Strangers in the Land (The Zombie Bible)

by Stant Litore

  One corpse was dragging a flailing woman through the barley by the hair, while four other dead lurched after her, bending, their hands grasping, trying to clutch at the living woman, who was young, too young. Nearby, a man had been torn apart, drenching a patch of the field in his blood; one of the crouching dead was chewing on a hand, another on a foot, a third had an ear. One corpse was seated with a pile of entrails in its lap like a nest of dead serpents. It lifted the glistening intestines to its mouth with a slow grace, like a dignified grandmother at a banquet.

  The living by the river did not scream as they ran; many of them fled half bent over, as though winded. One, a woman Devora’s own age, had cast aside her robe or her salmah and now ran naked in the barley, forsaking dignity for speed. Even as Devora looked, the woman stumbled, and three of the dead fell on her. One grasped the woman’s leg in its hands and tore strips of flesh from her thigh with its teeth. The woman kicked with her other leg and screamed, shrill peals of pain and terror. The other two corpses tore into her breast with their fingers, ripping her open and reaching in for those parts of her that God had hidden within her body before birth. The corpses’ arms were bloodied to the elbows; one reached low and pulled out the entrails, and the other corpse snatched at them; the first turned on the second and hissed like a cat. The woman’s shrieks went on and on, terribly similar to the screams of Devora’s mother. But gazing at that woman dying in the barley, this time Devora did not see her mother’s face in her mind, her mother dragged screaming out the door of her tent. She saw only Hurriya’s face. Hurriya, her life bleeding out, dying helplessly where Devora could not reach her or console her. Fury rushed through Devora like flame roaring from one tree to the next. She held Mishpat out to the side, ready, though her arm felt the strain.

  No more of the People must perish.

  “Ride, Shomar,” she whispered fiercely, and sent the horse surging beneath her in a gallop that tore up the dirt.

  Faces of the dead turned toward her. A song of metal in the air, slicing down as her horse carried her into this rot in the tall barley in the Galilee night. She rode down upon the woman being eaten amid the trampled plants, and her sword took away first the top of the woman’s head, silencing her screams. Then she wheeled about, and Shomar’s hoof took one of the dead in the face, sending it sprawling. One corpse still gnawed at the woman’s leg, the other rose snarling and lunged at Devora, its gray hands grasping for her sandal, her leg. Mishpat cut away the hands, then carved through the thing’s head, and the body fell like chopped wood.

  Then Devora was riding about the field, slashing. With her knees she kept a tight hold on her horse, her heart hammering, her mouth hot and dry, her mind gone in one long scream of horror.

  The terrible, half-unfleshed faces of the dead—

  The moonlight dyeing the grasses the color of blood—

  Her own screams reaching her ears—

  Her frantic glances about the field showed just moaning, lurching figures and a few dying men and women twisting on the ground, the others in the distance fleeing. Her horse had carried her through to the other side, where the hills rose again and there were fewer dead. She grasped Shomar’s mane and dug in and wheeled him about once more, riding back at a canter into the dead. Her body was covered in a sheen of cold sweat, she was shivering. She fought for focus, rode at the first standing corpse she saw and took away its head with her sword.

  Another corpse was devouring a boy who struggled weakly under it, and she stopped her horse, and as it reared she carved down into the creature’s head. After the corpse fell to the side, she leaned over and drove her blade through the boy. Then she was trotting her horse through the moon-red field, and tears were hot on her cheeks, and she was fighting and killing in a blurred world. She heard sharp cries and deep, hungry moans; she rode through the midst of them, brushing tears and sweat and dirt from her eyes and gazing into faces as she passed, but none of them were her mother, none of them were Naomi, none of them Zadok or Hurriya. And she could save none of them. None of the bitten. Just a chop of the blade she held, butcher’s work.

