Star Drawn Saga (Book 2): Lost Among The Dead (34 page)

‘Oh… Jimmy,’ sighed Fran, noticing the red stain slowly blooming across his wet shirt.

With a look of disbelief and fear dancing in his eyes, Jimmy held his blood covered fingers in front of him. Yet even now he could not release Fran’s gaze to look at them; for somewhere in the back of his mind he knew to acknowledge the blood there would be to acknowledge his own demise.

‘Jimmy,’ she repeated, knowing there was nothing she could say to make this better, no words of comfort that could ease his fear.

‘No, Fran, I…I…’ he started to reply, as he shook his head in disbelief, denying the reality written in the blood across his fingers. ‘Fran…’ he continued, gulping down air as he broke eye contact with her to look from one hand covered in blood to the other still clutching the knife. ‘I…I can’t come back…’ he went on to say, looking back up at her; tears filling his eyes, ‘don’t let me come back… Promise me, Fran… I can’t… I can’t come back… Promise me.’

‘Jimmy, I…’ she began to say just as Jimmy’s hand started to move; the blade once again flashing. ‘No, wait!’ she cried, suddenly realising what he was doing. ‘Jimmy!’

But it was too late and as their eyes locked for a final time, Jimmy drew the knife swiftly across his throat.

‘No,’ she choked, rushing forward to catch the dying young man, his legs suddenly buckling under him as his life blood gushed from his body in a terrible red arc. ‘You had some time, you idiot,’ she continued, ignoring the hot blood that splashed across her shaking hands as she instinctively tried to stem the flow, ‘it didn’t have to be like this… Jimmy, you had time… it could’ve been painless… Jimmy, you fool… you bloody fool.’

But as she sunk to her knees cradling Jimmy in her arms, his blood pumping over her, his eyes wild with fear; she realised now was not the time for such words.

‘It’s… it’s okay… it’s okay, Jimmy. I’m here, I’m with you,’ she said, cupping his face; her bloody hands standing in stark contrast to the ghostly pallor of his skin. ‘It’s okay… everything’s okay,’ she went on to say, making sure he looked into her eyes as his life drained from him, ‘I’ll take care of you, I promise…’ she continued, hoping he could still hear her. ‘You won’t come back, Jimmy, I promise you… I promise, Jimmy… I promise.’

But even as she spoke, her words finally nothing more than tearful whispers, the life in Jimmy’s eyes began to fade. Fingers that had gripped tightly to her jacket, that had held on to her as his body fought to hold onto life itself, slowly began to release their fevered grasp; and then as a soft wet gurgle escaped his lips, Jimmy’s body at last admitted defeat in this one-sided and pointless battle. Once she was sure he was gone, Fran slowly moved her shaking fingers across his lifeless face to close his eyes once and for all. She knew this was a battle she would fight one day, a battle with Death that, just like everyone else, she too was destined to lose. For Death would always win this war; he held all the cards, made all the rules and was the ultimate commander of life. But although Death had been cheated of his conquests of late by the Dead, Fran would make sure he was not cheated of Jimmy. She had made a promise to this dying man, a man whose still warm blood now covered her arms and chest; and it was a promise she intended to keep.

‘I’m sorry, Jimmy,’ she whispered, her fingers finally slipping from his eyes; leaving thick crimson tracks across his already blood splattered face.

Fran silently looked into Jimmy’s pale face, his features now calm and peaceful as if in sleep, and let a weary sigh shake through her. For a moment the waste and total pointlessness of it all seemed to overwhelm her; crashing against her resolve like a dark smothering cloud. But she pushed back against the despair that could so easily have consumed her and even without conscious thought, her love for Kai transformed within her, becoming a shield against this threatening darkness; while the memories of those that had been taken from her became her sword. And as her determination blossomed, she knew she would go on. Not just for Jimmy, for she barely knew him, but for all of them; for each and every one of those poor souls that had had their lives needlessly cut short by this nightmare existence. She would continue, she would fight and she would go on; the Dead would not beat her.

