Wrath of Hades (2 page)

Raven stopped in front of one of the statues and stared at it. Her finger tips traced the curves of the marble statue.

“I wonder what they did with Jay.” Raven closed her and let her forehead rest on the cold marble. A couple of tears rolled down her cheeks. “How do they do it? How do people go on living? Will I ever really come to terms with what I did? Will I ever feel like I belong with the living?”

The wind picked up, rattling the bare tree limbs.

Raven wiped the moisture off of her cheeks. She looked at the statue. “Thanks for listening. Sorry if I got you wet, but I guess you don’t mind, do you?” She patted the cold marble and sighed.

The snap of something or someone stepping on a broken twig echoed through the area. Raven whirled around. She scanned the area, but the mausoleums blocked most of her view.

“Great,” she grumbled. “Just great! I walked right into the perfect ambush. What was I thinking?” She slapped her forehead with her hand. “Oh yeah, I wasn’t.”

Another twig snapped.

Raven pulled her new cellphone out of her pocket. She skimmed through the contacts until she found Ethan’s name and tapped it. She wasn’t happy about calling him because she knew he was going to fuss at her for ditching Leslie and the girls, but something wasn’t right and she needed backup.

Snap!

The hair on the back of Raven’s neck stood up. “Come on! Ring!” She glanced around, but still didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. “Why aren’t you ringing?” She moved the phone away from her ear and looked at the screen. “Great! Just flipping great! What is the point of having a cellphone when it won’t work because it doesn’t have any signal bars? I might as well bury it with the rest of the dead stuff.”

Raven shoved the cellphone back into her pocket. “Stupid cellphones never work when you need them to, but when you don’t care,
it’s one ridiculous call after the other trying to sell you anything and everything or just waste your time with their nonsense.”

Slowly, she turned in a circle, scanning her surroundings
for anything out of the ordinary. Everything looked clear, but a gut feeling told her not to trust what she saw. Almost halfway through the cemetery, Raven decided to keep going in her original direction instead of turning back. Besides, the noises were coming from behind her.

The wind died and the air became extremely still. Not even the blackbirds roosting in the gray, leafless tress flapped their wings or even whistled to
each other. Something had frightened even them into silence.

Raven stopped.

A dark, swirling cloud hung over the path, floating just inches from the ground. It slowly drifted toward her. Goosebumps popped up even though she had on a thick jacket. The cold, hatred radiating from the dark, swirling mass reached out to Raven. She felt an icy hand caress her hair. Raven took several hasty steps backwards, afraid to take her eyes off the cloud.

“
Raaveennn!”

Raven’s heart skipped a beat. She whirled around, but saw no one.

“Raaveennn!” The voice came from nowhere and everywhere at once.

“Who’s there?” Raven turned back to face the dark cloud.

It was closer.

Raven
spun around on her heels and took off running. The aisle, created by mausoleums she ran between, opened up to a large expanse of tombstones and monuments marking one grave after the next. Raven didn’t stop. She just kept running.

“
Raaveennn!” The voice surrounded Raven.

She glanced over her shoulder, just as her toe caught the edge of a tombstone partially hidden in the grass. Raven stumbled and fell. She landed face first into a pile of freshly turned earth.

Raven screamed before she could stop herself. In the middle of the grave she was lying on, was a huge hole, going all the way down to the coffin at the bottom. The coffin had a huge hole in the top of it. It looked like something had ripped its way out of the wooden coffin.

Raven stared. She could see inside the coffin.

Nothing was in it.

The body that should have been there was gone!

Rocks and clumps of dirt tumbled down and bounced on the coffin. Feeling the ground shift under her, Raven rolled away from the hole and scrambled to her feet, not bothering to dust off the dirt and dead leaves covering her clothes.

Her heart pounded against her chest. Dead bodies didn’t climb out of their graves. Not in reality. That was just a movie trick.

“Raaveennn!”

Raven’s eyes widened. The voice was directly behind her. Slowly she turned.

She gasped.

“
Raaveennn!”

Her hand went up to her mouth to stifle the scream as much as it was to block the foul stench drifting to her. “No! It can’t be. This isn’t happening. You’re supposed to b
e in your coffin growing mold. You’re not supposed to be doing this moving around stuff? No way. It’s breaking the clause in your contract about staying in your grave,” she said. “Once you’re buried, you’re supposed to stay buried.”

Standing in front of her was Jerry
Spillman. The same Jerry Spillman who was buried over a week ago; at least it was what was left of Jerry. He had died when the jet ski he was riding hit a partially submerged stump, and he was thrown into the path of an oncoming boat.

“This isn’t real. Bodies don’t climb out of their graves.” Raven swallowed. “You’re dead! Dead bodies don’t walk or whatever you call that shuffling movement you’re trying to make.”

Jerry took an awkward step toward Raven. “Raaveennn!” He called her name through what was left of his mouth.

Fear rippled through Raven. “This isn’t happening. This isn’t real,” she told herself. “Dead bodies don’t come back to life unless they’re—”

Jerry lunged at her. Something shiny flashed in the light.

Raven ducked and rolled out of his way. The knife missed her by a couple of inches.

“Raaveennn diiie!” It turned to face her.

Raven scrambled to her feet. “Great.
A zombie with a knife, who wants me dead. Just what I needed! Is there anyone who doesn’t want to kill me? I mean, this is pretty pathetic. I’ve got a dead guy—a DEAD GUY—who wants me dead.”

It lunged at Raven again.

