Sorrow's Gift (Eternal Sorrows Book 2) Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2015 by Sarra Cannon

  ISBN: 978-1-62421-041-9

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  Cover Art by Sarah Hansen at Okay Creations

  http://okaycreations.com/

  Formatting by Dead River Books

  http://www.deadriverbooks.com/

  The last of the sun’s light lingered like a halo above the city.

  Zoe hated this time of day. Everything looked warm and beautiful, but as the night came, it turned cold and horrible. It was a betrayal of the worst kind, like giving hope to someone on death row.

  She didn’t like watching what came next, but this stupid suite had so many windows. When they’d first checked in, she’d thought they were lucky to get a room with such an amazing view of the city and a balcony.

  Now, she despised it. She had a front row seat to all the destruction and death. The fires that had spread throughout Central Park. The cars piled up in the streets where desperate people had rammed into each other, trying to force their way out of the city.

  And worst of all, she could see hundreds of those things as they shambled and limped along the sidewalks and streets below, their clothes covered in blood and their jaws snapping hungrily.

  She shuddered just thinking about it.

  It was almost dark again. The small groups that wandered the streets during the day were nothing compared to the large packs that took over during the darkest hours.

  Soon the undead would emerge from the shadows, their hungry mouths ringed with blood. The sound of their moans would echo in the streets below. Sometimes, she could hear people screaming.

  But the screams were less frequent now.

  Zoe wasn’t sure if that was because there were no survivors or if the ones who were left were hiding, like her. Waiting for something—or someone—to come save them. Zoe hadn’t seen more than a handful of survivors all week.

  In the first few days of the awakening, she had seen thousands of frightened people traveling in groups during the daytime, scrambling to escape the city. After the sun had set, she sometimes liked to imagine those people had made it somewhere safe. Somewhere the rotters didn’t exist. Someday, those people would come back for her and take her to a city that had running water and electricity. Maybe Parrish would be there waiting for her.

  But tonight she didn’t have the energy to pretend. She knew it was a fairy tale.

  No one was safe anymore. No one was coming for her.

  Maybe she was the only person left in the entire world.

  Every once in awhile, she caught the flutter of a curtain in the window of a building across the street. Sometimes she’d wave toward them, hoping they could see her. Longing for some kind of human connection. But she never saw their faces. For all she knew, it was a trick of her imagination. Maybe she really was all alone in this world.

  She hadn’t left the safety of her hotel room in more than a week. One of those things was trapped in the hallway just outside her door. She could hear it pacing the floor, roaming from one side to the other in an endless loop. It never seemed to get tired or want to sleep. It just walked and walked and walked.

  Her father was one of them now, too.

  When he’d first gotten sick, he had locked himself away, only talking to her through the door of his bedroom. He’d told her to stay safe and cover her mouth if anyone came into the room. He’d told her everything was going to be okay.

  But a couple days later, he’d stopped talking. He’d stopped coughing.

  It was the weirdest feeling to hear nothing on the other side of that door and know there was nothing she could do about it. He was dead and there was no doctor to call. No police or ambulance to help.

  There wouldn’t even be a funeral. Before the power shut off, she’d seen on TV that there were so many dead now they had started putting the bodies into mass graves. She’d thought maybe someone would come to collect her father’s body. But that was before the dead started walking around and attacking people. After that, the TV stopped reporting news and just started showing endless reruns until it finally cut off altogether.

  She was alone now, her dead father’s hungry moans the only thing keeping her company.

  Zoe had moved a few things in front of his door, just in case. Things she could carry. Her suitcase. A chair. She’d managed to push a table in front of his door, but everything else had been too heavy for her to move. She lived in constant fear, plagued by nightmares about her father pushing through that door and coming after her.

  She’d seen what the rotters do to the living.

  The thought of her father…

  A tear rolled down her cheek. What was wrong with the world? How could something like this be possible? Why wasn’t someone coming to save them?

  She turned away from the brilliant colors of the setting sun and ran the back of her hand under her runny nose. No one was coming, because there was no one left.

  Zoe glanced longingly at her violin case on the bar. God, she wanted to play so badly her fingers ached. She needed something to drown out the endless moans. The sorrow and death.

  The light was almost gone, and the tears began to flow. She hated the night. And right now, she had the thought that she wasn’t even sure she could survive it. Not again.

  Her heart ached. She ran her fingers along the rough edges of the black case and wished they’d never left their home in Virginia.

  She wished she knew if her mom and Parrish were still alive.

  If anyone was still alive out there.

  Zoe brought a hand to the silver necklace she wore. Parrish had given it to her the day she left for New York. An infinity sign with both their birthstones.

  Parrish promised she was coming to get her, but even that was just a fairy tale. Even if her sister was still alive, there was no way she’d make it through the city. It was hopeless.

