The Secret Dead (London Bones Book 1) (30 page)

60

I left the bag on my bed while I grabbed the first aid kit from the bathroom. Again. I stared into the mirror above the sink. It was brown with age but clear enough to show my face was the dead white I was so familiar with. Yet another crop of warts had emerged some time during the night. They stood out on my cheeks like measles spots. I guessed if I’d been confronted with someone who looked like me, I’d make a run for it too. Especially if I knew that person kept an unburied corpse in the house. Another wave of fever washed over me, and my knees buckled. I sat on the edge of the tub and breathed in and out slowly. I could feel death eating away at my flesh and my internal organs. I was decomposing from the inside out. I counted to one hundred before I tried to push myself to my feet, succeeding on the second attempt. I limped to the kitchen, where I put the first aid kit onto a tray then filled the blue china teapot my mother kept for company and shuffled a pile of ginger biscuits onto a plate. My head felt like someone was slicing blades through it, and the sound of the biscuits hitting the plate was like an avalanche. I placed them on the side table next to the bed and the first aid kit on the armchair in the corner.

I retrieved two clean bed sheets and placed one on the bed. I crumpled the other under the door so there wasn’t an inch free and flipped the little switch on the cat flap so it stayed stuck when I pushed it. Then I closed and locked the door and pocketed the key. Finally, I unzipped the bag on the bed. I staggered over to the armchair and sunk into it.

I swallowed. ‘I’ve locked the door so you don’t try to run for it, but I just want to talk to you. Then you are welcome to go.’

The snake in the bag lay still. I propped the first aid box on my lap and popped the lid.

The puncture wounds were swollen, tinged with red, and still bleeding. I wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad thing. I wiped rubbing alcohol onto the puncture wounds. The pad came away soaked in blood.

I looked up at a rustling sound from the bag and saw a small, green, arrow-shaped head emerge. It blinked at me twice. A pink tongue sneaked out to test the air before the remainder of the snake slithered out onto the duvet.

Black eyes surveyed me without blinking.

‘I’m not going to hurt you. I’ve been looking for Ben and for you. I’m a colleague of his... your father’s.’

The snake tipped its head, which I took as a sign for me to continue.

‘I just want to find Ben. I’ve been very worried about him. His... wings were found some days ago. If he’s still alive, he’s going to need urgent medical attention. I work for the Lipscombe. You know the Lipscombe?’

The green head nodded.

‘I’ve been working with the police. You’re not in any trouble with them.’ The snake continued to stare. ‘I brought some tea and biscuits. See? Civilised.’

Too much talking dried out my mouth. I tried to swallow, but it felt as if I’d stuffed one of the cotton pads in there.

‘At least tell me if you’re poisonous. Then I’ll know whether or not to worry.’

The snake lengthened, and a skinny and pale human body poured onto my bed. He looked around then grabbed the bed sheet.

Alister glared at me. ‘The word you’re looking for is venomous. Snakes are venomous, not poisonous. Something is only poisonous if you eat it. And you need to let me go.’

I ignored the request. ‘Okay, are you venomous then?’

‘Only mildly. Not enough to kill anyone. I’m sorry about the old man. I wanted to smell him, that’s all, and then he rolled over onto me.’

I believed him. Margery called it ‘shifterbrain’—the way a shifter’s thoughts changed and matched the animal they were. To a snake’s-eye view, we’re nothing but feet and nostrils—maybe feet, nostrils, and belly if you’re a bit chubby. He glanced at me then raced to the door and grabbed the handle.

‘I told you it was locked.’

‘You need to let me go.’

‘I want to talk to you. What’s the hurry?’

‘I’m not saying anything to you. Margery said I could trust you, but she didn’t say you were a zombie. And you have a corpse in the attic.’

‘That’s my mother. She’s dead, but it may not be permanent. And I’m not a zombie, not yet.’ It came out a croak.

He shrugged as if it were only a matter of time.