She managed to leap out of its path. “Okay, dumb question of the day. How do you kill something that’s already dead? Someone forgot that chapter in the Guardian 101 manual. This is definitely not a good joke. It’s so totally not funny.”

Laughter echoed through the cemetery.

Raven stared at the zombie. Her eyes widened. “That little ventriloquist trick wasn’t funny either.”

The zombie slung its arm in a slashing movement.

Raven threw up her hands to protect herself from the blow. The tip of the knife cut through the palms of both of her hands. Raven cried out in pain. “Crap! That wasn’t supposed to happen! Where was that energy shield thing?”

The zombie slashed at her again with the knife.

Raven twisted out of its reach. Frustration and anger filled her, replacing most of the fear, but not quite all of it. She was angry because someone was orchestrating this attack and frustrated because her abilities had failed her and left her seriously vulnerable.

The ground shifted under her feet. Rocks and dirt hit the wooden coffin with loud thuds. Raven scrambled to get away from the hole. “Falling in would not be very good for my health.
A broken ankle or leg? Not a good plan. I don’t know how dead guy got out, but don’t think I could.” She shook her head. “Nope. Don’t want to play the ‘Bop Raven on the Head’ game either.”

“
Raaveeennn,” moaned the zombie. It climbed over the debris and headed directly toward her. It swung the knife it was still holding with its good hand.

“Great. The zombie knows my name on top of trying to kill me.” Raven looked around and spotted a long, slender metal plant holder in front of a nearby tombstone. She ran over to it and pulled the planter out of the ground. Dumping out the flowers, she swung the plant holder, testing the weight. “It will have to do for now.” Her hands were tender, but the gashes left by the knife were almost completely healed.
At least one of her abilities hadn’t totally disappeared on her.

Raven swung the plant holder again. It wasn’t a great weapon, but at this point being picky wasn’t an option. It was better than nothing, especially with her abilities not working. Running away was her first thought, but it wasn’t an option. The zombi
e would probably keep coming after her and other people could get hurt. That wasn’t going to happen if she could help it. Besides the zombie was slow moving because of all the damage the body had suffered in the accident. It didn’t help that it had been buried for a week and smelled really, really bad!

She turned and faced the zombie. It had changed its original direction and was coming straight at her. Raven frowned. Staying out of its reach, she moved until she was directly behind it. The zombie stopped and turned too, following Raven.

For whatever reason, it was fixated on her.

“I’ve got a rotting corpse for a member of my fan club. How did I manage to get so lucky?” Raven shook her head, but didn’t take her eyes off the knife welding zombie. “But where did it get the knife? Last time I checked the fan club was not issuing anything like that. How is it even functioning? Dead is supposed to be dead, not up running around the cemetery.”

“Raaveennnnn.”

Raven looked at the metal plant holder. It wasn’t much of a weapon, but with her cranky powers, it was all she had.

“Raaveenn.”

Raven rolled her eyes. “Would you just shut up.” she sniffed the air. “Gross! You really need to do something about that smell. You know—deodorant, body spray, bleach. Like maybe gallons and gallons of bleach.”

The zombie made a slashing motion with the knife as it crept closer to her.

“Maybe some lye instead.
I’ve heard it does wonders for bad smells. Like that dead smell you’ve got going on. That’s so not going to attract the girls to you, and that knife is a total turn off.” She looked around. Behind her were mausoleums. To her right and her left, as well as in front of her were tombstones of various sizes and shapes. Every so often there was a statue, but not as many as there were around the mausoleums. And then there was the hole the zombie had created when it clawed its way out of the grave.

“How do I stop—” she stopped talking and stared at the hole.

It hit her.

Somehow she had to get the thing back into its grave and somehow keep it there.

“Piece of cake,” she said to herself.

The zombie shuffled closer.

Raven took a couple of steps back, just as the zombie swung its arm in an attempt to cut her with the knife. She took a couple of sideways steps.

The zombie turned too.

Raven kept moving—taking a few steps at a time until the hole was between her and the zombie. Hopefully it couldn’t do any higher level problem-solving, or she was in real trouble.

“
Raaveennn,” it groaned.

“That’s right. I’m right here. Come on. Bring your dragon breath self over here.”

The zombie shuffled toward her as fast as its damaged legs would take it.

“That’s it.
Just a few more steps. Come on. You can do it.”

It moved closer to the hole.

“Come on. Just a little more.”

The zombie stopped just inches from the hole.

Raven held her breath.

The zombie didn’t move.

Several rocks fell into the hole, but the zombie didn’t move.

“Give me a freaking break!” Raven groaned. “This isn’t happening.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “If you want to stab me, you have to come get me.”

But the zombie just stood there.

“Come on.
Just an inch more. You can do it.” She wasn’t exactly sure if the zombie understood her or not, but she didn’t care as long as it moved in the direction she wanted it to go.

It took a small half step. More rocks tumbled into the hole.
“Raaveennn.” It sounded more like a growl this time.

“That’s right. If you want Raven, you have to take another step this way.”

The zombie made a shuffling step. The soft ground shifted. The dirt, the zombie was standing on, suddenly crumbled. The creature tumbled into the hole.

Raven threw the metal plant holder like a spear.

A horrible screeching roar came from the bottom of the hole. A dark cloud of swirling black and red drifted up.

Raven’s eyes widened. She took a step back.

The strange cloud started drifting toward her, but the next instant it was sucked back into the hole and was gone.

Raven stood still. The only thing she heard was the pounding of her heart. She took a deep breath and carefully stepped to the hole and looked in.

The body was twisted in an awkward angle. The metal plant holder went totally through its chest.

The zombie wasn’t moving.