Max Helsing and the Beast of Bone Creek

by Curtis Jobling

  Right in Jed’s path, snared on a low-hanging branch, was a red plaid hunting hat. It hung limp, one of its fluffy white earflaps soaked with blood. Jed maneuvered around it, finding a huge pine to duck behind. He pulled Wing close, placing the boy’s back so that it was against the rough, rippled bark.

  “You stay here,” Jed muttered, and Wing nodded. With a big hand firmly set against Wing’s chest, Jed chanced a peek around the tree trunk.

  A neglected fire popped and crackled in the center of a small clearing, its flames dying as it slowly burned out. Empty beer cans littered the ground. Three men lay sprawled around the fire, still in their shredded sleeping bags. Their gear was strewn around them, their rifles leaning against a nearby tree.

  One hunter wore a flannel shirt that matched the hat Jed had found flung in the bushes. His chest had been ripped open, and steam still rose from the exposed inner workings of his torso. Beside him, a second hunter’s carefully chosen camouflage outfit had clearly not saved his skin; he lay facedown, covered in the fluffy white filler from his sleeping bag, the wool sticking to his blood as if he’d been tarred and feathered. The final hunter’s Green Day T-shirt had been torn in two and painted red, as had the man himself.

  The hunters weren’t alone, either.

  Jed counted four of the most enormous wolves he’d ever seen, their monstrous heads buried in the slaughtered hunters as they worried organs and hunks of flesh loose from the still-warm corpses. While one pawed at the camouflaged body, two of them fought over the remains of the T-shirt’s owner. The biggest of the bunch, its fur black and oily, had the flannel shirt all to itself. It threw its head back, gorging on a rack of ribs like a glutton. Mighty jaws cracked as it ground the bones to crunchy pulp, swallowing the lot in one gulp. The wolf was easily the size of a grizzly, its fur flecked with blood and chunks of meat.

  “Eat your fill, boys,” said the monster, its voice booming from its vast, shaggy chest. “It’s been too long since we enjoyed the taste of man.”

  The other wolves didn’t answer, still lost in the feeding frenzy. Jed had never encountered any beast such as these before. Big wolves, yes, but none with the power of speech. The alpha smacked its lips, a pink towwQngue slurping gore off its huge, knifelike teeth as it returned its head to its dinner. Then it stopped. The black wolf lifted its head. Jed heard it growl. He could feel himself shrinking back, making himself smaller, his only thought to keep Wing safe. Even Eightball backed away now, his tiny paws silent as he took a tentative step into the shadows. One of these terrors, Jed might have been able to face, and eventually kill. But four of them? He was hopelessly outgunned.

  “What’s the matter, Grimgrin?” said another wolf, lifting its head from its meal as it noticed its brother’s agitation.

  “We’re not alone, Fellfang,” replied the black-furred pack leader. “I smell humans in the air once more.”

  Jed clasped his hand over Wing’s face, clamping the boy’s nose and mouth closed. He raised his forearm to his mouth, trying to blanket his own breath.

  Fellfang sidled up to Grimgrin, his head low and subservient. Grimgrin snarled, snapping at him, but Fellfang held his ground.

  “Where does this scent come from, brother?”

  Grimgrin sniffed at the air again. “North of here, not far at all.”

  “Eat, brother,” said the smaller wolf. “One meal at a time. We finish here, then we follow your scent. And we find the next human. And we feast once more. The night is young.”

  The wolves returned their attention to their meals, hurrying down the remains of the dead hunters. Jed stared at Wing, then gestured that they were leaving. The two backed up, Eightball alongside them, all three grateful beyond words that they were covered in wood musk.

  “Are we heading out of here?” whispered Wing when they were out of earshot.

  “Not yet,” said Jed, skirting the bloody campsite as they headed north. “We need to find the poor sap who’s nearby. I don’t think he realizes he’s on the dessert menu.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  X MARKS THE SPOT

  Max held the scroll in both hands, checking he had indeed found the right place. Syd peered over his shoulder at the map, then looked ahead. Partially obscured by scrawny trees and threadbare bushes, the fissure in the rock seemed unremarkable. A stream trickled out from within, joining up with a faster-flowing body of water at their backs, which would eventually reach the waterfall that tumbled to Bone Creek below. The crack in the mountain was perhaps twenty feet high at its tallest point, widening to a gap of six feet at its base.

