Leah gunned the engine and headed straight toward them. At the last minute she aimed the motorcycle at a demon corpse to one side, clutched and revved the engine, then popped the clutch and pulled back on the handlebars. The front wheel hit the demon’s dead body and shot into the air.
She sailed a good twenty feet before touching down again, well over the snapping jaws of the Stalkers. The handlebar dragged against the side of the wall for just a moment, and Leah fought to keep control.
Then she raced forward again, mentally mapping her route through the city. Getting out would be the most dangerous part.
The Burn had spread past London’s geographical boundaries and sent uneven tendrils into the countryside surrounding the suburbs. The gray buildings of the inner city gave to homes with yards and space in between.
Although the line between the Burn and the snow-covered landscape beyond couldn’t be laid with a straightedge, enough of a change existed to make the difference immediately visual. The land closer to the city was dry and cracked. Inside London only acid rain had fallen in the past few weeks, and that had only been liquid death and not really any moisture.
The land beyond reminded Leah of Christmases with her family, long trips to her grandmother’s house, and a world where seasons still took place all over. Those, at least for the moment, were things of the past.
She glanced at the mirrors as she sped into the countryside. So far, it appeared that she’d left all the monsters behind. Demons filled London, but they weren’t everywhere.
Not yet.
She relaxed only a little as she gave herself to the road. She told herself that the safety she felt was only an illusion, not something to be trusted. The illusion shattered when she passed a roadside stand filled with rotted fruits and vegetables. Bloated corpses hung over the stand like grisly piñatas.
Leah knew the corpses weren’t the people who had owned the stand. Those people would have left years ago, when the Hellgate had first opened.
Something hunts regularly in this area, she told herself. It uses the stand to display its kills like trophies. It’s something that takes pride in its work.
She forced herself to look away from the dead and not remember that at one time they had been individuals with hopes and desires. At the same time, she hoped that she didn’t get so inured to switching off her feelings that one day they didn’t come back.
Kept warm by the blacksuit, which had now turned white as part of its camouflage technology, Leah trudged through the snow. The motorcycle was seven miles back, parked in the barn behind an old farmhouse. Stealth mode through the hill country didn’t involve a motorcycle that would easily get mired in the deep snow. She gazed at the hills and valleys, and at the snow-laden evergreens butted up next to the stark skeletons of oaks and ash.
The prodigious amount of snow impressed her. She couldn’t recall it ever snowing so much, and it just kept coming. She wondered if the proximity to the Burn caused the amount of snowfall’s increase. Maybe nature herself was trying to strike back at the demons.
A quarter mile farther on, she spotted the Templar scout high up on a ridge. When he didn’t move, Leah thought possibly the man hadn’t seen her. She wondered if she should turn off the camouflage utility on her suit or try to flag the man down.
Then two Templar, one male and one female, stepped from the brush ahead of her. They aimed machine pistols at her.
“Stop,” the female commanded.
Leah stopped and held her hands out at her sides.
“Who are you?” the woman demanded.
“I can remove my mask,” Leah offered.
“Do so slowly.”
Gingerly, Leah touched her finger to her mask and opened the electromagnetic seals. Once the mask disconnected from the blacksuit, it became as limp as fabric except for the extra Kevlar plates over the back of her skull, her forehead, around her eyes, her chin, and across her cheekbones. The constant electric current conducted through the suit “hardened” the fabric to near steel.
“My name is Leah Creasey,” she said. “I’m a friend of Simon’s. I mean, Lord Cross’s.”
The Templar stood still for a moment, then the man waved her forward. “We’ve identified you. You have clearance. Come along then.”
“May I put my mask back on?” she asked. Her breath made small gray puffs. “It’s cold out.”
“You may.”
Gratefully, Leah pulled the hood back on, fastened the electromagnetic seals, and felt the mask “harden” as the electricity was generated by her suit. In seconds, it was once more a form-fitting, bullet-resistant shield.
“Is Lord Cross at the redoubt?” Leah asked.
“Yes,” one of the men answered. “Would you like us to get a message to him?”
“No, thank you. I’d rather surprise him.”
“This really isn’t a good time for surprises, miss.”
“Give it a rest,” the female suggested. “Lord Cross will be glad to see her. And something like this? Well, it makes a good surprise.”
Leah hoped so, but she didn’t think the offer she’d come there to make would get a good reception. Simon Cross was one of the most fascinating men she’d ever met, but when it came to affairs of honor, he tended to keep everything controllable, neat, and honest.
She felt certain she knew what his answer to Lyra’s offer would be. She just hoped that he wasn’t so angry that he tossed her out flat on her arse.
TWENTY-ONE
How big do you think it is?”
Warren stared at the buried structure and shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Is it Roman?” Naomi asked. She stood beside him at the edge of the ditch dug by the zombies over the past five days.
The irregular ditch sometimes measured four feet wide and at other times closer
