by James Hunt
“But how—” Amy stopped, the miner vanishing into thin air. She waited a moment and then turned to Terry, who had remained motionless. “Terry?”
He shivered. His skin had become so white that it glowed.
Amy gently reached for his hand, her touch breaking him from the trance. “Hey.”
Terry shuddered. “It’s true.”
Amy nodded. “Yes.”
“So,” Terry said, his mouth dry from a lack of spit. “Maisie’s…”
Amy tightened her grip. “She’s alive, Terry. And we can get her back, but we need Kara and Ben’s help. And they’ll only help us if you send that letter to the EPA.”
Terry stared at the darkness for a long time, and more than once he tried to speak, but while his lips moved, he couldn’t produce any words. But finally, he nodded and reciprocated Amy’s squeeze. “I’ll need my laptop.”
60
With Terry on his computer in the passenger seat, typing furiously over the keyboard, the man sitting next to Amy was a stark contrast to the man who rode with them back to Ghost Town. But Amy was glad to have him back.
Aside from the clacking of the keyboard, the trip to the reservation was quiet. Liz had fallen asleep, and the sun was setting to the west.
Once back on the reservation, the fading sun made the trailer easy to spot on its little hill, gleaming brightly from the rich oranges and reds. Amy parked next to Ben’s truck, turning her attention to Terry once she cut the engine.
“Are you done?” Amy asked, her tone more panicked than she wanted it to be.
“Almost,” Terry answered, the bulk of his attention still on the computer screen. “Just need to include some of the data I have and….” He smacked the enter button on the keyboard with a quick strike and then turned to Amy. “Sent.”
Kara smiled. “About time.”
“Kara, wait,” Amy said, then returned the necklace she’d borrowed. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” She joined her brother by the front of the truck while Amy woke up Liz, and Terry slid his laptop back to the floorboard.
“Hey,” Amy said, grabbing Terry’s shoulder. “Thank you.”
Terry nodded, avoiding eye contact, his cheeks reddening from embarrassment. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.” He met her gaze. “That won’t happen again.” He leaned over and kissed her, the touch tender but firm. It was the first real sign of affection since the accident.
When Terry pulled away, Amy still had her eyes closed, the memory of her husband’s touch flooding her senses and reigniting a life inside of her that she thought had died.
“Hey!” Kara said, pounding on the hood of the van. “Let’s go.”
The Holloway family quickly exited the vehicle and walked around toward the back of the trailer where the hut had been.
Ben thumbed inside. “He’s waiting for you.” But when Terry went to follow Amy, Ben blocked his path. “She goes in alone.”
As Terry tensed, Amy was quick to spin around, separating the pair. “It’s okay. I’ll be fine.” And with Amy’s assurance, Terry acquiesced. Amy bent low to enter the hut.
Despite finally convincing Terry to come to her side and the fact that she had saved Liz, and that she was now on good terms with Ben and Kara after convincing Terry to send in the report to the EPA, she couldn’t shake the dread from herself as she entered. And she couldn’t stop the shiver running up her back when she locked eyes with Running Water, his black eyes boring into her soul as she stood upright in the tent, hands clasped nervously in front of her and at her waist.
She couldn’t stop the fear from entering her mind because deep down, she understood that this was the end of something precious. She had gone too far and seen too much. And now it was time to pay the price for all that she’d seen. It was time to pay the price for everything that she’d done.
“You’ve returned.” The old man sat still, only the loose muscles around his mouth and jaw moving as he stared into Amy’s eyes.
“I still have another daughter that needs to be saved,” Amy said, walking to the medicine man’s side. “I know what the miner wants, and he’ll trade it for my daughter’s life.”
“He wants to be free of his curse,” Running Water said. “He wants to be with the woman whom he loved.”
“Yes.”
Running Water adjusted himself on the bed of pillows that comfortably propped him up, and the worn lines on his face set into hard creases from his frown. “I told you there would be two trials. And while you conquered the trial of the mind, the next requires a higher cost.”
“Whatever it is, I’ll pay it,” Amy said.
“To trade for your daughter’s life will cost something more than just another life. Something greater, and far more precious.”
