In the Woods

by Nancy Gideon

  A tide of silver swept across the shallow stream to meet the black shadow of their enemy as they swarmed down the opposite bank.They clashed in noisy combat, blade against shield, the clangs ringing out in resounding echoes to intensify the sound. Freeacas stood slightly apart, gauging the ebb and flow of battle, occasionally enjoining the fight, but constantly on guard for any shift in balance between the two forces—especially if it be an unnatural one.

  He had to be ready. He had to be prepared to do what he must.

  Both sides were equally met and the encounter soon had the clear waters of the stream running red as the battle line moved back and forth across it. Suddenly a cry went up, a spine-shriveling shriek of pure terror that froze Prince Freeacas within his suit of mail and metal.

  The demon beast bounded over the crest of the embankment and surged downward upon his knights, teeth gnashing, tearing, talons ripping in a path of incredible savagery. Most of the men it overtook offered no resistance, too paralyzed by fright to react until their entrails were carried away upon the stream's crimson current.

  The screams of the dying and soon to be dead mobilized Freeacas.These were his men! He understood his father now. He’d do whatever had to be done to save them. Earlier reluctance evaporated like the morning haze.

  Turning from the grisly scene, he looked up into the trees to command, "Tall Creature!"

  There was a rending of branches and a tremendous thud as two huge feet, each with three clawed toes, struck the ground. For a moment, Freeacas could not move, over-awed by what he called forth with his cry. Then, slowly, he looked to where the devil dog attacked his knights, and a hard brilliance entered his eyes. He pointed to the snarling hell hound and demanded of his own champion, "Do your work. Kill the beast!"

  Knights, light and dark, scattered as the two unnatural fiends met in unholy battle. Howls that curdled blood in the veins replaced the sound of steel upon steel as mankind stood back, amazed, and let the denizens of hell finish their fight in the primitive forest arena. All knew what they witnessed was not a sight meant for the eyes of mortals. All knew they should run for the sake of their souls, yet they were powerless to do naught but remain, mesmerized.

  Finally, brutally, it was over. Mammoth hands hoisted the writhing, snapping demon dog high into the air. The crack of the creature's backbone was followed by an eerie silence. Then, as the limp devil was cast down indifferently at Freeacas's feet, the legion of black knights broke from the field of honor and ran in hasty retreat.

  Their paralysis ended, the silver force leapt into action, to do what they’d been trained to do, relieved and eager to take up their swords against a recognizable enemy. Many were pursued and slain, others convinced to throw down their arms in surrender. The victory was Freeacas's, won at a tremendous cost of blood, and a mystical bargain not yet met.

  The prince pulled off this helm and shook loose his mane of fair hair as a prisoner was brought to kneel before him in the cold waters of the creek. When the black visor was lifted, all were stunned to see Karth, himself, brought to the humble pose at his vanquisher's feet. Despite the crushing defeat, King Karth was still open in his defiance, his lips pulled back in a feral sneer, his black eyes glittering with bitter malice as he observed the motionless figure of his demon hound. The hate in that gaze as it shifted to Freeacas helped the boy forget that this was his uncle, his blood kin, who might well have the right to his rage as well as a right to the property ruled by his brother. Instead of family, he saw an enemy kneeling before him, an enemy to be stopped at all costs and pitied for no reason.

  "It’s too soon to gloat, boy,” Karth growled. “You've not yet won the day."

  Freeacas allowed himself the luxury of a laugh. Giddy with their success, his thoughts jumped ahead to his reception at his father’s court when he brought them their enemy in chains. "T'would seem so, Karth, for it is you, not I upon knees, and your, not my legion pleading for mercy. Would you also plead for your miserable life?"

  Karth laughed as well, a deep, harsh rasp of sound that had nothing to do with mirth. "You would like that, wouldn't you, pup, but it will not come to pass. Death has no hold upon my devil dog.I can call it back, and it will follow to the very gateway of Hell and beyond whoever wakes it."

