Zombies Sold Separately

TWENTY-ONE



Both Witches screamed as Zombies poured into the coffee shop.

Colin and I surged to our feet so fast we knocked our table over. It hit the floor with a crash. Our mugs slammed to the floor. Ceramic shattered. Hot chocolate sprayed in an arc, reaching the legs of the beings coming toward us.

My heart thudded. The keystone burned hot through the pouch of my belt and I felt its heat against my hip.

Colin was suddenly holding a sword. I didn’t know where it came from. I had a second to be relieved that a garbage-truck-sized Dragon wasn’t filling the place. Would have made it difficult to maneuver well enough to fight.

“I think the first two are Sentients,” I said over the moans and groans of the Zombies. There was something different about the smell of the Sentients. Not as bad as the dirty dishwater smell of the Zombies, but not human, either. “I’ll take them down first. For now the Zombies are yours.”

“I’ve got them.” Colin dodged the two Sentients as I rushed them.

The move confused both of the Sentients for a moment and I used that to my advantage. Since I couldn’t kill them, I’d have to find other ways to take care of them.

I felt the dangerous white flash in my eyes right before I slammed my fist into the male’s nose and used a knife hand strike against the female’s neck at the same time. I used only enough force to stop, not kill.

It wasn’t enough.

The female didn’t go down and the male leapt for me. I had a fraction of a second to remember the Magi’s warning.

“Do not let a stone-bearing Sentient touch you with his hands,” she had said as she left. “Lock … away.”

I didn’t know what that last part meant, and I didn’t know if these Sentients carried stones, but I didn’t want to find out right now.

As the male grabbed at me, I ducked between the pair, hitting my knees. I flung my arms out, striking them behind their knees and caused them both to drop to the floor.

The female shouted and the male cursed. They each rolled away with surprising speed.

As they moved out of the way, three Zombies lunged for me.

I somersaulted backward and was on my feet with the corner behind me. Trapped if I didn’t get out of here.

Over their shoulders I saw Colin using his sword and his strength to battle Zombies.

More Zombies were behind the three in front of me and that didn’t count the Sentients who were now to the sides.

I drew both Dragon-claw daggers and charged the three Zombies. The one on my left went down as my dagger made a clean slice across his neck and beheaded him.

The middle Zombie stumbled back when I rammed my right dagger into her chest where her heart should be—but when I yanked back, blood didn’t cover the dagger.

As I kicked his jaw at just the right angle, the third Zombie’s neck snapped, its head twisted at a freakish angle.

The headless Zombie was down, but the one I’d impaled came right back at me again. I heard a crack and a snap and my stomach clenched as the third Zombie’s eyes popped open and I saw it had wrenched its broken neck back into place.

And the two Sentients were coming for me, too.

Adrenaline pumped through me and blood rushed in my ears. I had to get out of the corner. I was almost pinned with no place to move to.

Then I saw a stone. A Sentient was holding it. The female.

My heart thudded. I didn’t know what it meant for a Sentient to have a stone, but I sure remembered the Magi’s warning.

Two remaining Zombies and the two Sentients closed in on me. The female holding the stone said something that sounded like it was spoken in French, but it wasn’t French. The other three backed off a little as she came toward me.

I dove to the side, close to the wall, propelling myself beyond the four of them. I slid along the floor, skidding on my shoulder with enough force that I slammed into two more Zombies beyond them.

The Zombies I hit toppled onto their backsides. I leapt to my feet and grabbed my oval double-sided buckler from my weapons belt and flung it at the two Zombies that had attacked me. It beheaded them both. The bodies collapsed to the café floor as the buckler returned to my hand.

More words in the French-sounding language and the Sentients were charging me again. The two Zombies that I’d knocked down when I slid across the floor were now on their feet.

Back to four against one.

I went after the Sentients.

Avoiding the female’s hand, I balanced on one leg while I kicked her head then her arm. She cried out as she fell and the stone spun across the room. It hit the far wall with a clunk.

The male Sentient went after the stone.

The two Zombies came after me.

In the background I heard Colin’s shouts and the sounds of other Zombies, their cries, moans, and groans.

I turned away from the male and faced the Zombies. Like the others, these two were in various stages of decomposition. The Sentients, on the other hand, looked whole and healthy.

I drew my second Dragon-claw dagger and beheaded one Zombie while lopping off the arm of the other that was reaching for me.

The male Sentient rushed toward me with the stone. The female was right behind him.

With one stroke I finished off the armless Zombie, ridding it of its head.

I faced the Sentients. They were almost on me.

A roar shook the café and my gaze cut to the side just enough to see that a Dragon the size of a horse now stood where Colin had been.

Fire blasted from its snout at the remaining Zombies in the room. Moans and cries filled the area as they were roasted.

The Sentients ran through the front entrance.

I bolted after them.

Zombie bodies littered the café. I leapt over them as I went after the Sentients. They were faster than I’d have given them credit for.

I caught up to the male and lunged for his legs. I wrapped my arms around them and brought him down.

His face hit the concrete. The stone flew out of his hand and into the street. A Toyota zipped over it, barely missing hitting the stone with its tires.

From out of nowhere, a woman I hadn’t seen before cried out and dove for the stone—right into the path of an oncoming truck.