  Zoe reluctantly closed the curtains as the last of the pink sunset disappeared on the horizon. In the darkness, she walked over to the bar and pulled her violin from its case. It was too dangerous to play at night. Noise agitated them and drew them closer. She needed to stay as quiet as possible and wait for morning.

  But the thought of another endless night with nothing to do but listen to the sound of their moans nearly broke her.

  Maybe it would be better to just invite them in and let it all be over.

  Crying, she lifted the instrument to her shoulder and rested her face against the cool chinrest, closing her eyes as she slid her bow effortlessly across the strings. The sound made her heart soar and expand, hope blossoming inside her for the first time in days. It was dangerous, but she didn’t care. She needed something. She needed to feel okay for a little while.

  She heard the orchestra in her head and imagined the conductor leading them as an entire hall full of people listened. She clung to the memory of the music.

  Sobs shook her shoulders as she played, knowing a rotter could burst through the door at any moment, lured by the sound of her violin. She didn’t care. Let them come. All she cared about was this one thing that told her she was still alive.

  This one thing that proved the whole world was not lost.

  Rotters flooded the streets of D.C.

  Parrish gripped a canvas loop hanging from the ceiling, her body jerking with each bump as the Humvee plowed over the corpses of the dead.

  At firs
t, no one spoke. They were all exhausted. Confused. And scared as hell.

  What were those things back there?

  Parrish had barely gotten used to the idea that the dead were walking around trying to eat the living. Now she was supposed to somehow wrap her head around the idea of super-zombies with magical powers and enormous strength?

  It was too much.

  Surviving the endless attacks of the regular rotters was hard enough when they were in big groups, but these super zombies? They were impossible. And worse, those things had come straight for them. It was almost like they’d been hunting them. If Crash hadn’t shown up when he did, what would have happened?

  Parrish closed her eyes and leaned her head against her arm. She didn’t want to think about that. She wanted to go to sleep and wake up tomorrow to find this was all some terrible nightmare.

  The worst part was that it still wasn’t over yet. They still weren’t safe.

  The truck swerved violently to one side and Parrish slammed into Noah. He reached his hands out to steady her, and the warmth of his fingers brushed across the bare skin at her waist.

  Parrish drew in a sharp breath and turned to look at him. A streak of blood had dried across his forehead and his hair was covered in dirt and ash, but his eyes were as blue as ever, clear and beautiful. Her heart raced a little faster.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  She nodded and looked away, gripping the loop tighter above her head. She didn’t want him to see her fear. Or her attraction. She scooted back over on the bench seat and shrugged out of his grasp.

  She needed to focus on survival. Staying alive so she could get to her sister in New York was all that mattered now. The last thing she needed was to be daydreaming about some guy.

  Still, her eyes traveled back to his.

  The problem was he wasn’t just some guy. This was Noah. She’d stayed up late thinking of him so many nights she’d lost count. He was the one she’d always looked for in a crowd. The one guy she’d ever wanted to kiss.

  But that was before the end of the world.

  He was staring at her, one hand gripping the canvas loop next to hers, and the other resting on the bench between them like a dare.

  “What were those new zombies? Where did they come from?” he asked, barely loud enough for her to hear over the roar of the Humvee’s engine and the groans of the undead clawing at the truck.

  “I don’t know,” she said. She scooted toward the guy in the driver’s seat. “Hey, Crash. You ever seen anything like those rotters back there? The ones with glowing eyes?”

  Even though he was only a few feet away, she had to shout to be heard.

  Crash shook his head. Their eyes met through the rear-view mirror for an instant. “No way, man. What the hell were they?”

  “I was hoping you would know,” she yelled back. “We’ve never seen anything like it. If you hadn’t gotten there in time, I don’t think we would have made it.”

  Across from her, Karmen pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her head between them.

  The new girl sat next to Karmen, her eyes wide and her hands cradled in her lap. Parrish still didn’t even know the girl’s name. They’d all risked their lives to rescue her, even though they had no idea who she was. How in the world had Crash even known she was up there? A dream, he’d said. She was the fifth. The one who was supposed to complete their group somehow. But what did that even mean?

  There were too many questions and not enough answers.

  Parrish just wanted to find a safe place where they could try to make sense of this.

  “How much farther?” she shouted.

  Crash pointed to something up ahead. “We’re almost there,” he said, slowing down to a stop. “But getting in is going to be a bitch.”

  There was only one small window in the back of the truck, so Parrish leaned forward to look through the windshield. Hundreds of rotters swarmed the vehicle, their bloodied hands grasping at metal, desperate to get inside. Their jaws snapped like gators, hungry for the taste of flesh.

  Parrish searched their eyes, looking for any sign of a red glow like the ones they’d fought in the office building earlier.

  Anger surged through her as she studied the monsters on the street. Some of them wore suits, as if they’d gotten dressed for work and died somewhere along the way. Some wore hospital gowns or pajamas. Jeans and t-shirts. But their clothes were the only things normal about them anymore. It was the only thing that proved they had been people once, just like her. Just like her mother.

