Not good.
A third zombie lunges at me and rips off my mask. I gulp in a breath, only to realize the mask has been greatly dampening the stench of the battle. Gagging, I try not to hyperventilate as the zombie throws down my mask and stomps on it until it’s all but useless.
I flail and kick at my captors. Two zombies dive for my legs, grasping them and holding them in place. To my left, Valerian is bashing a zombie on the head with an arm he must’ve ripped off from another attacker. An armless zombie—presumably the owner of Valerian’s makeshift club—takes a swing at Valerian with its remaining hand.
A dozen more zombies gang up on Valerian, and I lose sight of him for a few terrifying seconds. All I hear are thuds of flesh beating flesh. I struggle harder. For some reason, the thought of him perishing is infinitely worse than the thought of myself dying in this putrid mess.
Some of the zombies shift aside, and I catch sight of him—bruised and battered but alive. My breath escapes in relief. Two zombies are holding his left arm and three his right, with each of his legs also meriting a couple of zombies.
For a guy with no supernatural speed or strength, he’s certainly holding his own.
The zombie who destroyed my mask lunges at Valerian and gives his mask the same treatment. Puck. This mask-stealing is deliberate.
There’s a flurry of movement from where Dylan stands over Rowan, but before I can make out what’s happening there, a shadow blots the sky, stealing my attention.
I look up as far as I can, nearly dislocating something in my neck.
It’s the bird, and it’s holding Keyser in its talons.
Puck. He’s found a way to bypass Fabian, Stanislav, and Ariel.
The bird deposits Keyser in front of me, and we lock eyes.
My heartbeat skyrockets.
His eyes aren’t just fiery. They’re rimmed with bloody tears.
Whoever made him the Overtaken also made sure he was infected with the virus.
I rip at the zombie hands holding me with renewed vigor, but I might as well try to move a concrete wall.
Keyser closes what little distance was between us, makes a disgusting hawking sound in his throat, and spits a large wad of mucus straight into my face.
I reflexively cringe, closing my eyes, and feel viscous liquid cover every inch of my face. My stomach heaves and my skin prickles as though it wants to crawl away from my body. This is worse than the dive into the moat sewer where I nearly got eaten. I’m so grossed out I think I might go into shock of the type people get when they lose a limb.
I crack open my lids in time to see Keyser spit at me again. It lands on my chin and drips down, sending a surge of bile up my throat.
“An agonizing end for you, child of Soma,” Keyser says in a gloating voice, killing what little hope I had that the splatter of blood under his eyes wasn’t the symptom of the virus.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Before I can recover from the gross assault or process his words, Keyser turns to face Valerian, who’s putting up a solid fight with the zombies trying to pin him down. As I realize Keyser’s intention, all blood drains from my face.
“No!” I yell—just as Keyser makes the same awful hawking noise and spits in Valerian’s unprotected face.
“I haven’t forgotten you either,” the necromancer says gloatingly.
My heartbeat is nearing lightspeed, and my vision is red from anger. I strain against the zombie hands holding me in place, but to no avail.
If I were free, I would rip Keyser into little pieces with my bare hands. I really would.
Through the haze of fury, I catch another sign of movement near Dylan.
It’s Rowan. She’s sitting up and looking around, her gaze unfocused.
Spotting Keyser, she shoots multicolored energy at one of the zombies holding Valerian’s right arm. That zombie releases Valerian and smashes a fist into Keyser’s face.
The bird takes flight and dives for Rowan. She shoots necromantic energy at it, while her zombie punches Keyser in the stomach. Air audibly whooshes out of Keyser’s lungs.
In the meantime, Valerian yanks on his partially freed right arm and twists it out of the other zombies’ grip. With a murderous look in his eyes, he punches Keyser in the temple.
The bird swoops, snatches Keyser with its claws, and takes flight. When they’re some twenty feet off the ground, Keyser shoots the bird with his energy. As an Overtaken, he seems oblivious to pain, which allows him to recover impossibly fast.
Rowan shoots the bird also, wrenching the control away long enough to force the bird to open its claws. Keyser plummets. With a desperate twist in the air, he takes over the bird and makes it swoop after him, but Rowan steals the bird back and makes it fly up.