That Wicked Apple: A Scary Tale of Snow White and Even More Zombies

Chapter Three

Grouchy

THE ENTIRE BUILDING TREMBLES from the mob’s onslaught. The pounding on the roof intensifies. The crack in the ceiling grows. Already, the Horrors’ bloody stink has wafted upstairs, mixed with the exotic spice of Killington’s trampled herbs. Yanky whines and growls.

 Snoozy sits on the floor, picking bits of root out of the broken glass.

The Queen stares down at him as if he were a piss stain. “If you’re looking for raylee root, little stump, then your search is in vain. That’s gymsump root.”

“Quite right,” the doctor’s wife says, reaching down toward the broken glass. Dr. Killington bats her hand away gently. She continues, unfazed. “We keep the raylee root hidden in the downstairs cabinets. Folks get so bunchy about raylee root.”

Grouchy stomps his foot. “What if one of us goes outside? Sacrifices herself to draw the mob away?” He stares at the Queen. “It’d have to be someone expendable—useless to us.”

The Queen sneers. “You would do well to hold your tongue, stump, or I will hold it for you.”

“Bag it up, you two,” the farmer-turned-soldier, Hays, says. “Everyone grab some wood.”

Battson points at the cracking ceiling. “We need to move now. Just saying.”

Everyone except the Queen picks up some wood before retreating to the back room, which apparently is used to hide the gruesome items that’d only scare Killington’s patients—a variety of toothed metal instruments with sharp points and worn handles.

The doctor makes introductions. “I’m Dr. Killington, folks, and this is my wife Margerine.” His bushy eyebrows rise as he touches her arm.

“Margie, please,” she says with a wide smile. “It’s so wonderful to have guests. I’m sorry I didn’t make tea.” She frowns nervously at the dwarfs. “And what are your names, little boys?”

“I’m Grouchy.” He points then at Snoozy. “This is Snoozy. You can ignore most anything he says.”

“Where’s Bones?” Killington says.

“Snow bit him yesterday morning, right after she woke up.” Anger simmers in Grouchy’s belly when he thinks of the Prince’s kiss that woke his Snowflake. The Prince became Snow’s first victim and first Horror. Last night, Grouchy and Battson finally put that rotten dandy to rest, but Grouchy’s hatred still simmers.

“Snow?” Lox says. “How is she involved with this?”

Grouchy shakes his head. “We provided Snow shelter after the Queen ordered her death.” He points at Adara, who offers a gesture of her own. “But this wench disguised herself as an old hag and gave Snow a cursed apple. Snow slept for many moons. That ass Prince from the Western Kingdom showed up yestermorn. He kissed her, and she woke as one of those things. We tried to fight them off, but we lost the cottage.” He gestures at Hays and Battson. “We ran into the Prince’s soldiers in the woods. We tried barricading ourselves in the mines.” Grouchy shakes his head. “It didn’t go well.”

“That’s an understatement,” Battson says.

“Shut up, swob,” Grouchy says.

“Make me, stump.”

Grouchy grins. He and Battson have survived a lot together in a short time, and the only thing they share is a general disgust for each other’s species. Somehow, it’s enough common ground that they find each other tolerable.

“Snoozy and I are all that’s left of the Collective,” Grouchy tells the doctor. “They got Bones, Blushful, Coughy, and Merry. Not even Dim was fast enough to escape.”

Killington frowns.

“I’m Battson,” the blond soldier says. “I’m a soldier from the Western Kingdom. Lucky for you all, I’m very good at what I do.”

“I’m Captain Hays,” says the other soldier, emphasizing the title their old captain had given him in the mines. Battson doesn’t look too happy about Hays’s promotion. “And this is Yanky.” Hays pats his dog and smiles.

Across the room, Lox stiffens and eyes the beast warily. Lox. Snow talked often of her friend, of their time wandering in the countryside or flirting with boys at the Platessa markets. Snow said that Lox was afraid of dogs but never said why. The girl is shorter than Snow, built a bit more solid. Her face is plain, her nose large and flat.

“I need no introduction,” the Queen says, crossing her arms over her chest.

Killington shakes his head. “I’m sorry you folks came here. If you’re injured, I can do my best to heal you, though I fear my work will be in vain.”

Hays nods. “We ain’t here for healing. We’re hoping you can stop the curse what caused all this.”

Killington frowns. “Hell. We barely dabble in herbs and spells, mostly gypsy stuff my Margie learned as a girl.”

“Shit-cakes,” Grouchy says.

Killington points at the Queen. “I will say this. If she started this, then she has the best chance at ending it.”

The Queen smirks.

“Fump me,” Grouchy says.

Devere empties a trunk of blades, syringes, and pliers. He kneels before Lox. “When the time comes, you hide in the trunk.”

“Rub that. I’ll fight.”

“Loxy, we can’t win. There are too many of them.”

“I’ll hide,” the Queen says.

“This is your damn fault,” Devere says, then adds, “my Queen.”

“If you’d killed the girl as I’d commanded, none of this would have happened.”

“What girl?” Lox says, her face flushed. “Snow? Is that why we had to flee Platessa?”

“Loxy.”

“How is it you and your daughter are here in Abundance?” Grouchy says to the giant. “And how is it that the curse started yestermorn here, too?”

Before Devere can answer Grouchy, footsteps outside scramble across the loft floor. Damn. The Horrors have reached the second floor. Devere distributes the remaining weapons. Killington takes a short sword and practices stabbing it into the air. Margie takes a sword of her own, but Killington beckons her to sit.

She offers him a trembling smile. “I must say, this is all very exciting.”

Killington nods. “Indeed, my love. You rest here a moment. Write me one of your poems.”

“I’d rather write a song.”

He pats her hand. “A song then. Wonderful.”

Grouchy finds the older couple charming. He imagines that they are how he and Snow would be many years from now—wearing each other like old, cherished cloaks.

The Horrors pound at the door, rattling its hinges. So many of them. Too many. Devere and the two soldiers yank down a shelf and put it across the room’s center as a barricade. Grouchy and Snoozy stand on either side of the door, swords in hand. The clamoring outside intensifies. Hissing. Thudding. And then silence.

Rain taps expectantly against the building, anxious for blood. Snoozy puts his ear against the door and mouths four words: Something is out there.

Lox and the Queen cock their bows. Battson curses. Yanky sniffs under the door.

Footsteps come closer.

A folded piece of parchment slides under the door.

“Since when do these spuds write notes?” Battson says.

Grouchy picks up the parchment. His belly swells and his mouth falls open as he reads the two words written in an elegant hand:

IT’S DIM