Amy swallowed, the blood draining from her face, leaving behind pallid cheeks and pale lips. “It will cost something greater than a life?”
“And what is more precious than a life?” the old man asked, his voice quivering as more tears filled the bottom rim of his eyes.
Amy’s brow twitched together, finally understanding the man’s words. “A soul.”
“Yes,” Running Water said, his voice exploding in a whisper. “A soul. That’s what it will cost to give the miner what he wants. Is that something that you will be able to give up? Is that something that you will be able to sever from yourself? Because losing your soul is deadlier than losing your life. It will bring you pain not just in this world, but all other worlds and realms you visit.”
Amy hesitated, opening her mouth to speak, but then shutting it quickly. She glanced down at her hands, the same pair of hands that had held both of her girls when they came out of her womb. They were so small, so warm, so helpless and fragile. She had held them as long as she could.
The older her girls became, the more she was forced to let go and let them find their own way. But she was always less than just a breath away to help, even when they didn’t want her to be.
A mother’s duty never ends. No matter how old your children grow, you still remember how they felt in your arms when they were little.
Amy squeezed her hands into fists. “Tell me what I have to do.”
61
The whiskey was poured from a crystal vase and into a matching glass. Mulaney waited until it was just below the rim before he finally stopped, then set the decanter on his desk and propped his feet up.
He wrapped his fingers around the glass, his prints smudging the crystal as he brought the rim to a thin smile and let the liquor warm his innards. He leaned back into his chair, the leather groaning from his weight, and rested the glass on his stomach.
It was done. Everything he needed was lined up perfectly. Less than a month from now, that tourist trap would be bulldozed to the ground and his workers would be moved in, extracting that precious metal from the earth and into his pocket.
“Too easy.” Mulaney sipped and scratched a pimple on the square point of his jaw. It had started to come in this morning and had only grown worse throughout the day. He grimaced from the pressure that it gave beneath his finger. It took all of his effort and concentration to keep himself from squeezing it. He focused on the drink instead, letting it distract him from the grotesque growth getting larger on his face. The whiskey helped and by the time he reached the halfway point in his glass, he stopped fingering the pimple on his cheek.
Mulaney hated imperfections. He hated waste and things that were unwanted. They had no place in his life, hell, they had no place in all of the world. He gently swirled the whiskey with a dazed glare in his eyes.
The motion was hypnotic, and it didn’t take long before his eyes half-closed. He had spent his entire life building and expanding an empire, and if this new drilling technique was as surefire as his engineers told him, then he was about to set out and conquer the world like Alexander the Great.
Mulaney sipped the whiskey. “To my future kingdom.” The knock at the door broke the mold of his fantasy, and he grimaced
as he finished a swallow. “What?”
The door opened and a slim man in a collared shirt and tie stuck his head through the narrow crack that he allotted himself, keeping his body outside of the office. “I’m sorry, Mr. Mulaney, but I received an email that I think you should see.”
“Whoever it is, tell them that I’ll get back to them first thing in the morning.”
Clark hesitated, and then opened the door the rest of the way and let himself inside. “Sir, it’s from the EPA.”
Mulaney lifted his feet from his desk and harshly tapped the spacebar on his keyboard, waking the sleeping monitor. “What the hell do they want?” He logged into his account while the lanky assistant inched closer to the desk.
“They received new information on the drilling site,” Clark said, twisting his fingers together and hunching forward at the stomach. “I-I don’t know how they got it, or—”
“Get my lawyers on the phone, now!” Mulaney slammed his fist into the table, rattling the desk and sending Clark running out of the office and slamming the door shut. Mulaney thumped his elbows on the desk and ran his fingers through his hair. “This isn’t possible.”
The more he read the email, the angrier he became and the more he realized how completely fucked they were. The EPA knew everything. Soil density, water table levels, and they’d put a complete cease and desist on all future drilling starting immediately.
“Fuck,” Mulaney said, fisting bunches of his hair. “Fuck!” He picked up the monitor and flung it against the wall. The screen shattered, and the plastic casing around the parts eroded into nothing as it crashed to the ground.
Mulaney grabbed the whiskey decanter and flung it across the room, and it smashed against the floor, where it exploded.
