Kidnapped (10 page)

“Get the girl and the horse inside.” He yelled to his valet not taking his eyes off the creatures for a moment. There were two of them now and he stabbed the first in the throat before gaining momentum and slicing across the throat of the second in the same sweeping swing; severing its windpipe and causing them both to fall. He did not have a moments respite; another zombie was coming after him already; clambering over the prone bodies of its fallen comrades. His muscles were beginning to quiver from the most intense work out he had ever had with the sword. The report of a pistol sounded behind him, and a faint breeze ruffled his hair as a bullet zipped past him, to lodge in the head of the creature. It fell where it had stood, dead. Grayson turned to find his valet with smoking pistol in hand.
 

“Get in the house Your Grace.” His valet yelled to him over the din of snarling and rattling and Grayson did not have to be told twice; slipping through the door as Jackson was already pushing it closed against the onslaught of creatures.
 

Grayson helped the valet; lending his weight to the struggle, and between the two of them, they managed to get the door shut; chest heaving from exertion, muscles
cramping and aching Jackson quickly bolted the door and hammered several boards across the entrance for added support.
 

“What in the devil is going on out there?” Grayson demanded of the man, as his valet turned to him, hammer still in hand. “Where did those damned things come from?”
 

A frown of concentration creased his valet’s brow. “We have not a clue Your Grace; try as we have been racking our brains we cannot figure how such an abomination came to be.” The man paused for a moment as though emotionally overcome, which was strange enough for the usually sombre valet, before he continued in a gravelly voice. “We are bloody glad you came back to us in one piece. We were worried that you were…”
 

“A creature?” Sussex supplied for him, but the man shook him head.
 

“No, Your Grace those are no creatures created by our Lord; those things are from the devil.” He looked pale and shaky. “They are the un dead.” He confided with a shudder.
 

Grayson snorted derisively. “Come on man that is impossible.” He eyed his valet.
 

The man shifted nervously beneath his hard gaze but did not take back his words.
 

“It tis true. No one rightly knows how it happened, but those creatures are the walking dead.” Jackson was adamant.
 

Grayson did not know what to think; his valet seemed to believe it and who was he to naysay. The idea of the walking dead seemed impossible but so did the idea of human beings turned into mindless creature’s intent only on devouring flesh. He was reminded back to earlier that morning when he, himself had considered the possibility of vampires.
 

“If you could come with me Your Grace? There is something I think you need to see.” Jackson interrupted his musing.
 

Grayson nodded, motioning to the girl, who was standing in the corner crying silently, for her to join them before nodding to Jackson to lead the way.
 

He followed his valet down his own hallway until they reached a small sitting room on the main floor of the house that Grayson did not use. There Jackson paused looking uncertainly at the girl.
 

“Perhaps the girl should wait for us outside?” Jackson suggested giving Grayson a significant look.
 

Grayson caught his meaning and turning to Celia he placed a comforting hand upon her thin shoulder.
 

“I will be back momentarily; you are safe here.” He looked steadily into her eyes as he spoke, though he honestly did not know if he spoke the truth. Celia looked as though she wanted to follow him, but she did as she had been told.
 

“That’s a good girl.” Grayson said gently giving her a small smile.
 

Jackson nodded at the girl and turning motioned for Sussex to precede him into the room. Grayson did not know what to expect though he was fairly certain his valet would not intentionally put his life in danger, but he gripped his sword tightly none the less.
 

At first it was difficult to find anything out of place in the green brocade sitting room. It had been closed up for ages, and white dust covers shrouded the furniture giving it an eerie unlived in feel. Then Grayson saw it. A body had been laid in the middle of the floor upon one of those dust sheets. Creeping closer Sussex stared down at his housekeeper; an elderly matron who had served him well over the years and his father before that. He felt an immense sadness as he stared down at the woman who had been the only one in the ducal household to treat him with open affection despite their difference in stations.
 

“She was a … creature?” The words stuck in his throat, and Grayson had to clear it several times before forcing himself to turn away from the slightly bloated corpse with the large butcher’s knife sticking out of its head; choosing instead to stare at Jackson.
 

The valet nodded gravely.
 

“Aye, but she didn’t start out that way.”
 

Grayson felt shock course through him at his valet’s words. “What do you mean by that?” He asked an icy foreboding trickling down his spine.
 

“This morning there weren’t as many of those creatures out there as now. Opal here was nearly all the way to work before she noticed them. One attacked her and bit her on the arm, but she bashed it over the head with a rock and got away. She was right hysterical when she came crashing through these doors. None of the live in staff knew anything about it…” Jackson trailed off, snuffled a bit and blew his nose before continuing.
 

“She was in a right state going on about monsters attacking her. We didn’t even believe her until she showed us the bite, poor love.”
 

Jackson pointed to a plainly visible imprint of teeth upon her forearm. Bits of flesh had been torn away, and the wound appeared to have turned putrid and black.
 

Grayson had to fight down the urge to retch as he stared into the grey face of his beloved housekeeper.
 

“What happened then?”
 

“We barricaded the doors and watched the slaughter from the windows. Half the staff left to find their families. We told them to stay; that it would be safer but you know how people are about their families...” He shrugged helplessly.
 

Grayson didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to admit that to Jackson. His mother was long dead from complications birthing a brother that Grayson had never met for he had died that day too. He had been raised instead by an army of tutors paid for by a cold father that he had barely seen nor particularly liked.
 

“About an hour after Opal arrived she got a terrible sweat. It was like she was burning up inside and then just as suddenly she was as cold as ice.” Jackson continued taking his employers silence as an indication to continue.
 

“She was dead?” Grayson asked a frown marring his classically handsome brow.
 

“As a doornail; I checked her pulse myself.”
 

“Then why did you feel the need to stab her in the head with the knife?” Grayson asked incredulously, not at all liking the way his dear housekeeper’s body had been handled.
 

“It didn’t start off like that Your Grace. We had her all set up nice on the settee in the main salon… but then she woke up.”
 

Grayson blinked. “Beg pardon?”
 

“Yes Your Grace, I said she woke up, her eyes were all covered in that white film and she was intent on killing the lot of us.”
 

“She would never…” Grayson began to protest, but Jackson seeming to forget his station in this time of crisis interrupted him.
 

“She wasn’t herself Your Grace. It was like a demon possessed her. She chased us into the kitchen. That’s where Cook seized one of her great butcher’s knives and cleaved her in the head with it. She saved us all.
 

“So it was the bite that turned her into the monster then?” Grayson struggled to understand this new development.
 

“It would appear to be, it certainly explains how there are so many of them so quickly.”
 

The idea horrified Sussex…If that were true they could easily overtake the entire population with nothing more than a single bite. Grayson blanched thinking back to how easily he; himself could have been bitten today.
 

Jackson looked grim at the prospect, as well.
 

The sound of breaking glass followed by a scream that could only be Celia shattered the silence in the room causing Grayson to spring into action.