by Laken Cane
“Not our story to tell,” Richard interrupted.
Caleb’s cheeks reddened. “Sorry.”
“Anyway,” Richard continued, “you want to know about the man who was bitten. What the bite did to him. What it changed him into.”
“Yes.”
“He started getting stronger. Hungrier. Meaner.” Richard kept his stony stare pinned to mine as he spoke, and I wondered if he could see the truth in my eyes. “Darker.”
“He got faster, too,” Caleb added.
“Like the mutants?” I asked.
“No,” Richard said. “Like the gods.”
I swallowed, trying to dislodge the cold lump of fear in my throat. “How are the gods different from regular vampires?”
“Mutants,” Caleb said.
I tore my stare from Richard to look at him. “What?”
“You called them vampires.”
I frowned at him and turned back to Richard. “So? How are they different?”
“You realize I’m figuring this out as I go along,” Richard said. “Don’t you? The only way to find out the truth about them is to ask them.”
I sighed. “Yes, I guess so.”
“The gods are more powerful,” Richard said. “That’s all I know for sure. And I think that as the months march on, they’re going to adapt and…find themselves. Then they’ll be forces to fear.”
“You don’t think they’ve accessed their full power yet.”
“No,” he said. “I do not.”
So many questions. And we had the answers to almost none of them.
I realized that Caleb still held my hand, so I pulled away from his grasp and twisted my fingers together.
“In the beginning,” Richard said, his voice low, almost hypnotic, “they were not nearly as bad as they are now. They were nearly human in their confusion.”
“Oh,” I murmured, my eyes wide. “You were their prisoner, weren’t you?”
Caleb looked at the tabletop.
Rage like lightning flashed through Richard’s eyes and for a second, I was terrified of him. Terrified.
There was something in his eyes so awful I couldn’t bear to look at him.
I shoved my chair back and stood, reaching automatically for weapons I wasn’t wearing.
He calmed almost immediately—soothed, perhaps, by my fear.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.
But I had no trouble hearing the lie in his voice.
Richard would hurt whoever he needed to hurt.
I could barely breathe. Not just because of what I might be or what I might become, but because they—my friends—might kill me because of it.
They were not really my friends.
And I was not safe.
I slid my fingers to the bandage around my neck, but dropped them when I looked up to find Richard watching me.
I’d been told more than once that my face was an open book, and anyone could read it.
I hadn’t yet learned to wear a mask of impassivity. I hadn’t yet learned to hide behind cold, blank eyes.
Not yet. But I would.
I backed away from them. “I’m going to bed.”
“Goodnight,” Richard said.
Caleb stood as well. “I’ll come with you.”
I frowned. “No. I’m going to sleep.”
He tossed me a grin. “I read a mean bedtime story.”
I hesitated.
“Come on,” he said. “It’s a hard, cold world. There’s nothing wrong with taking pleasure when it’s there for the taking.”
If he’d been someone else, I might have agreed. I’d have taken his hand and led him to my bed. But he was not someone else—and he scared me a little too much.
I shook my head. “No.”
I could feel him watching me as I crawled into my sleeping bag.
When I got a chance, I decided, I would slip away.
Because I had been bitten by a mutant.
And I was different because of that bite.
When they found out, they’d kill me just as they killed the mutants.
Just as they’d killed Lila’s father.
Chapter Twenty-Two
When I woke up, Lila was sitting in the chair beside my sleeping bag, watching me.
I sat up and slid my hand under the cover, feeling for the sheathed blade I’d stashed there. “What time is it?”
She tapped her baseball bat against the bed. “Just past dawn. Let’s go search for Sage.”
“What?”
She lifted an eyebrow. “I found tracks last night, on the edge of town. Whoever has her is moving slow, but they’re moving. I’m sure this town’s mutant infestation slowed them down.”
I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and placed the blade on my lap. “Humans? Humans have her?”
