The Dying & The Dead 2 (14 page)

He put his hand on the coat beside
him to move it away. The leather was cold on his fingers, and something rattled
in the pocket. Eric reached in and grasped a set of keys. Without thinking, he
put them in his own pocket. He knew that he shouldn’t, but part of him thought
of Goral walking around the cabin in the morning looking for his keys and
getting angry, completely unaware that a DC had sneaked in and stolen them. It
was a small bucket of pleasure bailed out of a sea of crashing defeats.

He stood up. As he went to leave the
cubbyhole, Goral’s bedroom door opened. Eric sank to the floor. He put a hand
out and stopped the coat swinging on the hook. His pulse throbbed.
Did he see
the movement? Is he going to walk over here?

Allie suddenly screamed. Slowly, Eric
got to his knees. He moved the coat to one side so that he could see the living
room. When he did, the blood froze in his veins.

Goral was completely naked. He walked
from his bedroom to the living room with his penis swinging between his legs. A
black symbol was drawn on his chest. It looked like a circle with triangles in
it, all pointing different ways. He had coloured his face pure black, and he
had smeared white paint around the eyes and mouth.

Allie fell off his chair and hit his
head on the floor. Goral stepped forward. Eric wanted to look away, but he
couldn’t. He saw Goral’s tight skin stretch over his chest. He watched as his
testicles bounced with every step. He felt sick.

He wanted to get out of the cabin,
but he knew that he couldn’t get through the living room without Goral seeing
him. What if he just took a chance and made a break for it? He knew that he was
faster than the old man, but that would leave Allie alone.

As Goral crossed the floor he took
large, oversized steps, as if he was lifting his feet over something. He gave a
grin so wide that it seemed to stretch off his face.

Allie scrambled back on the floor
using his feet and legs. He moved away from Goral’s advance until he hit the
door. He glanced behind him, and his eyes widened as he realised he had nowhere
else to go.

“Come now, Allie,” said Goral. “This
won’t be so bad.”

Eric stood up. He didn’t care anymore
how much noise he made, or if Goral saw him. He was about to rush out and help
Allie, when a thought hit him.

Even if he helped Allie, both of them
would still die. If they somehow managed to kill the old man, there was no way
to hide the body. The guards would already know that Allie won the competition
and was in Goral’s cabin that night, and they would come for him. Eric had no
doubt that they would torture him, and in between his screams, the boy would
give Eric’s name.

Then, after they had dragged Eric
away, Kim would be alone. She’d have nobody to look after her, nobody to give
her their share of the only food she could eat. Kim would die, and someday,
Heather would hear about it and the news would finish her too.

He owed them too much. Heather and
Kim had helped him when he was the most alone he’d ever been. He wasn’t going
to desert Kim now. The choice was to help Allie and have all three of them die,
or leave Allie alone with this monster.

Eric realised he was breathing
heavily. He felt as if he could pass out at any moment. He sank back to the
floor. He put his hands to his face and hid behind them, as if doing so would
take him out of this cabin; as if somehow he would wake up in his bed back at
Dale’s house, with his sister sleeping across from him and his mum in the room
next door.

He wanted to punch the wall. He
wanted to slam his knuckles against it until the skin split and his blood
splattered on the plaster, and then he wanted to scream out until he drowned
out the world around him.

Instead, he moved the coats to the side.
He watched as Goral advanced on Allie, tiger-like. Someday, Eric vowed, he was
going to take a match and burn the whole camp to the ground.

Goral stopped when he reached the
table. He picked up the knife they had used to slice the pie. At the doorway,
Allie looked up at the blade, terrified. Goral brought it up to his own mouth.
He stuck his tongue out, and with a delicate movement, sliced the tip of it
with the steel. Blood bubbled on the red flesh, and Goral let his tongue hang.
He put the knife on the table and then cupped his hands up at his chest. Blood
dripped from his tongue and onto his palms, and after a few seconds, Goral
lifted his hands to his face and spread the blood over his forehead, nose and
cheeks.

Allie stood up, and Eric saw a damp
patch on the back of his pants. He scrambled for the door handle. Eric thought
of the keys in his pocket. Was one of them for the door? If it was, then Allie
wasn’t getting out of here. Eric knew there was no way he could leave the cubbyhole
because if he did, then that was the end for him and Kim.

The handle turned, but the door
didn’t open. Allie let out a whimper.

“Some find it pleasant, I’m told,”
said Goral. “Not now, of course. But in the hereafter. When their spirit finds
its way into the clouds.”

Eric put his hand in his pocket and
gripped the keys, feeling the metal dig into his skin. He wanted to rush over
to the door and unlock it, but he couldn’t. He thought of Kim.

Goral took big strides until he was
in front of Allie. The fresh blood on his face glinted in the flame of the
candle on the window. His smile spread even further, and Eric realised that the
smile was painted on.

Allie ducked to his side, dodged past
Goral and ran toward the bedroom.

Go,
thought Eric.
Find the hatch and get the hell out
of here.

As the boy ran toward the doorway,
Goral turned to his bookcase and picked up a large rock. It was as black as
tar, except for tiny dots of silver that shone from it. He clutched it in his
hand, turned to Allie and wound his arm back. It seemed like it only took a
millisecond for the rock to leave Goral’s hand and smash into the back of
Allie’s head.