‘Right,’ she eventually muttered, readying herself as she slipped her arms around Jimmy’s slack body, ‘let’s get you back on dry land.’

After losing her footing a few times on the muddy riverbed beneath her, Fran at last pulled the lifeless body the final few metres back to shore; all the while only making things difficult for herself by needlessly trying to keep the young man’s face above the rippling water.

‘Urrgghh,’ she grunted with effort, collapsing on her backside as she finally pulled Jimmy’s torso free of the water. ‘Well… a promise… is a promise, Jimmy,’ she panted, deftly retrieving her knife all the while watching the young man’s blood and mud covered corpse for movement. ‘I promised you, you wouldn’t come back… and… and you won’t.’

Taking a deep calming breath, Fran gently tilted his head to one side.

‘Goodbye, Jimmy,’ she whispered, before, with a quick sharp motion, she stabbed the blade of her knife down through the ear canal and deep into his brain; forever allowing Jimmy the solace of an uninterrupted eternal rest.

Ignoring the scraping sensation of metal against shattered bone, Fran slowly pulled the blade from Jimmy’s skull; carefully rinsed it free of its coating of bloody gore, checked for any damage and then slipped it back into its sheath. Only once she had taken care of her weapon did she then turn her attention to herself. With a sigh she glanced down at her arms and chest, still slick with a coating of dark mud and Jimmy’s cooling blood. Fran knew only a good scrubbing was going to make any real headway in cleaning the clothes she now wore and she was about to take off her jacket when another spirited autumn breeze suddenly whistled past her.

‘Oh… perhaps not,’ she mumbled to herself, deciding to just wash the worst of the blood from her for now.

She was just dipping her forearms into the cold water of the lake, the movement of her hands causing swirls of deep red to slowly entwine themselves with the clouds of churned up mud around her, when out of the corner of her eye she caught a dark and fleeting movement. Instantly on alert again, her head snapped to follow the shadow, while down at her side and almost without conscious thought, her hand made a grab for her knife.

‘
Jesus
….’ she thought to herself, somewhat relieved to see just a small startled moorhen darting away from her across the water, its darkly feathered body quickly disappearing among the tall reeds to her left. ‘
Talk about jumpy.
’

It was only as her eyes lingered on the place where the small bird had just vanished that a thought struck her.

‘Oh…’ she sighed, glancing back over at Jimmy’s lifeless body; realising that whatever information she had hoped to get out of him was now lost to her forever. ‘Shit!’

‘
What,
you couldn’t have waited ten minutes?
’ she thought, shooting an annoyed glare to where the corpse that had killed Jimmy still floated face down in the water.

Yet no sooner had the thought come to mind than Fran felt a familiar stab of guilt, for deep down she knew it was pointless to blame the Dead for their actions. By their very existence the Dead were as much a victim as Jimmy; each of them perpetuating a tragic and deadly game of tag, damned to pass on their awful curse until someone stopped them.

‘You selfish cow,’ she muttered, berating herself as she turned and clambered the rest of the way back up the muddy bank to shoreline. ‘What a mess…’ she continued to mumble to herself; turning to give the two bodies one final and exhausted look. ‘What a pointless fucking mess.’

She knew the permanent oblivion of death already granted to the two corpses was all any of them could hope for in the end now, and as she took solace in the knowledge she had kept a promise to a dying man, Fran let her gaze wonder out over the lake; suddenly a little unsure what she should do next. Chewing on her lip she pondered just how the rest of those at White Oak Park would react to the news of Jimmy’s death; after all they would only have her word to go on regarding what happened and as a still relative stranger to them, fingers and blame could so easily start pointing in her direction.

‘Christ! It just keeps getting better and better,’ she grumbled aloud, rubbing her fingers angrily through her damp hair.

Fran knew whether they believed her or not, their opinion would likely change the moment she and Kai made a run for it; and the fact they intended to take Star with them would surely only compound their suspicions.

