And not a minute later, the radio speakers blared with a new voice – this one belonging to a soft-spoken man, telling of a community of survivors occupying the castle in the village of Sible.
“There are over thirty of us here already,” the man said. “Carpenters, doctors, nurses, policemen, chefs, firefighters… people from all different backgrounds with different skills. Valuable skills. Since this started, I’ve seen people band together and help each other. I’ve seen people come to the aid of complete strangers. I always thought that desperate situations bring out the worst in human beings, but that isn’t always the case. Because when everything else is stripped away and the life you’ve always known falls apart, it forces you to ask what matters most to you. Forces you to change. And sometimes – maybe more often than we like to admit – that change is for the better.
“What we’re trying to build here is a community of people who can learn and grow from the struggles we’ve all faced. We don’t just want to survive; we want to build a new world where we can thrive. And we’re inviting anyone listening to come and be part of that new world so we can win this war against the undead. I said it when I started this transmission, but in case you’ve just tuned in, we are at Sible Castle in Essex. I repeat, Sible Castle in Essex. I’ll be on here three times a day for the next week to relay this same message. Good luck out there.”
8.
Sible Castle was about a forty-minute drive away. And they had doctors there. As soon as the man on the radio had mentioned that, Kingsley’s mind had gone to Eric.
Because he needed a doctor. It had been nearly a week and the co-amoxiclav wasn’t working. Perhaps they just needed different antibiotics to beat the infection, but the time it would take to loot a hospital or pharmacy for more was time Eric didn’t have. And then what if it didn’t help?
Eric would stand a much better chance of survival if he could get treatment from a medical professional.
Kingsley had already made his mind up. He told the others.
Leena was shaking her head before he had finished. “That sounds like a terrible idea,” she said. “I’m sorry, but are you actually suggesting we throw away everything we have here to go sit on a rock and entertain the fantasy of a man we’ve never met? I’m surprised you’re even that quick to believe he was telling the truth. Because I think it’s just as likely that this community is really a group of maniacs selling hope to other survivors to lure them into a trap where they can kill them and steal everything they have. After all you’ve been through, I should think you would feel the same.”
Kingsley thought about all the terrible things he’d seen people do; Darren shooting James, Mark trailing them for days to get his revenge and then brutally murdering Sammy, Rebecca and Kara.
But he’d also seen people do good things; he thought about Emma saving a homeless man and his dog from the undead, and that same homeless man helping him find his friends, fighting side-by-side with him. He thought about Kara and Rebecca giving their lives in an effort to rescue Sammy, who they had only met a day prior.
A week ago, Kingsley would have agreed with Leena. In fact, there was a part of him that still thought that way. Reluctant to place trust in the good nature of human beings, reluctant to hope. But it didn’t matter.
Eric needs help.
Kingsley sighed. “I understand where you’re coming from. You have a safe place here and a family to look out for, kids to care for. I get that. So I won’t ask anyone to come with me. But… if that man’s telling the truth about this community, you’d be a lot safer there with all those other survivors. And it’s not like this house is going to disappear; we can scout the castle out from a distance, and if it looks dodgy, we turn back.”
He glanced at the others, hoping someone would voice their agreement. With or without them, Kingsley was going to that castle. But he’d rather not say goodbye to Emma a second time.
Emma opened her mouth to say something but Leena piped up again before she could speak.
“Look, I’ll be honest with you… I don’t trust you. You said you came back to Colchester because you didn’t know where else to go. But that’s bullshit, isn’t it? It’s obvious you still have feelings for my sister, and I bet you had it in your head that if you could protect her, you might earn her respect again. Maybe she would even forget what you took from her and fall in love with you all over again. Well, I’m here to tell you that—”
“Stop,” Emma interrupted. Everyone looked at her.
Staring her sister in the eye, she folded her arms and said, “Kingsley’s right. I think we should go with him.”
Leena frowned. “What?”
“This house won’t be safe forever. We need to stick together.”
After several seconds of stunned silence, Leena’s lips pursed as if she was about to say something. But the words didn’t come out and instead she shook her head, turned on her heel and marched out of the room.
Emma followed, hobbling after her sister on the ornate cane Brian had given her. Kingsley stared at the doorway and tried to make sense of what had just happened.
*
Hours later, Kingsley watched from the van as the others got into their vehicles. Leena, Dave and the kids in the SUV. Archie riding with Brian in his dark grey sedan.
After Emma had talked her
