Six Days With the Dead (10 page)

‘
Earth to Liz!’ Alice said, waving her hand in front of Liz’s face. ‘You were miles away… everything alright?’

‘
Erm, what?.. sorry, just thinking about something,’ Liz replied, her attention back onto the two other women in the bathroom with her.

‘
Have you finished?’ Sally said, gesturing to the shower Liz was still standing under.

‘
God, sorry Sally, yes, go ahead,’ Liz stepped out of the bath and moved over to the mirror with her towel wrapped about her. Sally poured her warm water into the tank and let the tap begin to run.

‘
Are you sure you’re ok?’ Alice asked, lowering her voice and glancing at Sally to make sure Liz could speak if she wanted to.

‘
Hmm, yeah, look if I say something, don’t get the wrong idea, it’s just a feeling,’ Liz said, bending down to pick up her clothes.

‘
Well, if that’s meant to put me at ease you’re failing terribly,’ grabbing her arm and pulling her up, ‘Come on, what’s up?’

‘
Look, it’s just a hunch…but watch yourself around Adrian when we’re gone. I don’t trust him, there’s just something about him’ she replied, holding her clothes to her chest.

Liz could see the concern written on Alice
’s face. She hadn’t intended to frighten her, not just based on a feeling, anyway.

‘
I’m probably just a bit worked up about being away from Anne for a few days, that’s all. You know, seeing problems where there aren’t any,’ she said, trying to take back what she had said.

But Liz knew that
now the seed of doubt had been planted, Alice would subconsciously be wary of Adrian anyway. After what had happened to her before, Alice didn’t take threats of unwanted attention lightly. As Liz got dressed, she could see Alice going through the various interactions she had had with Adrian, looking for any sign that he could be trouble. Alice had always found Adrian a bit of a loner, not really interacting with the rest of the group. She doubted even Bryon, who Adrian mainly worked with, would class him as a friend. No, she would definitely keep an eye on Adrian from now on. She was a different woman now, she was no longer the woman who had been dragged into the dark by those men. That woman had died the moment she had stabbed one of them in neck with his own knife, as he lay grunting on top her. She had learnt to take care of herself now and would gut Adrian where he stood rather than let him lay a hand on her, Anne or any of the other women at Lanherne.

Sally had finished her brief shower and was combing
her short hair in the mirror she had placed above the sink.

‘
I used to have such lovely hair before all this crap happened,’ she said, pulling at the knots in her short mousey blond hair. ‘Oh and look at my skin,’ running her fingers along her jaw line. ‘I used to have beautiful skin. Now, look at me. All I see is my mother’s face looking back at me.’

Liz was used to Sally acting like this and tuned her out almost from the moment she started talking.

‘Pass me your bowl Sally and I’ll take it back to the kitchen for you,’ Liz said, gesturing to her own empty bowl she held in her arms, hoping to stop Sally mid flow of her pointless rant.

Barely even looking away from herself in the mirror Sally handed Liz her bowl
.

‘
Thanks.’

As Alice lifted her bowl of wate
r up to the tank, Liz opened the bathroom door just enough for her slip through, she didn’t want anyone else getting a free view. Walking back down the corridor she could hear the conversation coming from the kitchen. Sister Rebecca had joined Sister Margaret and as usual they were bullying Charlie into taking more supplies than he needed on their trip.

‘
Sister Rebecca, we are not going to need two jars of honey. We’ll only be gone for a few days,’ Charlie was saying, removing them from the rucksack on the table.

‘
But you never know,’ she replied, ‘what if you need something to trade with? What are you going to use then? Your charm and good looks won’t get you very far Sergeant.’

‘
She’s got you there Charlie,’ Liz interrupted, entering the room ‘with that ugly mug of yours we wouldn’t be able to get so much as a cup of water’. Liz placed the two bowls on the floor by the range and picked up the jars of honey.

