by Guy N Smith
She felt her eyes opening, couldn't stop them. It wasn't a shock because she knew what to expect, braced herself for it. He was kneeling over her, his face only inches from hers so that she smelled his breath. Spring onions, you've been pinching from Jon's garden at night, haven't you? Oh Christ, that's really funny. You always loved onions, Ek, even when we were courting. If I close my eyes I can go right back there only I can't get them shut.
She read a lot in his eyes, things that his brain was incapable of transmitting into words. Half-memories, recognition. He was struggling with it all but it was too much for him so he had to resort to a language he knew. Fingers explored her clothing, unfamiliar with how a blouse and skirt came off.
I'll help you, Ek. She fumbled, her fingers shaking so much that the buttons twisted in their holes and she tore at them in her frustration. You don't have to use anything, I'll be OK. If anything goes wrong we'll blame Roy Patter-son again, OK?
He couldn't wait, was helping her to tear off her remaining garments, grunting his delight as he fingered her, hurt her, but she did not cry out. Oh God, it was too wonderful to be true. You've been searching for me all these months, Eric. How did you find me here . . .?
Guilt; he'd known all along, guessed where she went to get screwed whilst he was away peddling his wares. She dropped her gaze, spread her legs wide, edged back on the hard quarries of the kitchen floor but they had the softness of a French quilt. I didn't want to come here, Eric, please believe me. Can't things be as they once were between us?
He wanted her from behind, lifted her bodily, turned her over, pulled her up into a kneeling position. His thrust took her by surprise, threw her forward so that she hit her head hard on the table leg. Blackness and pain, then he was in her, shuddering her whole body with the lust of weeks of waiting. Mind-blowing, an erotic dream, soaring her to unbelievable heights and then leaving her writhing on the floor. Her strength was gone, her groping arms dropping back down. Don't leave me, Eric, I need you. Take me with you wherever you're going. Don't leave me!
And in those few moments of silence they both heard the sound of approaching footsteps, studded working boots on the yard outside scraping on pebbles. And in that moment Eric Atkinson was a beast of the wild again, primitive man obeying the strongest instinct of all—survival.
One bound took him to the open door. Sylvia glimpsed him from the rear, unfamiliar now, the hairy flesh rippling with muscle, short legs bracing him for the rush to freedom.
'Eric . . . don't leave me, please.'
He ran, low and fast, a direct course for the gap in the straggling hawthorn hedge. Aware of the man he had watched for so long from the hills above, the pale hairless features and strange colourful clothing, the stick he carried that made loud bangs and dropped birds dead in flight.
For a second, maybe two, Jon Quinn's reflexes froze, a snippet of time that meant the difference between life and death for Eric Atkinson. Seeing but not wholly believing, the terrible fear of what he might find back in the cottage.
Anger climbing into fury, remembering his gun and what it could do. He threw it to his shoulder, pulled twice, cursed because there was no more than a faint futile click from each trigger. The safety-catch was on! Valuable seconds consumed as he half-lowered the weapon, forced the serrated sliding catch forward; back to his shoulder, searching for his target.
The other was already in the hedge, scrambling through like a dog-fox to whom its escape route was second nature; screened from view. Right or left? He hedged his bets, fired 6ne barrel a yard to the right of the gap, the other a yard to the left. No answering cry of pain. He could have killed the bastard stone dead. Or he could have missed.
Running, still carrying the smoking shotgun, in through the door. Oh my God!
At first he thought Sylvia was dead, the way her naked body was stretched out across the quarries, those weals on her flesh, the rape blood smeared on the insides of her thighs. My fault, oh Jesus, my fault, I shouldn't have left her. I killed her!
Then her head moved and her eyes opened, insistently asking questions as he knelt to examine her. 'You didn't kill him, did you? DidyouT Starting to scream hysterically.
'No.' He knew he spoke the truth, knew only too well that the fleeing throwback had flung himself flat once he was through the hedge; was now on his way back up to those thorn bushes where he could sit and watch them in safety, probably wanking himself and remembering what he'd done in that cottage. The filthy fucking bastard! Next time . . .