  Barak rode hard, and Ager wheezed under him. He could hear the navi’s hoofbeats ahead of him, though distant, otherwise there would have been no way he could have followed her in this terrible dark. Yet he rode blind; trees rushed by on one side or the other like grim presences, brief touches of some dark heathen god on his mind, looming large and horribly close, then gone as he rode deeper into the night. He was panting, his eyes wide, straining for some glimpse of light; he rode in terror of losing the navi, in terror of his horse stumbling. He had not paused to look in her tent but had run for his horse; as it was, he had barely saddled in time to pursue her. Behind him he could hear the faint hoofbeats of a few horses following. Laban perhaps. A glance over his shoulder showed him torches and their reflections on the water, and the dark silhouettes of armed men hurrying after their chieftains on foot. When he heard the screams ahead and the low moaning, it shook him. This was not how he’d wanted to come upon the dead. No plan of attack, no hiding of men in high places where they could rain spears down. Just a headlong gallop into a valley of corpses with his men far behind and leaderless. He cursed under his breath and drove Ager to greater speed.

  Then the moon rose, and it rose the color of blood, and he heard the screams in the moonlit field ahead. Everything turned cold within him, and he saw the corpses bathed in the red light, their eyes blind and unblinking. He saw their feeding, saw the People being violated and devoured, heard their shrieks in the barley. Saw the navi ride into them as though into a field of wheat, her sword flashing in the moon. Ager carried him into the field after her, in a rush; the reek of decay slammed into his nostrils, stronger than he’d ever encountered it, powerful enough that he nearly slid from his horse.

  One moment the dead were far out in the field; the next he was among them, attacking two-handed with his spear, a thrust to the left, a thrust to the right, their faces crowding near, hands reaching for him. He struck at them desperately as his horse surged past them. He was too panicked, sweating, to look and see if his blows had any effect. He tried to keep his eyes on the navi ahead; he called out to her, but the moans of the dead overwhelmed his voice.

  He was wrenched backward and off his horse, and he landed with a cry in the tall barley, his spear flying from his hands. His stallion sped on, but he could not hear Ager’s hooves above the noise of the dead. A hand grasped his ankle, others clutched at his throat, hands cold like water in a pool at the bottom of a cave, but dry as soil baked by the sun. A face swung over his, a face with no eyes but with a gaping mouth filled with teeth. Howling, he shoved his hands against the creature’s chest, toppling it over. He reached down, plucked from his hip the small bronze knife he kept there, but others were on him. He kicked and fought, slashing with the knife, his heart pounding wildly in his chest, too much terror to think of where to strike the creatures. He laid open one’s belly—it made no effort to defend itself, a thing that had once been a plump woman; its organs spilled from it now, and it still reached for his throat with fleshy fingers. He hacked away another’s hand—his knife was sharp—and still it bent and dug its teeth into the leather strap covering his shoulder. The world, the unclean faces, the bright harvest stars and the waving ears of barley between them and him—it all vanished in a white fury of pain and terror. A shriek went on and on—his.

  Then he could see again, he was shoving the ravenous corpse off him, pulling his knife free of its skull. He rolled, gritting his teeth, his shoulder on fire. Hands were grasping at his armor; he hacked them off and stumbled, crawled through the barley. Somewhere nearby now he heard the cries of living men. And above it all those long, wailing moans, a sound that was a rape of the mind, a sound that took away all his senses and battered him with unreasoning, animal fear.

  He found himself on his hands and knees and he crawled swiftly through the barley. A shape loomed over him. He rolled to the side, somehow got on his feet. His
knife found its home in the creature’s throat, and he felt hands wrap about his own throat as he sawed, cutting away its head. The body fell lifeless, the hands slipping from Barak’s throat. The head fell to the side, and as Barak glanced down at it, he saw the eyes—those murky eyes—still moving, tracking him. The jaw still working silently. With a cry he sent it away with a kick of his foot.

  He gazed around the barley field, wild with terror, his shoulder burning. Other figures were stumbling toward him, arms outstretched, eyes bright in the moonlight. He cast a frantic look ahead—he could not see Devora anywhere. Only the stumbling dead, so many. A glance over his shoulder showed him the glow of the torches of his men on the edge of the field. Gasping, he staggered toward them, then caught his breath and burst into a run.

  No man could face this field of dead alone.

