Season Of Decay (The Decaying World Saga Book 2) (13 page)

Jonah was thrown forward several feet before his face hit the ground. The impact dazed him and he didn’t realize he’d been flung onto his back until the soldier mounted him like a horse. She was smiling as the rest of the trailing posse rushed in behind her. The woman never said a word, instead making her point with a single, yet devastating punch to the jaw.

13

There was no good reason to go down into the gorge alone. Rowan had argued against Mia’s point but he could admit, at least to himself, that she was right. The truth was he didn’t want to bear the burden of having to keep anyone else safe. He told himself that everyone else had something important to do. He told himself that the people of Canaan should be preparing to evacuate the hives.

He and Mia parted at the confines of the supply room and headed in opposite directions. Rowan couldn’t get the encounter out of his mind no matter how hard he tried. He’d fantasized countless times, about what it would be like to explore her body, but the actual event was far more exhilarating than he ever imagined. It felt more like a dream than anything else.

He was working through a series of things he needed to get done when he made the turn on to the main hall. The entrances into the sleeping areas were alive with movement. Rowan was trying to decide what gear he needed to take with him. Finding the undead boy Dr. Olric called the nexus felt like an impossible task. He had it in mind to close off the underground tunnel they’d used to gain entry once and for all.

“When are we going?”

Rowan was so intently focused on the items he wanted to gather that he barely took in the question.

“As soon as I can get everything together,” he said then knelt down and flipped open his footlocker. “I need to talk to Asher and find out where he got the…” Rowan stopped with his arm leaning on the end of the bed. He peeked over his shoulder and centered on Bree and Bale now standing in the doorway. “Don’t even think about it.”

“We’re going,” Bale said defiantly.

Rowan shook his head before turning back to his task.

“You can’t stop us,” Bree added.

Rowan continued what he was doing until he had everything he figured he’d need. He crammed most of it into the backpack he had stashed under his cot. He slipped the pack over his shoulder then scooped up the lantern beside the footlocker before turning to face the onlookers. Neither of them moved out of the way.

“How do you even know where I’m going?” he asked.

Bree smiled.

“I followed you and Mia to the tribal council meeting,” she said.

Rowan thought about it.

“You listened out in the hall, didn’t you?”

Her smile widened then quickly vanished.

“We have to do something,” she said as the air rushed from her lungs in a long sigh. “I can’t sit here and hope I see Jonah and Tate again.”

“You know we can fight,” Bale said.

“I know you can fight,” Rowan assured him. “But they’re not down there. If you heard me in the council meeting, you know that already.”

The truth was Rowan couldn’t stop either of them from doing whatever they wanted. Bale was a few years younger than he was but capable of going off on his own if he saw fit. Bree was another matter altogether. She was still young and needed the protection of the tribe to survive. Rowan saw something in the girl that reminded him of Mia’s strength and passion. None of his feelings about the duo changed his opinion on his descent into the bowels of hive six.

“You won’t make it out alive,” Rowan said.

“I could say the same to you,” Bree countered in a tone much too close to Mia’s for Rowan’s comfort. “We survived the last time.”

Rowan had enough. He pushed in between them, knocking both aside as he stepped out into the hall. “I need you to do something for me,” he said as he walked away. He heard their stomping boots rushing to catch up with him. He was already at the turn before they stepped in stride with him. Rowan knew each of them well enough to know which strings to pull.

“Do what?” Bale asked.

“Do you have any idea how dangerous it’s going to be evacuating the hives?” Rowan asked as he carefully laid his trap.

“I guess,” Bree said.

“I need the remaining Knights of Rowan to provide an escort for the tribal council,” he said, “of course that includes Mia.” He had to suppress a smile. Their silence spoke volumes about how deeply they’d taken the bait. Rowan slowed as they reached the stairs leading down to the second level. He made sure their eyes were on him. “Do you think you could do that for me?”