  “So come on, dude. What does the X stand for?”

  “We’re about to find out,” said Max, stepping forward across the babbling stream bed, flashlight in one hand, stake in the other.

  “You sure you’re gonna need that?” asked Syd, following him and gesturing to the ancient silver-tipped wooden spike.

  “After what happened to poor Barnum? Heck, yeah. And besides, Splinter goes everywhere with me, Syd. He’s stuck by me through some pretty rough times.”

  “You do realize that you’ve not only named your stick, but you’re also projecting feelings onto it?”

  “It’s a monster-hunter thing, Perez,” said Max, stepping through the rocky arch. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  “I worry about you sometimes,” she muttered as she went in after him, glancing back as they were swallowed by the mountain.

  The twin beams of light cut through the darkness, illuminating a twisting avenue in the rock, the walls leaning in on either side. It felt to Max that two mountains had met, crashing together and leaving the narrowest gap between them. Their feet splashed in the stream bed that passed for a path, the sound echoing deep into the tunnel as they continued forward. Gradually, the space began to open up, the ceiling growing taller until they found themselves in a vast, vaulted cavern. Stalactites and stalagmites threatened to meet one another, glistening with mineral deposits. His flashlight picked up other colors sparkling in the walls of the huge cave, hinting at gems and precious metals aplenty. Max had joked about the existence of quicksilver ore in the mountains, but now it wouldn’t surprise him one bit to find a clan of gnomes in this secluded, secretive corner of the White Mountains.

  “This place is beautiful,” whispered Syd, smitten by the surroundings.

  “Yeah, caves always tend to start out that way, before the hordes of goblins show up looking to tear our faces off.”

  “Could it just be a regular cave?”

  “Why would Barnum have not only marked it on his map like other paranormal hot spots, but also put a dirty red cross on it?”

  Max threw the light straight up into the ceiling of the cavern, and regretted it instantly. The dark rock suddenly came to life as thousands of winged creatures disengaged from the roof. They swept down, a squealing storm of wings and fur. Syd screeched, and Max joined her, as the colony of bats rushed around their heads, mobbing and dive-bombing them as they made for the exit en masse. In the commotion, Max’s flashlight fell to the ground with a clatter, the light instantly extinguished. When the last of the bats had vanished, he reached down, searching for it. Syd threw her own beam across the floor to help. His heart sank as he saw the smashed bulb within the already broken glass.

  “Crapsacks,” he grumbled, standing again.

  “So,” said Syd, managing a faint smile. “Max Helsing is scared of bats?”

  “You screamed too!”

  “Yeah, but I don’t profess to being a monster hunter.”

  “Hey, I’ve faced some pretty heinous beasts in my time!”

  Syd smirked. “Don’t worry, Max. It’s perfectly normal to be scared.”

  The two laughed as their heart rate returned to something approaching normal. As they quieted, they returned their attention to the cavern. Pools of water had gathered here and there, their depth immeasurable, and Max
had no intention of investigating further.

  “Shine your light back over there,” said Max, as Syd’s beam caught something pale lying on the dark ground: a bar or stick of something, white against the absolute blackness. The two stepped carefully over, walking around the puddles and pools and rock formations. They rounded a huge stalagmite in the recesses of the cave and found the white stick.

  “Wouldn’t you just know it?” said Syd, as the flashlight picked out the stripped bone on the ground. Gradually, she began to find others, strewn about, piled in heaps, broken and gnawed on by whatever called the cavern its home. Max crouched and picked one up. It could have been a human femur, but could’ve equally been the leg bone from a large deer. Teeth marks ran up and down its length—extra large, naturally. Max stood still, listening, while Syd swirled the flashlight around her.

  “Nobody’s home,” she said.

  “Correction,” whispered Max, grabbing her flashlight and turning it off. “Nobody was home.”

