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must find our spears.” He began walking, but instantly sensed that his son had not obeyed him. Once more, he turned to look at Gel who remained stooped, staring at the rock, all amusement vanished from his face and replaced by something resembling fear.
    “ What is it, boy?” Napro asked.
    “ It’s moving,” Gel replied, his voice low. “Whatever is inside these rocks, it moves on its own.”
    Napro groaned, walking back to where his son was. “Perhaps your empty belly is causing you to see things.” He stopped, looked down at where his son was staring, frowned and bent over for a better view.
    Indeed, the slime was moving of its own volition, slithering over the edge of the rock, down its side to pool on the ground beside it. Napro and Gel exchanged shocked expressions. When Gel looked down once more, he shouted “Look!”
    The slime was not just pooling on the ground; it was burrowing into it. Not simply being absorbed, but forcing its way in the same manner an earth worm would.
    In fact, though it was clearly liquid, the slime moved very much like a worm; slowly, deliberately, inching its way down into the earth. It moved with purpose.
    “ It’s alive,” Napro whispered. “Some kind of creature.”
    Gel could only nod, staring down at the wriggling slime with something bordering between disgust and fascination.
    Napro straightened up once more. “Come! We must find our spears and warn the others.”
    Again, Gel nodded, but made no indication that he intended to move from that spot, his eyes glued to what remained of the vanishing slime. Napro grabbed him by the shoulder, shook him hard. “ Now! ”
    Shaken from his trance, Gel stood and then chased his running father back to the place they were the previous day when the stones had begun to fall, loping through the woods with an animal-like grace.
    When they arrived at the edge of the burial ground, Napro stopped abruptly, causing Gel to bump into his back. “What it is?” Gel asked, vaguely annoyed.
    But before Napro could reply, Gel saw for himself why his father had halted: there were people in the burial ground, though to call them people was not exactly accurate. They had once been people. It was completely obvious what they were now: corpses.
    Gel’s eyes quickly took in the surroundings, the holes in the ground, all of them near the biggest of the shattered stones. About fourteen of them, all told. Holes which had just yesterday been covered graves.
    Napro made a squeaking sound in his throat, backed up a step so that he was standing side by side with his son.
    The zombies shuffled around in circles, seemingly unsure of what to do with themselves. Some of them were more decomposed than others. Most of them, however, the father and son could easily recognize. Family members, one of which—a little girl—had only been buried for a season. She had been Zic’s twin and had died after diving from a tree branch and into a river’s shallows. Her neck had snapped like a dry twig and now her head rested at an odd angle, her right cheek touching her right shoulder. She was naked, as were all the others. The clan did not dress their dead, it would never have occurred to them to waste animal skins on people who would no longer be needing them.
    The squeaking noise came again and Gel glanced quickly at Napro. Tears streamed down the man’s cheeks, his eyes wide as he slowly shook his head as though he couldn’t possibly be seeing what his vision was showing him.
    The corpses took notice of the man and the boy and instantly reversed direction and started towards the two, Zic’s twin leading the pack, dead eyes staring directly into her father’s without showing the slightest recognition. She made a low guttural sound in her throat—a long miserable wail—and then the others followed suit, all of them groaning and screeching as they staggered forward, arms outstretched.
    One of the dead dragged a badly broken leg behind himself and Napro could see the