‘
What’s the harm in taking them anyway, and if we don’t use them then they just go back in the stores, no problem,’ Liz said, as she held the jars, one in each hand, for Charlie to put back.

Begrudgingly Charlie took the jars one at a time and grumbling under his breath replaced them in the rucksack. Liz sat down as Si
ster Margaret placed a bowl of porridge in front of her.

‘
Thank you, Sister,’ she said, starting to eat the warm breakfast ‘So is everything else prepared? When are we off?’

‘
Well, Lars is getting the horse ready, thanks to the Sisters we’ve now got our supplies,’ he replied, patting the rucksack, ‘and Barry is loading some extra weapons onto the cart. So when you’re ready, we’ll go get Imran, have a chat about where we’re going and head off in about an hour I think’ Liz nodded her acknowledgment, her mouth full of porridge.

By the time Liz had finished her porridge, Alice and Sally were coming back from the bathroom, damp towels flung over their shoulders.

‘Here, you forgot this,’ Alice said, handing Liz her wet towel, as she sat down next to Charlie.

‘
Oh, thanks.’

As she folded her towel she noticed that Charlie
’s whole body seemed to relax, it’s natural readiness and tension ebbing away as he made idle chitchat with Alice. Something in his face also softened. It was then that she noticed Alice had her hand gently placed on his thigh.

‘Good,’ Liz thought, ‘about time.’

They must have finally given in to their obvious attraction last night when he went to tell her they were leaving today. As Liz smiled to herself, Anne and Ju
stin bundled their way into the kitchen.

‘
Uncle Barry says the cart’s ready, Charlie,’ Justin said, jostling with Anne to get his bowl of porridge first.

‘
Thanks,’ he replied, as he threw the rucksack over his shoulder, ‘Right Liz, let’s get that man of yours and get this party started.’

N
odding Liz got up and after washing her bowl, thanked the Sisters for her breakfast.

‘
I’ll see you before we go,’ she said to Anne, ‘but get on with your jobs as soon as you’ve eaten, Ok.

Anne, already tucking into her p
orridge mumbled something between mouthfuls. Although she didn’t like her sister going outside the walls, Anne knew Liz could take care of herself and would kill all the Dead in England to get back to her. If Liz said she would be back, Anne knew she would be back. Despite these reassurances she told herself, there was still that niggling doubt at the back of her mind. She had seen bigger, stronger and better equipped people, even soldiers, go out amongst the Dead and never come back. Each time Liz left the Convent, Anne would go to the Chapel and say a little prayer. She didn’t know if she really believed, but the statue of the lady with the chubby baby in her arms had a kind face, and she thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask the lady to look after her sister for her.

Liz and Charlie left the kitchen and made their way back up the worn stone stairs to the sleeping cells to get Imran.

‘So why didn’t you really want to take the honey? Surely they don’t weigh that much?’ Liz asked.

‘
If you were a raider and you found those two jars of honey on us, wouldn’t you think you must be near a pretty prosperous settlement? We don’t want to advertise how well we’ve got it here Liz, and those two jars speak volumes. It’s different with the other Outposters and settlements because in their own way they’re each trying to improve life. Raiders don’t farm Liz, they don’t harvest or plan ahead. All they want is to satisfy their immediate desires and that means usually someone gets killed along the way.’

‘
Oh, I suppose you’re right,’ she said, feeling a little stupid for not thinking of that.

They reached the cell Imran shared with his brother
, Mohammed, to find them each sitting on their beds. They both looked up as Charlie knocked on the door with his knife hand. Two identical smiles beamed forth from two mirror image warriors, but Liz knew which was Imran’s instantly. At his feet sat two quivers almost chock full of arrows. Liz was really hoping they wouldn’t have the need for so many. It took Imran a while to make his arrows, so he didn’t waste them. Luckily with his perfect aim, that didn’t happen very often.

‘
Right,’ said Charlie, dropping the rucksack next to Imran, ‘well I can see you’re more or less ready for the off.’

Imran gave his bow strin
g a twang. ‘Yep.’

