Fate's Surrender (Eternal Sorrows Book 3) Read online

  But the thing no one had mentioned yet was why, if they were so strong and capable, had they failed to kill this Dark One all those years ago? Why lock her away and seal her power? Why not just kill her if she was so dangerous?

  This had been the question on Karmen’s mind since last night, even though she hadn’t dared speak it out loud.

  There was only one answer to that question, anyway.

  The only reason they wouldn’t have killed her back then was that they couldn’t. And that was with their full memories and power.

  What exactly did they think they were going to do against her now when they had no real clue what their true abilities were or how to effectively use them?

  They needed more time. They needed someone to teach them what to do. Karmen was sure she had only scratched the surface of her powers.

  Yes, she could somehow reach into people’s minds and command them in some way, but she had a feeling she could do more than that if she really tried. Like listen to their thoughts, maybe.

  Or see inside their dreams.

  That’s what that witch had done, right? Lily? She’d seen inside Crash’s dreams.

  Well, maybe Karmen could do that, too.

  And she wanted more time to play around with those abilities before they went charging into a city full of those dead things. Ugh. It sucked that Zoe was trapped in New York, of all places.

  Why couldn’t she have been playing her violin in Cincinnati? Or Nashville? Somewhere with less than a million people living there?

  Better than Vienna or Paris, where they’d have almost no hope of reaching her, but it still sucked.

  Karmen understood why they had to get up there to find Zoe and the fifth before the Dark One could find them, but that didn’t mean she had to like it.

  If the others thought a handful of super zombies were difficult to defeat and that they’d barely survived the hospital, what did they think they were going to face in Manhattan?

  A million regular rotters. Hundreds, maybe thousands of super zombies. If Lily was really creating them herself, and she was up there now with at least a full day’s head start, she would have plenty of time to create an army of them and place them all around the city.

  They were never going to get through all that, and Lily knew it.

  But Lily also knew that Parrish wouldn’t be able to resist going after Zoe.

  Karmen shook her head and plopped herself down on a concrete block at the edge of the roof. Could she seriously blame Parrish, though?

  If she’d had a younger sister, she would have protected that little girl more fiercely than anyone could imagine. There was no way she would have ever let her father mess with her little sister the way he had done with Karmen. She would have killed him first.

  So, she could kind of understand how Parrish felt.

  Karmen’s stomach twisted as she thought of what they were about to face. There was no avoiding it, really. They had to get to New York, find Zoe, and meet up with the fifth. They had discussed it all morning before the sun came up, and no matter how much she hated it, she knew they had to go.

  A single male guard was up on the roof with her, pacing from one side of the rooftop to the other, looking out for any sign of unusual activity. He’d passed by Karmen’s perch at the edge of the roof multiple times, but this time, he stopped in his tracks and cursed loudly.

  She looked up, prepared to tell him to watch his language, but the second she saw the sheer terror on his face, she shut her mouth and followed his gaze.

  Karmen scrambled to her feet and backed away from the edge of the roof.

  An army of rotters stumbled down the streets. It wasn’t just one or two. It was hundreds. Thousands, maybe. Elbow to elbow coming from every visible street in this direction.

  “No. No, no, no,” the guard muttered.

  He seemed to be frozen in his tracks, just staring ahead with his mouth open.

  “Sound the alarm,” Karmen shouted, waving a hand in front of the guy’s face. “There’s no time to waste here. We have to move now.”

  The guy didn’t move. A tear rolled down his cheek, and he looked like he was contemplating dropping to the ground and rolling into the fetal position.

  Some lookout he turned out to be.

  If he didn’t get everyone to their stations right away, they were going to be in some major trouble.

  No wonder the freaking neighborhoods had been so quiet all morning on their drive back. Hadn’t they learned their lesson with this crap yesterday on their way over to the hospital?

  An abnormal lack of rotter activity did not mean they weren’t there. It meant they were somewhere you couldn’t see them, assembling for a massive attack.

  She wouldn’t forget it again.

  Karmen closed her eyes and focused her energy, reaching into the guard’s mind with as calm a tone as she could muster, considering the circumstances.

  It’s going to be okay. Sound the alarm and call for help. Get moving now.

  The moment she thought the word “now”, the guard seemed to wake up. He ran over toward the siren Karmen had seen them cranking when the group first got there, but instead of turning the hand crank, he reached for a walkie hidden there in a bag beneath it.

  The walkie had a strip of red electrical tape around it.

  “Code red,” he said clearly. “All hands on deck. We have a horde approaching from the South…”

  He turned in a circle to survey the area and stopped abruptly, dropping the walkie to the ground. The hard plastic side broke into several pieces that scattered across the ground at his feet.

  Loud static responded from the broken walkie, but Karmen couldn’t hear what the person on the other side was saying. She picked it up and pressed the button on the side, hoping whoever was there could at least still hear her.

  “Major horde approaching the compound from all directions,” she shouted. “Get your asses to your stations. Now.”

  More static responded, so Karmen did the only thing she could think of doing. She had no idea if it would work, but at this point, she had to at least try.

