Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy (37 page)

Grab a knife.
Sprinting across the front room, he straight-armed the
push plate, banging the door aside.
Maybe a poker from the woodstove
.
The kitchen was on the southeast corner of the house, same as
Chris’s room, and already going thick with shadows. Directly ahead
were eight chairs ranged around the long oval of a butcher block
pedestal table, draped with a light blue tablecloth and set for a meal,
probably a late dinner for Jayden and Connor. An ornate, old-fashioned kerosene wick lantern with a frosted shade and green glass base
stood in the center. To the right was a black cast-iron cookstove on
a square of raised red block, with a box of oak splits, a pail for ash, a
brush, and shovel. On the stove, a saucepan steamed. Three iron pots
and two large skillets dangled from a potrack. Beyond the kitchen
table were oak cupboards; a butcher block bristled with knives. The
way out was a door with floral chintz to the left of an old-fashioned
refrigerator.
Then he registered what he hadn’t a split second before. The room
wasn’t toasty warm and it wasn’t freezing. But there was a lingering
raft of cold air, as if someone had just gone out—
Or come in.
That also was when he noticed how the flowery curtains over that
kitchen door . . . still swayed. Not a lot, but enough.
It dawned on him then. The kitchen was right below his room.
Whenever Hannah worked in here, he heard her. So when he’d
shouted his warning, he’d shown the Changed exactly where, in
which corner of the house, they should start looking.
A small shuffle.
Right behind him.

Rifle.
Alex knew from that distinctive whipcrack.
Close, coming from
the west.
Before the first echoes had died, she was pelting up the hill.
“Penny, get in the house, get in the house!”

The smell was rolling from the woods, too: not only that familiar
scent of cool shadows but a rancid fug of desperation.
It’s Wolf, close
enough to smell now
. Wolf was in trouble, maybe hurt. She felt herself
reaching out to him before she even realized what she was doing—and
deep in her brain, the monster again shuddered to life, her thoughts
slipping sideways. In an instant, she was both in her body and elsewhere, seeing through Wolf ’s eyes: tangy fear in her mouth, sour
sweat on her chest. Ahead, the house was coming together out of the
trees, light winking off windows like beacons. Something heavy, the
sack, tried to slip off her shoulder—

Only it’s not me.
Her head was huge. Yet everything that
was
her
felt very far away, like Alice shooting up after nibbling that
Eat Me
cake. Alex was in here and out there,
with
Wolf.

The air crackled with more gunfire. The sound socked her back
into her own head.
They’re heading straight for us.
Her stomach doubleclutched with dread.
Move, move, move!

She sprinted for the house. Ahead, Penny and Bert were just scuttling inside, though Penny was awkward, slow. Darth grabbed the
girl’s arm and reeled her in. As Alex tore up the last few steps, the big
boy clamped a hand the size of a ham on her shoulder and heaved
her the final ten feet. She gave a startled yelp as she hurtled past the
threshold to crash onto hardwood.

“Wait!” Scrambling up, Alex wedged herself between the door and
jamb before Darth could slam it shut. He might not understand, but
speech was all she had. Even Darth would get her meaning. “They’re
almost here! Those shots are close. Give Wolf a chance!” She could
tell he didn’t want to do it, smell it fuming through his pores, but his
arm relaxed.

A minute, maybe more like thirty seconds.
She tossed a wild glance
around the room, trying to figure out the best cover. This great room
was sparsely furnished: fireplace and woodstove on a brick pedestal
to the left, leather couch and two upholstered armchairs on an oval
rug in the center to catch the view from that big picture window.
Not enough to really barricade the door, and trying to take cover in
this great room would be suicidal. That sofa wouldn’t stop a spitball.
With that picture window, they’d be like fish in an aquarium.

Her eyes flitted past Penny, who’d retreated behind a long breakfast bar on which Alex had stashed the camp stove, Coleman lantern,
and spare fuel canisters. The girl had the right idea. The kitchen was
further back, and that window over the sink gave them a way out.
Topple the refrigerator, and she could take cover there.

Second best would be up those stairs at the extreme right, which
emptied into an open loft and then a short hall, down which was a
bathroom and two bedrooms, one right, one left. Easier to defend,
but just as easy to get themselves trapped.

Kitchen, then.
It was closer and she liked the look of that back window more and more. Without a weapon, she couldn’t help defend
the house anyway. She had a brief moment to wonder why she would
help them altogether and then thought,
Got a better chance
with
Wolf
than the guys after him.

