The Dire King (Jackaby #4)(21)
I pointed, and Charlie gave a mute nod. He moved a step closer to the man. “Hello?” he said at last. “We see you there. Show yourself.”
That was when the thing that had once been Steven Fairmont turned around. All of the horror I should have felt upon seeing the man’s body lying dead flooded my senses at the sight of him up and moving. Terrible things had been done to Fairmont’s body. Things that I will not recount. The man’s injuries were grievous, but they did not bleed. What fluids did escape the wretched creature’s wounds were the consistency of molasses and moved with its same sticky slowness. He continued to rock ever so gently, his eyes unfocused and filmy. The quiet hum in my skull had been replaced with a mad jangling of alarm bells. For all his rhythmic motion, the man’s chest was not heaving. I watched it, fixated on it, holding the air in my own lungs until I could not contain it any longer. Fairmont was not drawing breath. The dead walked.
Chapter Eight
That dime novel, the one with the spooky cult and the unrealistic rituals on the cover, had not mentioned the living dead. It had concluded, as I recall, with a miserly old man from up the lane being unmasked and the whole affair being chalked up as a showy attempt to frighten away superstitious neighbors all along.
The thing beneath the trees was not wearing a mask. It was barely wearing its own skin.
“Mr. Fairmont?” Charlie called out, cautiously. “Can you hear me?”
The grisly face snapped up, milky white eyes fixing on Charlie’s voice. The corpse’s whole body seemed to shudder as it tensed.
“We are here to help,” Charlie said soothingly. “Can you tell us who did this to you?”
Fairmont’s sallow brow furrowed into a fierce scowl, and pale lips peeled back as the mutilated corpse bared its yellow teeth. It snarled wetly, a sound more like that of a rabid dog than of a man.
“We are not your enemies, Mr. Fairmont,” Charlie continued.
“I don’t think that’s Mr. Fairmont any longer,” I whispered.
Not–Mr. Fairmont leaned forward hungrily, its tortured muscles rippling for a moment as though straining against an invisible bond. In the next moment it was as if that bond had snapped. The corpse erupted forward. It was not running so much as it was falling, only barely catching itself with each stride. I staggered backward, clutching at my pockets to retrieve the silver dagger with which I hoped I might defend myself. Charlie positioned himself ahead of me, holding out his open palms, still trying to assuage the horrible creature. The wet, wheezing snarls only intensified as the cadaverous figure struggled up over the raised stage and back down on our side, lurching and swaying, but pressing ever toward us.
Charlie threw off his coat. “Stand down,” he yelled at the thing, but his optimism for a peaceful resolution was clearly draining fast. He pulled his suspenders off his shoulders hastily, preparing for the inevitable. “This is your last warning.” Charlie’s face darkened as the stubble along his jaw began to spread.
With the ravenous creature almost upon him, Charlie transformed. The corpse threw itself forward and a powerful hound met the thing in midair. Charlie, in his canine form, was no scrawny stray. Imposing muscles pumped beneath a coat of tawny caramel and rich chocolate brown fur. His front paws slammed into the corpse at its sternum, whipping the disfigured figure backward like a rag doll and slapping it onto the hard ground. Fairmont’s head hung at an unnatural angle on its neck.
Charlie growled low, baring his fangs.
The corpse reached a hand up to its own head and reset its neck with a sickening crack. Charlie barked, and I sincerely hoped he had no intention of actually biting that decaying carcass. The creature that had once been Fairmont balled its pallid fingers into a fist and hammered Charlie hard on his neck. Charlie was not braced for the first blow and bore the full brunt of it. The second he was prepared for, and he caught the corpse’s arm at the elbow. His fangs sank into the sickly flesh, but the wretch barely seemed to notice. With its free hand, the thing drove a ruthless blow into Charlie’s chest, spinning the hound off him and into the grass. They both staggered to their feet.
Charlie dropped something to the ground with a heavy thump. He had taken the dead man’s arm with him. He shook his shaggy head, smacking his canine lips and looking both dazed and thoroughly disgusted.
The thing’s milky eyes refocused on me. With renewed ardor, the creature lumbered at me, its one remaining arm reaching toward me. I fumbled frantically until I had the dagger free of its sheath, and then I whipped it straight at the monster’s head.
I am not a marksman, although I had found more cause of late to practice. Contrary to my customary athletic style—which is haphazard and graceless at best—my knife spun through the air directly on target, lodging itself with a satisfying thunk squarely in the creature’s jugular. I could not have replicated the shot with a hundred more attempts if I had tried. For a fleeting moment I allowed myself a modicum of pride in my own skill. The reanimated corpse of Steven Fairmont was harder to impress.
I felt the creature’s cold, dead fingers graze my neck as I threw myself out of its grasp. Had the thing still been in possession of both arms, my maneuver would have been too late. It stumbled and spun, correcting its balance after the near miss as I tumbled out of the way and back to my feet.
Charlie was at my side in an instant, growling and bracing himself for a second encounter.