Fallen (34 page)

A fist sized rock smacked the back of his
head. His vision blurred, then went black. He felt a warm trickle
down through his hair onto his neck. The voices grew distant and
muffled. The impact of stones seemed little more than small pricks
at his skin.

Donavan opened his eyes, coming back to
himself and his situation. He waited for the rocks pounding his
flesh, but they did not come. The voices had grown quiet. In fact,
now that he listened, the whole village had become eerily still. He
lifted his head, but did not see anyone standing around him as they
had been only a moment before.

Feeling the back of his head with his hand,
Donavan came away with congealed blood on his fingers. The bleeding
had already stopped. Still, he could feel a sizeable knot where
he’d been struck.

He moved, getting his hands and knees under
him. Donavan could feel bruises all over his body. His jaw was
still hurting. He hoped it wasn’t broken where the man had punched
him. Rocks of various sizes lay around him in the street along with
broken clods of dirt.

Donavan raised his head, noticing the sky
for the first time. The sun had been high overhead during his
preaching. Now, it was hovering just above one of the distant
mountains in the west. Dusk was approaching. Soon the sun would be
down completely. Had he really been unconscious for hours?

Villagers should have been quite busy right
now, trying to complete the day’s tasks and preparing for the
evening meal before darkness swept across the land. Donavan stood
to his feet. The only thing active right now was a steady breeze
blowing dust and light debris down the streets of the little
town.

Perhaps the citizens of the village had
already gone indoors leaving him for dead out in the street. It
wasn’t a comforting thought, or an unexpected one. After all,
Ezekiah had been right about the response the preachers would
experience as they traveled throughout the kingdom spreading the
good news.

Donavan brushed at some of the dirt
encrusting his shirt and jacket. The best thing he could do at this
point was probably to move on. No one would likely grant him a room
after so warm a reception. Still, the thought of trying to travel
through the wilderness toward the next town at this late hour was
not a very promising prospect.

A lamp was burning inside the local general
store. Donavan could still feel the coin pouch hidden beneath his
belt. At least the villagers hadn’t robbed him. He began walking
across the street toward the store. He might at least purchase some
provisions for his journey before setting off in search of a place
to make camp for the night.

As he approached the store, Donavan noticed
that several of the small square panes making up the whole front
window had been smashed. There was no one stirring within, as far
as he could tell from the street. A wagon with no horse sat in
front of the store. However, when Donavan came upon it, he noticed
that part of a torn harness was lying before it in a pool of blood
that trailed away from the wagon down the damp street.

Donavan’s eyes followed the trail until he
spotted the dark figure of a horse lying on its side near the edge
of town. It was not moving. No driver could be found. Fear crawled
up Donavan’s spine. What had happened while he was unconscious in
the street? Had the angry group gone on some bloodthirsty
rampage?

He stepped over the crimson trail, coming to
the door of the general store. It was hanging on one hinge half
open. Donavan pushed past it, trying to make as little noise as
possible. He crept inside. His feet crunched on the broken glass
lying on the dusty wooden floor. He paused, grimacing. But no one
appeared to have noticed. Nothing moved. He noticed that some of
the goods had been knocked off the shelves. Sacks of grain had been
torn open, spilling their contents out onto the floor. A shelf near
the back wall had been overturned.

He spotted a bloody handprint on the wall
behind the counter. The stain was smeared as though the hand that
had made it were sliding downward. Donavan tiptoed to the counter
and looked behind it. There, lying on the floor was the body of the
shop keeper. His neck was twisted almost completely around and his
abdomen had been torn open—not at all like a blade had done the
work.

This looked like some beast had gotten to
him without care for the carnage it wrought. Flies had begun to
buzz around his open wound, and Donavan thought he might be sick if
he didn’t get out of there immediately. He backed away from the
counter holding his hand over his nose and mouth.

As he started to turn for the door again,
Donavan noticed something out of the corner of his eye. A man was
standing at the rear of the store in the shadows looking at him.
Donavan knew he had not been standing there before. “You there, do
you know who did this to the shop keeper?” he asked the man.

There was only a low gurgling sound, then
the man shuffled forward a few steps, coming more into the light.
Donavan had been about to ask again, but was horrified as the light
revealed the man’s blood stained clothing. His nose and mouth were
covered in fresh blood; not as though he’d been injured, but more
like he had been
feeding
. He had the appearance of a man who
drops his face into his plate, eating ravenously.

Donavan caught sight of his eyes then. They
were black as night even where the white sclera should have been,
like to opals set into the man’s skull. Donavan realized he was
trembling, barely containing his own fear. He wanted to run, but
instinct told him it was unwise; like standing your ground with an
angry dog, knowing that if you run it will think of you as prey and
come after you.

His eyes scanned the room. Donavan spotted
farming implements and tools laid out on a table nearby. He looked
back at the man who still hadn’t moved toward him. Donavan edged
toward the table, letting his hands creep over it, taking hold of a
hatchet in his left and a machete in his right.

The bloody fiend had followed his movements
over the table. His gaze returned to Donavan’s face as he
straightened with his makeshift weapons in his hands. Even though
he was armed now, Donavan was still terrified. The fiend grinned at
him, as if smelling his fear in the air. It licked its lips
hungrily and started toward him.

Donavan backed away toward the awkward
hanging door, crunching broken glass beneath his feet again. The
fiend picked up speed, lumbering toward him despite being unarmed.
The man raised his gore-stained hands, reaching for his next
victim. Donavan turned, running through the half open door.

He began to sprint away from the doorway
when the fiend smashed through the remainder of the large front
window. The creature slammed down upon Donavan, driving him to the
street in a shower of broken glass. The machete fell from his hand,
landing a few paces away in the dirt.