'You're sure?' Sylvia was crying, clutching at him. 'You're sure you didn't kill him?'
'I missed.' Jon was shaking. God, I'm glad I never told her what happened to Gwyther. 'What happened?1 It was obvious but he had to ask just the same.
'I left the door open,' she said, calmer now, 'and before I knew it he was in here. He didn't hurt me, he . . .'
'It doesn't bloody look like it.' He winced at the sight of those nail gouges, the bruise on her forehead, pictured the intruder whipping himself up into a fury of lust, stabbing at her until he found the way in. 'In a civilised society they'd put a guy away for ten years for a rape like that.' Only we don't have a civilised society anymore.
'I. . . don't want you to kill anybody,' she sobbed, knew he couldn't see her expression at that moment because she was pulling her blouse back over her head. 'Whatever you do, Jon, you mustn't kill anybody. Now that you've shot at him and frightened him I don't expect he'll come back.'
'He won't go far,' Jon grimaced. 'He's been up there watching us for weeks, mooching about the place after dark. He's a threat to both of us and now you're asking me not to hurt him. Are you crazy?'
'I can't stand killing.' She turned her head away from him. 'I'm OK, there's no harm done, and in future I'll keep the door locked. I'm asking you is not to kill anybody.'
'So if they rush us one night we just open the doors and let them come in? Would you like me to arrange disarmament talks with them, unilateral, of course,' he sneered, regretted his sarcasm a moment later.
She leaped to her feet, ran for the stairs. He heard her sobs, the banging of the bedroom door. Jesus Harry Christ, this took some beating! He sighed, moved across to the doorway. It was raining again, splattering on the yard, melting the sun-baked summer clay into thick sticky mud. It was cold, too.
He found himself looking back up towards the hillside opposite, his eyes searching through the scattered thorn bushes. A hare was bounding up the slope, its powerful backlegs thrusting it upwards with an air of urgency; because something had disturbed it.
Jon Quinn narrowed his eyes, squinted, but he could not find what he was looking for, a hairy human shape squatting on its haunches, immobile as it gazed down on the cottage.
Jon could not see him but he knew he was there all right. Waiting again. He reloaded the gun, propped it up in the porch. I'm going to kill you, you bastard. She won't stop me because it's not because of her I'm going to blow your fucking head off like I did Gwyther's. It's because there s only room for one of us in these hills.
Autumn. The rutting season had begun when males fought to the death for their place at the stand. And Jon Quinn had made up his mind that he wasn't going to be the vanquished.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
PHIL WINDER was aware that large numbers of these wild tribes were moving into the hills. He had spied them in the distance from the Knoll, the highest point on the farm, whole packs of them trekking purposefully, urgently. They must be crazy moving up on to high ground for the winter, he thought.
He was worried about Jackie, too. It was like taking a dog that had lived in an outside kennel all its life and expecting it to adapt immediately to a life indoors. She was constantly going outside; once he awoke in the middle of the night and found her gone. Panicking, fearing lest she had gone back to the wild he had run downstairs, seen the back door wide open.
A starlit autumn night with no moon, a distinct chill creeping into the atmosphere, some of the leaves beginning to turn now. He shivere
d, called softly, 'Jac.'
He heard a movement, saw something materialising out of the clump of cupressus firs which served as a windbreak across the front of the farmhouse. It was Jackie, shaking her head and smiling weakly in her own kind of apology. She couldn't sleep, she needed fresh air. Day by day she was becoming more restless. He wondered if the call of the wild was proving too much for her and one morning he would wake up and she would be gone for good.
'We'd better go back inside and keep the door locked.' He used sign language still, let her pick up her own scraps of vocabulary; if he didn't talk to somebody he would go mad. These hills are full of your . . . people. We can't take risks.1
She nodded, followed him back into the house. How the hell did you ask a woman who had virtually stepped straight out of the Stone Age if something was troubling her? It was a miracle that the throwbacks had not attacked the house. Perhaps they were afraid, although he doubted it. More likely all their time was taken up preparing new dwelling-places for themselves and when that task was completed . . .