  This news alarmed Freeacas. He’d not considered the possibility of an immortal evil. But neither was he prepared to surrender his sense of victory. That proud tide made him bold in his boasting.

  "It will not be your voice it hears from where you will live out the rest of your life in our dungeons." Freeacas gestured to his men and spat, "Take him away. I will present him to my father in shackles, if not with an air of proper humility and defeat. Those things will come after a few decades of our hospitality.”

  "Fool," Karth snarled as he was dragged to his feet. "You’ll not enjoy your victory for long."

  But Freeacas turned from him, dismissing him as insignificant, which had the black king howling with fury in his captor's hands.With a plated toe, the young prince nudged the broken body of the beast, no longer afraid, and was satisfied with its stillness. He called out to another knight.

  "Wrap this creature well.I will see it taken far away, out of the range of its master's voice."

  It was quickly done. A heavy woven cloth was stitched up tightly about the body to form a crude sack. Then Freeacas looked up as a large shadow loomed over him. In his helm of horns and robe of skins, the fair Norseman was a fearsome sight, but not near as intimidating as the tall creature which lurked behind him.

  To the Viking mercenary, Freeacas said, "Take this burden with you when next you sail to the new world. Carry it deep into the forests of that land and see it laid to rest in unknown soil where no dark powers will find it. And you, tall creature," he glanced up, struggling to show no fear, only command, "you will spend an eternity in ever vigilant guard over its grave to see that none can bring forth its evil again." He passed a heavy pouch of gold to the glowering Norseman and murmured, "So it ends."

  "Not yet!"

  The fierce cry of denial brought Freeacas about in surprise, just in time to see Karth break free of his retainers. He wrested a mighty battle ax from one of them and in one determined stride, brought it swinging down with fatal purpose to shear through Freeacas's armor and the bone of his shoulder below.With a shout of impact and pain, the young prince went down upon one knee, reeling helplessly as he saw, through a haze of red, the ax rise again.

  In his last moment of coherent thought, he remembered the price his father had promised to pay.

  A price Haggert had not known would be the life of his only son and heir.

  The ax descended.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The ax bit deep, shining metal burying itself with an aggressive thunk of sound.

  It was wrested out of the wood where paint was already blistering, only to fall again with considerable force, this time splitting the panel. Several more blows broke the entrance door apart allowing a thick roil of smoke to escape, enveloping the fire-fighters as they nodded to one another behind their other-worldly face masks.

  They were brave in their assault on the blaze, these firemen who rushed into the jaws of a ready inferno. They fought hard with all the weapons and wits their experience commanded, but they'd known, deep down, when they'd pulled up in front of the isolated old house that it was a battle they couldn't win. Windows had already broken out of the upper story from the intense heat and pressure as the fire raced beneath the eaves in great curling tongues. It reflected with a hellish brilliance in the shards of glass littering the front yard, and upon the face plates of the men struggling for at least one victory against it. The house was gone, but their fervent hope was to pull someone from those greedy flames alive.

  The distant neighbor who’d phoned in the blaze said a woman and her small child were inside.

  Precious seconds ticked by. Water sizzled where the main hose coupled to the pumper truck. It came roaring through the ten inch tube, snapping it as st
iff and taut as a young man's excitement in his first back seat tumble, to provide a fierce stream of cooling relief through those shattered windows, tamping down the killing clouds of smoke and easing the raging temperatures inside while the firemen continued their desperate search. A search that grew more futile with each fateful advance of the clock.

  Illuminated by the glare of flashing emergency vehicle lights like an actor upon the stage, a fire-fighter emerged from the gaping doorway, a limp form draped within his arms. He was met in the center of the puddled yard by a team of paramedics who began working on his burden even as he settled her carefully upon the ruined lawn.Elbowed out of the way now that his part of the rescue was accomplished, the fire-fighter stepped back and let them work. Their hunched figures blocked out the sight of what a hungry flame could do to the human body, but there was no way to block out the smell. That sickly sweet stench was unforgettable once inhaled. The stink of burnt flesh.