Bree slid a look at Bale before nodding. Bale grunted his confirmation. Rowan started down the stairs still holding back his grin. They followed him to the infirmary where they found Mia standing over Asher. His eyes were open and his voice cracked as he spoke.

“It must be my lucky day,” Asher said.

“I’d say that’s a fact,” Rowan said coming to a stop at Mia’s side. He slid one hand across her back and patted Asher on the shoulder with the other. “Good to see you’re still breathing.”

“I was a little more concerned than I might have let on,” he admitted.

A grumbled laugh echoed from Yaffa on her way across the room with a clean set of bandages. She smiled at Mia and Rowan before turning her attention to Asher.

“You can try and be tough if you want,” she said as she started rewrapping the wound. “You’re not going to jump up and go running off any time soon.”

Rowan felt Mia wrap her arm around his waist and squeeze. He didn’t want to look at her. Her smell alone was tugging at his emotions and he had no interest in allowing her to work on his decision to go back down into the hive. He settled on what he really needed from Asher.

“You remember how you blew the hell out of the hallway?”

♦

The seemingly endless drop down into the darkness of the gorge was becoming a familiar sight. Rowan had avoided the view for most of the time following the detonation of the security system that reduced the compound to ruins. He flipped the end of the climbing net over the edge and let it fall. There was no sign of the herd of dead that he, Asher, Bale and Bree left on the landing several levels down, but there was little doubt they were hidden somewhere close by.

“You’ve got a lot to do,” he said, standing up and facing the small group that followed him out. “Stay strong, they need you.”

Mia nodded then wrapped her arms around him. Bree and Bale looked on, both trying not to stare. Mia kissed his neck and squeezed harder. She slid her cheek across his face and pressed her lips to his the moment their eyes met. She let go and took a step back.

“And you’re sure you know what you’re doing?” she asked.

“Nope,” he admitted.

She didn’t laugh.

“I know what I’m looking for,” he said. “I couldn’t forget that boy’s face. I’m going to try and find him and bind him.” He looked over the edge at the landing. “I’ll slip that sack over him and we’ll haul him up.”

The faux confidence ran from Mia’s face as she spoke. The finer points of Rowan’s plan were still in flux. He’d convinced himself that the commission wanted the nexus more than anything else. His efforts to convince the council and, in particular, Mia, that they could use the undead boy to trade for Jonah and Tate’s safe return was less than successful. He had no way of knowing how long it would take or at what point he’d give up. Mia forced him to agree to a three-day deadline.

“I have to try,” he said.

Rowan brushed her bangs from her eyes. Her expression soured, but she didn’t put up a fight. He felt closer to her than ever before. His devotion to Jonah was an extension of that love, and always had been. She nodded.

“You two,” he said stepping away from her. Bree and Bale snapped to attention. “Remember what I asked you to do.” They nodded and Mia’s brow furrowed. “Don’t worry about,” he offered.

Mia’s mouth opened, but she held on to whatever she was going to say. Rowan made sure his gear was securely strapped. He was standing at the edge of the gorge, eyeballing the sheer wall. He crouched down and started his climb without looking back at Mia. Her voice followed him over the side.

“I love you.”

The heartfelt emotion still had the impact it had when he first heard it. Rowan stopped, his feet several rungs down on the climbing rig.

“I love you, too.”

He descended quickly, coming to a stop over the landing. He held his breath, listening intently to the subtle sounds echoing up from the darkness of the gorge. His memory was filled with visions of the chaotic scene the last time his boots touched the landing. There was no sign of the countless dead.

Rowan took one last look at the edge of the gorge now high above him before slipping off the rig. He hit the metal grates with a solid blow. He scanned the room aligned with the landing and found complete stillness. Rowan unhooked the lantern from his belt and went to work. The light sprang to life and he let it fill the darkness to reassure himself.

“I guess I’m really doing this,” he said to himself as he got up to his feet and drew his gun. “Here we go.”