‘
Dennis will probably try to come after us simply for taking Star,’
she thought to herself; shaking her head as she finally turned away from the lake, its surface once more undisturbed by little more than the merry traffic of busy waterfowl and the buffeting wind. ‘
Fuck knows what he’ll do if he convinces himself I bumped off Jimmy too.
’

Dennis was the type of man that would happily meat out his revenge if he caught them, of this she had no doubt; though she thought when it came down to it, the insult of daring to defy him would be the real reason for his retaliation rather than any supposed justice for Jimmy.

Fran was just wondering if they could risk postponing their secret departure until the dust of Jimmy’s death had had time to settle, when something glinting on the path ahead of her briefly caught her attention. Ignoring it at first as probably just a bit of old rubbish, she carried on walking; that was until she noticed another small metal object lying near it and then another and another.

‘What the…’ she started to say, stopping to take a better look.

But no sooner had she taken another step closer than she realised what she was looking at; for there, scattered along the side of the path where it met the encroaching woodland, was one of the strings of tiny brass bells.

‘Well, guess we know how the corpse got the jump on Jimmy,’ she sighed, wearily crouching down to pick up one of the bells.

Still attached to the next bell, Fran started to wind the thin cord about her fist; collecting both string and bells as she went. By the time she finally came to the end of the string she had five small brass bells held in her palm; all of them ending in one suspiciously looking cut cord.

‘Oh…’ she whispered, her eyes instantly searching for the next string of bells that should have been hanging nearby. ‘Oh… oh, crap… shit… shit!’ she continued, her slow steps increasing in speed as she noticed another string of bells lying on the ground further on, partly hidden among the foliage.

Without even stopping Fran ran on, her eyes frantically searching for the next hanging string of alarm bells.

‘Must’ve missed them…must’ve have…’ she panted, glancing back the way she had come; her eyes darting back and forth, ever hopeful to see a glint of metal hanging among the trees.

But as she slowly began to walk back to the last one she had found lying on the ground, studiously pushing aside the encroaching ferns and bushes as she went, it became apparent that a gap of about thirty metres had opened up in the defences of White Oak Park; a gap that had ultimately been the cause of Jimmy’s demise. Bending down, she picked up the first bell from the fallen string she had found and then the next and the next; the gentle and merry tinkling they made at odds with the growing sense of unease building within her.

‘Christ,’ she said aloud, as the end of the string finally slipped into her fingers, ‘this one’s been cut too!’

Almost without realising she was doing it, Fran’s gaze slowly wandered back to the lake and Jimmy’s blood splattered corpse still lying motionless on the muddy bank; the scene transforming in front of her yet at the same time staying the same.

‘
This… this was no accident,
’ she thought to herself, her fist tightening about the brass bells in her hand until they began to dig painfully into her palm. ‘Not by a fucking long shot!’ she finally spat, shaking her head as her growing rage consumed her.

Furiously tossing aside the string of bells that she now knew someone’s sabotage had purposefully rendered impotent, Fran turned and she began to walk back along the path in the direction of the tree houses; all the while with only one name seething through her thoughts:

‘
Emma!
’

***

‘We can’t stay here, Kai,’ said Fran, later that day as she paced back and forth in their tree house bedroom; anxiously chewing on her fingernails while Bob sat with his head resting on his paws sleepily watching her. ‘I mean it… not even one more night.’

‘And y…you’re sure,’ asked Kai, his dark eyes full of concern as he looked up at her from the bed. ‘Y...you’re sure it w…was Emma?’

‘You didn’t see the look on Jimmy’s face,’ she replied, abandoning her pacing to sit beside him on the bed, ‘when Emma found out about him and her sister yesterday… he was scared, Kai… like, terrified of her,’ she continued, turning to look at him her own eyes full of worry. ‘It must’ve been her… who else?’

‘Dennis?’ Kai offered with a shrug of his shoulders.

‘As much as I’d like to think it was him, no… no, I doubt it’s his style,’ she replied, her nervous attack of her thumbnail resuming as she spoke. ‘No… no, this was meant to look like an accident, like Jimmy had become a problem that quietly needed to be dealt with and without ruffling too many feathers.’