Lanherne Chronicles (Prequel): To Escape the Dead by Stephen Charlick Read Free Book Online Page A

Charlie quickly made a grab at the back of the jerkin and even before the Dead man could turn his milky eyes upon him, he thrust upwards toward the back of the Dead man’s skull. With a crack the hunting knife strapped to Charlie’s wrist tore through the thin bone at the base of the skull and sliding through the putrid brain to its hilt, the knife came to a stop just proud of the matted hair on the top of the man’s head. As a dark and foul smelling liquid began to drip from the puncture wound down onto the plastic covering of what was left of his prosthetic arm Charlie yanked his arm back, allowing the corpse to fall lifeless to the road.
    After a brief pause to make sure the Dead man had been alone, Charlie turned and knocked gently on one of the cart’s hatches. When nothing happened he knocked again, this time with a little more urgency.
    ‘Who’s in there?’ he whispered, eager to find out just who had helped themselves to Star and their second cart.
    ‘Oh, thank God,’ came a woman’s worried voice, followed by the sound of a bolt being drawn across.
    By the time the hatch had been pushed open and the woman’s blood splattered face had appeared from the darkness, Charlie was unsurprised to see Sally looking back at him.
    ‘You have a knack for survival, Sally,’ he mused, pulling himself up into the darkness safe beyond the prying eyes of the Dead. ‘Is it just you in here?’
    ‘Yes,’ she tearfully replied, dramatically throwing herself against Charlie’s chest in true damsel in distress manner, ‘I only just managed to escape… They tore through the door before we knew what had happened… Daniels… they… they ripped him apart… I got past them and made my way through the kitchens to the stables… I didn’t know what else to do but drive Star out here and wait... wait for other survivors… ’
    Charlie nodded his understanding, unseen in the darkness. Sally had barely had enough time to build any sort of feelings for Daniels but even so, it was always horrific to witness the fast moving Dead in full attack. The fact that she had managed to escape them as they had swept through the Institute while others had fallen victim to their ravenous hunger proved to Charlie that when her life was on the line, Sally could be as lethal to the Dead as the rest of them. Perhaps she had some hidden talent after all.
    ‘Did… did we lose anybody?’ she continued in a whisper, almost as an afterthought to her own story.
    ‘No, thank God,’ he replied, feeling a little uncomfortable as Sally rested her head against his chest.
    He had already made it clear to her before that he held no interest in her in that way but Sally was just being Sally and if she could ingratiate herself with a man who would protect her, she would. Of course it never occurred to her that Charlie would protect her anyway regardless of any advances she made toward him, just as he would for any of their group. It was simply just in his nature.
    ‘And Phil managed to rescue another young woman,’ he continued. ‘Fran, she said her name was.’
    ‘Oh… her,’ Sally said, leaning away from Charlie, ‘I’m surprised she needed any rescuing. From what Daniels said about her and that sister of hers, she can take care of herself… her father was a judo instructor or something… she’s very tomboy-ish.’
    ‘She just had to kill that sister of hers,’ said Charlie, already not liking Sally’s disapproving tone toward Fran, ‘So play nice…’
    ‘What?’ she interrupted.
    ‘You know what…’ he replied, realising he was wasting his time if he thought he could ever change Sally’s attitude to other women.
    ‘Anyway,’ he continued, ‘there’s far too many of us in the other cart, so I’m going to go and bring some of them over here. You know the drill, keep quiet and in the morning we’ll check the grounds for other survivors and see what’s left in the Institute we can salvage…’
    ‘So we’re moving on