CHAPTER NINTEEN
Bach watched Hailey approach as he stood by Barton Lake. He hadn’t planned to see her that evening. Allowing Wisteria to believe that he was interested in this girl was only his way of distancing himself from her until he knew what he was going to do. He still didn’t know though, but he knew he did not like this Terran at all.
Even though he had no plans with Hailey, he wasn’t surprised to see her here. She had tracked him down at the Lake before. Bach liked coming to the water, and he’d come three times a day since Hailey first brought him. She’d always track him down and insist on keeping him company. Her version of keeping him company was talking about herself and how being the daughter of the head of the leadership council was the worst thing in the world.
Thankfully, a siren went off. He assumed it was one of the safety drills that Garfield had told him about.
“What day is it today?” Hailey frowned.
“In Smythe, it is Thursday.”
“We weren’t supposed to have a drill until Saturday. I guess someone was too eager. My dad’s going to kill Coles in the morning.”
“Are drills not supposed to be a surprise?”
“Yeah to everyone else, but my father’s the head of the …” she started to say.
Is the head of the leadership council, he thought. He was tired of Hailey’s reframe and irritated with being around her so much.
“—is the head of the leadership council,” she continued to brag. “We know about things like this. There’s never been a breach on the Isle of Smythe—ever.”
“Well, just in case, you should go home.” He was going to return to Barton Lake the moment she looked away as he wasn’t ready to leave the water.
“I can go to your house? It’s closer, so technically safer.” She grinned at him.
“Ugh…”
Her smile vanished at the sight of two infected, moving toward them. “What is wrong with them?” She clutched Bach’s shirt.
“They have got your Nero disease.” Although he’d sensed the infected, he hadn’t sensed these specific infected in the town before now. He could tell that there were several other infected people in Smythe. About thirty, and not all were newly sick. “We should go.”
Hailey fainted.
The temptation to leave her was immense; she was truly annoying and might do better as a biter. After thinking for a moment, he gathered her up and ran past the infected toward his home. Taking the Terran girl to his apartment, he laid her on the new sofa Felip had acquired a few nights ago from the furniture shop.
“What’s going on? That’s Hailey, right?” Garfield approached the girl. “What happened to her?”
“There are infected on the island. Why are you not in the bunker?”
“I thought it was another drill. Besides, I’m with you and you’re…” Garfield paused. “Like immune to biters, and can fly or something, right?”
“Take her downstairs,” Bach instructed.
“I can’t carry her. Like you say, I’m only Terran, remember?”
“I will do it.” Felip came into the room. Seeing the girl on the sofa, he looked back at Bach and picked her up with one arm. “But you will have to stay with her,” he informed Garfield.
With the humans locked down below, Felip returned.
“I did not sense the infected were here—this close?” Bach asked him. “Did you?”
“No, I think the strangle weed on the island is making it hard to use our senses.”
Bach sat on the new sofa. It wasn’t as soft as the one he had in the Hunter Tower and in no way as luxurious as the furnishings back home, but it was ten times better than what they were using the day before. Yawning, he relaxed.
The infected groaned from outside.
“Maybe this is a good thing,” Bach commented. “The infected would cut down the number of Terrans and possibly infect the ones who stole our obsidian coral which would make their plans useless.”
“I guess.”
“If the Terrans who stole the obsidian coral are infected, we will not know what they were planning or how they got it. I know that, but the empirics will have to deal with that,” Bach concluded.
“Then you should renew your Terran tonight or she might get infected too. Then she would be useless as a Thayn. Unless you have settled on the prettier one downstairs?”
Getting to his feet, Bach started feeling dizzy, but the spell soon passed. “You are right. We should not let the infection spread any further. I will draw the swarm together, can you find—?”
“Your Terran? I will bring her back here and you can renew—”
“No.” Bach couldn’t bring himself to admit that he felt anything more for her than ownership. Thayns were interchangeable, so sending a Famila to rescue one would be admitting that was not the case. “Just make sure her friend Garfield is safe.” He could find her on his own.
Returning to the town square, he sensed the infected spreading through the island. There were over forty now and he secretly hoped Coles was among the freshly infected. Come, he whispered into the wind. He closed his eyes. “Come, now.”
After ten minutes, some of the infected began shuffling into the square. Then one of the flesh eaters dropped and blood poured from its head.
Looking up, he saw Mrs. Kuti standing on the courthouse roof with a rifle gun. Curiously, her rifle was quieter than he’d previously heard. Firing again, she downed another and another.