  Alex Kerwood removed his mask and let it dangle by the hose connecting it to the oxygen tank on his back. His work was done. It would have been unproductive for him to go back inside. Support beams were beginning to buckle on the old house. The men already inside would get their orders to withdraw at any second. And that would mean leaving the child, an innocent sacrifice to the flames. No one wanted that.

  A head poked out through one of the shattered upper windows, and the fireman's mask lifted long enough for him to shout, "We found her!"

  "Get the hell outta there, Al!" Alex yelled back.

  Anxiety bunched, a tight fist to the gut until he saw two shapes emerge from the fiery mouth of death. One of the men carried a tiny bundle in the crook of his arm. Alex waited, praying for signs of movement, life. A reason to claim this battle a success.

  Dimly, Alex heard the conversation between the paramedics at his feet.

  "I've still got no pulse."

  A pause.

  "The pupil's fixed and dilated."

  "Damn."

  Momentarily distracted as the paramedics rose from the woman,his questioning gaze was met with a brief shake of the head. Alex saw the words mouthed, but never heard them spoken through the sudden muffling buzz in his head.

  "Too late."

  Too late.

  The firemen manning the hose cranked the pressure down once their team was clear of the howling blaze. Now it became a matter of control, not conquest, as the structure began a drunken wobble and collapsed in upon itself, a wall at a time, until the upper floor was gone and the remains of the roof rested atop the lower level.The spray from the hoses turned flame to steam as the fire died, giving up, just as its two victims had.

  Alex got a brief glimpse of what looked like a charred roast.The bundle Al Fargo surrendered up to the paramedics bore no resemblance to a human child. Alex didn't need to hear the pronouncement.

  Too late.

  He staggered away from the network of hissing hoses and dripping men, trying unsuccessfully to shut out the odors assailing his senses. The raw bite of smoke, the pungent scent of burnt lumber, and the other awful smell—the one that symbolized failure. For a moment, he stood, head thrown back, eyes squeezed shut, wishing he were anywhere else, doing anything but this, as tendrils of sickness wormed their way up to knot in the back of his throat.

  He was no rookie. For six years he’d battled fires set by careless smokers, colliding cars, faulty wiring, and the occasional wacko who got his rocks off watching things go up in smoke. Up in smoke. That's what had happened to his idealism, his belief that he was doing good, making a difference. Those rose-colored ideals hadn't held for long under the harsh strain of his profession. But still, hope lingered, a spark under cold ash, the whisper that what they did mattered.

  Lately, everything had soured. He’d started backsliding down from that pillar of heroism he'd once commanded and he didn’t know how to stop the fall. Lately, he’d begun to think everything was a sham—their struggle against the violent sear of Mother Nature, their optimism about serving the community, their philosophy of making a difference.

  They hadn't made any differences lately.

  Lately, all they'd been was too damned late.

  And this time it was a mother and child who paid the price of their noble failure.

  Just like last time, when it had been his best friend, fire-fighter Terry Birdsall.

  "Alex?Hey, buddy, you okay?"

  Alex took a quick swipe at his eyes with his sleeve, inadvertently leaving a streak of soot to mask them like a bandit's."Yeah. Fine." He glanced back at Al.

  Al Fargo was a veteran fire-fighter, as seasoned as good wood.A big man with better than a half dozen years on Alex, he'd mentored the young fireman through his first trials by fire. Just as he'd then done for Terry. Looking at Al now, one would never guess that he'd suffered a crushing defeat. He refused to let things like that get to him, at least not at the scene. He let off steam in rowdy bars and in foolish fistfights. Probably why he was still sane. And twice divorced.

  "How's the baby?"

  Al never blinked."She didn't make it."

  Alex's fists beat against his thighs.

  "Hey, calm down, bud. You did everything you're supposed to do."

  As he watched the zipper close up a heavy gage plastic bag over what had once been a woman with her whole life before her, Alex was in no mood for that familiar argument. "We just got our butts kicked!"