  He led her to the stalagmite, colliding blindly with the twisted tower of petrified minerals. Syd flinched when Max’s lips brushed her ear, his voice a warm whisper.

  “Listen.”

  They both heard it now: a shuffling, splashing sound, as feet hit water, coming through the passage they’d entered by. Max and Syd remained still as statues, hugging the gray pillar, unable to see a thing. The footsteps drew closer, heavy and slapping against the cave floor. Grunting, burbling, hacking, and coughing. It was almost on top of them.

  Max leaped out and flicked on the flashlight.

  His aim wasn’t great. The beam hit the creature somewhere around its chest, illuminating the dead black bear it was carrying. The bear’s neck was broken, lolling over a huge gray arm as if the animal were a slumbering infant. Max let the light shoot up the enormous body, the monster already recoiling. The beam finally reached the creature’s head, around fifteen feet off the ground. Max saw the monster’s eyes go wide with horror, as its irises retracted with the speed of a camera shutter. It was too late for the cave dweller, though. The flashlight had done its work.

  “Troll!” shouted Max, as much to himself as to Syd, as the giant dropped the dead bear and crashed toward him.

  Max dove one way, Syd the other, as the troll bounced off the stalagmite, cracking its shin. It staggered back, striking its head on a low-hanging stalactite and collapsing to the ground with an earthshaking crash. It lay there, wheezing for a moment, before its fingers scrabbled around and into one of the pools. It wailed, tossing the stagnant water into its blinded eyes, trying to restore its stolen sight.

  “What’s you done to Murdo’s eyes?” shouted the troll. “You’s blinded ’em, is what you’s done!”

  Syd was already pulling at Max’s arm, trying to encourage him to leave, but Max held fast.

  “No, Syd,” he said as the troll gnashed his teeth and balled his fists in anger. “Boyle could be here, somewhere in this cave.” Max kicked some of the bones aside. “If he hasn’t already been eaten.”

  The troll turned his head toward the bones that Max had kicked, his attention fixed upon the two kids.

  “Who’s you to be ’ere in Murdo’s ’ome?”

  “I’ll take this,” Max whispered to Syd, warily stepping forward to the blind monster. “The name’s Max Helsing. And you’d be Murdo, right?”

  The troll growled, turning his head one way and then the other as Max let the light wander over his grotesque frame. This was a mountain troll. His gray flesh was the color of the rocks around them, and where one might have expected to find hair—he was, after all, naked—great clumps of moss and lichen grew, peppered here and there with a variety of odd-shaped fungi. His feet were broad and flat, as were his hands, while his large knobby head was covered in growths, as if he had gone through some strange process of rapid calcification. He reminded Max of the earth elemental he’d encountered in the Undercity, only minus a great many of its better features, not least charm and personal hygiene. The canines of the troll’s jaw jutted up like a pair of hippo tusks, almost touching the bags of dark flesh that gathered beneath his eyes. The eyes were pale, like saucers of milk, the irises at their centers flickering like moths around a flame at night. The tiny dots were lost, looking anywhere but at Max and Syd.

  “What’s you wanting in Murdo’s cave, Maxelsing?”

  “We came here looking for answers,” said Max, trying to deepen his voice and sound authoritative. After all, the troll didn’t know he was speaking to a scrawny human kid, did he? “The deaths, down in Bone Creek; your doing, right, Murdo?”

  “Why would Murdo go killing down there? Murdo’s got all ’e needs up ’ere on the plateau. Murdo’s ’appy ’ere.”

  “Don’t lie, troll. You’re the one who killed those people—admit it. Tell us what you’ve done with our friend!”

  The troll scratched his throat, slate fingernails scraping like chalk on a board. “Murdo eats animals, Maxelsing. Not ’umans.” He chuckled and smacked his lips. “Not anymore, anyways.”

  “So you’re reformed, then? You’re not partial to the odd manburger?”

  “Murdo ’as to live near the ’ermit. ’Ermit would kill Murdo if ’e knew Murdo were eating ’umans.”

  Syd tugged Max’s sleeve. “So Barnum and the troll knew all about each other? Maybe the map was just marking up this lair for Barnum’s peace of mind then? A reminder to steer clear?”

