Free Star Drawn Saga (Book 1): Death Among The Dead: A Zombie Novel by Stephen Charlick Page A

let Fran lead him across the beach away from the scene of just one more life being cut needlessly short.
    ***
    ‘You know… when I was a little girl, like seven or eight years old, I… I wanted to be an architect of all things,’ mused Sharon, watching the gently lapping waves cascade rhythmically over her exposed feet. ‘Can you believe it… all my friends wanted to be famous pop-stars or princesses or something… me, I wanted to design houses… can’t even remember anymore why it grabbed me as so interesting… Oh well… guess it doesn’t really matter now I suppose…’
    With a shaky sigh escaping her, Sharon lent back cradling her wounded arm, grateful to feel Tom’s reassuring solid body kneeling behind her.
    At first Tom had been reluctant about letting any more of this new group come with them to St Michael’s mount. There was certainly something about Max that had instantly annoyed and rubbed him up the wrong way but despite this Tom couldn’t deny the man was clearly doing all he felt best to keep the rest of his group alive; even if he was being a little heavy handed in the process. It had only been once Max had mentioned his brother’s wife and young son, Riley, that they had left with Kai that Tom had eventually agreed to give them safe passage to the island; after all, perhaps it was just that Max had no skills in diplomacy that made him come across as so harsh, he certainly hoped so.
    After Max and his brother, Dave, had followed Fran and Peter back to the cart, Tom had been left alone with Sharon and the unsavoury task of asking her how she would like to spend the remainder of her short life or rather how she would like him to end it. She had looked at the curved blades in his hands, her face crumbling with despair, turned and silently walked down to the water’s edge, safe in the knowledge that her executioner followed but a step behind her. Once she had reached the gently crashing waves, Sharon had sat down amid the soft shingle and began to unlace her boots.
    ‘You’d… you’d better take these…’ she said, the fingers unlacing her boots seeming to move of their own accord. ‘No point in wasting a good pair of boots… perhaps… perhaps Fran will have use for them…’
    Once her feet were both free of their confines, Sharon tugged off her socks and let the cool water wash over her tired feet.
    ‘Oh, you’d better take this too,’ she continued, pulling a long thin knife from a sheath on her calf. ‘It’s good for…’
    ‘Thanks,’ Tom replied, slowly taking the strange blade that looked more like a piece of cutlery than any sort of hunting knife he had seen before.
    ‘It’s a letter opener… I think,’ said Sharon, noticing the way Tom looked at the odd knife before she turned back to look out across the endless expanse of lightly rolling water. ‘Use it to…’ she whispered, her fingers slowly enclosing about fistfuls of the cool shingle by her sides.
    ‘Sharon, I…’ Tom began, wondering just how she wanted him to release her.
    ‘Sit behind me,’ she muttered, allowing the small wet pebbles to dig welcomingly into her palms, ‘I’m… I’m going to talk, don’t tell me when you’re going to… I’m… I’m just going to talk. Put… put your arm around my neck for leverage…but don’t… don’t tell me when, just let me… let me talk and… and…’
    With these last words a heartrending sob threatened to break through her resolve but with a cough, Sharon managed to choke back the almost overwhelming mix of fear, grief and loss and began to speak.
    Kneeling behind the doomed woman, Tom felt her slowly lean back against him as she spoke. He wanted to take this brave young woman in his arms, take her in his arms and tell her everything was going to be alright. He wanted to tell her that her lost loved ones awaited her beyond the thin vale of death and he wanted to reassure her that her death would be not be in vain but he could do none of this; all he