Allie gave a shout unlike anything
Eric had ever heard. He fell to the floor, where he stayed motionless. Eric
heard a gurgling sound that made him want to be sick. As he watched Goral pick
up Allie from the floor and carry his limp body over to the table, Eric knew
that if he left this cabin tonight, he would never be the same.

He shook the thoughts away. He’d
known Allie for a few days, but Kim had been in his life for longer and had a
much bigger impact. Between her and Heather, they’d helped him more than he
ever thought possible. As much as he felt his soul blackening by the second, he
knew he couldn’t give himself away.

Goral huffed as he dropped Allie on
the table. The little boy was surrounded by the strawberries and sugar that he
had enjoyed not so long ago, and the pie was squashed somewhere underneath his
back.

Goral started to chant under his
breath. Eric couldn’t hear the words clearly, but he didn’t need to in order to
know they were a foreign language. The old man made a sign of a cross on his
chest, and then took hold of Allie’s shirt.

It happened in seconds, but for Eric
it seemed like the hands of time had expanded until he couldn’t even see where
they began or where they pointed. He watched as Goral undressed Allie and
spread his arms and legs wide across the table.

Allie started to stir.

Eric couldn’t contain the groan that
escaped his throat. A part of him wanted Allie to be dead. At least then it
would have been quick.

Goral’s chanting became louder. With
Allie naked and squirming on the table, he picked up the knife. The tip of the
blade was already red with his own blood. He lifted it, and just as Allie
opened his eyes and moaned, Goral put the knife to his neck and slit a line
along it. Eric heard the sound of the blade slicing through skin.

Eric fell back against the wall. He
didn’t even care about the noise now, because all he could hear the knife
cutting through Allie’s throat. It was something that he knew he would hear
endlessly from now on, no matter how much time passed.

Smoke drifted from the incense
sticks, but not even the exotic spices could dilute the smell of iron in the
air as Allie’s blood gushed from his neck. It ran down the table, bubbling up
in the cracks and smothering every inch of the surface in crimson. Finally it
met the edge and then pattered down onto the floor.

Goral pressed his hands into it. As
Allie twitched beneath him, he coated his wrinkled hands in the blood and then
pressed it to his face and chest, smearing his skin until the pink was gone.

He walked over to the window. His
chanting grew. Eric still couldn’t make out the words but he heard the sounds
repeat in his head, thudding against his skull and then mixing with his brain,
melding with it until his cells started to corrupt. The blood drained from his
face.

Goral reached out toward the candle
and pinched the flame between his fingers, extinguishing it. Moonlight shone
through the cabin window and cast a pale glow on his skin. Allie’s blood
covered every inch of him.

Eric’s stomach started to churn and
his mouth filled with spit. There was no stopping it now. He was going to be
sick. He put his sleeve around his hand and put it to his mouth. He moved as
far back into the cubbyhole as he could and quietly retched into his palm.

Goral’s attention snapped in his
direction. Eric felt his eyes on him, the whites of them the only thing about
the old man that wasn’t stained red. He didn’t dare breathe. He stayed
completely still. The wall pressed hard against his back, and the leather coat
hung from the hook like a skin.

The old man looked at the table.
Blood dripped from the edge with the rhythm of a ticking clock. Eric’s lungs
ached as his body used up the air. He looked around and tried to find
something, anything, that could be used as a weapon.

A second later, Goral walked out of
the room, staring down at Allie as he passed the table. He went into his
bedroom and shut the door, and Eric heard the click of a bolt.

He clutched the keys in his hand. He
looked at the body of his friend, and as he saw the claret fall from the table,
he felt his eyes moisten. He watched smoke drift from the extinguished candle
wick on the window. He would die in this camp, he knew. He wouldn’t find his
mother or sister, and he wouldn’t save Kim. Like the spent candle, it was only
a matter of time before the fingers of the Capita pinched him and extinguished
his light.

Chapter
Fourteen

Tammuz
(Baz)

It was playing on his mind. Earlier
in the day, Tammuz had stepped into the Grand Hall to find Marduk and Nabu
stood near an open hearth. The flames cast an orange glow over the marble
floors. Marduk and Nabu stood close together, and though they whispered, the
sound echoed in the Hall like the tweeting of a bird. Tammuz didn’t know what
they were saying. He could tell from the way Nabu turned his ear to Marduk’s
mouth that they were making sure not a single word spilled out.

He thought about speaking to Ishkur,
but he knew that the Grand Lord swatted away issues like this. Unless Tammuz
had proof that Marduk was up to something, the head of the Five was just as
likely to turn his ire on Tammuz as he was the others.

Even if he thought Ishkur would
listen, when would he even talk to him? Outside of the Hall, Ishkur was a
shadow. Sometimes he made public appearances and spoke to the crowds, but
otherwise he confined himself to the walls of his house. He didn’t know if
Ishkur was scared of assassination or just didn’t like the people he ruled, but
he’d never get a chance to talk to him privately.

After the meeting he walked through
the tunnel under the hall. At the end of it he had his customary cigarette. As
the circle glowed in the darkness and the passageway filled with smoke, he
thought about the impending invasion.

The Capita army was already balancing
resources and preparing their men for the march across the wasteland. Kiele was
only a few days’ walk away, and the fact they hadn’t raided them yet was
testament to how good the Resistance’s secrecy had been up to now. The Capita
always found out, though. The men and women of Kiele didn’t know what was
coming to them.