Sure enough, Riley shouted down to them moments later. “We’re almost tapped out up here! Roughly two dozen hostiles left!”
That was far too many to handle if the Girl Explorers couldn’t restrain them. The five fighters were going to be overrun. Soon.
“Gwen, you’re up! Alert Starla when you’re ready!” Sabrina swung her axe with a panting yell. “Riley, one of your girls needs to get her down safely and silently!”
Edie didn’t hear Gwen’s descent from the tree or see her short journey to a spot deeper in the woods, which was a good thing. If the zombies pinpointed her location, a lone human who knew nothing about fighting wouldn’t last long.
The next creature only had one hand loosely bound by a branch, and as Edie began slicing through its neck, its viciously sharp claws raked across her ribs, gouging deeply enough that warm wetness began trickling down her side. The initial lightning flash of agony turned into an intense, throbbing ache. It was her first serious injury, and given the current turn of events, it would be far from her last.
She didn’t do more than gasp, but somehow Max knew. Maybe he was able to smell her blood, even through all the effluvia and smoke and body odor.
“Edie,” he roared.
It was a hoarse demand for information. For the sound of her voice to confirm that she was still alive and mostly okay.
“I’m…” Oh shit, breathing hurt now. “I’m good.”
The nearest zombie was writhing, twisting its ankle to free itself from a root and just about to succeed. With a cry, she swung at its neck and—missed. Because it wasn’t bound by anything at all anymore.
Its thighs bunched for a fatal leap, its snarl rang in her ears, and she stumbled backward on numb legs.
“Now!” Sabrina yelled.
The explosion rang through the night.
It was another of Edie’s ideas, using what they had on hand.Large quantities of lye—herlye—in an old abandoned bathtub on the forest floor. A simple wooden trough, swiftly built by Lorraine from scavenged floorboards, perched carefully but precariously on branches high above the tub. The entire setup positioned a safe distance away, with a long, sturdy stick for Gwen to tip the trough, sending water pouring onto all the lye.
And then:Boom!Ringing ears. Startled cries and howls.
The extreme heat of the immediate, violent exothermic reaction set some neatly crisscrossed kindling aflame, and every single zombie that remained alive swung toward the site of the explosion and subsequent fire, completely distracted.
Including Edie’s current zombie. This time, she managed to remove its head, and everyone else dispatched the creatures closest to them too.
It wasn’t enough. There were still a dozen left, maybe, and their attention was beginning to return to their designated prey.
“We need to lure them closer to the compound and keep distracting them.” Sabrina sounded grim. “Set the fires, Gwen, and Starla will let you know if we need you back here!”
Edie hoped like hells the oracle was fast and silent in her work. If Gwen moved too slowly, there wouldn’t be any fighters left to take advantage of the distraction. Too noisily, and her athame would be her only protection from the predators stalking her.
“We’re almost there!” Lorraine yelled. “Let’s finish ’em off, bros!”
As another creature swiveled its head back Edie’s way, her cleaver felt like an anvil. She swung it anyway, chopping through taut flesh and tough sinew. Not bone.
She’d injured it, which would slow its movements. But she hadn’t killed it, and she’d also made it very, very angry.
Fuck. One more kick, and her legs would collapse beneath her. Her arms were shaking, her head swimming from horror and blood loss, and no one could help her now. Max, Sabrina, Lorraine, and Kip had their own battles to wage as they waited for Gwen to light another house on fire, somewhere closer to that gaping hole in Wall One, and set off more flares.
Edie was a sitting duck, and not the kind that swam in pools of gold ducats.
The creature’s garbledmagnifiquecame from a mouth dripping saliva, and its yellowed teeth shone in the firelight as it stalked the final, necessary step closer. It leapt for her neck, and she slashed her cleaver in its direction, but she closed her eyes too, unable to watch her own death.
Nothing happened.
Her lids flew open, and there was Max, clamping one zombie’s jaw shut with a white-knuckled grip, the swing of his sword a graceful arc as he lopped off another zombie’s head.Herzombie’s head.
A third one was sprinting up on him from behind, and the sweet idiot wasn’t paying a fucking bit of attention, too concerned about her to do his damned job.
“Max!” she shrieked, thrusting her cleaver in the direction of his would-be killer.