She stared at the blade before meeting my eyes. “Yeah.” She nodded toward the blade. “You thinking I’m going to murder you in your sleep?”
“I was thinking you might try,” I said, calmly.
“You’re like an infant, Teagan. I wouldn’t have to try very hard.”
My whole body tensed. I said nothing.
“Are you coming or what?”
I stood. “Let me get dressed.”
She nodded.
As I walked toward the bathroom, I heard Caleb and Richard in the kitchen, their voices low, and the comforting clink of silverware as they ate their breakfasts.
When I returned, washed, dressed, and a little more cheerful, I brought with me a bottle of lotion. “Moisturizer,” I told Lila. “Want some?”
She snorted. “God, you’re such a fucking girl.”
I shrugged and put the lotion on a table, then followed her into the kitchen. “And you’re such a bitch.”
She laughed. “Grab a protein bar and let’s get out there. We’re wasting daylight. You’re like a turtle, you’re so slow.”
“I’m too much of a girl, I’m too slow…is there anything about me you actually like?” I grabbed a protein bar and ripped open the package. Surely there was. She’d saved my life. And every moment that she kept her mouth shut, she continued to save it.
Her smile slipped, and she ran her stare over my face. “No.” But her voice was soft.
“Good morning,” Richard said, putting his plate in the sink. “Lila tells me you’re tracking Sage today.”
“Morning,” I mumbled.
“Lila has been busy,” Caleb said. “Do you want some help?”
Lila shoved a blade into her belt, looking at no one. “We’ve got it covered.”
“I don’t mind,” Caleb told her.
She straightened and turned to glare at him. “I told you—”
“I need you today, Caleb,” Richard interrupted. “I want to do a run on the other side of town.”
Caleb shrugged, but his disappointed gaze lingered on me. “Okay.”
I took an enormous bite of my protein bar, then shrugged into my protective vest. The vests were as plentiful as candles. When the world had begun to go bad, everyone had started stocking up on them.
Lila watched me quietly as I buckled on my belts. I pushed a water gun into the holster at my side, then slid my arms into the straps of the bag holding extra alcohol.
Lastly, I began loading up on blades, flashlights, and other things I might need while on the road. I shouldn’t have made it so obvious that I wasn’t coming back, but the supplies were worth the risk.
If Richard had been telling the truth, there weren’t a lot of supplies left out in the world.
“Jesus, Teagan. We’re not leaving the country,” Lila said.
“You never know what might happen out there.”
I pulled another bag off a hook on the wall and began filling it from the pile of supplies on the table we’d shoved against the wall. Packages of food, a couple bottles of water, extra weapons, first aid kit, whatever else I could fit in there without weighing it down too much.
“For fuck’s sake!”
Lila put her hands on her hips and shook her head.
“You act like you’re never coming back,” Caleb said.
I laughed. “I like to be prepared.”
“If you have to fight,” Richard said, “you’ll be at a disadvantage with too many weapons and supplies. Leave the bag.”
It sounded more like an order than a request, but when I looked at him, he smiled. “Think of me as your teacher.”
“And her keeper,” Lila muttered. “God knows she needs one.”
I paused with a bottle of aspirin halfway to the bag. “No supplies? We may have to track her for miles. And what if we find her in a camp of baddies? We’re going to need some things.”
“If we find her in a camp,” Lila said, “we’re coming back here to get Richard and Caleb to help. We can’t attack a camp by ourselves. I’m not looking to get us killed.”
Dammit. I did not want to leave without a bag of supplies. If I had my way, I was going to get as far away from Crowbridge as possible.
Start over.
Start over with people who didn’t know that I’d been bitten by a mutant and think that meant they should automatically kill me.
I sighed and reluctantly left the bag behind as I followed Lila out the back door. I was glad Richard hadn’t made me empty my belt and pockets. I was halfway afraid to grab a machete from beside the door, but when I did, he said nothing.
