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Bloom, John Brown, and quite a few of Moll Grimes’s personal guards met us several blocks away from Mini City at the first place where Shep, Erik, and I could exit the sewers. They carried the unresponsive body of Moll Grimes on an impromptu litter made of scrap plywood.
The light from several lanterns exposed the extent of her wounds. A rotting monster had bitten a chunk of flesh from her neck, and a large gash rent both the fabric of her dress and the skin beneath, exposing the tendons in her shoulder. She might’ve had more wounds, but I didn’t need to see them to guess how she was feeling. Her countenance was haggard, and the hairs that had come loose from the pompadour fell lank across her forehead. She looked nothing like the queen of this fetid city but rather like and old, stained, and worn-out silk slipper.
She was quiet, as if sleeping, but it was likely she had passed out from extensive pain and blood loss. I doubted she’d survive long enough for us to deliver her to Dwivedi. If she woke up howling for fresh flesh, I vowed to myself that I’d be the first to put a bullet in her.
“How’d it happen?” Shep asked one of the soldiers supporting Moll’s litter.
The soldier gave Shep a bleak look, eyes wide, pupils huge. “They came out of nowhere. One minute, they were under control, dropping like flies. Then, all of a sudden...” He stopped and swallowed. He coughed, clearing his throat. The memory clearly unsettled him. “All of a sudden, they were there, falling on us. More than we could fight off.”
Our small troupe was hurrying through the city, moving as swiftly as a group could travel while toting an incapacitated body and staying on guard against further meetings with the undead. I couldn’t see how another encounter could happen, though, because every living dead thing in the city had showed up at Moll Grimes’s front door. There couldn’t possibly be any more left. If only that were true. There are always more.
“Who threw the shock bombs?” Shep asked.
“That was us,” said another soldier at Moll’s legs. “I was with another unit. We came out of headquarters, chasing a group of Rotters out of Mini City, when we ran up on Moll and her folks.”
“How’d this all happen anyway?” asked the first soldier, the one at Moll’s shoulders. He gave Shep a curious glance. “We were down at the river at the generator site, and a couple of guys from the guard unit on duty at the perimeter of Mini City came flying up to the party, yelling about a security breach. We were on our way back with Ms. Grimes when we ran into you.”
Shep shrugged. “It’s a long story. Let’s save our breath for the hike.” When the soldier bobbed his head and turned his attention forward again, Shep leaned close and muttered in my ear, “I’m going to slip away and run ahead. Gonna give Dwivedi time to prepare for our arrival.”
Nodding, I glanced at our companions, who could be as big a threat to us as the undead if they decided we might be the enemy. “Be careful.”
John Brown had kept quiet throughout the trip, bringing up the rear and rarely taking his worried eyes from the wrecked figure of his esteemed leader. Erik and I walked together, separate from the main group but careful to keep them in sight.
“Will we ever have a moment of peace together?” He sighed sadly and gestured to our surrounding troupe and to our situation in general, I suspected. “Or will it always be like this?”
I shrugged. “I’m sure that soon enough, we’ll be so bored with each other, we’ll be begging for another adventure.”
“No.” He snorted. “I don’t think you’ll ever hear me wishing for a time like this again.”
I poked his ribs, teasing, but he caught my hand before I could pull away and tugged me off-balance. I stumbled against him, and he threw an arm around my shoulder, holding me close as we marched on. “I don’t want there to ever be another time when you and I are apart.”
“I don’t want to be away from you again either.” His presence allowed me to breathe, big lung-sucking breaths, for the first time in weeks. Being with Bloom had never done that for me. Even in this strange moment, walking behind a dying Moll Grimes, I had absolute confidence that everything was going to be all right simply because I was with him.
Erik squeezed my shoulder. “I’m glad we finally found something we can agree on.”
I could think of other things we could agree on, and they started with us being alone together, but I didn’t have the guts to say such a thing out loud. He must have sensed my feelings, though. His mouth twitched, and he pulled me away from the group, taking us deeper into the shadows where passing lantern lights couldn’t reach. Throwing caution aside, he backed me against the brick wall of a nearby building, pressing his weight against me. My fingers, my lips, even my ears started to tingle. My eyelids drooped, and my thoughts swirled similar to the way they had the night I drank too much Indian wine. Inhaling, I savored his sandalwood scent.
His low voice was almost a growl in my ear. “I swear to you that very soon, it’s going to be just you and me. No more distractions or interruptions.” He dropped his lips to mine for a soft, sweet moment. “No more undead. No Bloom, no Shep, no Moll Grimes or John Brown.”
He pushed harder against me, his hands sliding over my hips and waist then roaming higher up to my throat. He pressed his mouth over the pulse in my neck, and a little whimper escaped me. Thoughts of immediate risk and danger slipped from my mind.
“Just you and me.”
I couldn’t think that far ahead because his hands and kisses turned me soft and warm like a ripe plum, and I was perfectly content to stay right there in that moment for the rest of my life. It was not to be, though. Not in this world. The ability to savor things, to take safety absolutely for granted, had died in the Dead Wars.
Before our group got too far ahead, Erik pulled away and hurried us into place behind Moll Grimes’s funeral procession. At least, that was what it resembled. As we walked, Moll had expressed the occasional groan or grunt of pain, but nothing coherent. Now that we were nearing Dwivedi’s college, I wondered if we’d come all this way in vain. Even if Moll had taken the immunity serum, and even if it had remained effective when she was attacked, her wound was severe and her blood loss massive. Dwivedi was clever and resourceful, but he wasn’t a god, and I suspected Moll would need a miracle to survive.