by Holly Lisle
She moved toward the phone-stand — and the hair on her arms stood up. The blackness in that corner of the room seemed darker than it had any right to be. She imagined she could feel something waiting with breath held for her to step across an unseen line — she could almost hear ghostly whispers, beckoning her near.
She was being stupid. She didn’t care. Too much in one night, she thought, and did not brave the phone. She took the flashlight and the kitchen knife and fled. Minerva wished right then that she and Darryl had a gun. But the knife would have to do.
Parka on, knife in her coat pocket, she stepped out into the bitter blackness of early morning. No one was visible outside, either. She left the front door unlocked and trudged down the stairs. The wind blew like the end of the world — intensely cold and miserably wet. The darkness seemed to devour her as she stepped cautiously away from the house. Her boots crunched on the mixed ice and snow, and her nose began to run. No sense, she thought, taking the damned station wagon for the short distance I’m going. I’d probably just slide it into a ditch, anyway, and I don’t think it would fit down that path. She jingled the keys in her pocket and left the hated LTD behind.
It’s only a block and a half, she thought.
Halfway to the empty lot, she began to wonder if she’d made a mistake. She looked up at the sky and shivered. God, but it’s dark! she thought. And scary. The streetlights would have been some help in the near-blizzard — the flashlight simply wasn’t enough. She watched the little puddle of bobbing light she made, feeling the weight of the storm and the night all around her. The eyes of the darkness seemed to watch her — she felt their gaze fixed on her back.
Wretched, wretched storm.
She trudged through the mess of slush and ice; her boots slipped from time to time as they hit spots where the asphalt was uniformly glazed. As long as she could walk on the grassy shoulder, the going wasn’t quite so bad.
Gusts of wind buffeted her and shoved her from side to side. She slipped once, fell into the ditch, and the knife in her pocket jabbed into her hip. Swearing, she pulled the point loose. Not deep — sure as hell painful, though.
Wet snow and crystals of ice lashed her cheeks and stung her eyes. Her hands inside her knitted mittens felt frozen. She jammed the flashlight under her arm and pressed the arm tight against her side — her hands had grown too numb to hold it.
There were no cars at all — nobody up, no lights on in the houses she passed. Minerva felt like the last living person on earth.
A block and a half. Seemed like it took forever. There it was, though — the empty lot, complete with snow-covered two-rut road diving straight into the black heart of an overgrown woods.
These places never look so goddamned ominous in the daylight.
She stamped her feet to warm them; stared down that overgrown maw of a tunnel.
Light from the flashlight illuminated no more than ten feet into the gloom. The beam seemed dim to her; she smacked the base of the flashlight once with the flat of her hand, but it didn’t help.
In the stygian blackness, something terrible waited for her. Something straight out of her worst nightmares.
And that something had her kids.
“All right!” she said into the wind. “Give them back to me now and I won’t come after you.”
The wind whistled and howled. It made voices — but the voices said nothing she could understand.
“Give them back or I’m coming in!” she yelled. “You don’t want me to come in.”
But the invisible thing that waited evidently did.
She stepped onto the road. Immediately, the canopy of pines and evergreen hollies overhead cut the wind and blocked some of the snow and sleet. The blanket of snow was smoother where the road lay — a narrow ribbon of white between the overarching trees. Even out of the wind, the woods were colder than Viking hell, Minerva thought. She jammed her mittened hands into the pockets of her nylon, polyester-stuffed parka, and plodded along with the flashlight pressed between her elbow and her waist.
She paced along her rut, darting her flashlight from right to left and back, looking for some sign of the Miata. She walked for what she guessed would be the length of the empty lot, but the path went onward, and the woods showed no evidence of thinning. She walked on, doggedly. She lost all sense of time, and the cut on her hip began to throb. Her legs grew tired. The woods stretched out on all sides, devoid of people or houses.
