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Lucy said, “I heard you baby, I’m right here. ”
“No. Not what I meant. Wait—stay back. ” She could feel it when she ran her palm against his head; she could detect the fractured buckle and the dangling, unfastened strap that should’ve held his mask firmly against his face.
He was wheezing. His head knocked lightly against her body and there was a rhythm to it that didn’t sound like breathing. Tighter and tighter he squeezed at her hand, and then at her arm, and then at her waist as he tried to draw her nearer.
Briar resisted. She used the rifle to pry him off her and away.
Lucy crouched down close and tried to grab him. She said, “Hank, don’t tell me you’re so soggy you’re getting fresh with our guest. ”
But Briar grabbed the clockwork arm before Lucy could land a grip. “Don’t,” she said. She stood up and pulled Lucy back, too. “Don’t, Lucy. His mask has come off. He’s been breathing it. ”
“Oh Jesus. Oh Jesus. ”
“What’s going on hack there?”
“Go on” Lucy said. “We’ll catch up to you. ”
“Forget it” Swakhammer said, and a rustling of armor suggested he’d reversed his course.
She insisted, “We’re right behind you. Get the rest of them under. ” Lucy said that last part quickly, because Hank was standing and straightening.
Briar could see him too, the way his body’s shadow reluctantly hauled itself upright and shuddered. “It’s too fast,” she said to herself, or maybe to Lucy. “It shouldn’t change him so fast. It ought to take days. ”
“It used to take days. It doesn’t anymore. ”
They were paralyzed as long as Hank only stood, and did not make a move toward them. Briar breathed through the mask, “Lucy, what do we do?”
“We have to put him down. Sorry,” Lucy said to him, or at least Briar hoped it was to the fresh and retching rotter who reached out with bony, angry hands.
Briar used her elbow to knock the swinging rifle back into her hands. Although she could barely see even the fuzziest shape of the thing that once was Hank, she listened for his next gurgle and aimed for it.
The blast hit him and knocked him down. She didn’t know if it’d killed him. She didn’t care—and Lucy seemed to approve.
The barkeep seized Briar by the gun and drew her forward, and away. In only a few feet they collided with the wall they’d been hugging as they fled the apothecary’s shop, and they hugged it again together, their panting gasps revealing far too much of their location.
Farther down the block, Swakhammer was doing his best to prevent an outbreak of full-on chaos. He held the crew together and pressed them firmly against the building with his own body and said, just loud enough for Lucy and Briar to hear, “Here’s the corner. Follow it around to the right. ”
“I know,” Lucy said, no longer whispering, her voice tinged with frustration and fear.
“Hush up!” Swakhammer told her, but his own vibrating words were creeping up as well.
“It don’t matter. They hear us now,” Lucy complained, and still towing Briar by the warm gun, she led the way along the block. “Keep going, you big old bastard. I’ll bring up the rear with Miss Wilkes. ”
“Lucy—”
“Run, iron man. Stop arguing with me, and we’ll do the same,” she puffed.
New moans coughed through the city night. They fed on one another, alerted by the noise and driven by their insatiable hunger for more meat—and they gathered, unhindered by the lack of light.
Lucy jerked on Briar’s gun and pulled her toward the corner, where the clattering retreat of Swakhammer and the other denizens of Maynard’s could be heard above the racket. They were getting farther ahead by the moment, but Lucy acted like she knew where she was going, so Briar let her lead.
Only two blocks, they’d said; but these must be the longest blocks in the universe, and the rotters had caught their scent, or their trail, or whatever thread by which they tracked their prey.
Briar wrestled her way out of Lucy’s grip and said, “Not the gun. Might need it. ”
“Take the apron ties. Stay with me. ”
She wormed one hand’s fingers between the linen strips until her grip was assured. She said, “Got it. Go. How much farther?”