  Tall ears of barley whacked across his skirt of leather and his bronze breast-piece as he ran. Sweat poured from his brow. There were dead all about him, but always he looked for where they were thinnest and darted through before they could seize him. His sides, his shoulder, his very lungs burned with fire.

  He stumbled over a body and nearly cried out, but then he saw the eyes and saw that she was a woman, one of the living, her mouth open in silent pleading, and he reached down to take her hand and pull her to her feet, panting as the dead closed in. Yet when he pulled at her arm, she was strangely light and her eyes rolled back in her head. He glanced down and screamed, for her belly was torn open and nearly hollowed out, her entrails fleshy and half chewed away, and as he pulled, only the top part of the woman came with him. He dropped her and fell in his horror and shock. Then he scrambled away through the barley, lurching figures all about him, reaching down for him.

  His mind, his breath, his whole being was taken up in the effort of flight. Ducking low through the barley, hoping to avoid being seen by the dead. There were too many between him and his men now, but at last he reached the riverside edge of the field and collapsed behind a stand of terebinths. He threw himself into the shadows behind one of the trees, dropping his knife to the ground. There he shook and sweated, certain they were following him, their dark shapes staggering through that field. But he was unable to get up. He clutched his shoulder and cried out. With a need fiercer than he’d ever felt, he longed for his own house and for the cool taste of the grapes from his vines. He clenched his eyelids shut and breathed in through his teeth, losing himself in the throbs of pain, agony that beat like a drum in his shoulder with every pulse of his blood.

  He had seen what had happened to the woman in his house. Had seen her eyes open, heard her low wail. He remembered clearly the bite in her arm. He was unclean, unclean, and the wounds the dead left were lethal.

  Not daring yet to look out into the field, he set his hand against the bole of the terebinth, forcing himself up onto his knees, baring his teeth against the pain and fear. His throat felt terribly dry, his body seized with thirst. He unstrapped his bronze breast-piece and cast it aside. Tore the leather jerkin beneath it up over his head with frantic, fumbling hands. Ran his fingers across the tender skin of his shoulder, wincing. His shoulder was one great bruise; the leather had been mashed into his body by the force of that corpse’s jaws—but when he lifted his fingertips to his eyes, there was no blood on them. Panting, he clutched the jerkin, explored the leather with trembling fingers. He found impressions there, but the leather was tough; the teeth had not cut completely through it. Clutching the jerkin to his chest, he closed his eyes and moaned.

  He had not been bitten.

  Not bitten.

  He was whole.

  Tilting his head back, he sucked in great breaths of the night air, filling his chest. Alive. He was alive.

  On his knees beneath the terebinths, his chest bared, he clutched the leather and just breathed. He could hear water; glancing up, he saw that the ground disappeared into a ravine perhaps a spear’s cast from where he stood. Below must be the Tumbling Water, or whatever trickle would later become Tumbling Water farther south; up here on the high, cliff-like bank, the roots of the terebinths likely dug deep toward that enticing water.

  Breathing fast, Barak began to shrug the leather back over his head and shoulders. Then strapped the bronze piece back on above it. It had saved him once this night; he might need it again. He cast about him; the knife he’d dropped by his feet seemed a pitiful blade to carry against the dead. After a moment he found a long branch, nearly straight, that had fallen from the tree overhead. He bent and took it up, skinning twigs from it with the knife and then hacking desperately at the narrower end, improvising a spear point. The branch was dry and he feared it might break, but at any moment a corpse might stumble in under the trees and see him. He wanted something with more reach than that knife in his hands.

  “Get out,” a voice hissed softly.

  Startled, Barak nearly leapt up from his hiding place. Glancing sharply over his shoulder, his heart pounding, he found two eyes peering up at him amid a face smudged with dirt. A young man—hardly more than a boy—was hiding in a hollow beneath the terebinth. He’d blackened his face with dirt and was lying with his belly to the ground; he’d drawn the year’s first fallen leaves over his body to conceal himself.

  “Go!” the youth whispered fiercely. “This is my place. You’ll bring them!”

