Fatal Read online

  Chapter 3

  A Nothing-Special Human

  GRAYSON DIDN’T KNOW who she was, but he knew she would be there today, at school. He’d known the exact date for years. He also knew that finding her would be a cinch. They were meant to meet. They would each feel the connection, the pull. It would be undeniable.

  What he didn’t know was what to do once he found her. But he would get to that later. First things, first.

  As he stalked toward the doors of the school, he kept up his usual glare—couldn’t risk anybody thinking he was in a good mood. He spared a glance at the moist, colorless sky. His pale grayish skin fit right in with his surroundings. A morbid chameleon. Anywhere else in the world, the natural skin tone of a zombie would stand out. But not here in the upper northwest corner of the United States. Some of the humans here could almost be mistaken for a zombie just because of their coloring. The lack of sun did much to help his kind blend in.

  He pushed through the doors and immediately began scanning the crowd. He couldn’t feel her yet, but he wasn’t alarmed. Somewhere in this place there was a new girl…he just had to follow all the awkward stares until he found her—or got close enough to feel her.

  As he meandered through the halls, people stayed out of his way. As they always did. It was good because he was all purpose right then. It’d be extremely annoying if some twiggy freshman got in his way.

  There it was. The pull. Like an invisible bungee cord that connected him to her. It had been stretched too tight for so long, linking them across distances, that it’d been almost nonexistent. But now that they were in each other’s vicinity, the band was snapping back, contracting with a force neither of them would be able to ignore.

  Grayson stopped walking and let his senses take over. Yes, it was her. She was here. And nearby.

  He was shocked to realize he almost felt alive again—the hair on his arms stood up; a chill ran down his back; he could breathe easier, think clearer. He knew both zombie and Save would experience unique physical reactions when in close proximity to one another, but Leiv and Raina hadn’t told him he would feel like this. He really couldn’t remember what it felt like to be alive…but this was as close as he could imagine.

  He noticed some students looking at him strangely. When he went to glare at them, he was horrified to realize he was smiling. Smiling. Great. Just great.

  Whatever.

  He continued down the hall, following the pull. Almost…he was almost there. Just a little closer…riiight…there.

  Grayson stopped short when he saw her.

  This was a mistake. Had to be. He looked around for someone else. But no, she was the only person he didn’t recognize.

  With narrowed eyes, he examined her. She wasn’t what he’d expected. Not. At. All. He’d imagined someone much like his sister: statuesque and strong, with an attitude to match. Someone who could make a valid attempt at passing the Oracles’ tests. Someone who could actually succeed. What was before his eyes was…shrimpy.

  He watched from a distance as the girl put her backpack in her locker. She was tiny, barely five feet tall, and plain as vanilla ice cream. Straight brown hair hung down her back. He couldn’t see much of her face, but from what he could tell, it wasn’t anything to look twice at. She was dressed simply in jeans and a long sleeved shirt. There was nothing special about this human.

  Nothing at all.

  How was this depressingly average girl supposed to save him? She looked like she could barely carry her books down the hall.

  Anger and frustration filled him until all he could see was shades of sepia. That’s when he knew his eyes had turned. Quickly, he ducked into the restroom and shut himself in one of the stalls. He forced himself to calm down. Leiv had taught him a lot about taming his temper, and he was glad for it in moments like these. Because if anyone got a look at his eyes right now…these eyes weren’t human, weren’t alive.

  A minute later the door opened and he heard two voices.

  “You see the new girl?”

  “Yeah. Nothing special.”

  His thoughts exactly. Grayson rolled his eyes.

  “I heard she was from New York or something.”

  “No, man, Tennessee.”

  “Oh, yeah. I guess that’s it. Whatever.”

  Finally they were gone. Grayson came out of the stall and examined his reflection in the mirror. His eyes were back to their normal green-brown color. His reflection looked mad. He was mad.

  So long, he’d waited for this day for so long, only to find that his savior was a miniature human from Tennessee.

