It yanked on the shutter.
Not only did the wooden latch pop off, but the entire shutter tore from its hinges. The zombie tossed it to the side, and it clattered on the porch. The zombie paused for a moment, standing just outside the window.
“Miss Sadie?” it said.
“She’s not here,” Thomas said.
It started forward, reaching out its one arm—knife still buried in its palm—to grasp the side of the window. It flipped its leg back over the windowsill, and began to pull itself through.
Not knowing what else to do, Thomas punched it in the nose.
The bone crunched beneath his fist, and the face flattened, but the zombie didn’t falter. It shoved Thomas, so that he stumbled backward onto the bed, and pulled its body inside. Only one leg remained out.
A gunshot filled the air, and a muzzle flashed at the doorway—Charles had gotten one of the guns. The zombie’s head snapped back. When it came forward, again, a chunk was missing from the top. But the zombie didn’t stop. It brought its other leg through the window.
Thomas started to stand, but Charles yelled as he cocked the gun again.
“Stay down!”
So Thomas rolled off of the bed and fell to all fours just as another shot rang out. But the zombie kept coming forward. It leaped over Thomas, who tried to grab its legs to trip it up, but it kicked itself free and reached Charles before he could get off a third shot.
It grabbed the barrel of the gun and pulled it out of Charles’s hands, tossed it backwards, out of the window. Charles dove at the zombie, trying to tackle it, but with one hand it shoved him back, into the kitchen, and followed him inside.
Clara May screamed. She’d always been screaming, now that Thomas thought about it—he just hadn’t noticed it. But it came to the forefront of his attention as he felt grave danger for her.
If the zombie could mistake Mama’s dead body for Miss Sadie, surely it would think Clara May—about the same age as Miss Sadie—was the person it sought.
Thomas leaped to his feet and headed for the kitchen. By the time he made it through the door, the zombie had already moved across the room and stepped over Papa, who still lay on the floor where Thomas had pushed him. Charles had actually stood and climbed onto the zombie’s back, trying to tackle him—but without effect.
Clara May, wearing a white nightgown, had backed into her room, screaming.
Thomas went around the table and to the counter. Moonlight through a crack touched the glass jar of utensils and cooking tools—including the long knife for carving meat. He yanked it from among the spoons and wooden forks, spilling the jar in the process.
By the time he turned back to the struggle at Clara May’s doorway, Charles lay on the floor, and the zombie had one of Clara May’s wrists grasped in its hand.
“No, no, no!” she said.
The zombie turned back toward the kitchen, towing her behind it. Without a free hand to defend itself, it never stood a chance.
Thomas jumped past the kitchen table, over Papa and Charles, and swiped at the zombie’s neck. Its head came off.
Clara May broke free of the suddenly loosened grasp, and fell backward into the room. The zombie’s body went limp and collapsed onto the floor, next to where Charles struggled to stand. An ungodly smell exploded into the room.
Thomas staggered backward, tripping over Papa, and landed with a grunt on his rear.
Franky stepped into the doorway from the bedroom, rubbing his eyes.
“What’s all the noise?” he said.
Thomas laughed. He had no other choice.
But Charles apparently had another choice, because in an instant he’d found his feet and stood over Thomas, his face lit with rage and his body heaving in great breaths.
“Where’s Mama?” he said.
Almost immediately after our marriage, Willam sought the blessing of persuasion. I reckon that by denying that petition, the good Lord saved the world from a fair bit of trouble, even at the cost of my own comfort.
Chapter 12: Risks of resurrection
In the morning, Thomas went early to David’s farm. He felt it a duty to let his friend know that a zombie had haunted the area the night before; if one had, others might have, and if they looked for a young girl of seventeen or eighteen, Miss Wendy was in as much danger as Clara May. For that matter, so was David’s wife. She was only twenty, after all.
Enjoying the morning light and how it played off of the red hills, he took his time on the walk. He found everything fine at David’s farm. As he talked with David behind the house, standing in the shade near the chicken coops, David assured him that they hadn’t seen a zombie the night before, and conveyed skepticism when Thomas said they’d had a minor run in with a zombie back at his farm. David laughed and said he would come up and see Thomas’s zombie corpse later that day.
Then with a wink, he pointed at the barn. “I know the real reason you came. Good choice. She’s in there.”
Thomas didn’t move. He looked over at the barn and its light brown wood. If he could build a new barn at his farm, he would make it just like David’s, with the wide double doors and steep roof with a hayloft door up top. And boards that fit together so that the wind didn’t draft, and when a tempest blew you didn’t have to worry about the entire structure coming down on your animals.
Same with the house. What would it be like in the winter, when the temperature dropped, to sit in a house and not feel the biting wind on the back of your neck?
“Go on,” David said. “She’ll be glad you came.” He raised an eyebrow. “In fact, if you could keep her busy for a little while, I’d like to visit my wife inside the house. With Wendy here last night we couldn’t—“
“I’m going,” Thomas said.
As he approached the barn, he thought he heard a woman singing. It intrigued him, touched him in a way he couldn’t remember ever being touched. No one sang at his farm—certainly not Mama or Clara May. So, he approached with the intention of not interrupting the song. What did it look like when a woman sang as she worked?
