Page 44 of Hollow Valley

Alphie looked at me in confusion.“What do you mean?”

“When they come to collect two of us for the expiation, do they allow us to volunteer?”I clarified.

“What are you at, asking that?”Fergus asked.“You’ve got Fae to think of, not this.”

“I am thinking about Fae,” I said emphatically.“But there’s something you don’t know about me.”

“Stella,” Boden whispered, trying to admonish me.

“They’re going to find out anyway,” I reasoned.“And it’ll be easier if everyone knows what’s going on.”

Fergus’s eyes shot up.“You’ve kept a secret, yeah?Well, that’s altogether grand.”

“It felt like it was more of a need-to-know basis kind of thing,” I explained awkwardly.“When I was pregnant with my daughter, shortly before I gave birth to her, I was bitten by a zombie.I was infected, and I nearly turned, but Fae’s immune system helped me resist it.”

I carefully left out the fact that that had happened because Fae herself had an immunity to the virus.Remy had always insisted that the fewer people who knew about Fae’s condition the safer it was for her and the rest of us.

“It’s called microchimerism,” Edie elaborated.She had been one of my midwives while I was sick and when I gave birth, and she had known about my condition because she was treating it as it happened.“It’s when a fetus’s immune system helps bolster the mothers to fight off infections, even viruses and diseases.”

“You’re saying that you were infected, but you’re not anymore?”Leandro asked, his brow crinkled in confusion.“Like you’re immune to zombies?”

“Yes,” I admitted and took a deep breath.“I can also communicate with them, but only in the most rudimentary way using pheromones.I honestly don’t have much of a grasp on how it works exactly, but the zombies won’t hurt me.”

“What?”Fergus asked.

“That’s why we haven’t seen many of the Revenant on our way here,” Alphie realized.“Usually there’s so many more out in the summer.And when they attacked the cabin and got Oakley and Juniper, you weren’t around.Have you kept them away?”

I swallowed back guilt and gave a quick nod.“I’ve been doing my best to repel them.”

“You can control two hearts,” Alphie murmured, looking at me with wide eyes.

“Why didn’t you tell us that?”Leandro asked.

“Because I warned her not to,” Boden answered for me.“People can react in strange ways when they find out about something like this.I didn’t want her to be a target for the Revvers or anyone else.”

“If Nell discovered what you could do, she’d keep you on a golden chain so you could never get away,” Alphie said, sounding both awed and menacing.“She’s been searching for someone like you for so long, and she would do anything to possess you.”

“Well, that is never going to fucking happen,” Boden said.

“So you’re heading into the courtyard to take charge of the zombies, yeah?”Fergus said, surmising the initial part of my plan.“And then what?How’re we meant to get Dougal and Fae out past those bloody thick walls?”

I took a deep breath and explained my plan, the one that I had come up with Boden while Alphie had still been sobbing and hyperventilating.

Edie and Leandro were initially dismayed and opposed, while Fergus got on board almost immediately.He and I had an understanding because he would do anything to save his brother the same way I would do anything to save my daughter.

Alphie, interestingly, only had one question.“Are you planning to hurt the Loved Ones?”

“I am not,” I said truthfully.“But I can’t predict how the Revvers themselves will act when the Loved Ones are unleashed.”

“So who’s the second then?”Fergus asked when the other details had been sorted out.“They usually offer up two, yeah?”

“I am,” Boden said without waiting for anyone else to answer.

I frowned at him.“We talked about this.I would rather you stay back in case something happens to me, so someone is here for Fae.”

“Edie’s here, and I know Fergus and Leandro wouldn’t leave Fae behind, either,” Boden said.

“The only way I’m going out those bloody walls is ifbothDougal and Fae are with me,” Fergus immediately promised me.