground all around me. No yellow flowers bloomed, but I knew its form all the same. My old friend, purslane.

  I caught up a broken stem with several leaves. A drop of its clear fluid remained on my fingers as I pushed the leaves into my mouth. It tasted a bit like tough lettuce with a hint of lemon. I felt comfort at its familiar taste, even as it triggered gnawing stomach pains and a burst of saliva. I thought from my level of hunger that the fevers had lasted for only a few hours, but I couldn’t be sure.

  The silence disturbed me. The only sounds were the crackle of weeds near the edge of my body line, my own breathing, my own heart beating. I had broken into Cal Expo yet there was no sound to indicate it was anything more than a grave.

  My joints popped in quick succession as I pulled my belly along the metal underside of the truck. Rust and dirt rained on me. I had my mouth open like a fool. I spit and thanked the purslane for producing saliva.

  Had something crackled in the weeds just along the far edge of the truck?<
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  My heart beat increased and filled my ears with a roar.

  I forced myself to go slow and silent, using only one arm as my other shoulder was locked up. I could see only inches ahead, everything beyond the border of the truck was blurred, and I did not know if it was because of fog or fever.

  A woman’s head reared into view. Stinking breath, dirt-smudged face, crazy hair. I jumped away, banged my head against the bumper, jabbed my injured shoulder against a sharp corner. I fell back to the ground in agony.

  The woman hadn’t died. She was alive and had searched for me and—

  She disappeared into the fog like evaporating water.

  A ghost-memory, I told myself. That’s all.

  The fog parted, forming a small circular stage, and Mr. Sidner was there, and the other woman I had almost killed, alive and well, on top of him, hurting him. I scrambled up, ignored the pain in my shoulder, and tried to outrun these nightmares. Instead, I barreled into a wall.

  Pain bloomed on my face, along with embarrassment. Running from a ghost-memory in the fog was one of the more stupid things I could do.

  After the pain lessened I opened my eyes. The damn fog still surrounded me. My nose was on fire. I forced my numb fingers to touch the edge of the pain. No way to tell how bad, but my fingers came away blood-tipped. At least the cold might keep the swelling down.

  I forced myself to walk on, using the wall as a guide.

  The truck that took Dylan away drove into view. Dylan locked inside but not more than a hundred yards away.

  A strangled moan left my throat and slapped back to me. I beat away the instinct to run. I locked my legs, locked my mind. I would not run after a ghost-memory. I would not become a V. I would not.

  An eternity passed.

  Then a new fear sprung my legs from their lock.

  Neither did I want to become one of the Faint.

  I shuddered, licked my cracked lips, and hobbled away from the van mirage. One creaking foot after another. One step away, two steps away. Three steps. Four. My hand against the wood wall kept me steady. Five steps.

  The van disappeared.

  My fingers caught on something other than wood.

  Six steps and my hands fumbled at the latch. Seven steps and a creaking door, and I was inside. Smells of hay, dust, rotting wood. Metal animal stalls crisscrossed the room.

  I stumbled into a stall full of clean hay, not looking or caring about what else might be inside.

  The metal latch to open the stall might as well have been padlocked. My hands could not budge it. I draped my upper half over the stomach-high top bar, leaned and pushed and struggled and flipped onto my back on the other side. I lay there stunned for a moment.

  I shimmied deeper into the hay, heaping it over me while I sneezed and itched. I ignored the ghost-memory that appeared outside my stall. Another woman, locked in a fog of memory, old, like a grandmother, like the one I had hurt, yet different. I couldn’t place her, couldn’t remember what ghost-memory this was—when had one of the sick ones shuffled her way to me, staring vacant, arms pinned to her sides, stopping feet from me, not seeing me? The fever rose in me again, obliterating the question from my mind. I welcomed the heat the fever would generate under my layer of hay.

  I awoke all at once as if someone had sprayed water in my face. Yellow hay stalks filled my vision, hay dust tickled my throat, my rhythmic breaths counterpointed with someone else’s.

  The woman whose arms were pinned to her sides, whose vacant stare did not see me, whose body pressed against the stall bar. She was no ghost-memory.

  I thought about staying hidden in the hay, maybe she would leave, and then I thought about all the time I had already lost.

  And then I thought, what if she wasn’t the only one? I couldn’t see her, only hear her breathing. What if more had shuffled in from the corners of the building and surrounded this stall three lines deep, breathing, frozen, locked-in?

  I shot up from the hay, stalks flying in all directions and clinging to my hands and clothes.

  Only her. She was alone.

  I calmed myself down. I was almost warm and the memory-fevers had left me with a clear head for the moment. My shoulder throbbed, my face throbbed, my hands and feet throbbed. The pain was a good sign.

  The light signaled early morning. The fog was still thick but dissipating. A full night had passed—I hoped not more than that.

  The woman did not look dangerous. Only very sick.