‘I’m not a danger to anyone. Not yet.’

He didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. We both knew that was also only a matter of time. He folded his arms.

‘I’m not dead yet. I might get lucky. Maybe I’ll be a carrier.’

Alister gave me a pitying look. ‘Dad didn’t want to go into the pit either. He was going to be cremated.’

‘You saw him?’

He glanced at the door again and shifted his weight from foot to foot. ‘No. Ben told me. And I only saw Malcom... Dad when he was dead. He tried to hide it, but I could smell it. Zombies have a very sweet smell, like liquorice. I don’t know why. You’d think they’d smell of blood. Or dead things.’

I wondered how many zombies he’d met. ‘Do I smell of liquorice?’

‘Yeah, really strong.’

At least I no longer smelt like I was decomposing. Bonus point to zombiehood.

‘Alister, do you know who crushed you?’

‘My name’s Oliver. At least it’s the one I’m used to. And, yes I do. Can I go now?’ He glanced at the tea, seemingly seeing it for the first time.

‘Well? Are you going to tell me? Have you gone to the police?’

He gave me a look of contempt. ‘And why would I do that? You’re a zombie. You locked me in a bag. I don’t trust you. And the police don’t care about people like me.’

I couldn’t argue the point. I just had to look beyond him at the cat flap at the bottom of my door to see the proof of that. ‘What’s the hurry?’

‘I came looking for you because I needed help. Ben needs help. He’s so weak, and he can’t fly away anymore. But he doesn’t need another zombie.’

Per had been right. ‘You did it. You and Ben. Why on earth would you do something like that?’

He rolled his eyes. ‘Because everyone’s looking for this boy with these huge identifying characteristics.’ Then his voice dropped, and he said softly, ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time.’

‘If he’s that sick, call Per Ogunwale. He’ll help.’

‘He
has
been helping. I can’t get hold of him. Per set up a bed and a drip for him in the spare room at Per’s dad’s house.’ I closed my eyes and suppressed a silent scream. All the time I’d been speaking to Moses and Florence, Ben had been upstairs. ‘But Ben’s not answering his phone. And neither is Per or his dad. There’s something wrong.’

‘Call 999. They’ll send someone out there.’ I swallowed. Alister’s face was beginning to grow fuzzy. I blinked and shook my head to try to clear my vision, but it just made my head thump harder.

‘They’ll just send Ben to prison. You’re the Lipscombe. You’re supposed to help people like us. If you’re not going to let me go, you need to send someone to help him.’

‘Like who?’

‘Like healers. And security just in case. Don’t you have, like, werewolf swat teams and stuff?’

‘You’ve been paying too much attention to the Human Preservation Front.’ A tickle rose in my throat. I began to cough, but it was stuck. I reached out for the cup of tea at my side. It smashed on the floor.

Alister’s gaze flicked to the cup and back to me. But evidently he wasn’t going to risk coming any closer. He said something to me, but the words came at me through a fog. I tried to catch them, but they slid through my brain and dissipated into the air. Burning bile blistered my throat. My body slid, hot and boneless, to the carpet. I blinked twice to try to rid my eyes of the wetness, but the world blurred further. My heart, which had been racing, began to slow.

Uninstructed, limbs pinned to the floor, my body began a familiar process.

61

I’ve died enough times that I’ve never been afraid of the real thing, but I’d always thought I knew what came next. I never thought I’d still be walking in this world, the same way it had never occurred to me as a child that I might spend my adulthood wiping Sigrid’s arse and worrying that someone would find out about the dead body in the attic.

I opened my eyes. The floor was hard under my nose and only an inch from my face. The nausea was gone, as was the fever and accompanying aches and pains. I stretched, a long glorious stretch, and rolled onto my back.

The door stood wide open. Alister was gone.
No surprise there
. The only surprise was that he had left me a note on the floor beside my head. In neat block letters, under an 077 mobile number, he’d written, ‘
Not going to wait around for you to wake up. You know I can’t not say anything. I’ll wait twelve hours in case you want the other option.
Please don’t’

Please don’t... what? Eat anyone?