Brakes squealed as the truck slammed into the woman.

She lay still in front of its bumper as it came to a hard stop.

The male and female Sentients fled. For one second I debated about whether to go after them or grabbing the stone. I went for the stone.

Sirens in the distance. Sounds of people talking. Sights of some looking at the apparently dead woman. Others looking at me.

We were going to have to call the PTF and a Soothsayer in a hurry.

I wrapped myself in an air glamour and vanished from human sight.

More gasps and cries echoed in the street.

“Did you see that?” came one voice. “A purple woman?” said another. “She just disappeared,” and “I got her on camera with my cell phone.”

Great.

The woman continued to lie still in front of the truck as the driver came out and started patting her shoulder and asking her what her name was.

Was she alive? My senses told me she wasn’t a Sentient, she was human. Yet she’d gone for the stone.

Right now the stone was mine. Just in time I remembered not to touch it with my fingers.

I’d tucked the second handkerchief into the weapons belt in the pouch next to the first stone. I pulled it out, tossed it over the stone lying in the street. I grabbed it up and ducked out of the way before I was almost hit by a car that came to a screeching halt behind the truck that hit the woman.

When I glanced at her body, my stomach churned. Something was very wrong about the woman and however she was involved with the Zombies and Sentients.

“She’s alive,” I heard the truck driver say. “Breathing but unconscious.”

Relief that she hadn’t died made my blood move again. I went to where she was lying face down on the asphalt. I looked over the shoulder of the man who’d hit her and two other men who’d gathered close. I couldn’t see the woman’s face, but noticed that she had short dark hair and a crescent-shaped wound behind her left ear.

Still in glamour, I turned and rushed into the café. The floor was covered in Zombie bodies. The Witches were nowhere in sight.

Colin stood in the center of the café, the horse-sized Dragon gone. Gold sparkles still glittered around him. He must have shifted back moments ago. His jacket was lying on the ground, shredded, and his T-shirt was torn.

He gripped his sword in one hand. In the other hand he held a cell phone and was talking on it. The scaled serpent tattoo winding up his arm seemed to glimmer.

Sirens in the distance. Obviously able to see through my glamour, Colin gave me a quick nod as he was explaining the situation and requesting cleanup.

After he snapped his cell shut and stuffed it in his pocket he looked at me. “Well, the chill is gone. Ready for that beer?”

“In the worst way.” A sigh rushed out of me in a whoosh. “I could use a six-pack right now.”

Colin lightly kicked one of the headless bodies. “I’m willing to bet that these will be just like the others. No ID, nothing telling us what or who these things are.”

“Or were.” I put my hands on my hips as I around us. “Are the Witches okay?”

“I think so.” Colin pointed toward the doorway behind the counter. “I saw them run through there as soon as the Zombies rushed in, and someone called the PTF before I did.”

I recognized the sirens as they drew near. Not NYPD but PTF. “They must have called the agency while we were fighting off the bad guys.”

“Good girls.” Colin gave a nod of approval. “That will save some headache.”

We found the Witches and calmed them down as we consulted with the PTF.

The second stone weighed heavy at my hip as I went outside. I waved to Karen Tanner, who’d been called in as Soothsayer for this incident. The Soothsayers had been kept busy lately with all of the Zombie attacks.

I walked to the ambulance, where the PTF emergency techs were bent over a gurney. The unconscious woman was strapped down on the gurney, and Sara, a Healer, stood to the side of the ambulance.

“Hey, Sara,” I said to the Healer as I went to the woman who’d been hit by the truck.

Sara shoved her gloved hands into her pockets. The Healer was shivering and her teeth chattered as she said, “Hi there, Nyx.”

I wanted to take a look at the human now that she was on her back and I could see her features. One side of her face was scraped from skidding on the asphalt.

The woman looked Hispanic, about thirty, and a couple of inches shorter than me. She had long lashes that were black crescents beneath her closed eyes. She had a naturally olive complexion yet her face was pale.

That strong sense that she was Other came to me along with the sense that she was human. Not like me, half human and half Other, but something was different. Impossible, of course. But what was she?

“Is the woman going to be all right?” I asked Sara as the techs put the gurney into the ambulance.

“She has multiple lacerations and a few broken bones.” Sara watched the ambulance doors shut behind the woman. “She’s in a coma.”

“A coma?” I rubbed my arms. “Do you think she’ll come out of it soon?”

Sara shook her head. “I saw into her mind and it is still. Very still.”

My skin prickled even as I rubbed my arms. “Is she human?”

The Healer frowned, looking perplexed. A little confused. “She’s human, but I sensed something different about her when I reached into her mind. Yet she’s definitely human.”

I frowned, too, but I didn’t mention I’d had the same feeling.

After talking with the Healer, I spoke to one of the PTF agents who said they’d found a wallet on her. According to her New York driver’s license, her name was Candace Moreno. Her wallet held pictures and she had a laminated badge with the name of a stock brokerage company on it.

Stock brokerage and not really human. Very weird.

When Colin and I had talked through things until we had exhausted every angle we could think of, we were ready to get out of there.

The only thing I hadn’t told him about was the stone, and this wasn’t the place to do it.