Chapter 403: Stupid Zombie AirTags
The ride back to the mansion was quieter than usual.
That was saying something, considering Yuche could sit beside me for an hour without speaking and somehow make it feel like an entire conversation. This time, however, even Lingyun had stopped talking after the sixth zombie turned toward the SUV.
None of them chased us. They simply abandoned whatever had been holding their attention and followed the vehicle with their eyes until we disappeared from view.
I wasn’t sure whether that made it better or worse.
"At least they aren’t running after us," I said eventually.
Lingyun’s arm tightened around my waist. "They can try."
"I don’t think they’re trying to catch me," I pointed out, but apparently, no one agreed with me on that.
Yuche looked through the rear window as another zombie turned in the middle of an intersection. "They’re tracking you."
"Yes, thank you. We established that several warehouses ago."
His attention returned to me, and the faintest trace of amusement appeared in his eyes. "You asked whether they were trying to catch you."
"I was thinking out loud."
"You should stop doing that," Lingyun suggested. "Someone might answer."
I elbowed him carefully, avoiding the fresh bandages around his ribs. He still winced, but the grin that followed made it impossible to feel guilty.
We left the delivery truck at an old loading depot several streets away from the mansion. Chenghai transferred the visible boxes into one of our own vehicles while I moved everything valuable into my space whenever no one was looking directly at me.
The driver never saw where we lived, which kept Yuche from folding him into the truck for asking too many questions.
By the time we reached the outer edge of the property, the sun had begun sinking behind the buildings. The mansion’s walls rose ahead of us, quiet and familiar, while thick vines covered the sealed entrance Yuche had rebuilt after the fire attack.
I expected the plants to react to my return.
They always did.
Usually, the vines lifted their leaves, the grass leaned toward the vehicle, and the baby vine became unbearable as soon as it sensed the larger plants nearby. This time, however, everything outside the wall became still.
The SUV slowed down even more as Zhenlan noticed the change from the front passenger seat. "The wind didn’t stop."
"I know."
The plants weren’t calm. Their silence pressed against my senses with the same tension I had felt in the lower level of the storage building, as though every root beneath the ground had paused to listen.
Chenghai stopped the SUV several meters from the wall. "Can you open it?"
"Of course I can."
I reached toward the vines and felt them recoil.
Not from me, but from something attached to me.
The old bite burned hard enough to make my leg jerk. Chenghai’s hand left the steering wheel immediately, while Lingyun and Yuche shifted on either side of me.
"I’m fine," I said through my teeth before anyone could even start.
"No one asked," Yuche replied.
"That’s never stopped any of you before."
I pushed against the plants again, gentler this time. The vines recognized my power and loosened enough to reveal the metal barrier beneath them, but their attention remained fixed on the scar at the back of my leg.
The baby vine climbed down from my shoulder and wrapped itself around my leg. Both leaf-heads pressed close to the fabric covering the old bite, sniffing and making low, unhappy noises.
"What is it doing?" Chenghai asked.
"Being dramatic."
One leaf-head hissed at me.
"Sorry. It’s being more dramatic than usual," I corrected.
Yuche opened the metal barrier once the vines pulled back, and Chenghai drove us through. The wall sealed behind us immediately, but the plants didn’t relax once we were inside.
Roots moved beneath the driveway.
They followed the SUV toward the mansion, staying close to my side of the vehicle without touching the tires. Every tree, weed, and creeping vine on the property seemed to turn toward the same place on my leg.
Lingyun looked down at the baby vine. "It doesn’t like the bite."
"The bite has been there for months."
"It wasn’t doing this before."
"I noticed."
The front doors opened before we reached the steps. Several workers came outside, followed by one of the men who had been keeping watch over the injured survivor we’d brought back.
I had nearly forgotten about him.
He stood near the entrance with one hand braced against the doorframe. His skin remained pale from blood loss, and the bandages beneath his shirt made one side of his body appear larger than the other.
The moment he saw me, he froze.
The roots beneath the driveway froze with him.
I stopped halfway out of the SUV.
The man’s eyes dropped to my leg.
Not my face. Not the blood covering my clothes or the baby vine wrapped around my shoulders.
He looked directly at the old bite.
"Why is he out here?" Yuche asked.
The worker beside him stiffened. "He woke up when the barrier opened. He said he felt something coming."
Lingyun’s warmth disappeared so quickly that the air around him began to heat. "Something?"
The injured man swallowed. His gaze remained fixed on my calf as though he could see through the fabric. "I don’t know."
"That’s not a useful answer," I said.
"I felt pressure." His breathing quickened as the plants shifted beneath us. "Like something was pulling from far away."
The scar burned again.
The man flinched at exactly the same time.
Everyone saw it.
Yuche moved between us before I could take another step. Chenghai came around the SUV and positioned himself beside the injured man, while Zhenlan remained close enough that the air stirred around my body.
Lingyun smiled, but there was nothing friendly in it. "Take off his bandages."
The worker hesitated. "He’s still healing."
"Then be careful."
The injured man backed into the doorframe. "What are you doing?"
I looked at the way he protected one side of his body and remembered the wounds he’d arrived with. The bite marks. The torn flesh. The miraculous fact that he had escaped something that usually didn’t leave enough behind to escape.
"Show us where it bit you," I said.
His face lost what little color remained.
He knew exactly what I meant.
That was enough to make the roots push through the cracks in the driveway.
They didn’t reach for him immediately. Instead, they formed a loose circle around both of us, moving between his injured side and the scar on my leg as though comparing two scents they recognized but didn’t understand.
The baby vine’s leaf-heads opened their mouths and hissed at the man.
He stared at them in terror. "I didn’t bring anything here."
"I didn’t think I did either."
The pressure beneath my scar pulsed again, and his body folded around the same invisible pain.
Whatever the Devourer had left inside me wasn’t unique.
It had left something inside him too.
Stupid fucking zombie AirTags.