DAY ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTEEN
The positivity of the preceding weeks had been permanently shattered by Piotr’s actions. A familiar, gut-churning anxiety had returned. For the briefest of moments, people had begun to think the worst was over, that the fighting was finished and the time for rebuilding had begun, but what had happened in Yaxley had tipped everything on its head again. Several days passed in a whirl: frantic planning sessions followed by hours and hours of graft. They fortified the village as best they could and began making preparations for encircling themselves with a ring of dead flesh as a deterrent. The temperature had dropped. It was markedly harder working in the fields. The fragile optimism that had been felt by the people in the village snuffed out like a spent candle
