“Dad!” she screamed.
Her father’s eyes met hers and went wide with fear. “Get out!” he shouted as a swarm of flying snakes settled on him like a boiling coat of writhing black tar.
The snake creatures chittered and squeaked in excitement, their voices high and painful in Zoe’s ears. In a few seconds, everyone in the café was lost beneath seething piles of the hungry creatures. Snakes broke away from the pack and flew at her, tearing at her face and arms with needle-sharp teeth.
Zoe stumbled outside and ran back along the street. She stopped once at the corner to puke, but there was nothing in her stomach, so she just dry-heaved painfully. When she could get up, she started running again, heading back the way she’d come with Valentine. She ran back to the living, twisting buildings, over walkways that changed under her feet and through underpasses where the windows in sideways buildings showed her the inside of ghost kitchens and bedrooms. She ran until the pain in her leg forced her to stop. She looked around for landmarks. She was by a small park with broken benches and a jungle gym covered in cobwebs. Zoe didn’t recognize any of it. She was lost.
She followed the empty streets back along a path that felt right, but that she knew in her heart wasn’t taking her anywhere she knew. The streets grew narrower, the buildings older and more weather-beaten as she walked. The abandoned cars that dotted the other streets now became old single-speed bikes so choked with rust they were practically fossilized. Soon the asphalt gave way to wet cobblestones and the yellow light of gas lamps. This was an old part of town she’d seen earlier with Valentine, she was sure of it. If she could find her way through and back to her father’s building, she knew she could get to the boardwalk and work her way to Valentine’s home.
Along the way, she passed empty bakeries and a closed Laundromat full of rotting clothes. Occasionally, she’d catch a glimpse of someone ahead in the street, but they were always just stepping out of sight, turning down a side street or hurrying inside a building. The city was full of dead souls, but she hardly saw anyone. They’re all hiding inside, she thought, afraid of their queen and her dogs. And worse. The image of her father covered in snakes flashed into her head and she had to push it out or she knew she’d scream. Just get back to Valentine’s. Get back where it’s safe. Then I can think about it. But not now or I’ll come apart right here and die.
Jewels were scattered in the gutter. Diamonds. Rubies. Sapphires. She stopped to pick up some pearls, and when she stood again she saw three black dogs staring at her from the corner. As she started to cross the street away from them, one of the dogs raised its head and snarled. The others turned in her direction, showing their teeth and letting out deep, rumbling growls. Zoe was sure that the way to the beach was down the street where the dogs sat, so she walked a few yards past them, giving them a wide berth, hoping she could circle back and around them. One dog rolled to its feet and loped toward her. The others followed.
Zoe remembered a mean Doberman that one of the neighbors owned when she was a little girl. The first lesson her father had taught her was to never run from a dog. Zoe turned to her right and walked steadily away from the hounds, forcing herself to keep an even, unhurried pace, even as she heard the pack’s snarls getting closer. Her heart felt like it was trying to punch its way out of her chest. She tried to stay calm and breathe through her nose, but she couldn’t get air, so she gulped in lungfuls through her mouth. Could the dogs feel her fear?
Something tugged at the hem of her coat. As it pulled, it growled. Zoe tried to keep walking, but the growling grew louder and the pulling became more insistent. She couldn’t pull back because she was afraid of her ankle giving way and of falling. She knew if she did, the pack would never let her get up again. Zoe did the only thing she could think of. She stopped. To her relief, when she did, the dogs stopped, too. She felt the tension on her coat ease as the one pulling her let go. Then the snarling started again, deep-throated and deadly. The pack was spreading out behind her and moving forward, starting to encircle her.
Zoe stood her ground. She could hardly breathe and her hands shook. As the dogs moved closer they looked bigger than ever, the size of bulls or lions, but she knew that this was just fear playing tricks on her mind. She forced herself to stay still and not run. The dogs growl and let out small choked barks. Almost like they’re talking to each other, Zoe thought. And they’re not going to wait forever.
“Now or never,” she said. The dogs looked at her. She raised her right hand slowly. When it was chest-high, she threw the pearls she’d picked up as hard as she could. The dogs moved steadily toward her, but then the pearls began to fall, clattering and smashing apart as they hit the street, throwing gleaming shards into the air. The dogs leaped away from Zoe and tore after the rattling jewels. The moment they were gone, Zoe ran around the nearest corner.
The dogs turned as one and headed back for her, heads down, teeth bared. Zoe heard them behind her, barking and snarling. She ran as hard as she could, waiting for the attack, for the feel of the breath being knocked out of her as one leaped onto her back-the sound of the pack closing in on her when she went down. But nothing happened. Zoe stopped running and turned, looking back the way she’d come. Half a block back, the dogs paced impatiently at the entrance to the street. They whined and yelped, but refused to approach. Zoe turned in a slow circle, trying to catch her breath. She couldn’t see much around her. All the gas lamps had been broken and the street was dead black. Valentine said not to go down unlit streets. But he wasn’t here, and if he had been, would he be anxious to go back and face down a whole pack of the queen’s dogs?
She could make out the shapes of three- and four-story small apartment buildings, similar to others in the old quarter. But these buildings were barely standing. Some leaned heavily to one side, threatening to collapse. Others were mere skeletons with open roofs, charred by fire. The desiccated corpse of a black dog was nailed to the door of what might have once been a small church. Zoe stopped and stared in amazement at the sight. Who was crazy enough to kill and display the corpse of one of the queen’s spies for everyone to see? No one was going to come down here. Not unless they had to. She looked back and saw the dogs still pacing at the end of the street. Were they afraid, she wondered, or were they waiting for something? She turned back to the street, and understood instantly why the dogs hadn’t followed her.
“They” shambled onto the street one at a time or in stumbling groups. Zoe knew who they were and Valentine’s words came back to her. “There are souls a lot worse off than me,” he’d said. “The dying dead.”
They crawled from the doorless maws of crumbling buildings, clawed their way from under junked cars; they slipped from open windows and clambered from basements. They were thin beyond belief, less even than walking skeletons. They were sucked dry, empty, like papier-mâché ghosts on Halloween. But their teeth and nails looked hard.
It was too late to turn back. There were more behind her than in front. The souls were slow and she kept moving down the alley. Even on her bad ankle, when they reached for her, she was able to dodge their grasping hands.
As they lumbered out onto the street, the souls called to her. Their voices were barely a whisper. Not, Zoe knew, because they were trying to sneak up on her, but because they hadn’t had a reason to speak for a very long time and their vocal cords had withered to dry reeds.