Jackie was certainly disturbed. Uppermost in her mind was the fear that one day Kuz and his followers from the village might appear on the scene. She ought to persuade Phil to move on; they had not run far enough. Perhaps Kuz had another woman, had already forgotten her. Somehow her primitive pride refused to allow her to believe this. He would not let up until he found her.
And then there was this strange calling, something which she did not understand. The man called Phil was not truly her mate. They lived together, copulated frequently but . . . something was not quite right. She could not think of him in the same way as ... no, not Kuz . . . she struggled to come to terms with her problem. A ha If-re mem be red face that slipped from her memory just when she thought she had grasped it, left her with a frustrating blank. Who?
Who?
Searching her mind, going out into the garden at night and just standing there listening. She heard the others in j the hills, noises from encampments borne to her on the ! wind. The urge was becoming stronger, soon she would have to go out into the hills and , . . and what? She didn't know.
Phil Winder wished that he had a weapon of some kind, one that would give him superiority in the event of an attack on the farm. A shotgun, for instance. But his father was not a believer in guns, abhorred killing; he even refused to let the local hunt draw his land. He did have an old .410 though, one that had been his father's and had been used for shooting rats around the hayricks in the old days. Phil remembered it, determined to search for it and in due course found it hidden away on a shelf in the cowhouse. He grimaced when he saw it; the barrel was rusted, had a dent in it, the stock was split, and both hammer and trigger springs were broken. So he settled for the big wood axe, took it upstairs with them at night. Maybe, if the need arose, he could defend the landing in much the same way that Horatio had defended the bridge.
He did not go far from the farm these days, his furthest point the Knoll where he lay and watched the activity on the hillsides all around. There were more camp-fires than ever now, people coming in all day long, groups and singles, many of them hurrying as if there was some urgency to reach high ground. Fleeing from something perhaps . . .
Once he thought he heard gunfire in the distance, a sporadic burst of firing. If it was the army then they did not come this way. Phil half-considered taking Jackie and going in search of more survivors but discarded the idea. It was too dangerous, they were safer here.
It was inevitable that the throwbacks would come to the house one day. Phil just kept hoping that it would not be each today or tonight, for you did not plan as far as tomorrow. But some day or some night they would come.
He heard them that blustery autumn night down in the yard below. It was Jackie who gave him his first warning, a tensing of her body against his, her hand gripping his own. They are here!
He slid out of bed and crossed to the window. There was enough moonlight to see by, a weird scene below, furtive shapes that were barely human, slinking in the shadows; a dozen, maybe more, moving with a sinister stealth that left no doubt in his mind what they had come for.
He picked up the axe. Suddenly it felt puny, useless. The enemy would be suitably armed with whatever weapons they had stolen from farms and houses. He was one against many; his only advantage was the narrow landing with barely room for two people to pass. They could only come at him one at a time.
He heard them smash down the front door, a splintering and tearing of woodwork, a heavy beam crashing. Low snuffling noises, a snarl. Then silence except for their heavy breathing.
They were in the hall, waiting whilst their eyesight adjusted to the darkness, Phil Winder could hear the beating of his own heart, his pulses pumping blood as hard as they could go. His mouth was dry and he understood where the proverbial likeness to the bottom of a parrot's cage came from. He tasted his own terror, the fetid flavour of fear.
There was no sound from Jackie, she was lying on the bed, listening just like he was. There was no way out; they had lived for today too long and now tomorrow had caught up with them. He heard the first soft footfall on the stairs. Phil sweated, rested the axe on his shoulder, gripped the stail with sticky hands, pressed himself back into the shadows. He wanted the first blow to take them by surprise; the advantage was his for anyone approaching him would be silhouetted against the faint light of the small landing window. First up, first to die!
