After The Apocalypse (Book 2): Church of Chaos (3 page)

“You don't know?”

“I don't know. After the way Drake betrayed me, how can I trust anyone?”

“I'm
not
Drake.” Seth was angry now. I didn't blame him for it, but I couldn't change my feelings just to spare his.

“I know but-.” I shuddered and hugged myself.

“No buts. I'm not Drake. I'm nothing like Drake. I don't know how long it's going to take me to gain your trust, but I will.” Seth reached for my chin but I pulled away from him. He hissed with annoyance. “You will trust me, Pilar.”

I sat silently for a minute and then sighed. “I can't let myself trust anyone until I get my mom and dad back.”

Seth shook his head and stood up. He grabbed his sword up off the floor. I hadn't even noticed that the heavy weapon was there. He must have brought it into the room with him when he'd heard me screaming in my sleep. “Good night, Pilar.”

I watched him walk almost all the way to the door. “Wait. You're leaving?”

Seth half-way turned back towards me. “I came in here because I thought you were hurt. You're not hurt and I'm glad you had the nightmare. If you're dreaming about controlling zombies then it tells me that, despite the fact that you're terrified of me, we're probably moving in the right direction.”

“What direction is that?” I suddenly felt very abandoned and very alone. It stunned me to realize that I didn't want him to walk away angry.

He snorted back a choked laugh as he grabbed my bedroom door and opened it. “One you aren't ready to hear about until you trust me.”

He stepped out through the door. His hand was still on the knob as he began easing it closed.

“I'm sorry.”

Seth pushed the door back open and stepped back into the room. “You're sorry?”

I nodded and blinked back unexpected tears. “I'm scared, Seth. I trusted the Powers That Be and they kidnapped my parents and sold them for meat. I trusted Drake and he tried to kill me. Now you're here and I just don't know how I feel. I want to trust you, but I can't force myself to. I'm sorry.”

He sighed. “And yet when I ask you to give me time, you get mad at me?”

When he put it like that, he had a point. “I need to trust you before you explain the prophecies to me?”

“Have you ever considered that maybe I need be able to trust you?” Seth turned on his heel and walked out of the room without giving me a chance to answer.

Chapter 3

“I hope you understand the depths of the hell you're unleashing.”

I was sitting on my knees on the cold stone floor of the chapel, staring up the heavy iron cross that crowned the altar. The cross was easily ten feet tall and it looked like it had been in the Church for a hundred years if it had been here a day. The metal appeared to have been hammered into shape. The texture of the surface was rough and pitted as I ran my fingertips across it. I hadn't been able to fall back asleep after Seth had left my room. I'd come down into the main chapel of the Church hoping to find some type of solace in what remained of my faith in my parents religion.

My mother was a woman of God and she'd read the Bible to me every night when I was a child. She'd spoken often of God, Jesus and the saving grace of the Holy Spirit. I'd never been able to relate, but I'd also never dreamed that I would one day have personal relations with one the false idols that the good book spent so much time ruminating on. If there was ever a time for me to find a relationship with God, this did seem to be it.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” I said. In a matter of hours, Seth and I would ride for Ra-Shet in a last-ditch effort to save the lives of my parents before they were eaten by cannibalistic upper class of the city. Vera thought my parents were probably already steaks and that we were wasting our time. She hadn't been shy about saying so to my face.

Vera walked down the aisle of the church and sat down on the pew to my left. Her long, sleek hair hung down her back like a curtain of black silk. Her dress was a short black sheath that would have looked like a garbage bag on me. Her knee-high boots were made of shiny black plastic and featured pointy, open toes and ridiculously high stiletto heels. Clearly she wasn't dressing for function tonight. I wondered which one of the Church's handful of inner-circle members she had dressed to impress.

“Are you familiar with the battle of Troy?” Vera held up a battered paperback book in her right hand.

“I'm sorry?”

“Helen of Troy had a face so beautiful that it launched a 10 year war and a thousand ships.” She tossed the book down in front of my knees. It landed on the stone floor with a thump.

“I've read the Iliad.” I had no idea where she was going with this. I made no move to pick the book up.

“Then you should know that nothing but death is going to come from the war you're about to launch with that pretty face of yours.” Vera cocked her head and shrugged her narrow shoulders.

“I'm not launching a war,” I said. “I'm just trying to save the lives of the two people who matter most to me in this world.”

“If you don't think you're launching a war, then you obviously don't know my brother very well.” Vera sneered through lips that she'd painted cherry red. Her light blue eyes were bright in the darkness. “He's got a taste for blood and you've given him an excuse to storm the city.”