How much longer does this road go on? she wondered. Stonebridge should he over to my right, and the Loch Lomond development should be to my left. There should be houses and streets all over the place.
The trees crowded closer. The path became a single rut. There was no way the Miata could have gone down the path — but there was nowhere else it could have gone. The impossible had ceased to faze Minerva. She kept stubbornly on.
The cold ate into her, and her lungs burned from the freezing air. Ice-covered branches slapped her cheeks, and their bony-fingered assaults stung like hornets. Needles of white-hot pain stabbed her fingers and feet.
Suddenly the burning sensation grew overwhelming. It enveloped her body, and she bent over, gasping for breath while invisible needles ran through her from all sides. Dizziness overtook her, and her ears roared, drowning all other sounds. She felt suddenly light and disconnected — almost as if she would faint again. She collapsed — but could not feel herself hit the ground.
After an instant, though, the pain vanished, and the sense of strangeness passed. She stood and took a step.
Funny, she thought. I’m not at all cold anymore.
A warm, gentle breeze blew past her and caressed her skin, and she stared down at her body with horror. Her clothes were gone; she was completely naked. She realized at the same moment that her glasses were gone, too; the outlines of the trees around her had become blurry and indistinct. Her flashlight and her knife were gone. So was the snow. The leaves beneath her bare feet crunched.
Minerva screamed. She dropped to her knees and began feeling around for her clothes or her glasses — for anything.
Rational thought returned in tiny pieces, and she forced herself to sit, and breathe slowly, and collect herself. Panicked, she would be useless to her children.
The air smelled of autumn — the tang of cider — apples fermenting on the ground somewhere nearby; tannin; earth damp from recent rains; freshly fallen leaves. She didn’t understand what had happened — but she would have to keep a grip on herself and pretend she did. Feign sanity.
Losing her clothes wasn’t as bad as losing her glasses, she decided. She had to have those. If she couldn’t see, she would be helpless.
Knowing perfectly well she was being illogical — that if her clothes had just vanished, the glasses would have, too — she still got back on her knees, calmly this time, and started digging through the dry leaves. She would find her glasses, she decided. She just would.
She could almost see them half-covered by leaves, could almost feel the cold metal frames under her fingertips. They were as real in her mind as twenty years of desperately nearsighted dependence could make them — and suddenly her fingers brushed icy metal and snow-covered glass, and there they were, under her hand.
Better not to ask too many questions, she thought, and put them on.
She stood, and pulled her shoulders back and lifted her chin. The dragon, the ghost light — they were playing games with her — changing things. She wouldn’t let it stop her.
“You can’t scare me,” she whispered. Then louder, “I said, you can’t scare me. You have my kids. I want them back!”
She started walking again, determination undiminished in spite of her fear. She noted her hip didn’t hurt anymore, and she had no cut where the knife had gone in. It didn’t matter. She didn’t care what happened to her, she thought. Only finding Jamie and Carol and Barney mattered.
She arrived abruptly at a clearing. The sky along the horizon wore the first pale flush of coming dawn — there was eno
ugh light that Minerva could see she was at the top of a huge, dome-shaped hill. Meadowland spread in front of her, golden grasses bent and rippled like waves in the ocean. A string of little moons hung across the waist of the world like brightly colored jewels strung on an invisible chain.
The horizon pinked up, and from all around her, meadow birds began cheeping and singing. The path continued in front of her, along the ridge to the next hill over. Huge standing stones circled the top of that hill like a heavy crown. She walked toward them, a few tentative steps at a time. Nervously, she looked behind herself, and got a nasty shock.
The path behind her was gone.
So were the woods.
* * *
The sun was coming up when Darryl pulled into the drive. The world glared ice-white and dawn-pink — blinding, beautiful, wickedly cold. The walk up to the house was a solid sheet of glaring white, marred by two sets of footprints, both almost completely filled with snow.
He got out of the Nova, blowing steam into the frigid air, and crunched up the walk.
The front door was unlocked.