  Good thing he hadn’t hung his hopes on her…yeah, good thing.

  He left the bathroom but decided to skip his first class. Instead, he spent the whole hour in the parking lot, staring out his windshield and wondering what he should do now.

  Maybe he shouldn’t discard her yet. Just because she looked inadequate didn’t necessarily mean she was. Maybe she knew something that could help him. Maybe she was super smart or something, a genius. Sometimes brains could be better than brawn. Sometimes. Mostly never.

  He decided that he should talk to her. Then he would know for sure if she could help him.

  Grayson couldn’t make himself sit through class yet, so he spent all of second hour planning out what he would tell his brother and sister. There had to be a way to let them down easy. In his mind he’d already failed. There was nothing this girl could do for him. But at least he would be sure before he went home to his family.

  He couldn’t find her in the hall before third hour, so fifteen minutes into class he asked to be excused to the restroom. It didn’t take long for him to locate her. Once he could feel himself being drawn in her direction, it took only minutes to reach the classroom she was in. As he walked past, he glanced through the window.

  And he became angry all over again.

  Sure enough. There she was, his shrimpy little savior.

  He still couldn’t see her face very well. He’d have to get a better look at her at lunch. Hopefully she had lunch B.

  When he was almost back to class, the unexpected happened.

  Grayson was overcome by a gut clenching pain. It wasn’t the first and it wouldn’t be the last. But it was damn sure inconvenient. In the zombie world this pain was known as a water cramp, and it occurred when they were under-hydrated. Zombies had to have water. Lots of it. They had to drink it, live it, breathe it, and dream it. It was the only way their bodies could function. The cells had to be consistently hydrated and rehydrated. It was their one crutch and there was no avoiding it. They could go longer between feedings, days even, but water was a constant need.

  He glanced around. No water fountains in sight. But the bathroom wasn’t too far away.

  Grayson was in pure agony as his internal organs refused to work. As quickly as he could, he scooted—or as he liked to think of it, zombie-walked—toward the bathroom. With his joints refusing to move right, it really did resemble Hollywood’s version of the ghoulish undead.

  Once he’d made it there, he lunged for a sink and, lowering his head, drank directly from the faucet. He drank and drank but still the pain didn’t ease. A full five minutes later he finally felt close to normal. He turned off the tap. Dried his hands. Looked in the mirror. He could recall it as if it had happened just yesterday instead of fifteen years ago…

  He awoke that morning to Raina’s nearly unbearable excitement. She was bustling around the house, fixing things up and humming (off key) while she did it.

  “What’s up with her?” he asked Leiv.

  Not meeting Grayson’s eyes, he said, “We’ll be having a visitor this evening. Someone special.”

  “A visitor? Human or zombie?”

  “Zombie,” Leiv answered.

  Grayson was astonished at the idea. He’d never seen another zombie besides Leiv and Raina.

  “An Oracle,” Leiv added, making Grayson’s jaw drop in wonder.

  The Oracles were revered by all of the De
ad Walking. They themselves were of the risen dead, however, they were special…they had made it past the Age of Deterioration without losing their minds, without their bodies withering, without becoming contagious. And so they were allowed to live. Forever, it seemed, since none had ever had reason to be euthanized. There were few of them but they were the oldest and wisest among all zombies. The Old Ones, they were called. They guided the species in the proper ways, their leadership necessary in order to maintain balance between the zombies and the humans.

  But there was rarely a reason for one of them to visit a tribe.

  “An Oracle? But why?”

  “She’s coming to see you, dude,” his brother answered as he picked the newspaper off the table.

  Grayson’s jaw couldn’t have gotten any closer to the floor. “Me?”

  “Yes,” Leiv said, still not looking at him. “Today you will learn everything you need to know about your Save.”

  Grayson was wrong; his jaw, amazingly enough, dropped farther.

  This was something he’d been waiting for. From the moment he’d risen, all he could think about was being human again. Either that or dying again—but without the rising.