“My parents don't deserve to die.” I stood up because I didn't like having to stare up into her condescending sneer. Unfortunately for me, standing up did little good. She was still several inches taller than I was, thanks to the boots. “They didn't ask to be snatched from our apartment and served up on a plate to the highest bidder.”

“I never said they deserved their fate,” Vera replied. “I'm just asking if you're prepared to take responsibility for the hell you're about to unleash on thousands of innocent people.”

“I'm not unleashing hell on anybody,” I told her. “Except maybe the flesh broker who is holding my parents.”

Vera laughed in my face. “You have no idea what you've done or how many people are going to die because of you.”

“Seth thinks rescuing my parents is a suicide mission,” I said firmly. “If anyone is going to die, it's probably going to be me.”

“If you think my brother is going to let you die, then you really are much stupider than I thought.” Vera brushed her fingers back through her long hair and clucked her tongue at me. “Seth's been looking for an excuse to ravage the city ever since the day we were forced to flee from its gates. Fate and luck have given him the power to level Ra-Shet into dust and rubble. All he was missing was an excuse to do it. Until you came along, that is.”

“If Seth had wanted to destroy Ra-Shet, he didn't have to wait on me to give him a reason to do it. He's told me that human beings have been sold at meat markets within the city walls since before we were born.”

Vera shrugged. “Maybe you're right. But if Seth really cared about all those innocent lives being lost, it might behoove you to wonder why he hasn't done something to stop the murder before now?”

“I can't afford to worry about Seth's motives,” I said. “Not when my parent's lives hang in the balance. Seth is going to do whatever he damn well wants to do. I can't control him and neither can you. Don't try to pretend like you think I'm responsible for anything your brother does.”

Vera hissed at me through gritted teeth. “You're right. I can't control him. If I could, you wouldn't be here right now and Seth would be in the library preparing to give his Thursday sermon to our loyal followers. Instead he's down in the basement, checking weapons.”

“Your followers are a bunch of raving whack jobs,” I pointed out. “I don't blame Seth for not wanting to deal with them. He's not a god.”

“It's irrelevant whether or not Seth is really a god. It only matters that everyone outside the Church of Chaos believes he is.”

“What?” I blinked at Vera in total confusion.

“You're so ignorant, Pilar.” Vera fluffed her hair again. “I don't even know why I waste my time trying to talk to you. You don't understand anything about my brother or the Church of Chaos. You most assuredly know jack shit about life in Ra-Shet. You didn't understand your own life within the confines of the Cube until your ignorance nearly got you killed. You understand exactly nothing about anything. Yet you're perfectly willing to walk into someone's life and demand that everything be changed to suit your moods.”

“Actually, I don't really care about anyone's life other than mine. I just want my life back.” I spun on my heel and walked out of the chapel before she could see me cry.

Chapter 4

“Motorcycles?” I frowned at the pair of vehicles that Seth had so lovingly serviced and prepared for our trip to the city. Each one was dark, shiny and clean. Both had weapons and supplies strapped onto their metal frames.

“Dirt bikes, technically.” Seth grinned at me and patted the handlebars of one of the bikes.

“I don't know how to drive,” I said.

“You'll learn.” Seth looked entirely too pleased with himself as he straddled the larger of the bikes. His long legs were covered with black leather pants and lace up boots. “Unless you'd rather ride with me.”

“Don't you have a car or something?” I demanded. “A vehicle with four wheels and multiple seats?”

“Have you seen any roads coming up to the church?”

“No.” I hadn't really thought about it, but no.

“Have you seen any cars?”

“No. Dammit.” I scowled the bike. “What if I break my neck?”

He laughed. “After everything you've been through since you left the Cube, do you really think you're going to die because you laid over a dirt bike?”

“It would be kind of anticlimactic, wouldn't it?” I glanced unhappily down at the motorcycle.

“Extremely.” Seth lovingly stroked the handlebars of his bike. “In all seriousness, you need to learn how to ride a motorbike.”

“Why?” I prodded at the bag that Seth had fastened to the back of the smaller bike. I had no idea what kind of supplies we'd need to rescue my parents but I figured Seth probably had it covered.

“We're going into the city to rescue your parents from a flesh broker with a really nasty reputation for selling anyone who stands against him as meat for human consumption.” Seth rubbed his hands together as he raised one eyebrow at me. “How are you planning on getting out of the city if Bud Moon kills me?”

“What?” I stared at him in horror. “You told me that your plan is to get in, get my parents and head back to the Church before the sun sets.”

