Through Glass(40)

I wasn’t sure how long I had been walking or how long it had been since I slept, but I could already tell it was longer than I had become accustomed to. Being trapped in the house, I had slept constantly, waking only to eat and speak to Cohen through the glass. My clock told me when to go to the window, my stomach when to eat and my body to sleep, but out here, I had no way of knowing if I had been awake for days or for hours. I couldn’t tell.

My eyes darted around me with each step I took, they moved to each shadow the light on my back cast in expectation of a golden claw or the flap of a wing. Even with the light strapped to my back I didn’t feel safe. I knew they were waiting for me just beyond the line of light that surrounded me. I couldn’t keep the shadows from coming alive. A shiver wound its way up my spine as my hands gripped the heavy bed rail so tightly I could feel the skin break open from the pressure. The palm of my hand pulsed and burned, but I didn’t dare let go of it. I didn’t dare loosen my hold.

It seemed like every footfall was the boom of a cannon in my ears; everything was horribly quiet, so still.

Dead.

Just like everyone else, like what the monster who stalked me wished me to be. I swallowed hard and clenched my jaw, my heart hurting as I attempted to will the fear away, as I tried not to feel the pain. I stiffened my grip against the bed rail, picking up my pace as I pushed the thought to the back of my mind.

My feet hit the ground heavily as I stumbled around the graves that littered the ground in my desperation to move away from them. My weight shifted, jostling the pack on my back and I watched in dread as the light on my back flickered and died.

“No… nononono,” I moaned as I swung the pack around, ripping off the light in desperation.

The light was the only thing keeping them at bay; the only thing keeping me safe. I shook the light as I hit the exposed batteries in my attempts to get the lights back on. My breathing picking up as I tried again and again to reignite the light.

The blaze of white light flashed one, twice, before flickering into darkness again. The darkness swallowing me whole.

The fear of death and dread rippled through me as the sound of the Ulama ricocheted through the air. Every muscle in my body tensed in expectation for what I knew was coming, what my body and mind had been trained to expect at the sound.

My breath caught in my chest as the screech of warning rent through the air. My muscles tightened and the prickle of danger surged violently up my spine.

I hit the light hard twice before throwing the useless thing to the side and clenching the rail, bringing it up like a bat; ready for something—anything—to come after me. My eyes scanned the darkness of the sky as I watched, as I waited, as I breathed.

I lifted my eyes to the dark patch of sky where the sound seemed to be reverberating from. Everything in me caught fire in fear and anger as two dark shapes formed against the dark sky, the screech increasing in my ears as they came toward me. They had waited, just outside the light, for their chance to strike and they had found it. They were coming for me

I was in control of my death, but not like this. Like this, they were in control of me. This was death.

I didn’t wait. I ran.

I held the bar tightly as I ran down the street, my breath coming in strangled puffs as my feet pounded against the pavement. The heavy beat of a drum echoed off the empty houses that surrounded me. I fought the stubborn need to fight them, the anger at what they had done still pulsing through me.

The screech of the Ulama came again. Louder this time. It called through the air, loud in warning and in anger. In death. The sound of their battle cry chilled me, reminding me how foolish fighting them would be right now.

“No.” The word hissed through my teeth as I picked up the pace, my weak legs burning and screaming at the exertion. The bones in my back and shoulders rebelled from carrying the heavy backpack and the rail.

Through that, I didn’t stop. I didn’t slow down. I increased my speed as I turned toward one of the many darkened houses that surrounded me.

The dark maw of the house, where the door once stood, swallowed me up as I ran into the pit. My feet moved as I cut through the destroyed living room, swinging through the dark kitchen before I immerged in the backyard.

I pulled the door shut behind me in an attempt to give myself some distance and kept running. My feet took me through the broken gate in their back fence and into the alley.

The cry of the Ulama cried again, the sound louder. It echoed around the alley I ran through as the creatures followed my every move. I needed to move faster. They were keeping up with me too easily. I looked back once to see the monsters chasing me down, their powerful legs pumping them faster as they overtook me.

Evasion was my only tactic now. I darted quickly into another backyard, the dead grass scattered with old toddler toys and dark rings of forgotten life. I jumped over them, not wanting to disrupt something so precious, only to launch myself over the wooden fence that surrounded the yard.

I could have held still, hid in the dog house that sat forgotten amongst the wilted flowers, but they were still too close and would find me too easily. I needed to get ahead of them. I needed to hide. I clenched the rail in my hand tightly, wishing I could turn and fight them. It seemed easier to me, but I knew how that would end.

The sound of their warning grew and my feet fled from it, taking me into the dirty white house that sat before me. The windows were broken and burned from some battle that had been lost.