  Grayson walked around in a fog for the rest of the day, not sure whether to believe his good fortune or not. But when the doorbell rang ten minutes after sunset, he knew Leiv had been right. He watched with a strange detachment as Raina rushed to the door to let their visitor in. She had filled goblets with icy water and set them out in the living room where he and Leiv were waiting. There was also a tray full of thinly sliced raw beef, pork, and veal.

  All of it was forgotten though, as a small white-haired woman dressed in all white pranced delicately into the room. She didn’t appear old even with the white hair—and even though she actually was. Perhaps it was the absence of wrinkles. She was petite from her short, pointy nose to her inevitably tiny toes. One might think her powerless, especially going by the expression on her heart-shaped face. It was guileless, angelic. She almost seemed like a child.

  He couldn’t believe it really. This was one of their renowned leaders?

  She gave a single nod to Leiv before taking a seat. Once she was comfortable, her eyes honed in on Grayson and it was then that he knew he’d terribly misjudged her. Those eyes were the strangest color of brown he’d ever seen—sort of a mocha color mixed with ash—and they were shrewd. He had to force himself not to shiver. When she spoke, he was even more certain his first impressions were wrong.

  In an unexpectedly deep voice she said, “You are Grayson.” It was the voice of a smoker who’d swallowed velvet.

  There was no question mark after she spoke, but he nodded anyway.

  “I am Hannah. I assume you know what I am.” Again no question mark. And again, he nodded. She gave him a once-over, pursing her dainty lips in a way that made him want to squirm. “I have seen that you’ve been unhappy with your lot, quite nearly from the day of your rising.”

  “You’ve seen?” He hadn’t meant to say it out loud.

  Her expression became even sharper. “Of course I have seen; I am a seer.”

  “Yes, ma’am—”

  “As I was saying, we’ve not seen another of the Dead Walking who is quite as unhappy as you. It puzzles us—and believe me when I say, there is not much in the world that succeeds in puzzling us. When you are as knowledgeable as we are, it is almost a joy to discover something that has the power to mystify.” She sighed heavily, almost dramatically. “As thrilling as it is, however, we are not entirely cruel-hearted.” She glanced quickly at Leiv and then back. “No matter what some might think. So. The time has come for you to begin the journey that will lead to your inevitable happiness. Are you ready to hear of your Save?”

  Grayson knew his eyes were wide. He would need water soon; he could practically hear the fluid as it pumped wildly in his veins. Never had he been so excited. Finally he nodded.

  “You will meet your Save for the first time in your nineteenth year after rising. You will meet her at the high school you will begin attending in your sixteenth year, in a town not far from here called Asher.” Grayson nodded. He knew where Asher was; he’d been there plenty of times. “She will come on the one hundred and ninth day of school. She alone has the ability to save you from the reality that you hate so badly, but know that it will come at a price: her life for your happiness. If you are willing to accept that, then you will have what you desire.” Hannah stopped and stared at him, appraising.

  Grayson nodded like the price required was his favorite comic book and not someone’s life. He reacted like a zombie.

  He was a zombie.

  And maybe inside he always would be.

  Chapter 4

  A Bump in the Night...Er, Day

  BY THE TIME THE BELL RANG for lunch, Grayson was completely out of patience. In the hall, he tried to feel the pull…and then it was there. He followed it until the shrimp was in his sights. She was struggling down the hall, carrying a stack of books almost as tall as she was. It was clear that she couldn’t see where she was going.

  Suddenly, he had an idea.

  As casually as he could, he sauntered toward her, watching her stumble along. When he was close, he stepped in front of her.

  Perfect.

  The tiny wonder smacked right into him and all her books went flying in the air. With a gasp, she dropped to the ground to pick them up.

  Up close he could see that it was just as he’d suspected: she was plain as the dickens, flighty and weak. He was about to walk away without saying anything to her. But then she peered up at him.