I was just being paranoid. If Richard wanted me dead, he’d have killed me himself already.
“Come on, boy,” I called, but when the dog got up from his bed in the corner and walked toward me, Richard held him back.
“He’s not well enough to track,” he said. “We’ll take care of him.”
There was nothing I could do about that, either. Richard would keep the dog, and they really would take care of it. Not even Caleb, in his insanity, would hurt a dog.
So I left him there.
“Thanks for doing this, Lila,” I said, once we were outside. The air was crisp, almost cold. A fresh carpet of colorful leaves covered the ground. Overnight the trees’ branches had become a little barer.
Soon winter would come and the moon would crash the party a lot earlier in the day. I was not looking forward to early darkness.
Lila pursed her lips, shrugging. “I liked that kid. I want her safe.”
“Wow.” I grinned, but I was touched that she cared. “I didn’t think you had a heart.”
She lifted her chin and blanked her eyes immediately. “I don’t.”
I noticed she had a long, thin scar along her jawline.
Without thinking, I reached out to touch it.
She flinched, but held still as I traced the scar with my fingertips. “How’d you get it?”
“Doesn’t matter. It happened long before the world ended.” She looked away. “It doesn’t matter now.”
She stepped back and snatched off her cap—a red one—then ran her hand over her close cropped hair. Without another word, she rested her baseball bat on her shoulder and jogged through the yard.
I didn’t want to think about mutant saliva running through my bloodstream, wreaking havoc on my system, but as we strode down the street, I realized my body wanted to run. To fight.
I had so much energy I could barely contain it, and I was jumping out of my skin. Regardless of Lila’s assessment that I was a slowpoke, my insides were shaking like jelly, and I would have liked nothing more than to release that excess energy.
It seemed like the very air had woken what was inside of me.
I tried to tell myself it didn’t matter. I was me, simple as that.
Teagan Shaw.
Whatever happened, whatever came, I was not going to become someone else.
Right, Robin?
“Richard and Caleb,” I said. “They’re afraid I’ll…”
“Turn.”
“Yes.”
And the mutant’s face flashed into my mind. His mouth opening, his fangs, his eyes, his lack of any sort of humanity. The pain, the memories, the screaming…
I slapped a hand to my throat and stumbled as the memory became too vivid. I felt his teeth digging into my throat. I felt his rage. I felt his hatred, his…jealousy. I felt his hunger.
“Teagan! You’re okay. You’re fine.”
When the memory receded, I came back to reality crouched on the ground, my machete beside me. Lila bent over me, frowning, her hand on my shoulder.
“I will never be fine again,” I told her. “None of us will.”
Maybe they weren’t like the vampires of fiction. Maybe they weren’t like the vampires on TV, handsome and sexy and romantic, but yes.
They were vampires.
Sort of.
And I’d been bitten.
“Thing is,” she said, “the rest of us realized that two years ago.”
I stared up at her. “Do you think it’s true what the guys said? That a bitten person becomes the mutant?”
She sighed and knelt beside me. “I think it means you’ll become…modified. Not human, not mutant, but something more. Something just as dangerous as the gods.”
“The gods…”
She looked into my eyes, and hers bore no judgment. “You feel it, don’t you?”
I didn’t want to admit it, but I needed someone to know. I needed someone to tell me what to do.
I nodded. “Yes,” I whispered. “I feel different. I feel…” I tapped my chest. “I feel it growing inside me.” I burst into tears.
She pulled me into her arms. “Teagan…”
I buried my face against the warmth of her throat, wishing I could stay there forever. Wishing I could forget what had happened to me.
“You have to go,” she said. “Richard will figure it out, and he’ll kill you. His hatred of the mutants consumes him. He’s not exactly himself anymore.”
“Was he their prisoner?”
