Dread Nation (Dread Nation #1)(101)

I glance at Katherine and grin. “Sometimes a problem solves itself.”

People go running past, men and women, and I grab Katherine by the arm and drag her off the boardwalk in the direction of the church as the men start to scatter. A few have the presence of mind to run into the sheriff’s office to hide, but I ain’t got time to pay them any mind now.

“Jane—”

“We’ve got to get to the other side of town and fetch Lily and the Spencers. Mrs. Spencer and her boy won’t be any good at fighting the dead, and Lily is just a little girl.”

Katherine purses her lips and nods. “Lead the way.”

It is utter chaos. Men and women run here and there, seemingly aimless, while shamblers walk the street leisurely, grasping for whoever gets close. Most of these shamblers are old and barely holding together: men in wool uniforms missing limbs, women in full dresses that are decades out of fashion, Negroes wearing the wretched uniforms of the old plantations, boys and girls who drag themselves along, tiny nightmares in their own right. Here and there is someone unexpected, a man dressed in the heavy garb of a fur trapper, an Indian woman with long dark hair wearing the rough homespun of white settlers, men wearing uniforms I don’t recognize, the red and dark blue very different from the Union and Confederate uniforms that most shamblers wear.

And there are so many of them. A tidal wave of the dead breaking over the town. I’m frozen for a few precious moments, taking in this horrible scene, watching the inexorable march of the shamblers, when a strong grip on my arm jolts me out of my shock.

“Let’s move!” Katherine demands, as bossy as ever.

“Jane, which way?” The Duchess and a couple of her girls run up to me. I’m happy to see one of them is Nessie, the colored girl who braided my hair and brought me water the day I was whipped. I don’t recognize the other girl, a white girl with brown hair and freckles who gives me a shy smile. “Everything is chaos.”

Just like that, the uncertainty disappears and I know what we have to do. “Follow me. We can cut through town using Gideon’s tunnel.”

We hurry through the street toward the lab. But when we get there the door is locked.

“Gideon never locks his door,” the Duchess says, worry making her bruised face look even more tragic.

“These are extraordinary times.” A tendril of worry tries to rise up, but I smash it flat. I glance toward the street. The shamblers are getting more numerous, flooding into town. Pretty soon they’ll be too thick to maneuver and that’s when the real trouble starts. “I think we’re going to have to run to the other side of town.”

And so we do.

All of the Duchess’s ladies are wearing corsets, and our passage is slower than I’d like. I herd them before me like a dog nipping at the heels of livestock. People rush past us, fleeing the dead, and we’re about halfway to the better side of town when I realize there ain’t no way we’re going to make it. The dead are slow, but so are ladies who can’t breathe.

I grab the Duchess and pull her to the side. “What’s the problem, Jane?” she pants.

“We need to cut those lacings. If we don’t, we’re never to going to make it to the other side of town. We’re moving too slow. Eventually people will get bit and turn, and they’re going to move faster than those raggedy old shamblers. The fresh ones always do.”

“I am not cutting this corset,” Katherine announces. Only Katherine would have a tantrum in the midst of fleeing for her life. I give her a hard look and she rolls her eyes and stomps her foot. “Fine.”

I pull a knife from my boot, unfasten the back of her dress, cut the top few lacings, and fasten her back up. I do this with the Duchess and her girls, then tuck my knife away.

“All right, ladies,” I say. “Pick up those skirts and run.”

We make better time, and when we get to the rows of houses there’s no sign of the dead yet. It’s just the better families, packing up to leave. People are running between the houses, grabbing what they can, piling it in wagons. No one is even going to try to save the town. They’re just running for their lives.

Bitterness twists my lips and a hard feeling settles over me. These folks were more than happy to send us out there, day after day, but when it’s their turn to fight they ain’t got the stomach for it.

I lead us to Lily’s house, one of the few without the front door open. I pound on the wood. “Lily, it’s me! Open up.”

There’s a scraping on the other side of the door, and then “How do I know you ain’t a shambler?”

“Shamblers don’t talk. Stop being a muttonhead and let me in.”

The door opens and Lily flies into my arms. I hug her tightly more out of surprise than anything else. “Someone came through, yelling about the town been overrun. I didn’t know what to do.”

“Get Mrs. Spencer and the little ones, we need to get out of here,” I say, pushing past Lily into the house.

“Mrs. Spencer is gone. She left yesterday afternoon and never came back. It’s just me and Thomas.” A toddler plays on the floor with a wooden horse, and he beams at me.

I think about Mr. Spencer’s body, missing its head. Was Mrs. Spencer out there as well? I didn’t see her, but I also didn’t peep at every decapitated shambler.