One of the double doors stood open, and provided the only source of light to the barn. He paused there, smelling the musty hay that had sat in the barn all winter, and the cow and horse dung that had only arrived during the night. Though David and his father had built the barn almost two years before, the wood still smelled fresh.
Directly ahead, the wagon sat parked in the middle of the barn, in a square of light that came in through the door. To the right and left, shadows veiled animal stalls. Two stalls on the left stood open. Fresh hay sat in the corners, and no waste covered the floor. To the right, hay filled an open stall, and next to it another stall door stood open. Miss Wendy stood inside, facing away from him as she shoveled muck into a tin pail. Dust floated in the air around her.
The singing came from her.
He paused, looking at her as she sang, noticing the curve of her back each time she bent. It stirred something in him. He could see how it would lighten the load, make the day go faster, to work with a woman like that by his side.
She bent and picked up the pail full of muck, and turned to him. With a shriek, she jumped back and dropped the pail and shovel. The bucket tipped over, and muck spilled onto the stall floor.
“I’m sorry,” he said, stepping into the barn, wishing the song hadn’t ended.
Her fright disappeared as her lips split into a smile and her eyes widened. Hands clasped, she came toward him.
“Thomas! You came sooner than I thought you would! I haven’t baked any cakes, yet.”
She stepped into the square of light and stopped within arm’s reach, looking up into his face. He couldn’t remember anyone ever greeting him like that.
“I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“It’s fine,” she said. “I’m just happy you came.”
She smiled up at him, and he realized that she wore the same dark skirt and white shirt as the day before. Except this time the neck of the shirt was
not buttoned halfway up her throat. Instead, the collar lay open, showing the pale hollow of her neck.
His mouth went dry. “I, ah, just came to warn you of zombies.”
Her lips pursed and a dimple appeared in her cheek. Her face reddened.
“I’m flattered that you would worry over me like that.”
“I just—I don’t want anyone getting hurt.”
She stepped closer to him, and looked down. “That’s very kind of you.”
He had no idea what to say. What did she even want him to say? And did he want to say what she wanted to hear? It all felt so strange—this being close to her and knowing that David wanted him to court her. And so did she, by the looks of things.
She stared up at him, her brown eyes wide.
“I’m surprised you could get away from your farm to visit. You work so hard there.”
He swallowed hard. “I have to go back, soon.”
The corners of her mouth turned up. She lifted her eyebrows and turned away, back to the stall.
“I feel sorry for you, working that farm all alone.”
“Mama helps.”
She straightened the bucket and picked up the shovel.
“You know, when a man gets married, he leaves his parents. The Bible says it. He leaves his mother and father and cleaves to his wife.” She glanced back at him. “You work so hard on that farm, Thomas. Why not work on your own farm? Like David?”
“I’m not sure,” he said.
She laughed and turned to the muck. “Maybe you should think about it.”
He watched as she shoveled up the mess. Of course her logic made sense. He knew that if he got married he could leave his parents. Except, if Mama were alive, would she let him leave? And if she were dead, and Thomas moved somewhere close, wouldn't the rest of his family just follow him?
And what about Franky and Clara May? Who would take care of them? He could see leaving Papa and Charles to fend for themselves—insisting they did't follow him. But not Franky. Not Clara May. Someone had to take care of them.
And so if he got married, he wouldn’t be much better off than he was already. Just free of two moochers.
However, the idea held some appeal. It seemed like the obvious choice. The right thing to do. The inevitable thing. It almost felt like eventually he would do it, whether or not he wanted to.
But something else about it bothered him. He didn't quite know what.
Finished with the bucket and shovel, Miss Wendy stepped past Thomas, outside the door. He started to follow her, but she set the bucket down and came back inside, pulling the door almost shut, so that the light in the barn decreased to almost nothing. And the barn door didn’t creak.
She stepped right up close to him. He couldn’t see much more than just her shape, and the white of her neck.
“Thomas,” she said.
He swallowed hard. “Miss Wendy.”
She giggled and moved away, toward the open stall filled with hay. With a laugh, she flung herself backward into hay.
A year or more had passed, but he’d spent a little time in haylofts with girls. He’d kissed plenty of them for more than just a few seconds, and liked it well enough.
Yet, he hesitated.
Everything was right. She was a pretty girl. He was friends with her brother. Marrying her would rid him of a useless papa and brother. It was the right thing to do. The obvious thing. Any sane person would have joined her for some kissing in the hay.
Then, later, a marriage and everything that came with it. It was the right thing to do. His responsibility as a man to marry and raise a family.
Then why not do it?
Because the memory of Miss Sadie’s neck against his cheek, her fingers on his face, stopped him.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and turned away.
* * *
Not until he almost reached his farm thirty minutes later did he realize that not once during the walk had he noticed the morning sunlight spilling over the land like honey. Too many things on his mind.
He stopped at the head of the lane that led up to his house, noticing how the sun shone right on the face of the house and the red and white and black mountains in the background. The black and white wood of the house, lit with the sun like that, looked like a face smiling, with the porch and how it drooped near the middle serving as the upturned mouth, the stairs like the lolling tongue. The open windows looked like vacant, cheery eyes. Three of them. The open door was a long nose. Thomas had never seen his house smile, before. Odd that it would today.