  Recovering from his shock, Barak muttered, “Who are you, boy?”

  The boy lifted his head just a little, trying to peer out into the field. “Yehoyakim. From Walls.”

  “What are you doing down there?” Barak said sternly. He felt revulsion clenching up within him. “Your kin are dying out in the barley.”

  Yehoyakim met his gaze. The whites of his eyes showed. “What are you doing here?”

  The words struck Barak like a slap. Shame burned through him. He caught his breath, swore bitterly. Cast a glance out at the field. Several lurching dead were very near now, moving toward the stand of trees. He could still hear distant screams and the low moans and nearer, the trickle of water over stones in the ravine below. Stiffening, Barak tested the heft of his makeshift spear.

  Something went cold and hard inside him. His breathing calmed. He was Barak ben Abinoam, and no boy to hide behind a tree.

  “Fear would devour us all, even as the dead,” he muttered. He looked at the youth. The boy had lowered his chin to the ground again. “Stand and have courage, Yehoyakim. Hope that God is no woman to weep or gloat while we die, but a strong man, mighty and furious, as some of the levites say.”

  “So let him fight the dead,” the boy whispered.

  “Why should he? If God is a man, he will scorn you for shivering so. If God is a woman, she will not admire you or desire you. Either way, your submission to your fear makes you alone.” Barak’s anger was fuel and fire in his breast, and he straightened, his back to the tree, the spear ready in his hands. The dead were near now. He could hear one of them dragging one foot behind it. He took a steadying breath. In a softer voice, he added, “A day ago I saw a man take on four hundred dead by himself.”

  “Did he live?” the boy whispered.

  “No. But we will never forget him. Neither will God.” Barak’s hands tightened about the haft of the spear; its weight was reassuring. He could do this. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of flame. Looking carefully around the bole of the tree, he saw torches moving through the barley. “Look,” he breathed. “The men of the north fight the dead, Yehoyakim. Come with me.”

  The youth shook his head, but Barak could not see him. After a moment’s silence, the chieftain said, “Fine,” and then he leapt around the tree and ran at the approaching dead. Lifted his voice in a great roar, even as his father’s father must have roared at the walls of Yeriho and the burning of Ai, when the People were still newcome to the land and were strong. His blood burned; he lifted the terebinth spear high and drove it hard into the face of the nearest corpse, then swung hard to his right, wrenching the corpse to the side and down. It slid fr
ee from the sharpened wood and fell, and the wood did not break. Barak slammed the butt end of his spear backward to his left into the chest of the next corpse even as it closed with him. The corpse sprawled into the grass hissing, and two more were upon him, their milky eyes gleaming in the moonlight. He leapt back and brought up the spear, thrusting toward one’s head, even as the corpse that had sprawled to the side a moment before scrambled back to its feet.

  The air smelled of smoke. In the field near at hand Barak saw fire rising and the figures of his men and of the lurching dead dark against the flame. Barak fought with a ferocity he had never before felt. He did not know anymore if God was male or female, weak or strong, reliable or fickle. But he had seen how Zadok fought before the walls of Refuge. He had seen the nazarite fight as though possessed by a god, as though he were no mere man but whirlwind and fire in a man’s body. Whatever God Zadok had known, whatever that strange God was like, Barak hoped to catch that deity’s attention now. And he knew that whatever God might be watching, that God would respond only to courage.

  TO SAVE ONE LIFE

  DEVORA HAD not seen Barak ride into the field and hadn’t seen him unhorsed. She rode now along the rising cliffbank of the river, dealing grimly with those dead who were pursuing the refugees. She grunted and panted with the exertion, the burn in her arm as she swung Shomar about again, and again. Whenever she had breath, she screamed at the living. “Downriver!” she screamed. “Circle around! Downriver! There are tents. Downriver! Go downriver!”

  Some listened and bolted to their left, darting into the field to try cutting through and heading back the way they’d come, trusting her. Others kept moving north, up the rising slope of the land. In their panic they were no longer men or women but only frantic, darting animals, deer being chased by wolves.