Plague

She burst into the town plaza. Not knowing what she was looking for, not consciously. But she found herself running up the stone steps toward the ruined church.

Jamal caught her on the steps, grabbed her hair, and yanked back. Her legs went out from under her and she fell hard on her back, slamming onto sharp-edged granite.

But Brittney no longer felt real pain. She had long since gone beyond pain.

Jamal tried to straddle her, but he tripped on the rope and she pushed away from him.

“Stop it!” Jamal yelled.

Brittney rolled down a couple of steps, climbed to her feet, and plowed straight back into Jamal. She knocked him aside and dashed past him.

The church roof had collapsed long ago. But a path had been cleared to the inside. The cross had been propped back upright, leaning a bit but still there, silver in the moonlight.

Brittney ran toward the cross, tripped on debris, and slammed into a pew.

Jamal was on her in a flash, cursing, fumbling, trying to grab her, swat away her punching hands, trying to get the rope around her.

“No! No! No!” Brittney shouted.

Jamal punched her in the side of the head.

Brittney blinked and punched back. She kicked and flailed and punched as well as she could from her position half beneath a pew. And Jamal kicked her back viciously.

But Jamal could still feel pain. He backed away suddenly, eyes wild and dripping sweat. He leveled the rifle at her.

“I don’t want to shoot you,” Jamal pleaded.

“You can’t kill me,” Brittney said and got heavily to her feet.

“I know. Drake told me you’d say that. But I can blow up your face and then you won’t be better right away. That’s what he said. He told me to shoot you right in the face and tie you up.”

“I wish you could kill me,” Brittney said. And then, in a loud voice, trying to shout at heaven, she cried, “Jesus, I am in your house. I am in the house of the Lord begging you for death!”

“Just let me tie you up,” Jamal pleaded. “He’ll whip me if I don’t.” There were tears running down his face and Brittney felt sorry for him. They were both bound to Drake, unable to get away from him.

Jamal aimed the gun at her face.

“Don’t,” Brittney said. “We have to fight Drake, we have to get help. Sam. He has to burn Drake to ashes and scatter the ashes in the ocean.”

“Please don’t make me do this,” Jamal pleaded.

Brittney yelled, “Help! Some—”

Orc had run until he was tired. That didn’t take long. He was drunk and dehydrated. Weaker than he should have been. More easily tired.

But despair drove him on, staggering and weeping and bellowing in rage through the night.

“Never wanted to be no guard,” he yelled at the closed and darkened houses. “Everybody hear that? I didn’t ask to be no prison guard!”

He stood swaying back and forth, big stone-fingered fists clenched.

“No one wants to talk to me, huh?”

He smashed one arm down on the roof of a car. The driver’s-side window had long since been beaten in so the door could be opened and the car could be searched. The trunk was open, too, and the recoil from Orc’s blow made it bounce.

“Need another bottle,” he muttered. Then louder, yelling at the darkened windows and locked doors, “I want a bottle. Someone give me a bottle so I won’t hurt anyone.”

No answer. The streets were silent.

He started crying again and brushed angrily at the tears. He started running once more, ran for a block and stopped, wheezing and threatening to topple over.

Then he spotted the boy. A kid. Maybe eight, maybe nine or ten, hard to say. The boy was walking bent over, holding his stomach. Every few feet he would stop and cough and then groan from the pain of coughing.

“Hey-ey!” Orc yelled. “You! Go get me a bottle.” The word “bottle” came out “bah-hull.”

The sick boy blinked and seemed only then to notice the monster in the street ahead of him. He clutched a stop sign to keep himself from collapsing.

“Hey. You, kid. I’m talking to you!”

The boy started to answer, then started coughing. He coughed and groaned and sat down.

Orc stomped over to him. “You ig, um, ig . . . ignoring me?”

The boy shook his head weakly. He made a gesture toward his throat, tried to speak, couldn’t.

“I don’t want to . . . ,” Orc began, but lost the thread of his speech. “Just go get me a bah-hull.”

The boy coughed in Orc’s face.

Orc swatted him with the back of his hand.

The boy hit the signpost so hard it rang. Then fell onto his back on the sidewalk.

Orc stared stupidly, expecting the boy to start crying. But the kid wasn’t moving. Wasn’t coughing.

Orc felt ice water flood his veins.

“I didn’t . . . ,” Orc started to say.

He looked around, feeling sudden, overwhelming shame. No one had seen him.

He tried to lean down and prod the boy with his finger, but the blood rushed to his head and he almost passed out.

“Whatever,” Orc said sullenly, and headed off again into the night.

But quieter now.

Chapter Thirteen

48 HOURS, 29 MINUTES

BRIANNA TOOK A deep breath of chilly night air. Was that a breeze? Excellent: a breeze for the Breeze.

“Here, Drake-y, Drake-y,” she said.

She was in the middle of the street. As long as Drake hadn’t found a gun, she would be safe. Drake was quick with that whip hand of his, but not Breeze quick. No one was Breeze quick.