Soon, other armed men appeared in the square, firing at the biters.
Bach left just as a bullet zoomed past his ear.
Most of the infected would find their way to the square. But a handful didn’t respond to his call for some reason, including the one who had infected the others. But he knew where it was. It was in the library and it was looking for food.
* * * * *
“I guess I panicked.” Steven put his arm around Wisteria as they waited in the bunker.
“Thank you for changing your mind,” she replied. Hearing a series of loud crashes, she knew one or more biters had broken through her barricade.
Latching onto her, he asked, “How many people do you think are infected now?”
“I don’t know. The roads were quiet, so hopefully not a lot.”
Single biters were opportunists and with no one on the street, the biters had no one to infect. They only became a real danger as their numbers grew. Enough of them could overrun entire cities.
“The siren sounded, so the soldiers will stop them.”
“Yeah.” She hoped he was right.
“You’re lucky, because you’ve seen these things before. You know what to do.”
“You’ve never seen the infected before?” She looked up at him in disbelief. This certainly explained the way he behaved.
“No,” he admitted. “I mean—not up close. When my family sailed to France I saw some of the infected from far off, you know, like miles away. Not face-to-face—like now.”
“Even your mother? I heard she was infected?”
“I only saw her body after she passed away for the last time. When she got infected we thought she died and she came back at the funeral and killed so many people. That’s what my dad said. He didn’t let me go and he didn’t go either.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Your leg’s bleeding.” He leapt up. “Are you bitten?”
“I had to break a window to get to the alarm.” She had forgotten about her cut. Touching the wound, she felt some glass in her leg. “See? There’s glass.” She showed him.
Nodding, he headed to the metal cabinet where the rifles were.
“Steven?”
He brought out the first aid box and handed it to her. “Here.”
Collecting the box, she started to clean her cut.
“I can’t believe you’re so calm!” he exclaimed.
Calm? No, she was scared out of her mind, but she couldn’t afford to lose control.
Sitting back down next to her, he started tapping his feet nervously. “I can’t believe that was Scott.”
“Who was Scott?”
“Mrs. Reynolds’s son. We thought he died during the initial outbreak, three years ago. Why is he here?”
“You think his family hid him?” she suggested.
“How could they? What would they feed him? Biters only eat people. Right?”
“I guess so.” She wrapped the gauze around her leg and placed the remaining gauze back in the first aid box. “When I was a tracker, we tried feeding them other things—vegetables, other animals—but the biters wouldn’t eat anything else…just us.”
“So, we’re going to die, aren’t we? The doors won’t hold if there were a hundred out there?”
“There were only two or three.” She hoped. “We’ll be okay.”
Shaking, he buried his face in his hands.
“There weren’t that many, it might be okay.” Rubbing his back, she tried to reassure him.
“I’m sorry I’ve been such a jerk to you.”
“So you knew you were being a jerk?”
“You’re incredible, Wisteria, and I’ve always known that, but could never tell you before. I know Gareth gives you crap, but you’re really beautiful.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
He kissed her.
“Wow!” Wisteria pushed him away. “Steven, stop it.”
“If we’re going to die, I want you to know that I care about you.”
“Steven, we’ll be fine.” She chuckled apprehensively.
He kissed her again, more fervently, causing her to fall back on the bed.
The bunker doors ripped open and Bach appeared, holding Garfield’s crossbow.
“Hey, Bach,” Steven said.
Closing his eyes for a moment, Bach rubbed at his temples. He looked at her while smiling coldly.
Wriggling free of Steven, she stood up.
“The infected are gone.” Bach stormed away. “You are free to go.”
His funky mood was the least of her worries right now. She stepped out of the bunker and saw the rotting corpses of Tim and three other infected. Among them was the biter Steven had called Scott. They each had an arrow in their head.
“We’re lucky he shot them just in time. I mean, they’d already broken in,” Steven cheered happily. “Thanks.”
“Indeed.” Bach stood in the doorway of the staffroom.
“Thank you.” She walked up to him almost in tears.
“I am glad you were not alone,” he responded coldly. “I am only sorry I disturbed you and your friend.”
He was jealous? How dare he even think about himself at a time like this? What planet was he from? “What exactly is your problem? Are you crazy or something?” Wisteria fumed. “Why do I have to explain myself to you? I almost died, Bach. Maybe this is not big to you, but it is to me.” Not waiting for an answer, she returned to the bunker.
“What’s going on? Is it safe to leave?” she heard Steven ask Bach.