Charlie pulled out a folded map from one of the rucksacks many pockets and handed it to Imran to un-fold and spread out on the bed. As agile as Charlie was with only having one hand, some things were just easier to give to someone else t
o do, unfolding was one of those things. Charlie crouched down examining the unfolded map. Some areas on the map had been marked in red and some in blue. The red indicated high concentration of the Dead, while the blue showed areas where the Outposters or settlements were located. Many of the Dead had already been cleared from these areas, so were relatively safe. Places like Newquay, once a large busy town were totally shaded red. You didn’t want to go anywhere near there unless you could help it. The sheer number of the Dead, even though they were all slow walkers, would over power anyone unlucky enough to enter.

‘
Well, we’ll go to the village first and check out Crazy Jackson, then go on to here, here and here,’ Charlie said, indicating a winding route through the Cornish countryside, stopping off at various blue dots along the way, ‘then that should take us to the O’Brien place,’ pointing to a small blue shaded area on the map near the coast.

The O
’Brien place was only 30 miles as the crow flies but between the Convent and the O’Brien outpost a dozen small black X’s had been marked on the map. The X’s indicated were a route had become impassable. Without man’s upkeep, rivers flooded their banks, bridges and buildings collapsed, cutting off road access and nature generally claimed back what was hers. With each trip out the map was updated, for each new obstacle a new X would be added.

‘
We’ll collect Emma and her husband, and then take this route back,’ Charlie moved his finger along the map skirting any red areas ‘and hopefully she won’t give birth while we’re on the road.’

‘
Looks simple enough, as long as we don’t run into any trouble,’ Imran said, mentally following the route from blue area to blue area, ‘and Nadine says Mrs O’Brien has a good few weeks to go yet, so that shouldn’t be a problem. That just leaves Raiders or the Dead to screw things up.’

Folding up the map he handed it back to Charlie
, to stow back in the rucksack.

‘
Look you two, I want to get things clear. If we come across any raiders you do what I say, when I say it, no questions. If there’s trouble we need to take them out as quickly as possible. They cannot know about this place. Got it?’ Imran and Liz both nodded their understanding of how it would go. Liz didn’t relish killing a living person but if it meant keeping those she loved safe she would do what was necessary.

‘
Right let’s get this party started,’ Charlie said, as he slung the rucksack back over his shoulder.

‘
I have to go on watch soon,’ Mohammed said, as he stood up. ‘Take care, my brother,’ and he pulled Imran in a heartfelt hug.

Macho bravado wasn
’t part of this new world anymore. If someone you loved could walk out of the door and never come back, you let them know you cared about them.

‘
Don’t let him do anything stupid, Liz.’

‘
Can’t promise anything with this one,’ she replied, a sad smile on her face ‘and you’ll keep an eye out for Anne and Alice while we’re gone?’

S
he didn’t want to say anything about Adrian being a potential problem. Mohammed might take it too far and there was no point making trouble based on just a feeling.

‘
Of course,’ he said, pulling Liz into an equally heart warming embrace, ‘and you take care too, little sister.’

Picking up his own bow and quiver of arrows, Mohammed went to leave the room. As h
e passed Charlie he gave a quick salute, which Charlie returned with a nod and a wink. He knew the convent would be safe in Mohammed’s hands while they were gone. Charlie was proud of what both of the brothers had become. They had grown from angry, unruly boys into well trained, fine young men he would be happy to have watch his back.

As Liz watched Mohammed leave
, she hoped more unattached women would soon find their way to Lanherne. He deserved to find someone and feel the happiness she herself had discovered in Imran’s embrace. But it seemed wherever they went the men greatly out numbered the woman. In a few of the rougher settlements, Charlie had found there were no women at all. Of course to Liz these were nothing more than living men waiting to die, one by one behind their protective walls. These men seeking nothing beyond their own immediate safety, had nothing really to build a life for. A community that had no hope in the future could not grow and was ultimately fated to die.