Prologue
Nine Years Ago
“Run, Regan!” Kellan shouted. “Run and don’t look back!”
He was ahead of me, charging down the street, not waiting or even looking to see if I was behind him. I pumped my legs harder, trying to catch up, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t. He was older and faster and stronger. He was everything I wasn’t.
My feet pounded against the road, but I couldn’t hear my own footsteps over the moans. Those things were right behind us. So close their stink filled my nostrils with every breath I sucked in. They were after us. They wanted to bite us. To eat us. They weren’t alive, but they were still hungry. Desperate.
They were zombies.
A sob burst out of me, shaking my body, and tears filled my eyes, blurring the world in front of me. I tried to wipe them away as I ran, but it was no use. More tears followed, and they kept coming, harder and faster until catching my breath was impossible. Hiccupped sobs came next, making me gasp in panic as I tried to fill my lungs, tried to stay calm. Tried to stay focused. It didn’t work.
Then my toe caught on something—a crack in the road, maybe—and my body pitched forward. I reached for Kellan as I fell, knowing he was too far ahead and it was no use, but trying to find him anyway.
This was it. This was how I died.
“Kellan!” I screamed just before my body slammed into the hard pavement.
I rolled, my bare legs scraping against the road, my elbows and knees grinding against pebbles and other debris. Twice my body rotated before I came to a painful stop. When I did, I tried to push myself up. Tried to make my arms and legs obey. It was no use. I scrambled forward a few steps only to tumble down again, exhausted and shaky and too hurt to move.
Five feet in front of me, Kellan skittered to a stop and turned, gasping for breath. His bronzed cheeks had reddened from exertion, and his dark hair was plastered to his face with sweat. I waited for him to come back, but he just stood there, staring first at me and then at the zombies barreling toward us. They were so close. Ten feet, maybe less. They were coming. They were going to get me.
“Please,” I gasped, holding my hand out as I struggled to get up.
He swore and shook his head once before running to me. It took less than ten seconds for him to reach me, and he grasped my hand and pulled me to my feet.
“Run!” he screamed, taking off again, keeping hold of my hand as he did.
I struggled to keep up. My entire body throbbed, my lungs burned, my head was pounding from the heat and lack of water. It felt like I hadn’t had a drink in a week even though I knew it had only been a little over a day, and every move, every breath, every tiny gesture took effort.
We ran a little farther before I stumbled again, but this time I was able to stay on my feet thanks to Kellan’s support. He cursed and pulled me to the right, off the road toward a house. It was a sprawling one-story brick home with a matching four-foot wall cutting across the yard. The thing was only four feet high, but it was sturdy and would be more than enough to keep the dead out. Assuming we could get over it.
Kellan rushed to a black wrought iron gate, slamming his shoulder against it, but the thing didn’t budge.
“Up!” he yelled, nodding to the brick wall.
He released my hand, and I looked over my shoulder. The zombies were closer now. Close enough that I could see their milky eyes, vacant and yet somehow focused at the same time.
I wanted to cry again, but I forced the tears down. Kellan had run to the fence and was already pulling himself up with ease. He waited at the top, his hand out, motioning for me to take it.
“Now, Regan! Take my hand.”
I did, and he tugged, straining to pull me up. My free hand was on the wall, my arms straining to drag my weight up as my feet struggled to find purchase on the brick. My hand slipped from Kellan’s, and I fell, my backside landing on the ground with a painful thud that vibrated through me, forming new bruises on top of the ones I already had. But there was no time to lick my wounds. I had to move. I had to get up. Now.
I pushed myself to my feet and threw my body forward, grabbing Kellan’s hand once again, knowing there was no room for error this time. Either I made it to the top of the fence, or I was dead.
Using my free hand to help, I dragged my body forward while Kellan pulled. My bare arms and legs scraped against the rough brick, but in seconds, I was on top, sprawled out on my stomach beside Kellan as I desperately tried to catch my breath.
“Jump.” He didn’t even look at me before hopping down, landing on his feet on the other side of the fence.
I rolled more than jumped, but the result was the same—plus a few extra bruises—and I landed on the ground at Kellan’s feet. The brick wall and wrought iron gate separated us from the dead, but it didn’t stop them from slamming against the other side, snarling and moaning. Growling. Decayed fingers stretched through the openings in the gate while rotten arms reached over the fence, clawing at air. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t catch my breath. Couldn’t do anything but lie there.
“Get up, Regan,” Kellan snapped. “We have to go. Now. Before they figure out how to get over.”
I nodded and pulled myself to my feet, wincing with every painful movement. My legs were a scraped and bloody mess, and my arms weren’t much better. When I took a step, I cried out from the throbbing in my ankle.
Kellan had already started walking.
