“These are the rules,” he continued, “the fucking rules. Rules you helped make.”
“Kill him!” Liv shrieked. “Jeffers, you kill him now!”
Jeffers attempted to laugh but could only manage a throaty growl. For a moment, he just stared at Liv. “You wouldn’t miss him?” he asked, sarcasm tightening his broken voice. “You wouldn’t miss fucking him?”
Liv’s jaw went slack and her eyes widened as they darted between Jeffers and me. “No,” she gasped. “No, Jeffers—”
“Shut up!” I roared, and jumped to my feet. My hands clenched into fists, I loomed over her and her mouth snapped shut.
“Get her out of the cage,” I demanded, turning to Jeffers.
Struggling to get to his feet, Jeffers took a fighting stance and shook his head. “No.”
Nostrils flaring, I dove across the small space between us and slammed my fist into his face as our bodies came crashing together. I threw punch after punch, between dodging and ducking his fists. We were evenly matched, but I had one advantage.
I didn’t care anymore. I didn’t give a single fuck. There was only one way that this was going to end.
One of us was going to die.
• • •
Autumn
As the biter continued toward me, I thought back to the time that a different biter had stumbled upon my cave, how it had clawed and scratched, desperate to climb inside and get to me. I’d sat vigil in the dark, rocking back and forth, hoping and praying that it would eventually give up and go away. But as time passed, it only increased its attempts.
For two days I’d waited for the biter to leave, until I was so hungry and thirsty, I’d had no choice but finally crawl from my corner and come up with a plan.
With shaking hands, I’d wrapped my fingers around a large rock and tiptoed my way to the opening of the cave. The creature was a horrible sight, its face twisted and warped with decay, its skinless fingers reaching through the opening, clawing at whatever it could find purchase on.
My stomach in knots, fear gripping my chest to the point of pain, I bent down on my knees and lifted that rock, and with a scream that could have shattered glass, I brought it down on its skull as hard as I could.
I’d been brave then, and I could be brave now.
I had to be brave.
Letting go of the fragile sanity that I’d been clinging to, sanity that I had only just regained after years of surviving on my own, I launched myself at the biter. Pushing past a flurry of rotten and frenzied limbs, my hands grappled for purchase on any part of it, finally finding its head. I gripped its skull between my sweaty palms, digging my nails into its decaying flesh, and I squeezed.
I squeezed and I squeezed, feeling the brittle bone beneath the leathered skin begin to crack. Mere inches from my face, its teeth were snapping, its eyes wide and wild as its hands clawed at my sides, tearing my clothing and pushing painfully into my skin.
And still I squeezed. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I squeezed until my arms ached and my throat burned, until I lost myself somewhere between that invisible place between this world and the next. I refused to die, but so did it. The creature fought for its false life just as I clung to mine.
To onlookers, it was a battle to the death. For me, however, it was a battle for life, a battle that I wasn’t strong enough to make it through, and yet I refused to give up. I wanted this life, this life with Eagle where I wasn’t alone. I wanted it so powerfully and profoundly that I couldn’t give up even if I wanted to, because Eagle had taught me how to live. He had brought me back from nothing and made me whole again, and I would be fucking sturdy for him, even if it killed me.
Wild with hunger, the biter thrashed and lost its balance, and together we toppled to the floor of the cage. Straddling its body, I kept my grip on its head and lifted it, then smashed back down against the ground with more force than I’d thought myself capable of. I smashed over and over until the skull cracked and the skin split. Bits of brain and fluid seeped out, and still I smashed it over and over without stopping, even after I felt the skull collapse beneath my fingers.
The snarling stopped, the hands digging into my waist went limp and fell away. But I couldn’t stop. Screaming, and shaking so violently that the world around me appeared to be vibrating, I continued to pound its head into the ground.
I smashed it over and over again until it was nothing but mush. There was nothing else there, nothing else beneath this rotten blood and shattered bone. I smashed until there was nothing left for my fingers to hold on to, and with one final sorrow-filled cry, I finally stopped.
My arms aching and my body sore, I looked up and out at the crowd, my vision blurry, and blinked as I stared at them. The silent faces gawped at me, their mouths open in shock, and then I fell to my side, broken and lost.
It was over. I had won. But how could this ever be called winning? I had discovered the secret, staring death in the face and sending it back to hell. Listening to the crowd’s screams for my demise, I had found it, the truth of this world, the key to our existence ...
Beneath the blood and bone, there was nothing.
There was nothing.
There was nothing more than this. Nothing to reach for, nothing to wish for.