“Not everything always goes to plan, Pilar. You should know that better than anyone.” Seth twisted the ignition on his bike, making the engine jump to life. The whine of the engine droned out all conversation as the bike's exhaust expelled a cloud of blue smoke. “You really want to be stranded if I die?”

I choked on the smoke. “You aren't going to die.”

“Never say never,” Seth eased the engine down to a slow idle. “Not all gods are infallible.”

“You aren't a god,” I reminded him tiredly. “And even if you were, wouldn't dying kind of render all your precious prophecies useless?”

“I don't ever recall saying they were useful,” Seth clarified. “Besides, you can't ever take a prophecy as proof that you're going to survive the rest of the day. Trust me, prophecies don't mean shit when it comes to predicting who lives and who dies.”

“But, if you're supposed to live-.”

“Death changes the prophecies,” Seth cut me short. “Believe me. I never wanted to be the high priest. My brother Jeremiah was supposed to be the one who lead the church. The prophecies didn't show me as the high priest until after Jeremiah died.”

“Oh.” I shuddered slightly. “Who would be high priest if you died?”

“No idea.” Seth's expression implied he'd never even considered the question before. “Hell, I don't even know if there would still be prophecies. Vera has never had any visions. Not sure if the old prophecies would still apply with both me and Jeremiah dead.”

“Let's not find out,” I said abruptly. “I don't even want to think about you dying.”

“Aw, are you starting to care?” Seth grinned at me with his usual coldness, but there was a slight flicker in his one light blue eye that made me wonder if the question wasn't entirely sarcastic.

I took a deep breath and tried not to think about exactly how dead I would be without Seth. “I'll never be able to save my parents without your help.”

Seth sat silently for a minute and then grunted. “You'll never save your parents sitting around here all day either. We need to get moving if we want to make it Ra-Shet before sunset.”

“What are we waiting for?” I asked with fake brightness.

“I'm waiting for you to get on that dirt bike.” Seth pointed at the second bike. “The sooner you learn how to operate it, the sooner we save your parent's lives.”

With considerable reservations, I got on the dirt bike. Thirty minutes later we were roaring down a narrow trail through the woods. I was finally headed for the city I'd only ever seen in my worst nightmares.

Chapter 5

“You don't honestly expect the high priest of the Church of Chaos to just go waltzing into the city, do you?” Seth leaned on the dusty front counter of the long closed beauty school and held up two dingy boxes of hair dye.

We'd made it to the abandoned beauty school with less than an hour until nightfall. Seth had parked the bikes inside a dingy old storage room that was full of discarded mannequins and rotting beauty supplies.

He'd explained to me that the Church had 'claimed' the beauty school as an outpost years ago. The crosses that had been spray painted onto all the doors and windows of the building backed up his claims. We would be safe here for the night.

“Actually, I've been under the impression that you did whatever you wanted to, whenever you wanted to.” I frowned at him as the last brilliant rays of sunset began to fade from the sky behind us.

Seth let out a dry chuckle. “I do.”

“But you can't just walk into the city?”

The city lights were coming on in the valley below us. I couldn't help walking over the gigantic plate glass windows and just staring down at the rows and rows of houses. I'd never seen so many homes. Or so many people. They looked like ants from our perch near the top of the mountain. Tiny ants scurrying through the streets on this early winter evening. I supposed that they were just going about their usual business. Living their lives the same way they had always lived them. Going to work. Going home. Spending time with their families. I missed my quiet, worrywart mother and outspoken father more than I knew how to say. I closed my eyes and leaned my forehead against the dusty, cold glass.

“Maybe I should rephrase. Nothing is stopping me from walking into the city, but it would certainly attract a lot of attention.” Seth spread his long, muscular arms out into a broad shrug and grinned at me. The gaping hole in his lower jaw exposed his jawbone and bottom teeth quite clearly through the side of his face.

“Yeah, I can see where you might.” I was tempted to reach out and touch his face just to confirm that he was real and not part of one of my nightmares. I didn't do it. Touching Seth always made him too real. “They don't normally let zombies just walk through the streets of the city, do they?”

“I am not a zombie.” Seth was smirking slightly as he crossed his arms over his muscular chest. He still had the boxed of hair dye in his hands. “But you're right, they're afraid of me.”

“Because you're-,” I struggled for a second before I remembered the word that he and his church for of followers preferred to use to describe themselves, “- changed.”