He swallowed uneasiness. Maybe Minerva is already up, he thought, and went in.
The house was still. He stood in the foyer, holding his breath, listening. Maybe the kids are still asleep, he told himself.
“Minerva!” he yelled. “I’m home!”
No answer.
“Minerva! I’m home! Is everything all right?”
Still no answer.
Darryl closed his eyes. Please, he thought. Please just be pissed off at me. Please don’t be gone.
He walked to the stairs and up them. They creaked beneath his weight, incredibly loud in the silence. The grandfather clock bonged once, and he looked at his watch. Six-thirty.
He thought about calling out to the kids, then decided against it. They’re still asleep, he told himself. If I wake them up early, Minerva will kill me. There’s no way she’ll believe I’m freaked out because of something I thought I saw in a mirror.
He reached the top of the stairs, turned, walked slowly along the landing. He peeked into Carol’s door. Her bed was empty.
He opened the boys’ door, and a blast of icy air hit him. The window was out — looked to him almost as if it had been exploded from the inside. He clenched his fists. Tears burned his eyes and rolled down his cheeks.
Real, he thought. It was all real. Something got them — something took them away—
He heard a noise coming from his and Minerva’s bedroom. Someone walking around, sitting on the bed, squeaking the bedsprings. Oh God, he thought, as relief rushed over him, so intense it made him queasy. They’re all in our room. Of course. The kids got scared because the power went off — because a tree limb or something knocked out the window. They’re all in our room—
He took a deep breath, and sighed, and laughed softly. Panic, why don’t you, Darryl?
“Minerva!” he called, and left the boys’ room, and closed the door behind him. “Why didn’t you answer me?” He went down the hall, his stomach still tied in knots from anxiety, and walked into his bedroom.
He immediately backed out, slammed the door, and stood in the hall for a moment, hyperventilating. I didn’t see anything, he told himself. Everything is okay, and when I walk back in there, Minerva and the kids will be fine.
He opened the door just a crack, and peeked in.
A vivid blue dragon curled up on his bed, eating Wheaties out of a box and reading a book. It had a can of Budweiser clutched in one huge forefoot. The dragon grinned at him.
“Hi!” it said, in a very deep, gravelly voice. “Want some Wheaties? Or a beer?”
Darryl slammed the door again. He leaned against the wall and slid down into a crouch, and rested his face in his hands. There is not a dragon in my bedroom, he told himself. There isn’t. He said it out loud. “There is not a dragon in my bedroom.”
“There was the last time I looked,” the incredibly deep voice rumbled from the other side of the door.
Darryl pressed his face against his thighs and wrapped his arms around his legs. There’s a dragon in my bedroom — I don’t even like having to get rid of mice!
He took a deep breath and straightened. He was going to have to get rid of it. He couldn’t leave it in there. What if it had hurt Minerva, or the kids? He stood and thought for a moment.
How the hell do you get a dragon out of your bedroom? Darryl suspected this wasn’t the sort of thing you could call Terminex for. He used an old golf club on mice — but that wasn’t going to work here. First, mice weren’t likely to turn around and charbroil you when you swung at them — and second, the golf club was in the bedroom, under the bed.
I don’t have a gun, I don’t have a sword, I don’t have a suit of armor. Modern man, Darryl decided, was remarkably unprepared for fighting dragons.
The dragon didn’t look all that threatening, really, he thought. It had really sharp teeth, and it was big, but— it was sitting in there drinking beer. I mean, unless it turns out to be a nasty drunk, maybe there won’t be a problem.
He stuck his head in the door again.
The dragon pulled a handful of Wheaties out of the box, tossed them down its huge maw, and chased the cereal with a dollop of beer.
“That wife of yours is a major babe,” the dragon offered. “I love babes.”
Darryl stepped into the room, caution forgotten. He was instantly angry. “How do you know my wife?” he demanded.