  She gripped the walkie in her hand and focused her attention on whoever nearby might be tuned into this frequency.

  We are being attacked. Thousands of rotters from all directions. Move as fast as you can. Spread the word.

  The guard near her still hadn’t moved at all, but she didn’t have time to sit up here and babysit him. She needed to find her friends as fast as possible.

  The group here was about to get the shock of their lives when they saw the real way she and her friends fought, but if they had any hope of survival, none of them could hold back.

  A terrifying thought crossed her mind, and with a growing knot in her stomach, she turned to look at the group of rotters once again. She couldn’t quite see them clearly from here. It just looked like a mass of putrid bodies, but she remembered seeing the guy next to her looking through a set of fancy binocular thingies a few times.

  She turned to him and was about to ask him to hand them over, but he had totally lost it. His entire body trembled, and his wide eyes made him look insane.

  “This can’t be happening,” he said. “We cleared all these areas. We’ll never survive this. We’re all going to die.”

  Something about the way he looked seemed strange to Karmen at first, but she immediately realized what it was.

  Those last words hadn’t been spoken out loud. For the first time, Karmen had actually been able to hear what someone else was thinking.

  Goosebumps broke out all over her arms.

  “We’ll be fine,” she said, patting him on the shoulder and sending a wave of calm energy into his mind. “Call everyone in. This is what you’ve been training for. And hand me those binoculars.”

  He nodded, inhaled a ragged breath, and then handed her the military-grade binoculars he’d had clipped to his belt.

  The door to the roof pushed open, and a group of armed men and women rushed out, the fear
in their eyes turning to sheer terror as they saw the number of rotters headed their way.

  But these guys had no idea what terror was yet.

  With trembling hands, Karmen brought the binoculars up to her eyes and searched the ocean of rotters, looking for one thing.

  Glowing red eyes.

  Seven

  Parrish

  Parrish marked three potential docking sites with pennies from a dish on Tank’s desk. No one would likely be using this kind of money again for a very long time. If ever. It felt foreign in her hand.

  “Where, exactly, is your sister hiding out?” Tank asked. “And you still haven’t explained to me how you know for sure she’s alive. None of the phones have been working for a long time.”

  “Her last known location was the Four Seasons,” Parrish said, not really wanting to have to explain more than that. “She’s likely still close to there.”

  Tank opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off.

  “Look, I know you think we’re taking a huge risk here, but I don’t think I have the energy to explain to you how we know or why it’s so important that we go,” she said. “I would appreciate it if you would just trust that we know what we’re doing and let it go.”

  Tank raised his eyebrows and looked at Crash, who just shrugged.

  “Okay,” Tank said. “I’ll take your word for it, and if you really want me to, I’ll stop trying to talk you out of it. You have to understand just how hard it is for me to think about you kids voluntarily walking into such a terrible situation. I’d rather you stayed here, where you’re safe.”

  As if to contradict his argument, though, a walkie on his desk with a strip of red tape across it lit up. “Code red,” the man on the other side said. “All hands on deck. We have a horde approaching—”

  Tank picked up the walkie and pressed the button.

  “Jonathan, say again,” he said. “How many can you see?

  There was no response. Just static.

  Tank repeated himself, but he didn’t wait for more information to come through. He grabbed a set of rifles leaning against the wall behind him and handed one to Crash.

  “Let’s get to the roof,” he said.

  Parrish and Crash shared a look.

  This was not good. And by not good, it was potentially catastrophic.

  Had their actions at the hospital brought the wrath of the Dark One down on this small compound of survivors? Parrish would never forgive herself if the families sheltered here died today.

  Static burst out of the walkie, but it was too jumbled to really hear. It sounded like a female voice this time, but Parrish only caught a few words like “horde”, “compound”, and “stations”.

  “Damn this thing,” Tank yelled, throwing it to the ground. “We have to get up there.”

  He took a few steps and then stopped all of a sudden, placing a hand to his temple. He shook his head, confused.

  “What is it?” Parrish asked. “Are you okay?”

  Tank took a deep breath and looked into her eyes. “I don’t know,” he said. “The weirdest thing. Like someone was talking directly into my mind. What the hell is happening here today?”

  Parrish exchanged another look with Crash.

  “Karmen,” he said. “She must be up on the roof. Come on.”

  But Parrish only took a handful of steps before she heard Karmen’s voice in her own mind. Tank was right. It was definitely weird to hear someone else’s voice in her head. It was almost like she was wearing headphones and talking on the phone, but it was even clearer than that.

  Like Karmen had opened a direct line into her brain.

  Neat trick, but when the hell had she learned to do that?

  It’s bad, you guys. Maybe thousands. Some have red eyes. Meet me in our room as fast as possible. Already on my way there.

  Crash grabbed Parrish’s arm.

  “Did you hear her, too?” he asked.

  “What are you doing?” Tank shouted over his shoulder. “Get to the roof, and tell everyone you see on the way to grab their weapons and get to their stations.”

  He disappeared around the corner, but Parrish and Crash didn’t follow him.

  “I heard,” she said. “Let’s get to the room.”