The dark-haired boy stormed out. On his way, he passed Lieutenant Andrews and her mother.
“Mum,” Wisteria called.
Her mother glanced at Bach briefly, before calmly walking over to Wisteria.
* * * * *
Thinking back to yesterday’s madness, Wisteria was unsettled by how cool her mother was when she reached the library basement. Ignoring Steven and the cured biters, she just asked how Wisteria was and inspected Wisteria’s cut. She seemed distant and preoccupied.
When they got home, she made Wisteria some warm goat’s milk and went to sleep in the bunker. The next morning, Wisteria got up after only managing two hours of sleep. That wasn’t surprising after the night before. However, she was surprised to see her mother standing outside her bedroom with a crossbow. “Mum, are you all right?”
“Baby, I’m fine.” She walked into the room and came close to Wisteria. “You were with Bach last night?”
“Yes, he stopped by the library.”
Her mother nodded.
“What’s wrong, Mum?”
“Then he came back later and shot the infected in the library basement?”
Wisteria nodded.
“You were lucky he was there.”
Wisteria could tell her mother wanted to say more. “What is it?”
“Nothing. I want you to be more careful. Clearly, people aren’t taking safety seriously. What would possess someone to keep a biter in their home?”
“I don’t know?”
“Interesting that the infected were able to rip through the door of the library and still be cured with a single arrow each,” her mother commented.
“I…um…?” Wisteria was confused by her mother’s conclusions.
“I guess the door was faulty. I’ll talk to Coles and see if someone can look into it.” Her mother hugged her and left.
* * * * *
The next day, the army placed a total curfew on the island. The people on the Isle of Smythe watched and waited as each building was searched by the soldiers and trackers. They were looking for biters hidden in the houses. Corporal Blair and several men searched Wisteria’s home earlier that morning. Many protested the drastic actions, but they had little ability to stop the soldiers.
Wisteria learned from her mother that Mrs. Reynolds hid her two infected children for years. In fact, it was her first child Scott who infected the second.
Later, Wisteria watched from a top floor window as the home of her neighbor, Keith Wicks, was tossed apart. The soldiers found that Wicks had hid his infected wife and son in his home. Keith pleaded for his family’s fleshers to be released into Norton or further away.
His pleas and cries fell on deaf ears.
She looked away rather than watch a grown man cry like a punished child.
“Stop, in the name of humanity!” the elderly Keith Wicks screamed over and over as his family got their treatment.
Having seen enough, she left the window.
Her mother wasn’t part of this group, but was probably doing the same thing somewhere else.
Andrew stopped by, looking for her mother, and told Wisteria that thirteen other families were found to be housing nineteen biters. The biters were immediately cured to the outrage and pain of their loved ones. When she asked how the biters had been fed, he told her that the families had kept many of the pirates alive. The very pirates who Coles and Andrew fought when they first arrived.
“We’d no idea how many there actually were and looking back, we should’ve done a house-to-house search sooner than this.” Andrew shook his head in disgust.
“So, where are the pirates now? How many are left?”
“None. Apparently they ran out of food four months ago. If that is true, it explains why the Reynolds’s flesher broke out—he was starving, and biters become more desperate and strong when they’re hungry.”
After he left, Wisteria was home alone, as David had snuck out to see some friends. When the sun started to set, she fretted about her brother because biters might still be on the island. David had little interest in the past about learning how to defend himself, beyond using a gun. Looking through the street, she didn’t see any sign of him.
Someone knocked on her bedroom door.
“David?” It just had to be, as her mother never knocked. Opening the door, she was shocked to see Hailey and Yvette. David had to be back, as the girls were friends of his, although they’d never come to her home before. This disturbed her.
“Hi Ria.” Hailey smiled.
“Hi Hailey, and my name is Wisteria,” she corrected. “What are you doing here?”
“David gave us the keys and asked us to meet him,” Yvette informed her. “So we thought we’d say hi.”
“Okay and where’s David?” Moving past the taller girl in the hallway, she heard people talking downstairs. “Who else is here?”
“He’s on his way.” Hailey walked up to the window.
The chaos at Keith’s house had died down, but the old man sat on the steps in front of his home, seemingly lost.
“I can see why you don’t want to end up like that old geezer,” Hailey jeered.
“What are you talking about?” Wisteria answered.
“I’m talking about you and Steven last night,” Hailey said coldly.
“I can’t believe you were so desperate,” Yvette chimed in.
“Hailey, I don’t know what you’re talking about and I don’t want to know, so please wait for David down stairs,” Wisteria retorted.