Suddenly he saw them, shaggy long-haired creatures which might have been werewolf images depicted in some macabre shadow-show, the first one taller than the second, striking his head against a low beam, ducking.
And that was then Phil Winder drove in the first blow. He felt the impact, felt his stomach heave up. Like splitting logs, if you hit them properly they fell apart; inaccuracy or knotted wood resulted in the axe-head sticking so that you had to tug it free. This was one of the latter.
No scream, just a dull thud, the other's arms going up instinctively to pull at the axe then falling away limply. Dead, tottering, falling, almost pulling Phil with him. Winder took the strain, used a foot on the stair-rail as a lever and then the corpse pulled free, staggered, slumped backwards taking the man directly behind him down with him on to those below.
Christ, if only somebody would scream! But nobody did; somebody grunted with surprise and it sounded like water was trickling somewhere except that it was too thick and sluggish for water, dripping steadily off the stair-head down into the well of the hall below.
Phil swung his axe, saw them coming again, warier this time, a long pitchfork being thrust up ahead of them. He struck, snapped it in two, sent the twin-pronged head spinning. A second blow just in time to catch the next man who rushed him, a devastating shoulder wound. The man dropped with a groan, blocked the stairs, but they were clambering over him, an army who seemed not to know the meaning of death! A gathering tide which would surely sweep him down.
One of them lost half his face to a downwards sweep of the axe, the blade scraping the forehead, biting deep and gouging out an eye, taking out the cheekbone on its downward journey, slicing the mouth through and coming out at the jaw, showering teeth and bone splinters as it came free. A hand grabbed the handle, jerked on it, two or three more hands securing a grip. And in those few seconds Phil Winder was rendered defenceless, his axe wrested from his grip. ,
Mentally he surrendered. Perhaps he could have lifted the narrow mirror off the picture-rail above his head, wielded it until the glass was all smashed and gone. Or run back into the bedroom, forced the ancient lock to turn, given himself and Jackie a minute or two more of life. But in the end it would not have made much difference and he knew it,
He retreated until his back touched the wall, his head brushed a low beam on the slanted roof. His guts were twisted up and he tasted blood in his mouth. He half-raised his arms, dropped them again, gave an hysterical laugh. This bloody Jot didn't know the meaning of surrender—you fought until you dropped. No quarter asked nor given, he had
killed and maimed two or three of them. Now it was their turn!
He remembered the pit; he'd sooner be dead, so long as they killed him quickly. Their hands reached out for him, scraped his face and chest like claws, gripped his arms. The man with the mutilated face miraculously still lived; it was impossible! Streaming blood, head thrust forward, blazing malevolence at Phil with his remaining eye. You did this to me and now I want my revenge!
Phil screamed, struggled with those who held him as the pain-maddened throwback clawed at his face, scraped, dug deep and raked. An eye for an eye . . . Blinded, blood streaming everywhere, pinioned whilst that pain-crazed bastard shredded him to bloody ribbons! Writhing. Strong fingers forced his mouth open, gripped his cheek flesh, tore in opposite directions.
Kill me, you fuckers. Kill me!
He was dying but not fast enough; not even the strength to writhe now. He thought about Jackie, this was all his fault. If she hadn't helped him escape in the first place she would still be the chiefs woman back at the settlement. Now they would take their vengeance, had waited weeks to catch up with the fugitives.
They released their hold and Phil Winder slumped to the floor. Feet kicked him but it didn't matter any more. They were slashing at the lower half of his body with a knife, machete-style. But it doesn't fucking matter, I'm beyond the pain barrier, I just want to die!
Frenzied, the peak of their fury, jostling one another to get in a blow or a stab at the body on the floor. Standing on him, trampolining him, ballooning his belly until the stretched skin split and showered out yards of slimy, bloody intestines.
It was some time before the killers realised that their victim was dead. The cessation of their vicious attack was gradual. They stood there looking at one another and only then did they remember the woman, the reason they had come. Kuz's woman, the unfaithful bitch who had freed this man, deprived them of a slave, run off with him and even now might be carrying his young.