  Al followed his angry stare, knowing where this conversation was heading and trying to avert the senseless punishment of guilt. He spoke with a calming logic that Alex would recognize once the emotions of the moment eased.

  "The house was a deathtrap before we ever arrived. If we would've gotten the call a second sooner, this wouldn't have happened. If they’d had a smoke detector, she could have made the call and gotten herself and the baby out, herself. But we didn’t and she didn’t.Everything else went by the book. Everything. We don't have anything to beat ourselves up over."

  "Don't give me that. We're the ones with the protective gear.We're the ones with their lifeline. If we can't save them, who can?"

  For a moment, only the sound of the ambulance doors closing was his answer. Then Al's echoed it.

  "Sometimes, no one. That's the way it is. We don't like losing anyone in a fire. But, sometimes things happen. Come on." His beefy hand slapped down on Alex's shoulder, steering him back toward their trucks. The lights were cut. Several of the men started rolling up hoses.

  Did that make it Miller time?

  Another of the firemen walked up to them. He was the one who'd come out of the flames with Al. His fire suit was smudged with black.Water cut through the dark film, smearing it like a woman's mascara after a good cry.

  "You okay, Alex?"

  "Yeah. He's fine," Al responded almost protectively.

  The fire-fighter sighed. "Listen, I know it didn't go down the way any of us wanted it to. But you did pull that woman out."

  Alex's lip gave a cynical curl. "I really helped her, didn't I?"

  "Let it go, Alex." Al's voice tightened, just as his grip on Alex's shoulder tightened. "None of us are happy about the outcome here. But you've got nothing to cry about. You did your job. Get over it. You know the drill."

  The other man re-enforced his stand with a fierce, "Yeah.Running into a burning building is fun, about as fun a watching someone die. None of us like it, but we do it. It's what we do. You did good work today, Alex. We can't save them all. I wish to God we could, but it just doesn't work that way. You can't accept that . . . maybe you should look into another line of work."

  Alex took a deep breath, stabilizing his tenuous emotions the way he'd shore up a sagging wall. "I'm okay. I just can't help second guessing that if we'd been here faster—"

  "Don't play that game with yourself," Al warned gently. "You can't win."

  "I know."

  It was one of the harsh truths of their profession.

  The ambulance pulled out of the rutted drive, no lights, no siren. There was
no hurry now.

  The fire station was old, one of those built from historic red brick with a pole still in back and a door in the second story where hay for the horses used to be hoisted up by a pulley. All that was missing was a Dalmatian.

  The exterior may have been quaintly archaic but equipment-wise, everything was new and up to code from the computer link with the 911 line to the Blu-ray and big screen TV in the 'family room'. It was home away from home for long shifts at a time and provided all the comforts they could ask for, with the exception of a wife.

  The lounge area offered ample seating. The recliners facing the television were on a first come first serve basis according to comfort. There was a wall of videos on everything from the latest emergency techniques to "Donna Does Duluth" or some similar escapist fare. Magazines were strewn next to each chair speaking of the tastes of whomever had been pulled from its pages to answer the afternoon call, from Popular Hot Rod, the Swimsuit Issue, to 100 New Ways to Make Chicken.

  The kitchen, where everyone took their turn either at the stove or sink, was just beyond, spotless, awaiting the next culinary specialty—anything from 4-Alarm Chili to Tuna Surprise. The chief, Wayne Higley, had his own office right next to another cubby hole for files and dispatch. In the back were sleeping quarters, empty now, where single beds lined up in dorm-like simplicity and personal effects for the on call shift were allotted to a tiny nightstand drawer.

  Four shiny trucks ran the gamut from the boxy EMT vehicle to the massive pumper which was being washed down in the drive. Soon there would be no reminder of the tragic scenario it had just left behind as it stood gleaming and groomed in wait next to the hook and ladder for their next call. Just like the men in the station house. Only the reminders didn't clean away from their memories with a little soap and water. Would that it could be that easy.