“You slept with Steven,” Hailey informed her.
Rolling her eyes, Wisteria pointed down the stairs. “Get out of my house.”
“He told us how you begged him,” Hailey seethed.
“I didn’t do Steven,” protested Wisteria. “And he’s not even your boyfriend anymore. So why do you care?”
Just then, Amanda and Karen came upstairs.
“What are we talking about?” Amanda asked.
“Steven shagging Wisteria in the library.” Yvette giggled. “I still can’t believe he did her.”
Karen laughed.
“I thought we agreed Steven was making that up?” Amanda commented. “Anyway, we found some chocolate downstairs. Come on, Hailey.”
“Your dream finally came true,” Hailey jeered. “That is all you think about, Wisteria.”
“Nothing happened,” Wisteria maintained.
“Yeah, right, nothing happened. We’re talking about Steven Hindle,” Karen sneered. “We all know how much you’ve been dying for him.”
“We both know this isn’t about Steven,” Wisteria accused. “And if you want Bach, you can have him, since I’m done with him now.”
“Bitch!” Hailey slapped her.
Wisteria hit the girl back, sending her tumbling into the other girls.
“You hit me!” Hailey screamed while she touched her eye. “You bitch!”
“Ah, leave her, she was probably overwhelmed that Steven saved her life,” Yvette joked. “From what I heard, he practically carried you into library.”
“I said I found chocolate downstairs,” Amanda repeated. “Chocolate!”
Karen lunged at Wisteria, but Amanda stopped her. “Come on, let’s go and get some food,” Amanda pleaded, but Karen pulled away.
“No, she can’t get away with what she did. I want to know what the little witch was trying to prove.” Karen pushed Wisteria back. “You can’t take us all.”
“Don’t touch me, just get out.” Wisteria smacked Karen’s hand away, but then Hailey and Karen pushed her to the ground.
“Yvette, give us a hand,” Karen called.
“Hailey, what are you doing?” Amanda yelled while Yvette laughed.
With both girls holding Wisteria down, Hailey slapped her face. “What do you have to say for yourself now, fat monkey?” Hailey squeezed Wisteria’s cheeks together. “Ah, the cow bit me.”
With Hailey distracted with her pain, Wisteria broke free and fled through the corridor, past an amused Yvette and a terrified Amanda. As Wisteria darted down the stairway, she ran into Billy Saunders.
The seventeen-year-old boy was six feet tall and the fattest kid in school and was one of Hailey’s admirers. “Hi, Wisteria,” he greeted warmly when he saw her.
“Billy, stop her!” Hailey screamed angrily after Wisteria.
“What’s wrong?” He seized Wisteria. “What did you do?”
“Billy, let go of me.” Wisteria tried to get free.
Ordinarily, Billy left her alone, so she didn’t want to hurt him. In all honestly, Wisteria didn’t know if she could. “Wisteria, Hailey just wants to talk to you. Relax.” He forced her arms down to her sides. “You shouldn’t have been messing around with Steven.”
“I don’t want to talk to her!” Wisteria forced one of her arms free. “Stop it.”
As he tried to hold her down, she scratched his face, making him angry. He threw her to the ground, kicking her in the stomach, and then he stomped on her wounded shin.
“Billy, press down on the bandage, you idiot,” Hailey ordered as she came down the stairs. “The one on her leg.”
The boy obeyed.
Yvette helped the boy restrain the screaming girl.
“Ah!” Wisteria wailed as he stepped on the wound. “Hailey, I promise nothing happened between me and Steven. We didn’t do anything.”
“Don’t worry, after this, nothing ever will happen.” She laughed and took out a large pair of scissors.
“Hailey, stop it,” Amanda pleaded. “We’ve scared her and she’s terrified. Let’s go.”
“Amanda, shut your fat face and hold the cow down!” Hailey ordered.
“I’m going to get David.” Amanda scurried away.
“Tomorrow, he won’t even be able to look at you.” Karen sneered.
“Oh, he’ll look. Then he’ll run when he sees the freak you really are.” Hailey grabbed Wisteria by the hair as her friend held her arms and legs.
“Please, Hailey, listen, I’m sorry,” Wisteria pleaded as she fought to escape. “Whatever I did, I’m sorry. I promise I won’t even talk to—”
“Shut the hell up!” Karen kicked her in the face.
“My mother should’ve made them sell you to those pirates,” Hailey whispered as Wisteria felt the cold of the scissors against her skin.