“I’m hurt,” I called.
He stopped and turned to face me, his face a mask of irritation. “What do you want me to do about it? I can’t carry you, Regan.”
“I need help,” I said. “Please.”
He cursed but came back anyway, allowing me to put my arm around his shoulders so I could use him for support.
“I’m not going to be able to run any more today,” I said.
“Shit.” Kellan looked around, his gaze taking in the back yard.
There was an above ground pool with a deck circling half of it, and a little shed that could have been a child’s playhouse. Lawn furniture was toppled over on a cement pad, and beyond that, the back door stood open as if waiting for someone to arrive and once again inhabit the house.
“We’ll go inside,” he said. “We can lay low and hope they get bored and leave.”
I gasped in pain when I took another step.
Kellan swore under his breath and muttered, “You’re dead weight, Regan. You’re going to get me killed.”
The words hurt worse than all my injuries combined.
* * *
The monsters were out there. I was sure of it. Kellan kept telling me we were safe, but I knew he was lying. I could tell because he wouldn’t talk to me, and he hadn’t looked at me since he’d helped me into the house hours ago. He hadn’t glanced my way once while searching for a safe place to hide, or even before we’d crawled into this closet and shut the door. He hadn’t looked at me since before he’d uttered those horrible words.
“How long have we been here?” I asked, keeping my voice low in case someone—or something—was in the house.
It was dark, so I couldn’t see him, but I felt Kellan’s body stiffen at the sound of my voice.
“I don’t know,” he said, his words cool.
I swallowed but couldn’t come up with any saliva. My mouth, which had been dry before we went out this morning in search of water, now felt like the sandy ground of the desert. Even worse, my head was pounding, and the intense heat in the closet wasn’t helping.
Kellan and I sat in silence a little longer, and I tried my best to stay quiet. With each passing moment, I could feel reality slipping farther away. Even surrounded by blackness, I could tell the edges of my vision had begun to darken, and my body was throbbing in places where it hadn’t before. The pain was inside. In my muscles and bones.
“Kellan,” I said, reaching for him, “I need water. I need—”
He shifted away when my hand brushed his arm, and I reached out again, trying to find him, but it suddenly felt as if he was being pulled away. Or maybe it was me who was being pulled away, because I felt like I was falling, tumbling down a hole. I grabbed at empty air, trying to hold on, but I couldn’t, and then it was too late, and everything went black.
* * *
“Regan.” Hands shook my shoulders. “Regan. Wake up. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Please.”
Once again, I grasped at the darkness, trying to find something to grab hold of, trying to ground myself by clinging to Kellan’s panicked voice. My hands touched something warm and solid, and I briefly registered that it was Kellan. This time, he didn’t push me away, but instead let out a deep sigh.
“Sit up. Here.” He helped me up, his arms around me.
Something wet touched my parched lips, then my tongue. It filled my mouth, refreshing despite its warmth, and I sucked it down, desperate for relief from the throbbing dryness in my body.
“Careful,” Kellan said. “Slowly.”
I couldn’t listen, I was too parched, and with each drop that slid down my throat, the fear of death slipped farther away.
It was then that I registered where I was. Not in the closet, but in a living room. On a couch. A large picture window took up most of the wall in front of me, and through it I could see the night sky. The yard we’d run across who knew how long ago stood empty and as still as the night. The horde was gone.
“They—” I swallowed, trying to get the words out. “They’re gone?”
“They are.” Kellan was at my side, kneeling on the floor and holding a bottle of SmartWater. “Drink more.”
I obeyed, taking the bottle and sucking it down, my gaze moving over the room. A television—now useless—sat in front of us, and to my left was a fireplace, and just past that a dining room table. Four wine racks were mounted on the wall next to it, flanking a huge picture of Paris. I stared at it as I drank, thinking about that faraway city and wondering if it had fared any better than Altus. It seemed unlikely. The last news reports to air had said the virus had gone global. Were there zombies stumbling around under the Eiffel Tower at this very moment?
“How do you feel?” Kellan asked, pulling my attention to him.
I swallowed another mouthful of water. “Better, I think.”
“Shit, Regan,” he shoved his hand through his dark hair, pushing it off his forehead, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it was that bad.”
“It’s okay.”
It was a lie. The water would help and my injuries would heal, but the words he’d flung at me had left a gash in my heart that I wasn’t sure would ever go away.
“No,” he said. “It isn’t. I didn’t mean it. I shouldn’t have—”
A bang from the other room made Kellan jump to his feet. The moonlight shining in through the picture window illuminated the knife in his hand. It was a big one his dad had used for hunting, but it was our only weapon. What good would it be against a horde of zombies?
A moan echoed through the house, and the hair on my arms stood up.