Steaming past Bert, who clutched a twelve-gauge but was otherwise rooted to the spot, she dashed into the kitchen. There was a
freestanding refrigerator on the left, an old retro model, aqua and
white with a chrome handle. She’d already searched inside and found
only four toxic eggs and a gray-green jungle fuzz that the jar claimed
once was mayonnaise. Now, squirming into the gap between the wall
and fridge, she braced her back, tucked her knees, planted her feet,
and gave the fridge a hard shove. The refrigerator lurched and then
toppled, slamming down with a thunderous crash. From deep in its
metal guts came the smash of glass and clang of shelves; a second
later, the gassy, fecal gag of fungus and gooey dead chick.

“Penny, over here!” Springing for the breakfast bar, she grabbed
the girl’s wrist. With a startled
eep
, Penny tried twisting away. “Stop
it!” Alex panted, hauling the thrashing Penny the way she would a
stubborn toddler. “You want to get shot? Get behind the refrigerator!
Get—”

From across the room came the shriek of hinges. Marley blew
through the front door on a blast of wintry air and a swirl of dreads.
Swiveling, he socked his rifle home and got off another shot as Darth
also opened up against the
spak
and crackle of more weapons’ fire.

Wolf, where’s Wolf ?
“Get down!” Shoving Penny behind the refrigerator, she ducked back into the great room. She heard the
pock
as a
slug drilled into the heavy oak door and showered splinters. “Marley!
Where’s—”

A second later and to her horror, she had her answer as the boys
blundered up the steps. A lumpy sack hung over Wolf ’s left shoulder.
His right arm was wrapped around Ernie. As the two staggered inside
on a fresh fusillade of snaps, the drone of bullets whirring overhead,
she got a good look. Wolf ’s face was whiter than bleached linen.

And covered in blood.
Chris didn’t turn. He barely thought. Maybe his mind had already
ticked through the math and realized that facing whatever lay behind
would only waste time—or make him freeze.

Chris dodged right. Out of his left ear, he heard a quick inhale, the
sudden stomp of a boot; sensed something rushing in from the side.
A hand whisked through his hair. Ducking, Chris raked the first chair
he came to, flinging it without turning around. He heard the clatter
of wood on the floor and then the stutter of boots as whatever was
back there bumbled into the chair. But whoever—whatever—it was
didn’t fall. A second later, a huge hand snatched at his neck, got a fistful of shirt collar and the tight silk thermal underneath, and twisted.

Suddenly, his breath was gone. His heart began to pound as his
vision reddened, first with panic and then lack of air. Flailing like a
fish hopelessly snagged on a line it could not break, he got his hands
up, but the silk thermal was so tight, he couldn’t hook his fingers.
His flannel shirt ripped; buttons popped free, pattering to the floor
like jumping beans. Yet the strong silk weave only grew tauter and
tighter. Whatever held him was shaking him now, like a puppet. Chris
heard, but only dimly, the thump and thud of his boots skating over
the floor. His knees buckled; Chris felt himself falling; felt the impact
of the table against his forehead as he pitched forward. Something, a
lot of somethings, bounced to the floor and smashed. Plates, a glass
. . . Chris didn’t know. Although his hips and legs were on the floor,
his chest wasn’t flat. The hardwood was still a half foot from his
nose because the Changed was holding him up by that noose of silk,
suspending his head and chest to allow gravity to do its thing. The
Changed would let Chris’s own weight kill him, bit by bit.