The fiend kept Donavan’s hatchet-wielding
hand at bay, scrabbling over him; its blood-streaked teeth bearing
down upon his throat in an attempt to rip it out. Donavan was
pushing with his feet, trying to reach the machete. He threw his
weight one way then another, hoping to keep his neck and face away
from the frothing gurgling mouth of the creature.

The beastly man lunged for his throat as
Donavan’s hand closed around the handle of the machete. He brought
it forward desperately. The silver blade sank into the creature’s
skull with a sickening
thwack
, like cutting into an unripe
melon. The man moaned loudly, now straddling Donavan’s torso as he
tried to remove the machete from his skull.

Donavan was still holding onto the handle of
the machete when the fiend finally got the blade out. But Donavan
reached back and let the machete fly again. This time it landed in
the softer flesh of the creature’s neck, biting better than halfway
through with his first swing.

The head bobbed sideways, teetering on the
remaining muscle and sinew, then the grisly man-thing fell away
from him into the street. Donavan hoped severing the creature’s
spinal cord might stop it. After all, legends said that the only
way to kill a
death walker
was to sever the spinal cord,
separating the creature’s tortured mind from the body it
controls.

Donavan kicked the twitching body away from
him, rolling back to his feet with the machete at the ready. Death
walkers were not technically dead. They could be killed; only it
was usually very difficult. They ignored much of the injuries that
would kill a normal person. The legends said they were created by
the dragons; a punishment upon those who offended them. There were
worse things than death.

For these poor creatures death was a release
from their torment. It was said that spirits haunted their minds
and took over their bodies; inhabiting the living. Insanity quickly
resulted. They were driven into the wilderness, scavenging on
carrion or whatever they could kill. It was unheard of that one
should come into a town on a killing spree.

The body stopped moving. Donavan’s heart
stampeded inside his chest. He tried to calm his breathing, then
turned to see if anyone had heard the commotion and had come
running to investigate. Another death walker was standing down the
road. What appeared to be entrails were dangling in its right hand,
dripping onto the ground.

Probably a fresh kill, Donavan thought. The
creature was staring at him, much the same way the other death
walker had been just before it attacked. This time he didn’t bother
with easy movements. Donavan lunged for the hatchet, arming himself
against what he knew was coming.

Another walker appeared on the opposite side
of the street, shuffling out of a home, dragging a small corpse by
the hand. Donavan shuddered at the grisly sight. He was nearly
frozen with fear. Three death walkers? Death walkers coming into a
civilized area? What was happening?

The dragons had never allowed such a thing
before. The tormenting spirits that inhabited death walkers were
supposed to be under their control, driving their victims away from
society to wander in the wilderness alone. Donavan seemed to have
found a pack of the creatures hunting together; killing men, women
and children without any regard for the Serpent Kings’
authority.

Another blood covered fiend wandered into
the street behind the others. Three pairs of pitch black eyes
stared at him, hungering for another victim. Donavan knew he
couldn’t possibly take on two, let alone three, death walkers at
once. No one could.

He turned and ran in the opposite direction,
heading north the way he had come from. With fresh prey in sight,
the death walkers came running like a pack of hounds. They may have
been gaunt with malnutrition and ravaged by disease in their flesh,
but the spirits pressed them onward, energizing their sinewy frames
with unnatural strength.

Donavan turned his head, checking to see how
close his pursuers were. They were running after him at different
speeds; the last in line loping along with a bad leg. He turned
back the way he was going and smashed right into a death walker who
had appeared out of nowhere. It was a woman.

Her skin was weathered and brown, her hair
stringy and sand colored. Donavan’s momentum combined with the
woman’s slight weight bowled her over in the street. He had tumbled
one way, her another. Donavan was so startled and terrified that he
managed to scrabble quickly back to his feet. If he remained on the
ground even a moment, the horrifying ghouls would swoop down upon
him, tearing him apart before he could get away.

A wooden fence sprang into view as he ran
toward the edge of the town. Another death walker was feeding upon
the carcass of a dead horse, pulling its innards out onto the
ground, gleefully taking its fill. Another pony was pacing near the
backside of the fence, clearly terrified of sharing the fate of the
slaughtered animal.

Donavan came up with a plan as he reached
the fence and climbed over. The feasting death walker had not even
noticed him yet, still kneeling before the horse with its back to
him. He ran upon the fiend before it could react, using the machete
to slice the creatures head cleanly away from its shoulders.

Leaping over the horse carcass, Donavan
charged toward the other pony. He had neither bridle nor saddle,
but Donavan had always been a good rider. The pony did not try to
get away, instead appearing relieved that someone normal had come
to help it get away. Donavan grabbed the mane trailing down the
pony’s neck and swung himself up onto the beast’s back.

Looking back, he found the death walkers
coming over and under the fence. They ran at him as Donavan kicked
his heels into the pony’s sides. The animal took off, directed by
Donavan’s clutch of mane within his hand. He had dropped the
hatchet, but kept the machete. Two of the male death walkers were
knocked aside by the pony’s shoulders. Donavan struck a final blow
to the female as she tried to flank him.

The machete cleaved a hunk of skull away
from her head, sending her tumbling into the horse manure littering
the pen. Donavan didn’t look back. He urged the pony on toward the
fence. At the last moment, they leaped as one over the top rung of
the wooden fence, barely clearing it with the pony’s hind
hooves.

Horse and rider left the remaining death
walkers in their wake, galloping away from the village at top
speed. Donavan patted the pony’s neck, whispering a prayer of
thanksgiving under his breath to Elithias. They had no food and no
water, but they did have their lives. And both horse and rider
were, in their own ways, grateful for that much.

MORE KINDLE NOVELS BY JAMES
SOMERS
: