When Benny had struck Charlie on the ridge and sent him tumbling into the darkness, Nix had not been a part of it. Charlie had overpowered her and Lilah; and it was a combination of dumb luck and warrior rage that had guided Benny’s hand as he swung the Motor City Hammer’s iron club. Charlie had fallen, but they hadn’t found his body. He was never quieted. For Nix, there was no closure. In some twisted way Charlie had escaped. And that had broken something inside Nix’s head. Maybe in her soul, as well. And with a flash of insight Benny realized that Nix’s desire to leave Mountainside was as much about running away from the possibility of facing Charlie, alive or dead, as it was about finding a new life.

Charlie Pink-eye took a lumbering step toward them. Benny snarled and pushed Nix back.

“God …” Nix’s voice was small and fragile.

Benny let out a bellow of fury and swung his hatchet, trying for a killing shot through the eye socket. Instead the glass blade dug into the front of Charlie’s cheek, punching through the sinus. The zoms in the dead-end tunnel moaned with raw hunger and shuffled forward, but Charlie’s massive body blocked the way. With a feral growl Charlie lashed out and knocked Benny sideways into the wall. The glass blade of the hatchet snapped, and the handle fell from Benny’s fingers. The blow was so fast and strong that for an insane moment Benny wondered if Charlie was somehow still alive. It was impossible, though. No … no, this thing was dead. Still … it was fast. Too fast. And so powerful!

Benny slid to the floor. Charlie bent down, grabbed Benny’s vest, and pulled him off the floor. Razor teeth gleamed like daggers in the torchlight. As Charlie pulled him close, Benny could see the gleaming tips of the nails that covered the monster’s body like a porcupine. Benny raised a knee and managed to get the flat of his shoe against the zom’s lower stomach—the only area not covered by the nail vest. He kicked out, trying to squirm out of the grip with leverage, aiming blows to dislocate the jaw or break the neck. He tried every trick of combat and physics Tom had taught him. The nail heads scratched him, and soon Benny was bleeding from a dozen shallow cuts. Then two dozen. Blood flew from the injuries, and though none of them were serious, the smell of fresh blood in the air seemed to drive Charlie and the other zombies wild. They snarled and moaned and bit the air.

Charlie’s big head darted forward, and his razor teeth bit down with devastating force—but not on Benny’s flesh.

Suddenly Nix was there, squeezing in between Benny and the monster, and she rammed her hatchet up into its mouth. The rows of filed teeth chomped down on the weapon and crunched on glass and wood. Nail tips pressed into Nix’s vest. The canvas was sturdy, but it wasn’t designed for this kind of protection. Not even a carpet coat would work if she didn’t get out of there soon.

Charlie flung Benny away and grabbed Nix instead. Benny crashed to the ground again. Pain exploded in his shoulder, numbing him all the way to his fingertips. The other zoms tried to reach past Charlie to get to Nix. Wax-white hands poked through the crooks of Charlie’s elbows and reached over his shoulders and around his sides, clawing at Nix’s vest and hair. In their attempts to grab her, they were also pulling her into the nail vest.

Benny hauled himself to his feet, saw his broken hatchet, dove for it, and came up with the splintered wood in his right hand. Nix still had her hatchet buried in Charlie’s mouth, and he was actually trying to chew his way through it to get to her. Benny rushed to Nix and looped his bad left arm around her waist while he chopped and pounded at the white hands with the hatchet handle. He broke fingers and wrists and some of the white hands flopped away, useless to their owners. One creature had a solid handful of Nix’s hair, and Benny could not shatter its wrist, so he did the only other thing he could do: He used the remaining bits of glass still tied to the hatchet and sawed through her hair. She sagged forward, but Charlie still had her.

Benny rammed the sharp end of his hatchet handle up under Charlie’s chin. He drove it with such force that it punched through into the zom’s mouth and pinned his jaws shut. At least for the moment. Immediately, Nix brought her knees up and aimed her feet just below the nail vest, then kicked out with all her force as Benny pulled with all of his. They burst free from Charlie’s grasp and fell backward; Benny hit the ground first, and Nix landed hard on top of him, driving most of the air from his lungs.

For the moment Charlie ignored them and clawed at the wooden spike that sealed his jaws shut. The other zoms pushed forward to get past him.

“Dust!” Benny croaked, and Nix tore a pouch of plaster dust from her vest and flung it at them. The dust exploded into a white cloud that swirled thickly around the zoms.

Benny didn’t know if the powder would do anything more than distract them for a moment. They had thought to use it against Digger and Heap, but for now it gave them a slender doorway of time. Nix grabbed Benny’s wrists and hauled him to his feet, slapped his shoulders to spin him, and then shoved him forward, keeping her hands on his back as he stumbled away from the zoms.

“Nix—are you okay?”

She gave him a wild-eyed stare. “I need to kill him,” she answered in a fierce whisper.

“I know,” he said, though they both knew that it was virtually impossible, and it was suicide to try. “Come on, let’s go.”

During this brief but awful fight they had been only dimly aware of the shouts and laughter from above. There were plenty of boos now. Defeating Charlie, however briefly, seemed to have turned the crowd against them. That or maybe the sheep were too afraid of Preacher Jack and White Bear to show any other reaction.

White Bear bent down into one of the pit openings, grinning like a ghoul. “Run as fast as you want, but there’s no way out.”

Nix pivoted and flung one of the pouches at him. White Bear got his hand up to block it, but the pouch flapped open and he was showered with white plaster dust. He reeled back, coughing and gagging and cursing. There was a quick ripple of surprised laughter, but it died down immediately as White Bear wheeled on Benny and Nix with a murderous glare.

They ran from under the pit opening, vanishing into the shadows. They heard zoms ahead of them, and they realized they were running back toward the main pit. They scrambled into a turn. Behind them Charlie Pink-eye was shambling toward them, the spike of wood no longer pinning his jaws shut.

That left the dark side tunnel. “No lights,” Benny said.

Nix chewed her lip, looking up and down the corridor. The front of her vest was dotted with drops of blood from where the tips of the nails had cut through her clothes and into her skin. Pain twisted her mouth as she said, “No choice.”

They ran into the darkness. Above them the crowd became suddenly silent.

“God!” panted Nix. “What now?”

77

PREACHER JACK STOOD NEXT TO WHITE BEAR, BOTH OF THEM SCOWLING down into the pits. “This is taking too long,” said the old man.

“Kids are pretty good,” replied White Bear. “I’m actually starting to enjoy this.”

Preacher Jack snarled, “They should be dead by now.”

“Lighten up, Dad … Charlie’s got their number. Those kids are Happy Meals, you’ll see.”

Preacher Jack leaned closer still. “You listen to me, boy, if they find that bell and we have to let them go, then—”

White Bear laughed deep in his chest. “Dad, for a man of faith you could use some more for your own kin. I got everything under control, and …”

His words trickled down and stopped as he realized that the crowd had suddenly fallen silent. The people weren’t looking into the Pits of Judgment. They were staring in shock at the back of the hotel. Preacher Jack and White Bear whipped their heads around to see a figure standing on the porch. He had a pistol in a belt holster and a long Japanese sword slung over his back.

“Imura,” murmured Preacher Jack; then he threw back his head and bellowed the name. It echoed all around the arena. “Imura!”

Beside him, White Bear grinned like a happy ghoul. He stepped forward and pitched his voice for all to hear. “Well, ain’t this just a treat? Come to watch the fun and games, Tom?” He laughed, but only the guards laughed with him. The people in the bleachers shifted in shocked and uncomfortable silence. Preacher Jack held up his hand, and every face turned toward him.

“Why am I here?” answered Tom with a faint smile. He spoke loud enough for the crowd to hear him. He held out a copy of the bounty sheet and showed it to everyone. “It’s pretty clear that you wanted me here.”

“That’s true enough,” answered Preacher Jack. “You and your little pack of sinners and murderers.”

“By that you mean my brother, Benny? And Nix Riley, Louis Chong, and Lilah?”

“Sinners all.” Preacher Jack nodded.

“Where are they, Matthias?” Tom demanded.

“Oh,” said Preacher Jack, not looking at the pits, “they’re waiting for their chance at redemption.”

Tom crumpled up the bounty sheet and dropped it off the porch into the dust. “This is between you and me. Leave the kids out of it.”