Papa sat on his rocker, and didn’t call out to Thomas. Before long, Stanley came around the house, saw Thomas, and ran through the field to him.
Thomas greeted him and scratched his back, but still did not start up the lane. The right half of the field lay barren, and much of the left half had a covering of darker red dirt—the layer of loam created with Thomas’s second-life days. Maybe, if he had his way and escaped the farm, it would lay fallow again this year—along with the rest of the farm. If he left as he wanted to, someone else would have to plant the fields. But he could not leave until he’d taken care of Franky and Clara May.
Horses approached from the southeast. Thomas heard them before he saw them, because a little ways on the ground sloped down and around a hill. Stanley started to bark in that direction. When the two riders came into view, Thomas immediately knew them. And, in fact, he also suddenly understood something about Miss Sadie.
It surprised him to see her. No, not to see her, but to behold her. She was both more beautiful and graceful than he remembered—far more than Miss Wendy. He couldn’t look away as she and Mr. Milne rode up at a canter. She held the reins just right, lifted slightly, wrist bent just forward. She kept her back straight. Her body rocked in perfect timing with the horse’s gait. Her white dress hiked up nearly to her knees, but her long white stockings went up past her dress’s hem.
“Quiet!” Thomas said to Stanley.
He needed to think about his revelation. Could it be right? He looked at Miss Sadie harder. Smiling, she lifted a white-gloved hand and waved at him. Her wrist twisted with perfection. Her hand tilted just right. The motion reminded him of the day before, when he’d first met her and she’d removed her glove to shake his hand. She’d done it with such deftness and skill. Thomas couldn’t doubt it.
She had the gift of grace.
It explained everything. How she moved with such smoothness. How her smile and touch disarmed him. She’d prepared for years and made the appropriate sacrifice on an altar, and received the gift of grace. No wonder she captivated him so.
When they reached him, she tilted her head just a little.
“Morning, Thomas.”
He mumbled something that not even he understood. It wasn’t fair. She had the gift of grace. He had nothing, hadn’t gained any gift, yet. How could he withstand her feminine wiles?
She laughed at him and shook her head.
“Is your mother dead?” Mr. Milne said.
“Yesterday.”
Without a reaction, Mr. Milne headed up the lane. Miss Sadie stayed behind, looking at Thomas. He noted that Mr. Milne had a rolled blanket tied to the back of his saddle. Several long-bladed swords rested on the blanket, tied down with a cord.
“Swords?” he said.
Miss Sadie nodded. “They’re the best tool for killing zombies.”
“I know that.”
“Then why did you ask?”
He pulled his gaze from Mr. Milne and found her still staring at him. What did a person have to sacrifice to get the gift of grace?
Usually, to obtain a gift, a person had to spend a great deal of time practicing the desired skill, and sacrifice something related to it. To earn his gift of a green thumb, he would have to practice growing and cultivating plants. But he would also have to sacrifice some of a harvest. Someone petitioning for the gift of intelligence had to study a great deal and sacrifice some emotions. The blessing of speed required considerable pr
actice running, and a sacrifice of the ability to sit still, to relax.
But what about the gift of grace? What was its price?
“Did you talk with the council?” Thomas said.
“Yes,” Miss Sadie said. She dismounted and stood in front of her horse, holding its reins. “We warned them about the barrier being down, and they’re beginning to gather a militia today—just in case the Moabites try anything.”
“What about the spell?”
“For your mother?”
He nodded and held his breath.
“They wouldn’t grant permission. They refused, saying it would set a bad precedent. Mr. Milne pressed them and pressed them, until they said that he couldn’t request a resurrection for someone who wasn’t his family member. So, you and your family need to make the petition yourselves.”
He looked back up at the house and its crazy grin. Mr. Milne had already gone inside.
“We learned more about the spell,” she said. “Did you know it has two parts?”
“Two parts?” He vaguely recalled hearing that the day before.
“The first part keeps the soul nearby for a time. The second part must be cast in a sacred place—here in Sanctuary that place is apparently up in Zion’s Canyon, up at the top of Angel’s Landing. Where the altar is.”
Thomas knew the place. Well, he’d visited it once, back at age five. The journey through Hurricane, past Gateway, and into Zion’s Canyon had seemed to take a million years, and at the end he’d endured an unpleasant hike up to the top of Angel’s Landing. There, he’d knelt at a stone altar hewn out of the mountain stone, and with Mama helping, said the words and completed the ceremony to obtain a second life.
After that, he’d learned over time to sense and use his second-life days. Mama taught him to reach deep into himself, into a well filled with shimmering liquid light, and summon the inner wind that siphoned that light—the second-life days—away into an abyss.
The granting of a second life was about the only blessing anyone could count on getting for sure. Every other blessing required a sacrifice that satisfied whoever granted the blessings. Some claimed that Jesus granted the blessings. Others thought a separate God existed for each blessing. And still others thought the earth gave the blessings.
Keep Mama Dead Page 10
