From the skin of the dréag wept tears of black blood that froze the hands of the men. Numb-fingered, took they the raven’s food and thrust it into the ground, stopping the way with stone. Then came the women and children, half-starved and scared, with shale from their houses and flint from their fields, to roof over the barrow so naught might grow upon it again. But beneath the blood, the hands of the men were white as midwinter snow.
Long then were the nights, though summer should have made sweet the sky. Brought the day little sun and no hope, and dwindled horse and kine for lack of grass. All kept watch for the waning of the moon, and what they knew it must bring.
When saw the watchers the wight again, it was the death of hope. No strength of sinew nor holiness of heart could drive the dréag down whither it should be, and its foulness drained the life from the land. Dim were the days and dead the fields, and the men with white hands walked about with empty eyes, stopping neither for food nor for sleep. Dread they woke in those who saw them, and in fear some sought to fight them; but when their foes their hands met, numb went their limbs, as if winter’s cold bent their bones. And so left they such men to wander, and those who had not forsaken hope kept far from their path.
But unaware the eorl was not, and had readied himself for this rising.
On the ground before his hall stood a stone. Into this carved the god-man his strongest runes, and wrote over them with his blood, begging the gods, the great ones of the other worlds, to make the stone the stopping of this bane.
Sent the eorl the last of his thanes to the bone-home’s bed, where the wight stood again. Dragged they the dréag thence, the white-handed ones walking after, as if they were the thanes of that thing. But stopped they at the stakes that marked the ground of the eorl’s hall.
On that ground one woman came forth, having kissed her kin and bid them farewell; Saehild was her name, and well she knew this work would be her death or worse. But for the well-being of her folk, put she her hands to the lich’s flesh, cutting it loose with an iron knife. Ulfcytel, best of the thanes, took the body-sticks she bared and laid them upon the stone, that the god-man had named the grinder of the grave. With other stones he broke them, stones carved also with the runes and blood of the god-man, while put Saehild the flesh into a churn of oak, whose staff then beat it soft. White grew their skin where it met bone and meat, but their word they had given, and break it they would not before they were done.
When ended their work, stood they with the empty-eyed ones; but their word they had kept, and so the eorl gave wergeld to their kin.
What abided still they put into a box, whose lid they nailed down with iron. At ene fell dead the god-man, and his body rotted where it lay. At this ill foretoken, more gave in to fear, but said the eorl that all his strength had gone into the spell, and his death was a mark of its might.
Few then yet stood at the eorl’s side. Frost-bitten was the wind and dim the light, and held many to their homes; of those who did not, too many walked about bearing white skin and empty eyes. But yet lived hope in the eorl’s heart. Took he the box and rode to the wealth-house of the dead, shifting aside the stone to bury his burden where first they had laid the lich, in harvest-time so long before. Then, having roofed the room anew, set he a watch, to see if things would now be well.
The end of this, all men know. Upon the dark of the moon, rose for the last time what men had thought to rid themselves of, fed full by the blood of the god-man, witlessly given. Came then those who yet lived, herded before the white-handed ones, to see the doom of the eorl, torn asunder for seeking to stop this thing. Fell his wound-flood upon the watching ones, waking hunger in their hearts. Crawled they up the barrow’s side to beg the blessing from the dréag; cut he his arm, and from it drank they the wolf-wine, which gave to them knowledge of their wyrd, and new ravening.
And so has it been since that day. Never came the sun over this land after that; dwell we therefore in darkness, that men from without hold in fear. From our new god take we our gift, and do his will however he bids. All hail to the holy one, the bestower of blood, the gainsayer of the grave, whose life and might shall be everlasting.
Jack and Jill
Jonathan Maberry
Jack Porter was twelve going on never grow up.
He was one of the walking dead.
He knew it. Everyone knew it.
Remission was not a reprieve; it just put you in a longer line at the airport. Jack had seen what happened to his cousin, Toby. Three remissions in three years. Hope pushed Toby into a corner and beat the shit out of him each time. Toby was a ghost in third grade, a skeleton in fourth grade, a withered thing in a bed by the end of fifth grade, and bones in a box before sixth grade even started. All that hope had accomplished was to make everyone more afraid.
Now it was Jack’s turn.
Chemo, radiation. Bone marrow transplants. Even surgery.
Like they say in the movies, life sucks and then you die.
So, yeah, life sucked.
What there was of it.
What there was left.
Jack sat cross-legged on the edge of his bed watching the weatherman on TV talk about the big storm that was about to hit. He kept going on and on about the dangers of floods and there was a continuous scroll across the bottom of the screen that listed the evacuation shelters.
Jack ate dry Honey-Nut Cheerios out of a bowl and thought about floods. The east bend of the river was one hundred feet from the house. Uncle Roger liked to say that they were a football field away, back door to muddy banks. Twice the river had flooded enough for there to be some small wavelets licking at the bottom step of the porch. But there hadn’t ever been a storm as bad as what they were predicting, at least not in Jack’s lifetime. The last storm big enough to flood the whole farm had been in 1931. Jack knew that because they showed flood maps on TV. The weather guy was really into it. He seemed jazzed by the idea that a lot of Stebbins County could be flooded out.
Jack was kind of jazzed about it, too.
It beat the crap out of rotting away. Remission or not, Jack was certain that he could feel himself die, cell by cell. He dreamed about that, thought about it. Wrote in his journal about it. Did everything but talk about it.
Not even to Jill. Jack and Jill had sworn an oath years ago to tell each other everything, no secrets. Not one. But that was before Jack got sick. That was back when they were two peas in a pod. Alike in everything, except that Jack was a boy and Jill was a girl. Back then, back when they’d made that pact, they were just kids. You could barely tell one from the other except in the bath.
Years ago. A lifetime ago, as Jack saw it.
The sickness changed everything. There were some secrets the dying were allowed to keep to themselves.
Jack watched the Doppler radar of the coming storm and smiled. He had an ear bud nestled into one ear and was also listening to Magic Marti on the radio. She was hyped about the storm, too, sounding as excited as Jack felt.
“Despite heavy winds, the storm front is slowing down and looks like it’s going to park right on the Maryland/Pennsylvania Border, with Stebbins County taking the brunt of it. They’re calling for torrential rains and strong winds, along with severe flooding. And here’s a twist . . . even though this is a November storm, warm air masses from the south are bringing significant lightning, and so far there have been several serious strikes. Air traffic is being diverted around the storm.”