Seth winked his cold, ruined left eye at me. The scar that ran from the middle of his scalp to the top of his cheekbone bisected his eye completely. The pupil had changed from light blue to a dead, white color that was more than slightly disturbing to look at for more than a couple of seconds. “Because I'm a legend.”

“More like a pompous ass,” I replied.

He laughed. “I wasn't actually referring to my ego. When I say that I'm a legend in the city of Ra-Shet, I mean that I'm basically the boogeyman. Say your prayers and wash behind your ears, little children, or the Church of Chaos will
get
you.” Seth grinned wickedly and made a swiping gesture through the air with one hand.

“Oh god. You're not serious?” I ran my hands through my frizzy, out of control brown curls. It was futile to try to tame them but I always made the effort.

“You don't think I make a good boogeyman?” He countered with a mildly surprised look on his face. “Come on, Pilar. You were terrified of me the first time you saw me. You still are.”

“The first time I ever saw you, you snuck-up on me,” I reminded him. “I'd never seen you before. I didn't even know it was possible to partially change into a zombie. You came out of the woods with a sword on your hip and that evil grin you're using on me now. You were scary.”

“Exactly my point,” Seth replied. “I'm fucking scary.”

“Which you use to your advantage,” I spoke the words as I realized where this was headed. “You want the people in Ra-Shet to be afraid of you. You like being the boogeyman.”

“It serves my purposes.” Seth looked smug. “People don't like wandering outside of the city walls when they know the woods are full of monsters.”

“And you'd prefer they stayed in the city?”

“It's not so much the regular people who concern me,” Seth said. “But the king of Ra-Shet wouldn't mind expanding his empire all the way through the mountains. He'd like nothing better than to rape the land of every resource it has to offer. Make every person for miles pay him taxes or be eaten by zombies.”

“He couldn't really do that,” I said.

“Want to bet?” Seth asked. “You clearly don't know what happens to the nice citizens of Ra-Shet when they fail to pay their taxes.”

I looked into his good eye, trying to determine if he was joking. His expression was serious. “What happens?”

Seth stepped up to the window beside me and tapped on the glass. “Do you see the double wall that surrounds the city? The circular one with all the lights on it.”

I nodded. “I see it.”

“You see the gates?” He pointed at the narrow corridors that appeared to poke out through the walls like spokes on a wheel.

“Yes.”

“Two of the gates are normal. They're nothing more than reinforced doors with guards posted on both sides. You show your official city pass, they let you in. You show your official gate pass, they'll let you out. Perfectly normal every day operations. The third gate, though. That one is different.”

“Which one is the third gate?” I asked.

“The one closest to us. It faces west.” He was standing so close to me that I could feel the slight heat radiating off of his body. His expression was grim as he directed my attention the gate in question.

“Okay. I see it.”

“The west gate actually has two gates on it. One attached to the inner part of the city and one that is attached to the outside wall. The corridor between the two gates is occupied by a starving horde of zombies.”

“What?” I stared at him in horror. “Why would they keep zombies so close to the city?”

“The king uses the zombies to keep the people under his control. If you break a law in the city or fail to pay your taxes, then you have to leave the city through the west gate.”

“You mean-?” I could barely wrap my head around the concept.

“I mean that the guards lead you up to the inner door of the west gate and they shove you out onto a platform that puts you ten feet above the heads of the zombies. There is a ladder going down to the ground. You have five minutes to climb down the ladder from the platform before the guards use an electric cattle prod to force you down into the horde. If you can make it across the corridor to the outer wall gate, you're free to leave the city.”

“Oh my god.” I bit my lip and sucked in my breath. “It's murder.”

“Mostly. Yes. The people who go into the west gate corridor don't typically make it out alive.”

“Has anyone ever survived?” I asked.

Seth's expression was darkly serious as he stared down at the city. There was no mistaking the hatred I saw in his one blue eye. “People have made it out. Every once in a while someone gets lucky and makes it to the gate. The spectators boo and throw food when that happens.”

“Spectators?” I asked.

“Sure. Why not?” Seth turned to face me head on. He raised one dark eyebrow at me. “Can you think of anything better to do on a Wednesday morning than watch people die because they couldn't afford to pay their rent to the city?”

My mouth felt dry. “Why do I get the feeling this is personal for you?”

“When I was six years old, my father made a mistake down at the quarry and his supervisor fired him from his job hauling rock. He didn't find another job until almost two months later. He thought he was going to be able to catch up the rent and tax payments, but then Vera got sick. He spent the tax money on a bottle full of antibiotics. Saved her life. Four days later, the king's tax men hauled him off to the west gate and threw us out of our home. I watched my father get ripped to shreds by the zombies in the corridor.” Seth snarled down at the city. “Let's just say it made an impression on me.”