“Met her at the grocery store. We were both shopping and we, ah, ran into each other. I’ll bet she’s hot, huh?” The mythical beast stared heavenward and sighed gustily. He started to sing.
“The lovely lady sang so sweet,
Upon her harp, she PLUCKED.
The dragon’s lust grew great and strong,
His heart thundered and BUCKED.
When she was through, he took her home,
And all night long the-e-e-e-ey—
WE-R-R-R-RRE—
Anatomically incompatible,
His was flyable, hers just SAT-able.
True love di-i-i-ied, ‘cause nothing FIT!
That’s the long — and — SHORT of it!”
Darryl leaned against the doorframe and tried to talk sense to himself. The dragon was a manifestation of his guilt. Had to be. His subconscious had to be finding something deeply significant in a randy blue — blue?! — mythological beast that made lewd remarks about his wife and sang dirty ditties.
“I love that song,” the psychological manifestation said. “It’s sort of the dragon national anthem.” He erupted into the second verse.
“They tried their best to make it work,
With effort pure and TRUE!
They used appliances and gels,
And lathered up with GOO!
’Twas all for naught, though — sad to tell.
They simply couldn’t—
THE-E-E-E-EY — WE-R-R-R-RRE—”
He launched into the chorus again, and Darryl closed his eyes. So let’s do a brief comparison here. Is a dragon singing on my bed better or worse than seeing my wife in the mirror at work? Sanity-wise, that is?
The dragon began the third verse.
“The dragon ceased his striving but
Alas, it was too LATE!
They buried her while he bemoaned
The fickleness of FATE!—”
Darryl gathered his courage and located his voice. “Excuse me,” he squeaked to the blue hallucination. “But would you please go away?”
The dragon stopped its racket long enough to stare at him. “—Eh? Oh, not right now. I’m singing. I wrote this song, you know.”
“Dead not for love but just because
They could not FOR—
THE-E-E-E-EY WE-R-R-R-RRE—”
“I know you’re singing,” Darryl interrupted. “I want you to stop.”
“I’m almost done. But the bridge is the best part. Here, listen.”
The moral of this sad lament,
/> Avoid the clench of FATE!
Make sure the plumbing measures up,
Before you copuLATE!
THE-E-E-E-EY WE-R-R-R-RRE—”
The dragon waggled the spiny rilles over his eye-ridges when he sang that last part. Darryl found the effect disconcerting.
“Very nice,” he interrupted again. His voice was coming back stronger. He didn’t sound like such a wimp anymore. He still felt like a wimp. Oh well, he thought. Can’t have everything. “Did you eat my wife?” he asked.
The dragon stopped singing. He cocked his head to one side and looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling. “No, unfortunately. She didn’t ask me to. Of course, we were in the supermarket at the time.” He fixed a hopeful gaze on Darryl. “Do you think she might?”
Darryl looked at the dragon with disbelief. “NO! Did you eat my children?”
“I get the feeling we aren’t talking about the same thing here. Kids aren’t my thing—” The dragon huffed and pouted. “And I never munch babes. For the record, I am an omnivore. Mostly, I require the same sorts of nourishment you do — by the way, these Wheaties taste like straw. You actually eat this stuff?”
“No,” Darryl said. “I hate Wheaties. So if you didn’t eat my wife and my kids, what did you do with them?”
“What did I do with them?! What did I do with — I didn’t do anything with them!” The blue rilles around the dragon’s face stood out like fans — the long, delicate spines quivered. The dragon’s pupils dilated and contracted rapidly, and he puffed out a thin tendril of smoke. “I’m just here to keep you company so you won’t be alone, bud, and to protect you from the Weirds. I wasn’t out till all hours of the morning boffing the office bimbo, was I? I’m the good guy in this little morality play.”
“How’d you know about that?” Darryl asked, then decided he didn’t want to know. “Look,” he said “I didn’t mean to offend you. You know where they are, though? My family, I mean.”