Kellan didn’t move, didn’t take his eyes off the doorway on the other side of the dining room table. He was still staring at it when he held out his hand.
“We need to go. Come on.”
I took his hand, but when I stood, pain throbbed through me, reminding me of all my earlier injuries. My ankle, especially, ached. I wouldn’t be able to run.
Kellan took a step, trying to pull me with him.
“I can’t. I’m too hurt to run.” I yanked my hand out of his. “Leave me.”
He tore his gaze from the doorway and focused on me, his eyes huge. “No. I won’t.”
“You’re right, Kellan. I’m dead weight. Don’t die for me.”
“Regan, no—”
A zombie stumbled into the room, arms out and grasping at air. The second he saw us, he moved faster, dragging himself around the table and heading our way.
Kellan gripped his knife and planted his feet, putting himself between the zombie and me. “Stay back.”
“Go, Kellan!” I yelled.
He ignored me, his focus on the creature.
The thing lunged when it was close enough, but Kellan was ready, his knife up. He was tall for fifteen, but not compared to a full-grown man, which was what this thing had been before the virus killed it. The knife hit low, sinking into the zombie’s neck. He and Kellan went down, struggling, the zombie attempting to sink his teeth into flesh while Kellan tried to pull the knife free. Neither was making any progress. Kellan had his forearm pressed against the zombie’s neck, holding him back, but he wouldn’t be able to hang on forever. The zombie was too big, and we were too weak from all these weeks of fighting to survive.
Kellan grunted, and I moved, limping across the room and grabbing the first thing I laid eyes on. It was a small statue of an armless, headless woman with wings. There was a stone base on the bottom, not big but hard. It was all I had. This tiny thing was all I had to fight off a dead creature desperate to sink its teeth into the only friend I had left in the world.
I screamed as I swung the statue through the air, aiming for the zombie’s head. It hit his skull, sinking in with a sickening crunch that made my stomach convulse. Blood, dark and thick and pungent, burst from the split in the zombie’s head, but the thing didn’t stop. It didn’t even seem to notice it was injured.
I swung the statue again, and again, each time making the fracture in the dead man’s head bigger. On the fourth hit, the sharp point of the base stuck, and I had to jerk it free. I stumbled back when it came out with a wet, sucking sound. I was panting, sweating, my limbs trembling, but I lifted the statue again, ready to hit him one more time.
Only I didn’t have to. He was no longer moving.
“Kellan,” I gasped, dropping to my knees at his side. “Are you okay? Answer me!”
He shifted, and the zombie rolled off him, plopping to the floor at his side. Kellan, like me, was breathing hard, and he was covered in the stinking blood of the dead man, but he looked unhurt.
“I’m okay,” he said, pushing himself up.
His gaze moved to the zombie, his eyes wide, then back to me. He didn’t say anything, and neither did I. I was in shock over what I’d just done, and he probably was as well.
We still hadn’t moved when footsteps scraped against the floor in the other room. Kellan grabbed for his knife, but before he could find it, the beam of a flashlight blinded us.
I covered my eyes and turned my head, trying to save my vision but also trying to get a good look at whoever was standing on the other side of the room. After only a second, the beam moved down, revealing a grizzled old man and a guy in his late twenties with white-blond hair.
The older man let out a low whistle. “What do we have here?”
“A couple badass kids,” the blond guy said, aiming the beam of his flashlight at the zombie. “Did you do this?”
I swallowed. “I did.”
“Well, now, that’s mighty impressive,” the older man said.
He took a step toward us, and Kellan moved, grabbing his knife and putting himself in front of me. “Stay back.”
“We’re not going to hurt you.” The older man lifted his hands. “It looks like you could use some help.”
“We’re doing okay,” Kellan said.
The man chuckled quietly. “I see that. But you could be doing better.”
“We have a place,” the younger guy said. “It’s safe. There’s food and water. Electricity.”
Kellan frowned and looked at me. I wasn’t sure if he believed him, wasn’t even sure if I did. It sounded too good to be true, but sitting there beside that dead zombie, my body aching from head to toe, I knew one thing for certain. We needed help.
“We’re not going to hurt you.” The older man took another step toward us. “I promise you that.” He crossed the room, moving slowly, and knelt when he reached us. “What’re your names?”
I swallowed. “Regan. This is Kellan.”
“Hi there, Regan. Kellan.” The man smiled, and it lit up his face. He had kind eyes. Eyes that said he was being sincere. Eyes you could trust. “This is Blake, and I’m Jasper, and we can help you if you’ll let us.”
He held his hand out, and before I could second-guess myself or even talk it over with Kellan, I slipped my hand into his.
“There,” Jasper said, helping me to my feet. “It’s going to be okay now. I promise.”
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