“That's horrible,” I said after a slightly stunned pause. “I didn't know. I didn't even know you grew up in the city.”

Seth nodded. “I lived in the Burroughs until I was twelve.”

“The Burroughs?”

He leaned closer to me and pointed to the far edge of the city walls. “See the top of the hill.”

“You mean where all the houses start to cluster together?”

“They're not even houses,” Seth said with a snort. “More like holes built into the hillside. The Burroughs are the poorest part of the city. It's where the beggars, thieves, drunkards and the hopelessly sick live.”

“You grew up there?” I was stunned to realize how little I knew about him.

“We moved to the Burroughs after my father was slaughtered in the corridor. It was supposed to be temporary, but my mother got sick working in the clothing factory. Some of the chemicals they use to dye the fabrics are so toxic that they burn your lungs. I remember being a kid and watching the skin fall off of her hands at night when she tried to do housework. Jeremiah, my older brother, wouldn't let her cook dinner because her fingernails used to fall off in our food.”

I gagged slightly but said nothing. Seth didn't seem to notice my disgust. He was more lost in his own thoughts than I had ever seen him.

“Eventually her hands stopped working altogether. I don't really remember what finally made her leave the clothing factory, whether they fired her because she could no longer do the work or if she finally quit. Either way, it was too late. The chemicals from the dye baths had ruined her lungs. It was a cold winter that year and she couldn't breathe. She suffocated on the floor of our living room. After that, Jeremiah raised Vera and me as best he could. He did alright, I guess. We were stubborn and uncooperative kids.”

“I can't imagine you as a child,” I said. It was the truth. “I don't even know how old you are now.”

“How old do you think I am?” Seth seemed intrigued by his own question.

“I don't know.” I didn't even want to try to hazard a guess. “I've never been good with age. Twenty, maybe. Twenty five?”

Seth snorted. “You think I'm twenty-five?”

“You could be,” I was blushing but fairly certain he wouldn't be able to see it in the fading light. “It's hard to tell. I warned you I was bad at this.”

“Plus I have all this gray in my hair.” Seth picked at the streak of white that shone brightly against his otherwise jet black hair. The white hair covered the portion of the scar that was on his scalp, as if the damage that had been done by the blade had struck all the color out of his hair. “Jesus, you think I'm old.”

“I said twenty first,” I reminded him defensively. “All I know is that you're older than me. I mean, you have to be older than me. I'm only fifteen. Or am I sixteen now?”

Seth snorted, his serious mood evaporating almost as quickly as it had come. “You don't know how old you are?”

“I was a few weeks shy of my sixteenth birthday when I left the Cube with Drake and the Scavengers. A lot has happened since then. I haven't exactly been keeping close track of the date.”

“Today is the third,” Seth said.

“Really?” I frowned at him, wondering if he was screwing with me. Seth had a twisted sense of humor. It was one of the first things I'd liked about him.

“Why would I lie?” Seth asked.

“My birthday is tomorrow,” I told him. “November fourth. Same as my Dad's. He always said I was the best birthday gift he'd ever been given. Isn't it funny, me being born on my dad's birthday?”

Seth hesitated and then nodded. “I didn't know. I guess I'll have to buy you a present while we're in the city tomorrow.”

“A birthday present?” I nearly laughed. “My parents are being sold for their flesh in the same city your parents were killed in. You're worried about getting me a birthday present?”

Seth reached out and touched my cheek. “Have to keep life in perspective, Pilar. Can't let the bad completely overwhelm the good. Tomorrow is your birthday. I'll buy you something pretty to celebrate with. Not every day a girl turns sixteen.”

I closed my eyes as I felt his fingertips brush against my skin. It was all I could do not to start crying. “I just want my parents back, Seth.”

“I know. And with any luck, we'll have them with us before the sun strikes noon in the sky. Not that I'm making you any promises.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I know you think they're dead. Thank you for coming with me anyway.”

Seth smiled down at me. “You're welcome. But enough talking. We have a lot to do before we go into the city in the morning.”

“We do?”

Seth reached up and tugged on the white streak in his hair again. “We do. Or at least, I do. You don't really need a disguise. You don't know anyone in Ra-Shet.”

“You're dyeing your hair?” I recalled the two boxes of hair dye that he'd been holding when we'd started the conversation.

He nodded. “Can't have anyone recognizing me as the high priest when we're in the meat market tomorrow morning. It would be messy.”