The preacher spat on the ground. “This is between your family and mine. You killed two of my sons and my grandson. Don’t pretend you don’t understand that, Tom Imura. It was you who made it about families. You owe me a blood debt.”

Tom ignored the jeering catcalls of the guards and the nervous buzz of the crowd. He locked eyes with Preacher Jack. “Charlie dealt the cards, Matthias, don’t you pretend he didn’t. He ran these hills like they were his personal kingdom, and he didn’t care who got hurt as long as he got what he wanted. He was a parasite, a thief, a murderer, and an abuser of children.”

“You don’t dare—,” began White Bear, but his father touched his arm.

“Let the man have his say. Then we’ll see what justice wants from this moment.”

As he said it, he let his eyes flick toward the pits.

Down below, completely hidden in the shadows, Benny and Nix stared upward as if they could see what was happening. The voices were muffled. Benny’s heart beat like a drum, and in the dark Nix grabbed his hand to give it a powerful squeeze.

“Nix,” Benny breathed, “is that Tom?”

Tom walked to the edge of the porch so everyone could see him. “Years ago Charlie and his thugs tried to raid Sunset Hollow. That was my home, my family’s home. I marked the place as off-limits. Everyone respected that except Charlie. He never respected anything … but things didn’t work out so well for him. I gave him and his men a chance to walk away. They didn’t take it. Later, when it was just Charlie kneeling in the dirt begging for his life, I let him live because he swore to me—swore to God above—that he’d change his ways, that he wouldn’t do this sort of thing again. That he wouldn’t hurt people again. I let him live, Matthias. I showed him mercy, but as soon as he slunk away he started back up worse than ever.”

“I’ve heard that story before,” said Preacher Jack. “It was a lie then and it’s a lie now. No one ever beat Charlie in a fair fight.”

Tom ignored that. “Last year Charlie opened a new Gameland, and he went hunting for the one person who might tell me where it was. Lilah. The Lost Girl. To find her he broke into Jessie Riley’s house. He beat that good woman to death and kidnapped her daughter, Nix. You know what happened then.”

“Yes, I know. You laid false charges on Charlie, then you and yours went out and ambushed him in the woods and killed him when he wasn’t looking.”

“False charges? I was there, Matthias. I held Jessie Riley in my arms when she died. I know what happened. Charlie asked for what he got, and my only regret is that it wasn’t from my own hand.”

“Yes … that hell-spawn brother of yours, that devil’s imp, managed some trickster ambush and killed my firstborn son.”

The crowd buzz intensified. There were dozens of versions of the battle at Charlie’s camp, and small arguments broke out as facts and suppositions were thrown out.

White Bear spun around and roared, “SHUT UP!” His bellow echoed off the walls of the Wawona Hotel. The crowd cowered into silence.

Preacher Jack took a threatening step toward Tom. “You had your say, such as it was. Now hear me on this, Tom Imura. Your time is over. Your reign of corruption, bullying, terrorism, and murder is done. I call a blood debt on you and yours, and like a farmer who burns a whole field to kill an encroaching blight, I will burn the name of Imura from this world. Your sins against my family are uncountable, and so I curse you and yours for all generations.” As he spoke he turned in a slow circle to likewise address the shocked and silent crowd. “Anyone who stands with you falls with you. So say I and so say mine.”

Silence owned the moment except for the constant low moans of the dead strapped to the chairs under the circus tent.

Down in the Pits of Judgment, Benny whispered, “What’s happening?”

“I don’t know,” said Nix. “We have to let Tom know we’re here!”

Behind them the shadows were filled with hungry moans.

“Don’t make a sound,” Benny whispered. Calling out to Tom was a good plan, but not at the moment. Not unless Tom was right there with a ladder ready to let them climb out, and from what Benny heard, that wasn’t the case. If they called to him now, it might be a fatal distraction for Tom.

Benny and Nix felt their way along the walls of the tunnel. It was absolutely pitch black. Even the torchlight from the main corridor faded and died within a few yards. They fought to keep their breathing as silent as possible, listening for the scuff of a shuffling dead foot or the soft moan of hunger. Except for the powder, they had no weapons left, and Charlie was still out there along with at least fifteen zombies. Maybe more. Time was running out.