  But there was nothing human about them anymore. Their milky eyes were wide and wild, desperate with hunger. Most of them were already rotting, their skin sagging and gray. Some had been partially eaten, their bones exposed and their clothes covered in dried blood.

  As her eyes scanned the group of them, rage pounded in her head.

  It wasn’t fair.

  It didn’t make any sense.

  How had this happened?

  She released her grip on the canvas loop and leaned forward. “Where exactly do we need to go?” she asked.

  Crash pointed to a gated garage about fifty feet away on the left. “That’s my apartment building,” he said. “I have the inside secured, but we have to find a way to hold these things off long enough to get the door open and drive inside without letting too many in with us.”

  She nodded and tried to estimate just how many were out there.

  “Give me ten minutes,” she said.

  Crash turned around in his seat, one eyebrow raised and a smile playing at the corners of his lips. He was a pretty good-looking guy, she realized for the first time. Asian with long, messy black hair and dark eyes. He looked a few years older than the rest of them.

  “What exactly do you have in mind?” he asked.

  Parrish glanced at the crowd of rotters standing between them and the gate. She reached back and closed her fingers around the hilt of her katana, carefully pulling the sword out of her bag.

  “I’m going to kill them all.”

  Noah moved forward to help open the back door of the Humvee. The entire inside of the vehicle had been customized and hollowed out to make room for two benches, one along each side, and a large door in the back. Karmen rushed forward, ready to shut the door quickly, but the new girl did nothing. She barely even looked up. Her hands were trembling.

  Was she in shock? How had she survived all on her own?

  Parrish shook her head and jumped forward, landing firmly on the pavement in front of Crash’s apartment building. There was no time to think or plan. There was only action.

  She and Noah raced around the left side of the truck. Most of the zombies had moved toward the front of the vehicle where the lights were shining. A few others stood alone in the darkness, stumbling toward the Humvee.

  She only had a breath’s worth of time to send up a prayer before she lifted her sword. The blade hit flesh and she winced as the sharpened sword sliced through the neck of a man in a brown suit.

  Or what used to be a man in a brown suit.

  His skin had begun to decay around his eyes and mouth, and there was a chunk of flesh missing from his cheek.

  The man’s head fell to the ground with a bloody thud.

  Noah moved ahead. He lifted his baseball bat and swung forward with enormous speed. The sound of wood meeting soft flesh rose over the sound of the truck’s engine as the zombie’s head caved in. Blood splattered out, some hitting the side of the dark green military vehicle.

  There was no time to think about what they were doing or who these people used to be. There was only time to kill. To do their best to survive.

  The two of them moved forward, picking off a handful of zombies that stumbled around the Humvee.

  They killed as quietly as they could, trying not to draw the attention of the larger group of rotters until they moved up near the front where they could be seen in the dim headlights.

  She wasn’t sure if they saw her or smelled her, b
ut the undead clustered in the headlights snapped their heads in her direction.

  Parrish didn’t hesitate. She swung her sword with a skill she still had no idea how she’d learned. Or when. She gave into that deep instinct and sliced into the first of the rotters—a woman with dirty blonde hair and bulging blue eyes. Her head landed at Parrish’s feet with a thump. Parrish kicked it aside and turned, gathering momentum and strength as she buried her sword into the neck of a large fat man.

  A bloodied hand grabbed her shoulder and tried to scratch at her, but she flipped around just in time, first kicking the dead woman away and then bringing her blade down hard on the woman’s skull, splitting it in two.

  Parrish gagged at the dark blood that spilled down the woman’s face as she fell forward.

  There was a part of her that just wanted to sit down and cry. To try to make sense of all this chaos. She needed peace and quiet and time to figure out how the world had turned into this horror show. But there were others clawing at her clothes, trying to grab her and drag her down.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw Noah’s bat slam into another of the zombies, crushing its skull like a rotten pumpkin.

  If he can do this, so can I.

  She drew in a deep breath, ignoring the putrid smell of decaying flesh, and forced herself to keep moving. She sliced and kicked and killed until a pile of bodies lay in a circle around her. She turned and looked for Noah.

  He was on the other side of the truck, fighting off a group of four or five.

  She scrambled over the bodies of the dead and ran through the headlights toward him.

  She drew in a breath and cursed. A huge crowd of rotters was making their way over from one of the side streets. There were too many of them. A lot more than four or five. There had to be dozens more. Hundreds, maybe. There was no way to kill them fast enough.

  She glanced at the Humvee. Should they give up and just go back inside and wait this out? It looked sturdy, but would they survive until morning?

  Parrish sheathed her sword and lifted her pistol into the air. Maybe she could kill them faster with a gun than with a sword. She took aim on one of the zombies in the middle of the crowd and squeezed the trigger.