Dread Nation (Dread Nation #1)(26)
“No. We didn’t see a single shambler,” Katherine says, her voice loud and disappointed.
“Not for lack of trying,” I mutter, shooting her a dark look. Both she and Jackson ignore me.
Red Jack gestures toward the main house. “I walked up and around the property. There’s no one there. All of the windows are still intact, and the front door is latched. It’s like they left on an errand and never came back.”
There’s a slight tremor to his voice, barely noticeable. I don’t say anything, because I understand why he’s upset. People—especially those that are well off—are heard to move around, try their luck in a different city or settlement. The Spencers could have done just that and taken Lily with them and somehow forgot to tell anyone they were doing so. But I’ve learned that the simplest explanation is usually the right one. And that means shamblers. I don’t care how “safe” these lands are supposed to be.
Jack said that there was no evidence of a break-in, but he couldn’t have gotten a good look inside yet. The dead tend to leave a lot of evidence. Very messy evidence. If the Spencers were attacked, as unlikely as that is, we’ll know soon enough.
I sigh loudly, dreading the task at hand. I’m tired of seeing people I care about die. “Come on, I’ll check out the perimeter, then we’ll let ourselves inside to see what’s going on.”
We walk down toward the homestead on cat feet, quiet except for the sound of our breathing. Even Katherine, who tromped through the woods like she was flushing rabbits, is silent, her footsteps whisper-soft. Shamblers are attracted to sound, so if we are discreet enough, any dead in the area shouldn’t even know we’re here.
The Spencers’ house is a modest thing. It’s newer, built in the years after the dead started to walk. You can always tell by the square windows, which are large enough to allow some light but too small to let a body in. Trip wires with early-warning alarms are scattered throughout the yard, but these are clearly marked by stakes in the ground and we step over them easily. On the small porch, there are a couple of rocking chairs and hooks holding sickles, a scythe, and extra-sharp swords within close reach, in case shamblers get through the barrier fence. These sorts of modest protections and alarms have been adequate for settlements in the county these last few years.
Jackson pulls a set of slim metal pieces from his pocket—a lock-picking set. Katherine’s brows draw together in a frown, and her lips purse in displeasure. She opens her mouth to say something, but I catch her eye and shake my head. There are some things she’s better off not knowing, and the sordid details surrounding that lock-picking set is one of them.
Red Jack unlocks the door easily, and it swings open on quiet hinges. I grip my sickles, ready to swipe at anything that comes out, but nothing does. I look to Jackson and Katherine, both of whom are looking at me.
“Oh, I take it I’m going in first?”
Katherine sniffs. “You do have the highest marks in close-quarters combat.”
I swallow a laugh. She has no idea.
I roll my shoulders a couple of times, trying to loosen up the suddenly tense muscles. Then I walk into the dark.
The windows only let in a tiny bit of the moonlight, so it’s hard to see anything. I make out a table, a long cold stove, a few chairs around a nearby fireplace. But there’s no one in the room, dead or otherwise.
“There’s a lamp on the table,” Jackson says, his voice close to my ear. It takes everything I have not to jump.
“Well, light it. I can’t see a damn thing in this gloom.”
“Jane, language,” Katherine calls from somewhere behind me.
Jackson walks over to the table and lights the oil lamp. Once it’s turned up it’s easy to see that the interior of the house is completely undisturbed. There ain’t even a dirty dish in the sink. If their disappearance was the work of shamblers, they were the tidiest shamblers I’ve ever heard of.
“You sure Lily didn’t mention anything about them all heading somewhere?” I ask, even though I already know the answer to my question.
Jackson shakes his head. “Their iron pony is still in the barn, stocked full of coal. And look.” He gestures to the wall where a portrait of the family hangs—Mr. and Mrs. Spencer and their two little ones, their pale faces staring out at us. If they’d picked up and left, they most definitely would’ve taken the family photo.
Katherine drags a finger across the ledge of a china hutch. “They’ve been gone for a while. Either that or Mrs. Spencer is an inadequate housekeeper,” she says, holding up a dusty finger. “Why was your sister staying with them, anyway?”
Jackson’s jaw tightens, and I answer for him. “Lily was about to turn twelve.”
What Katherine knows—what we all know—is that the Negro and Native Reeducation Act mandates that at twelve years old all Negroes, and any Indians living in a protectorate, must enroll in a combat school “for the betterment of themselves and of society.” The argument went that we benefitted from compulsory education, as it provides a livelihood for formerly enslaved, who couldn’t find gainful employment after the war. Whites, therefore, were excluded from the law, although some went to the combat schools of their own accord, since it was good to know how to protect one’s self in these dangerous times. Still, there’s a difference between an education officer showing up with a group of armed men and carrying someone off, and their enrolling in a school on their own.