  I backed to the far end of the stall, caught my foot on some sort of cloth. A stall blanket, like those clipped onto livestock to keep their fur clean before the show. I wrapped it around my shoulders and warmth flooded into my core. I clambered over the bars again, determined to find some water and begin my scouting, to find Dylan and never, ever come back to this place. The bare dirt floor was damp and there were two sets of footprints. My own and the woman's.

  When I reached the open door, the woman mewled behind me. She still pressed against the stall bars. Tears streamed down her face. She had wrapped her bare arms around her. Blue tinged her lips. She shivered uncontrollably.

  I told myself to keep moving. I told myself to get on with it, there was nothing I could do for her. I turned back, took off the cloth, and clipped it around her shoulders.

  She dropped her arms, and I thought she meant to attack me. Instead, she fingered the corner of the cloth, rubbed her cheek against it, and smiled.

  I opened a stall and led her inside. It took coaxing, but she sat and allowed me to arrange hay around her to create an insulating nest.

  “Stay here where it’s warm,” I said, when I had finished. This was what the bacterial infection did. She was like Matilda and her family. She was a Faint now. The virus I understood. The instinct for people to go V—to bite and injure and infect—was obvious. But how did someone catch the bacterial infection? How did it get passed from one person to another?

  “Stay here until I come back,” I said again.

  Her mouth curled into a slight smile.

  I feared she would wander away but was afraid to lock her inside. I didn’t know when I would be back and didn’t want her trapped, banging against the inside of the stall until she died of dehydration.

  I limped my way to the sink next to the stall. The tap ran for minutes—cold, almost frozen water—then gushed glorious hot water. I quickly stripped, ignoring my various injuries, and stepped into the deep sink. My toes and fingers stung as they came back to life. The shoulder wound was an ugly, swelling injury I cleaned as best I could. My face was next. Except for some tenderness, I did not think I had done much damage to my nose after all. Hay became my towel. I climbed back into my filthy clothes. Steam rose from my body in thick waves.

  A dirty mug rested on a wood beam next to the sink. I washed it out as best I could, filled it with warm water, and carried it back to the old woman. I held the water out to her, guided her hands around the cup. Being this close to her, I saw the dirt that filled the lines around her eyes. A chalky line of something else crusted her face from her eyes to her jaw. Maybe dried salt from old tears. She smelled no different than the building. A mix of dry hay, soil, wet earth, and decay, but not so bad really. We were in a barn after all.

  When she did nothing with the cup, I splashed the liquid onto her lips. With that vacant stare still in place, she opened her mouth and licked. She jerked from the taste of water, raised the cup and drained it.

  “Thank you, Lorraine,” she said, surprising me. Her voice cracked from disuse, but otherwise sounded steady, modulated for politeness and control. “I knew you would come back and take care of me.”

  My mind raced, would she hear me, listen to me? I had to try. “Of course, but you’re sick and need rest. I’ve made the bed. You need to lie down and rest. Wait for me. Don’t go anywhere.”

  Her laugh tinkled like glass. “Of course, dear. Where would I go? This is my home. Thank you for the soup. I will be fine now. Go look after your children and I’ll be here
.” She finished the water, moved the cup as if placing it on a side table, but since there was none, the cup disappeared into the hay. She lay down on the ground as if relaxing on a couch, folded her hands underneath her cheek like a child would, sighed, and closed her eyes.

  I tucked the hay around and fought back a sob. This horrible disease trapped people, and it scared other people so badly they became willing to kill because of it. I had killed because of it.

  My stomach rumbled and I wondered how long ago my meager purslane meal had happened, and then I wondered how long she had gone without food.

  I strode out of the barn, surveyed the area, and dropped to my knees to pick as much purslane as I could carry. When I returned with my bounty, I rinsed the weeds and set a pile next to the woman. I guided her hand to it and said, “Here’s a nice finger-food salad before dinner.”

  “Thank you, dear.” She proceeded to munch on the purslane and I did the same. It would not satisfy our hunger, only take the edge off for a short time.

  I stretched to warm up my joints and muscles and practiced walking around like a normal person. They’d shoot me on sight if they thought I was infected. I put my hair down and arranged it to cover the ashy, webbed cast of my skin that would give away my true state.

  The woman was as comfortable as I could make her. I promised myself I would come back for her.

  Chapter 18

  “Meeting…” The hiss and crackle of a stereo interrupted the message. I crouched behind a metal trash can big enough to hide my body from view. No smells of rotting food. I looked inside. Empty. Not even a plastic bag lined it. There were no people in this section.

  A speaker popped again and I found the source. A dozen feet away from where I hid stood a tall metal pole with a speaker attached. The fairground’s music and announcement system.

  “Meeting at Stage 1…Fifteen minutes. All must attend. Meeting at Stage 1…”

  If they used the same names as the state fair, I knew where to find Stage 1.

  The quality of light made me guess it was late morning, though even a vague outline of the sun wasn’t visible through the fog. I skirted along the edge of buildings, sidewalks, grassy areas, the skeletons of vendor stations. The building the old woman and I had taken refuge in was one of several animal housing structures near the horse racing stadium. There were no sounds of people or activity, but I thought maybe this was for safety reasons.