Blackbird's Fall - Jenika Snow Page 0,7

commodity now too, or at least she figured so from any post-apocalyptic movies she’d seen.

The images in her head of women being taken as sex slaves, used by various men for their own personal sexual gratification, had everything inside her on alert, fearing everyone and trusting no one.

She stayed to the trees, walked during the day, and had camped at night in any “safe” place she could find. Maya was tired, her feet had blisters on them, and she was filthy. But she was alive and finally at her destination, and that’s all that mattered.

Maya had been deep in the woods for the better part of a day, and the wired gate that went around the house, which had been put up when she was just a child by her father, still stood strong. She needed that gate to help her in keeping this place, her new home, safe.

Before all this had gone down with the infection, her family’s plan had been to come to this exact place. They waited, stocked up on supplies, weapons, not knowing how long the infection would last, or if help in the form of their government—the ones who had unleashed this hell on earth to begin with—would come.

They bided their time until things calmed, were taken care of, or they hoped on the latter. But her father had then been bitten shortly after everything, and their plans changed drastically.

Everything’s different.

They’d come here when things had been okay in the world. The two-story log cabin had been built by her grandfather before she was even born, was sturdy, protected by the forest and gate, and was her new home.

She was high in the mountains, miles from the town below, from civilization, and she felt her safety rise tenfold. The house itself had a natural well, a fully stocked pond—or she hoped it was still stocked—and sat on three acres.

The woods surrounded all four sides of the house, and in the back, she knew there was a functioning greenhouse. Yes, this had been their retreat, where they needed to be in order to stay alive and wait everything out.

But she was here now, and she had to make things right if she wanted to see this through. She wouldn’t be someone’s whore, and she wouldn’t be a walking corpse. She’d stay alive.

Maya reached for the loaded gun strapped to her thigh and advanced on the house. She needed to make sure it was safe before she went inside.

Moving around to the side, she grabbed a handful of pebbles and crouched behind some thick foliage. She tossed them toward one of the windows and crouched even lower to the ground, waiting to see if a healthy human would come out or if an infected would stumble toward her because of the noise.

She waited for several minutes and then tossed more pebbles to the window. After silence and nothingness greeted her, she was confident the home was vacant but still held her gun at the ready. Standing, she adjusted her bag on her back and shoulder and sighed. She was here, her new home.

“Come on, Sherman,” she said and whistled for her dog, who came trotting out of the woods and stopped beside her. She reached down and stroked his head, knowing she could make this work, could survive.

She didn’t have a choice, but she could make the best of it.

6

Marius pushed away the overgrown branches, held a firm grip on his knife, and was on alert. It had been several weeks of him trekking north, not coming across anything but a few infected he’d taken out swiftly.

He knew they were no longer human, knew that even if they could feel anything, which he highly doubted, he was putting them out of their misery.

The sun was going to set in the next hour or so, and he didn’t feel confident in setting up camp. What he needed to do was get to higher ground, maybe ascend to the mountains. But that logic would most likely put him farther away from supplies, if there were any to be found.

There might be lakes higher up, ones with fish.

His stomach clenched at the thought. He was now surviving off crackers and the little water he had left, and if he didn’t find some substantial food soon, he didn’t know how much longer he could last.

For the next forty-five minutes, he climbed higher and higher, going over rocky terrain before it smoothed out and became softer with fallen leaves, patches of flora,