  Max nodded and turned back to the troll. “If you haven’t been killing folk and kidnapping them, then who has? What do you know, Murdo? Tell us and we’ll leave you in peace.”

  “Leave Murdo in peace?” The troll laughed, his bellowing chortle loosening stones from the ceiling that showered down around the cavern. “You’s gone and blinded poor Murdo! ’Ow’s that leaving in peace?”

  “Ah, quit whining,” said Max. “It’ll be temporary. You’ll have your eyesight back in no time.”

  “Will he?” whispered Syd.

  “Haven’t a clue, but we’ll be long gone by then.” Then he was back to the troll. “Go on. Tell me what you know about the one that’s responsible for the attacks.”

  The troll pulled himself upright, taking hold of the tall stalagmite for support and straightening before the pair. Syd gulped as the gray giant cleared his throat.

  “Murdo may be big, but Murdo also be slow. ’E don’t think too ’ard about stuff. ’E keeps ’imself to ’imself. The Sasquatches . . . they’re the bosses of Bone Creek. This was their land before any of the rest of us came ’ere. They welcomed us. Let us live ’ere. Keep out of sight of ’umans and be at peace.”

  This all fit with what Max had heard about Esme Van Helsing’s work, just as Kimble had recounted.

  “Others always come to Bone Creek. Fairy folk and monsterkind alike. Looking for new beginnings. Trying to get along. Then something new came and changed everything. There’s always something new. . . .”

  “What new thing came knocking, Murdo? What came to make a home in Bone Creek?”

  The troll ran a hand along his rib cage, where Max could see a long white scar, recently healed over. “The stranger came knocking. It fought Murdo. Told Murdo to stay in ’is cave. Bone Creek belonged to the stranger now.” The troll scratched the wound, the great jagged line about a foot in length. “But Murdo’s gotta eat. So Murdo leaves the cave at night. But Murdo always looking out for the stranger. Murdo scared of stranger.”

  “Aw,” said Syd, tilting her head.

  “Really?” whispered Max, rolling his eyes. “Murdo, the stranger: was he a Sasquatch?”

  The troll shook his head. “Not Sasquatch.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “Murdo can describe ’im. But after Murdo’s eaten.”

  Max nodded. “Fair enough, if you must, but be quick. Our friend’s life depends on us finding this fiend, and when we do, things will be
better for everyone in Bone Creek, Murdo. You, the Sasquatches, every monster that lives in these mountains. You won’t live in fear anymore.”

  The troll wasn’t listening. He was scratching his stomach, which rumbled like a volcano about to erupt. He snapped the centuries-old stalagmite from the ground with an effortless crack, and in one fluid motion swung it at the kids. Max and Syd both dived, landing awkwardly as the giant stone club whooshed over their heads. The troll sniffed at the air once more.

  “Stay still, little ’umans.”

  “But I can help you!” shouted Max as Syd pulled him away, flashlight arcing wild in the darkness as she searched for the tunnel out of there. “It doesn’t have to be like this!”

  “Troll’s gotta eat!” bellowed the monster, lurching after the pair on his great, flapping feet, his belly growling like a caged beast.

  “What do we do?” screamed Syd as the two stumbled toward the exit.

  “You’re already doing it!” yelled Max. “Run! I’m right behind you!”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  THE DYRE DUEL

  Jed was running, and it wasn’t pretty. That bum leg of his was managing to snag itself on every passing root, rock, and rut in his path. More than once he hit the ground, Wing quick to help him to his feet. Eightball whimpered. Hellhound he may have been, but he was just a puppy in the shadow of those giant wolves. All the while they glanced back into the night, searching the swathes of darkness between the trees. Time was against them.

  “Do you even know where we’re running?” asked Wing. “This looks a lot like blind panic.”

  “North,” said Jed.

  “And you know which way north is?” No reply told Wing all he needed to know. He whipped out his cell, hit a few buttons, and within seconds he had a GPS compass on the screen. Then they were moving again, bearing north at last. “What kind of beasts were those back there?”