The room beyond the landing was in ruin. To his dismay, Rowan found Asher’s hand in the dirt precisely where Bree lopped it off. He moved quickly into the hall and advanced toward the center of the hive. The silence stood out, somehow increasing his fear. He’d seen the mob of dead with his own eyes and expected them to pour out of every opening.

The beam of light revealed the open archway where the main hall ended and split. Rowan slowed his pace. He stopped as something crossed through the light at the furthest point. The gun shook in his hand as he held it out in front of him.

He realized he still had one foot off the ground. Rowan lowered his boot and a sound reached him the moment his foot touched the dirty hallway floor. It was low, somewhere beyond the opening directly in front of him. The moan signified the dead, but the notes were somehow unfamiliar. The acknowledgement of the dead had an odd effect. Rowan’s hand grew still, his gun straight and true. There was something comforting about knowing the dead were out there, no longer hiding from him. Rowan couldn’t rightly explain it.

He pressed forward, his mind focused on a plan to reach the elevator door where he and Asher climbed down to the lower levels. Rowan anticipated that the nexus would be near the ground level where he’d ripped the boy from Dr. Olric’s clutches. The thought of his plan allowed him to take another step forward, and he managed to keep the pace until the split in the hall and the opening directly across from it were an arm’s length away.

The lantern’s beam shined through the opening onto a room in total disarray. Large chunks of the ceiling lay toppled on one another in the center of the floor. The decomposing lower remains of some poor sap hung off the edge of two sections of the ceiling, the torso smashed somewhere in between them. The clear sound of footsteps pulled Rowan away from the view, swinging the lantern toward one end of the split hallway.

He found a figure standing there at the edge of the light. It held still, the light catching its eyes. Rowan waited for it to begin it’s shifting walk toward him, but instead it pressed a hand against the wall and pointed at him with the other. The move was so surprising, Rowan called out before he thought it through.

“What are you doing down here?”

The figured lowered its hand, but didn’t respond.

“Are you okay?”

It turned slowly then stepped around the turn and disappeared. Rowan stared at the empty end of the hall, unsure of what he’d seen.

“What the hell?” he whispered.

The interior of the room, which was his focus a moment before, was an afterthought when he turned back to the opening. It took his mind a half second too long to process the hand reaching out into the light. He heard the guttural death moan as a second hand grabbed a hold of his arm. Rowan fired a shot wide off the mark as he pulled back to try and get away.

The woman stumbled into the hall and locked onto Rowan’s arm. He got a glimpse of another figure following her out before the beam of light swung wildly from one side of the hall to the other. Rowan slammed into the wall and used the momentum to swing his attacker around. Her naked figure crossed the light and the horror of her condition was on full display.

Deep gouges lined the side of her torso, ending at a festering mess of decaying muscle and tissue. The gruesome remains of her head were only distinguishable by a dangling eye wedged in the cavity in the center of her face. Her jaw clenched as she lunged, the putrefying muscles animated by the closeness of living flesh. Rowan got a close-up view of her rotting gums before the force slammed her into the wall beside him, cracking her head open in the process.

Her body went limp and her grip released. Rowan kept himself upright, but couldn’t lift his gun fast enough before the second zombie rushed toward him. Rowan managed to raise his knee up to keep the dead man from getting a handful of his clothes. He’d been a soldier by the look of his tattered black fatigues. The decrepit remains of one arm hinted at the pieces that his attackers feasted on when he was still one of the living.

The initial impact pushed the creature back and gave Rowan the time he needed. He leveled his sights directly between its eyes and pulled the trigger. The response was instant, snapping the creature’s head back with tremendous force. The remains of its brains burst from the back of its head and painted the wall behind it before the body hit the floor.

A continuing string of moans pulled Rowan’s attention to the opening across the hall. Shadows crept forward in the dim glow of the light as figures pulled away from the room. Rowan ran, making the turn in the hall as another set of hands reached out for him. He held the lantern up as he sped forward, anticipating what might be lurking around the next corner.