Chris’s right hand closed over something. He registered that it was
sharp, and his last chance.
Chris’s fingers clutched that dagger of glass, and struck.
“No!” Squirting past Bert, Alex made a diving grab for Wolf as Darth
and Marley muscled the door closed. Splashes of blood painted
Wolf ’s face and hands and the wolf skin knotted around his neck.
That lumpy sack he’d slung over his shoulder was sodden.
No.
For one second—a single terrified moment—her stupid, stupid heart turned over.
No, you can’t die, Wolf, you can’t die!
Then she realized that the blood wasn’t his.
Ernie’s face was gray, his lips dusky. To either side of his piggy
little nose, his small pellet-gray eyes rolled. His hands clutched his
soupy middle. From the strong stink of iron and the liquid slop as
Wolf tore open the boy’s jacket, she already had a pretty good idea of
just how bad this was.
Ernie’s abdomen was awash in gore. Some had already clotted
into grape-jelly goo. Most of it was only tacky and a lot of it fresh.
That was because the rips in his abdomen were ragged, wicked, and
very deep: gaping wounds that began just beneath his left rib cage to
slash through skin and belly fat and muscle. Bluing bags of wormy
intestines bulged from three of the tears. The smell was gagging,
round and thick and fecal. Eyeing the slow eel of a length of intestine,
Alex saw how it was already beginning to bloat. She felt the knot in
the pit of her gut try to
urp
its way into her throat.
Probably hooked him first, then ripped.
Teeth and nails, she guessed,
which meant that Wolf ’s group had gotten into it with that pack on
their heels. She watched as a bubbler of blood surged in a bright fresh
fountain. Tagged an artery, for sure. Well, this kid wouldn’t have to
worry about getting an infection from all that torn bowel. The bowl
of his belly was overflowing, his lips paling as his arteries emptied. A
clammy sweat filmed his face and neck, and the boy was starting to
shudder with shock.
Her eyes tracked to that lumpy, blood-soaked sack. From the
smell, the body inside was a man’s this time, and there was a lot of
blood. But no guts. Which was wrong. From experience, she knew
that Wolf and his crew liked liver, loved the heart, tolerated kidneys,
didn’t much care for tripe. Much more to the point, though, Wolf
never
butchered or sank his teeth into a kill until he and his crew made
it to safety. She understood why. Once upon a time and in a different
life, her dad always hung their food well off the ground in a bear
bag, same as Wolf and his crew secured their supplies in that stuff
sack. When you were on the trail, you didn’t want unwelcome visitors making off with your stash. (Why more Changed
didn’t
flock to
Wolf ’s little hideaway, like ants to spilled sugar, she didn’t know. They
had to smell the meat. She sure did.)
But the body in that sack, this man, was in pieces. He was
missing
several more, and here was Ernie, ripped to shreds, and other
Changed out for Wolf ’s blood.
“You
stole
it from them? They caught you
stealing
?” And she’d
been
worried
he was hurt? Wolf was tight-lipped, ashen, but his dark
eyes—
Chris’s
eyes—blazed. Bert, Ernie’s brother, was hustling across
the great room with his shotgun in one hand and her medic’s pack
swinging from the other. From the corner of her eye, she saw Darth
lurch from the door, heading past the window for the far side of the
room in an awkward crouch. For a fraction of a second, she almost
bawled,
Get down, you idiot!
Darth would be as tempting a target as a
metal duck in a midway:
Three hits, and the little lady gets a stuffed pig.

The picture window imploded in an enormous, glassy splash.
Darth’s head was there one instant and red mist the next. Gasping,
Alex ducked as fléchettes of razor glass whizzed overhead. An instant
later, someone let out a choking screech. She jerked her head around
and saw Bert’s hands flying for his face. A splinter of glass, as long as
her pinky, juddered from the ruin of his right socket. Another jagged
dagger had driven into the soft underbelly of his jaw.

“Bert!” Horrified, she was pushing Wolf aside even as her last
snippet of common sense clamored:
Get down, stay down!
She started
for the boy. “Bert, Bert, don’t touch it, don’t—”

Bert let go of another blubbering shriek—and his shotgun.
She saw the disaster unfold in slo-mo: the jets of Bert’s blood
dividing into individual drops, the flash and shiver of glass, even the
shotgun spiraling in a strange arabesque. Then time sped up; the eye
of the barrel was looking at her, and her brain was shrieking,
Down,
get down!
A fraction of a second too late.
The shotgun hit just as something crashed into her and knocked
her flat. Wolf covered her up as the shotgun roared a thunderous
baROOM
! The slug
brrred
over Wolf ’s head, trailing hot brass and burnt
powder before smashing into drywall with a heavy
thunk
. More shots
jetted through the shattered window. Craning past Wolf ’s shoulder,
she saw Bert’s body jitter in a spastic little dance, then drop, face-first.
Even with the cottony buzz in her ears, she heard the crunch as the
glass dagger punched bone and then brain. Bert’s arms and legs shot
straight out, like those of a little kid yelling
surprise
, then went limp.
At the window, Marley was springing up and down, firing wild
over the sill. From the
pock-pock
of return fire and
spangs
as bullets
ricocheted off the cast-iron woodstove, she didn’t think he hit much.