  It was the first good look he’d gotten of her face. And it was sorta like a punch in the gut. A much deserved punch since he’d just purposely tripped her up.

  It was her eyes. They had him riveted. They were ice-blue, but not at all cold. And they sparkled like tiny crystal orbs, but they weren’t delicate. It was more like they contained electricity. Like tapping into them could easily support the power grid of a good-sized city.

  These eyes didn’t belong on a human. They were…otherworldly. They were…they were…so not average. Not plain. And not weak. He wondered whether, if he stared at them directly, he would be burned or something—they were that powerful, that intense. Like staring at the sun. But with a blue flame.

  Then she spoke.

  “I’m so sorry. I wasn’t watching where I was going and I was in a hurry. I guess I just…”

  He wasn’t paying any attention to the words coming out of her mouth. Not at all. He was way too distracted by her voice. It was like music. But not the hair-metal stuff Leiv listened to or the femme-rock that Raina liked or even the indie-rock that he often jammed out to. No, it was like the stuff the angels played in heaven. Grayson didn’t believe in heaven—or angels—but maybe…maybe she was one? She couldn’t be human. Couldn’t be. No way.

  “…anyway, I’m sorry.”

  She waited for him to say something but he didn’t. So she went back to picking up the books. He watched her. He should’ve helped, but he was too busy being astonished.

  When she was done, she awkwardly stood up. This close, he could see that she wasn’t even as tall as his shoulders.

  He noticed she missed a book, so he bent to retrieve it. When he handed it to her, they locked eyes again. Hers were cool and sweet like a drink of ice water in the desert. He wanted to ask her what she was, but he couldn’t make those words come out. Probably a good thing.

  “What’s your name?” he asked instead. His voice sounded rough, cruel. But she didn’t seem to care.

  “Corinne. But people call me Cori.” She hesitated. “What’s yours?”

  He didn’t want her to know his name. He didn’t want anything to do with her. She was strange—possibly even more than he was. He wanted to forget her, forget this whole day, forget what her eyes looked like, forget how her voice made him feel like he was human again. He wanted to go back to thinking she was plain and dull and useless.

  “
Next time watch where you’re going,” he growled and then turned and stalked away.

  Cori stared after him, apparently stricken paralyzed. Because moving was just out of the question. Who was that guy? He was so rude. And oh my, why was he so utterly gorgeous? She’d never been attracted to the bad-boy type before. But this guy—

  There was something about him.

  Of course, he could be less of a jerk. Would it have hurt him to help pick up her books?

  When he was out of sight, Cori continued to her locker and shoved the giant stack of texts inside. Making her way to the cafeteria, she kept an eye out for Peg. She found her at a table smack in the center of the room. Only one other person was sitting with her, and Cori let out a relieved breath.

  After going through the line at the salad bar, she wove through the crowd toward Peg’s table.

  “Oh good! You made it,” Peg said with a smile.

  Cori put her tray down and realized she was shaking a little. The run-in with the mystery guy had only made her nerves worse.

  “This is Rex,” Peg told her, pointing to the only other person at the table.

  Cori tried to smile at the guy. He was the gangly type with almost too-big ears. His face, she noticed, was incredibly symmetrical, giving him a distinct quality different from what might normally be considered attractive. Thin wire glasses sat upon his perfectly pointed nose, and his hair—maybe his best physical trait—was a gold-blond layer of spiky perfection. It seemed that his name was meant for someone different. Almost as if his parents had chosen it with wishful thinking. It was like naming a kitten Tiger.

  “A pleasure to meet you, Cori,” he spoke with such eloquence. “I’m told you are from the great state of Tennessee?”

  She grinned. “Uh, no. I’m from Indianapolis.”

  He semi-glared at Peg, and she shrugged. “Someone told me Tennessee. So kill me.”

  He returned his attention to Cori. “How are you liking the tiny town of Asher?”

  Not wanting to offend him, she said, “It’s nice.”