I got up and sat heavily on the chair, or at least that’s what I intended to do. I
bounced
. My body was as lightweight as spider silk, dried from the inside. I was as light and inconsequential as a leaf. Did all zombies feel like this? I supposed no one had ever asked. I didn’t want to be light. I wanted to be heavy with muscle, tissue, and blood. Heavy with life.

I felt my teeth with a cautious finger. They felt the same shape but the tips were razor sharp, and when I tapped them, they made a light ringing sound. I stared at the floor.

I was a hag. My body was made for coming back from the dead. Maybe if I died then came back, it would trigger the reverse decomposition process. Maybe zombification didn’t have to be permanent.

I didn’t bother going to my bed or getting a sick bag. I closed my eyes.

In the underworld, harpies didn’t just cover the floor, they sat on each others’ shoulders four birds high and bickered and snapped and jostled. I gagged at the stink and ignored the squawking as I shoved my way to the door and back to the world of the living.

Where I was still dead. I sat still for a moment, even though I knew better, trying to feel for my heartbeat, but it wasn’t there. My eyes burned with tears.

Until a few minutes before, there had been the chance my body would fight the infection, that I’d be one of the two percent. Until a few minutes before, there had been hope.

Now there was none. I lay on the floor and thought about death.

I had options, but no hope. Stay in the underworld, get cremated, murder to eat, or go to the pit. None were particularly appealing.

I could just die and avoid the whole thing—spend the rest of eternity in the underworld. Alister would call the NRTs, and they’d come and cart my body off to the pit. It meant no coming back. If I did come back? Best-case scenario: I’d end up shambling, ravenous and insane, in the pit. Worst-case scenario: I wouldn’t be in the pit, and my family would be the casualties of the first rule of zombie club. If I was going to die, I might as well do it properly.

I certainly wasn’t going to murder anyone. There were plenty of people I didn’t like, but to casually stab them? Strangle them? I couldn’t picture myself doing it, not to anyone. It was one thing to say it was them or me, and quite another to go out and murder somebody. Relief washed over me. You never know until you’re tested, but I couldn’t do it. It wasn’t an option. Not a real one. I had alternatives. Nasty alternatives, but alternatives. And that left only one, because the pit was no alternative at all.

So that was it. The end of Vivia Brisk. I felt strangely calm, and that didn’t feel right. Wasn’t I supposed to be railing against the dying of the light? But all I could think was that all the things I needed to do—find Ben, fix Siggie—didn’t matter anymore.

If I couldn’t do them in twenty-four hours, they would be someone else’s problem. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to. I couldn’t. That was it. Game over.

My to-do list had suddenly been cropped a whole lot shorter. It shouldn’t have felt like a relief, but it did. Everyone else—Stanley, Obe, even Sigrid—would have to learn to stand on their own two feet.

I knew what being dead was like, and it wasn’t so bad. I’d get to find out if there really was an induction. And where all the dead people went once they were done with the underworld. Maybe I’d reincarnate. Start over. Or maybe whatever came next was something I just couldn’t imagine. I swallowed. It brought back the memory of Malcolm in his cell, trying to lick his dry lips with saliva that no longer existed.

I lurched to the bathroom and stared into the mirror above the sink. My eyes weren’t cloudy, but they weren’t bright and glossy either. I didn’t look dead, but I did look seriously ill. I wouldn’t be able to pass for long.

I grabbed my makeup bag and began applying foundation. It went on a bit bobbly over the new warts, but with a bit of blusher and lipstick, I looked alive at least.

Malcolm’s words returned to me.
You should wear more makeup, Vivvie.
Laughter burst from my lips. It hit my stomach, and I couldn’t stop. I laughed until my stomach ached, and then I cried and had to reapply all the makeup.