I felt her shrug. “Richard doesn’t tell me what he was or wasn’t.” She pushed me away from her. “I couldn’t get much, but when I went out this morning I stashed some supplies in a bag for you.” As I wiped my eyes, she stood, then pointed. “At the base of the third tree. Now get going.”
“Come with me.” I didn’t want to wander the world alone. I didn’t want to face what was happening inside me alone. I just…
I didn’t want to be alone.
She hesitated. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I owe him. Richard isn’t a bad person. He saved my life. Twice. And I fucking owe him. I belong in his group, hunting for him, helping him build. I’m being a traitorous fucking bitch right now and if you don’t go, I’ll...just go, Teagan. Fucking go.”
I backed away, nodding. Shivering. Alone.
Always alone.
“If you find Sage before I do,” I said, my teeth clacking together, “tell her I looked for her. Will you?”
“Yeah.” She turned away, her stare on the ground. “I’ll tell her.”
I straightened my spine. “Goodbye, Lila.”
She strode to me, hooked a hand around my neck, and slammed her mouth against mine. She softened the kiss as I stood there, unmoving, surprised.
Finally, I leaned into her kiss. I lay my fingers on her cheek, then slid them around to grip her neck. It’d been so long.
So long since the world had ended and there was no one to touch, no one to kiss, no one to care. And now…
There would be no one again.
She pulled away, finally, and rested her forehead against mine. For a long, long moment we just breathed.
“Go,” she said, finally. “Go make the world a better place, Teagan.”
I turned around and started toward the tree she’d indicated, my eyes full of tears I really didn’t want to shed in front of her.
I’d only taken a few steps when her voice stopped me.
But she wasn’t calling me back.
“No,” she screamed. “Teagan, run!”
Richard and Caleb loped toward us. Ri
chard pulled a sword from the sheath at his side, and Caleb held a machete in each hand.
Caleb ran around behind me as Richard took the front.
They’d come to kill me.
“Take off, Lila,” Caleb called. “One chance.”
I thought I heard her sigh, and then, she lifted her bat.
She stood alone, her and a fucking bat against two men with blades.
No. Not alone.
I hefted my machete and ran to stand at her side.
“The girls against the boys,” I whispered, and tried to smile. I was unsuccessful. I had no gun, or I would have shot them, mutants or no mutants.
Richard sprayed me with alcohol, but when I didn’t burn, he threw his gun to the ground and ran at me, his sword in both hands.
“Richard, don’t,” Lila screamed.
“You betrayed us, Lila,” he said, and finally, there was emotion in Richard’s voice. “You broke the rules.”
She spread her feet and held her baseball bat like she was getting ready to hit a homerun. “Match me,” she said. “At least do that, motherfucker.”
I had no idea what she was talking about until Richard stopped, dropped his sword, and drew a club from a sheath on his back. I’d never seen it before, and wished I hadn’t seen it then.
It was polished mahogany in some places, worn dull and colorless in others. He’d used it a lot—or someone else had. Metal bits gleamed from the bulbous business end.
He gave her a nod. “I did promise.”
Caleb crept closer. I hadn’t seen him drop his blades, but he held a club similar to Richard’s in his grip. His was black and as grim as his face.
He hadn’t made it out of his teens yet, but he was not a boy. He’d grown up when the world ended.
But I didn’t really know him. Maybe he’d grown up before the world ended.
“Lila,” he called. “You don’t have to die. No sense in both of you going down. It’s not going to help her. Get the fuck out of here.” His voice broke halfway through his words, but he continued on. “Please, Lila. Don’t make me.”
“If you kill me,” she said, gently, “that’s on you.”
“I can’t live with that,” he cried, but he took another step toward us, his club up. Ready to kill us—her—despite his reluctance. Despite his pain.
Despite his love for her.
“Rules are rules, Caleb,” Richard called. “We can’t keep people we can’t trust. She was dead the minute she tried to help a turned one escape.” He smiled, and there was a gleam of admiration in his eyes. “And she knew that.”