  They both took off running in the opposite direction from Tank, heading back toward the sleeping quarters. Parrish prayed Noah was in the room, or that wherever he was, he heard Karmen, too.

  Parrish had no idea how long Karmen had been able to do something like that, but the girl had basically opened a party line into their brains.

  That would come in handy. If they survived whatever the heck was going on outside.

  Another horde? Red-eyed super zombies?

  It had been less than twenty-four hours since they’d fought the last group of zombies at the hospital. The Dark One wasn’t giving them any breathing room, that’s for sure.

  But this time, she was going after more than just the four of them. She was going after an entire compound full of innocent families.

  “What’s our strategy?” she said to Crash as they ran through the hallways. “We aren’t going to be able to hide our abilities if we really want to save these people.”

  “Damn, I didn’t think of that,” he said. “But you’re right. I just hope it’s going to be enough. Karmen said there were maybe thousands of rotters out there. I mean, I know she can be prone to exaggeration and drama sometimes, but I doubt she’d overestimate this kind of thing.”

  “I don’t think so, either,” Parrish said, a knot of fear forming in her stomach. This was bad. “The group here can probably handle a good deal of the normal ones with the weapons they have, but if one of those super zombies breaks through the fence or scales the walls they built here, they could take out half the compound before anyone knew what was happening. These people are defenseless against zombies with powers.”

  “We can’t let that happen,” he said just as they got to the room.

  But when Parrish turned the knob, it wouldn’t budge.

  She backed up to check the room number, but it was definitely the right room.

  She tried the door again, but it was locked. She pounded on the door.

  “Noah? Are you in there?” she asked. “Open the door. There’s a horde outside the walls.”

  When there was no response, something inside Parrish twisted. What was going on here?

  Karmen came running down the hallway, her eyes wide. “It actually worked, didn’t it?” she asked. “What are you both doing out here? Let’s get inside and come up with a plan before it’s too late.”

  “The door’s locked,” Crash said.

  “Is Noah in there?” Karmen asked.

  “We don’t know,” Parrish said. “Did you try to reach him with your mind earlier?”

  “I tried to connect with all of you,” she said.

  “Can you tell if he’s in there?” Parrish asked.

  Why wasn’t he answering the door? And why would he have locked it in the first place?

  Maybe he just wasn’t in there at all. Maybe he was on his way here now, and he’d just locked the door behind him to keep their stuff safe.

  That had to be it.

  Only, she didn’t think that was it. She knew he was in that room, and that something was wrong. She could feel it.

  “We have to break it down,” she shouted, suddenly feeling that they didn’t have much time. “Crash, help me.”

  Together, they both walked as far away from the door as they could and then counted to three. In sync, they both rammed the side of their bodies into the door.

  Thankfully, these rooms were not designed to be all that secure. No one who built this place ever expected it to be a safe zone against a zombie horde or anything like that, so there was just a normal doorknob and lock, like you’d see in any house or office building.

  The door opened, and both she and Crash had to catch themselves before they ran into the set of bunk beds against the wall on the other
side of the room.

  To her horror, Noah was curled up on the floor, shivering.

  No, shivering was not a strong enough word to describe it. He was shaking uncontrollably.

  Parrish dropped to the floor at his side.

  “Noah, can you hear me?” she asked.

  She placed a hand on his arm to try to get him to open his eyes, but the moment her skin touched his, her panic ratcheted up a notch.

  “He’s burning up,” she said. “Crash, grab a washcloth and water bottle from my bag.”

  “We don’t have time for this,” Karmen said. “He has to wake up. How did he even get sick?”

  Parrish shook him a little less gently this time, and he didn’t even attempt to open his eyes. Was he in some kind of coma?

  When had this happened? She’d just seen him an hour or so ago when he’d told her to go to Tank’s office. He seemed fine then. How had he gotten so sick in just an hour?

  Her entire body went stiff with fear.

  “Do you think it’s possible he’s been bitten?” she asked.

  Noah had apparently taken most of his clothes off before he climbed into bed, so it made it easier for her to search for any kind of bite.

  “There’s not a scratch on him,” she said. “I don’t understand. What could have happened to him?”

  Crash handed her a cool, wet washcloth, and she pressed it against his forehead.

  “Stephen,” he said, sitting down on one of the other beds. “He helped to heal Stephen, earlier. The guy was so far gone, everyone was sure he was going to die. Even with the antibiotics, it wasn’t looking good. But Noah stepped in. Did his healing thing. Maybe something got into his system.”

  Parrish tried to calm her mind, but it was racing a mile a minute.

  They had a horde of zombies closing in on this place, with God knows how many super zombies in the mix. Zoe and the fifth were alive and trapped somewhere in New York with the Dark One and Lily searching for them.

  And now Noah had contracted some kind of potentially fatal illness from trying to heal a guy they’d never spoken to before and already risked their lives to save.

  It was not a great day.

  “I hate to break it to you, but we don’t have time to deal with him right now,” Karmen said. “Let him stay in here and rest if he has to, but we’ve got a horde to deal with.”