He kicked the chair to the side as he stepped around the desk and crunched the broken glass into smaller pieces of dust, grinding them into the carpet.
Mulaney slowed his breaths, his adrenaline focusing on a single face, a single image in his mind. He was drawn to it like sharks were drawn to blood in the water, and he circled it, slowly.
No one under his command would be stupid enough to send anything like that to the EPA, and to give up such detailed information limited the number of possible suspects to only a few. But only one was desperate enough to try and pull a fast one on him like this. And he wasn’t about to take it lying down.
62
Amy kept her arms around Liz for a long time. The pair rocked back and forth, swaying gently under the newly-minted night sky.
“I love you very much,” Amy said, clasping her daughter tightly. “More than you could ever possibly know.”
“I love you too,” Liz said, her voice muffled by Amy’s shoulder.
Knowing that Amy couldn’t hold on forever, she reluctantly let go. She kissed Liz’s forehead and smiled. “You’ve grown into such a beautiful young woman.”
Liz’s eyes watered. “I know it wasn’t your fault, Mom.” She sniffled, catching her breath. “I know it wasn’t you that day. I didn’t know how hard it was for you until—” She covered her mouth, taking a moment to regain her composure. “I just didn’t know. That’s all.”
There wasn’t anything more wonderful that could have graced her ears. She had never been so happy in all of her life than she was in that moment.
Amy reached for Liz one last time and kissed her cheek, then whispered into her ear. “Take care of your sister. Protect her. Okay?”
Liz only nodded, and the moment Amy let go, Liz made a beeline for the other side of the trailer, head down and her hands covering her face.
Terry placed his hand on Amy’s shoulder and she spun around, letting herself be held by him as she cried into his arms.
“It just doesn’t make any sense,” Terry said. He slowly brought Amy’s face up to his. “Giving up your soul? You’ve never been religious, or believed in God, or went to church—”
Amy placed three fingers over Terry’s mouth and shook her head. “I don’t really know what is going to happen, and I don’t know why I was chosen to do this, but I’m the only one that can bring Maisie back. I’m the only one that can make sure she’s okay.”
Terry gently grabbed hold of Amy’s face and pulled her close. “I was wrong to put all of the blame on you like that. It was wrong for me to even suggest that you had anything to do with hurting our daughters. This isn’t your fault.”
“Maybe,” Amy said, conceding the point. “But if there is a soul to trade for Maisie, then it’s mine.” She stepped out of his reach and headed into the tent.
The moment Amy stepped inside the tent, her husband’s screams were drowned out. She turned around, finding the canvas black, as though another sheet had been placed over it to prevent any moonlight from penetrating the hide.
“There is no turning back once I have started.” Running Water locked eyes with Amy through the flames, which danced in both of their pupils.
“I said I’d do whatever it takes,” Amy said. “I meant it.”
The medicine man gestured to the blue blanket in front of him next to the fire, and that was where Amy lay on her back.
Smoke drifted over her head, and the heat from the fire baked her left side, which broke out in a sweat. She took a breath then coughed, closing her eyes. When she opened them again, she saw the medicine man waving something overhead, some type of incense.
But the smoke didn’t disappear into thin air. Instead, it drifted downward and onto her body, clinging to her skin and clothes like a second cloth. She tried to lift her hand to remove some of it but found that she couldn’t move.
“What—” Amy jerked her head, which much like the rest of her body was anchored to the ground. She could only move the muscles along her face and shift her eyes back and forth to get a better look. “What’s happening?”
“Your body must be still, and your mind must be quiet,” the medicine man answered, then pressed the rim of a bowl to her lips. “I told you that once this was started, I could not stop it.”
Amy parted her lips and drank the liquid. It was cold and shocked her senses, freezing her insides so that it felt like they were on fire. But still she drank, allowing the medicine man to funnel the liquid down her throat until it was empty.
When the bowl was pulled back from her mouth, the freezing pain that the liquid had brought on vanished. A numbness had taken its place, much like the weight that kept her body still. She had lost every ability to speak, escape, or cry for help.
“In order for your soul to be exchanged, it must first be separated from your body,” Running Water said.
Amy tried to move her lips to speak, but she couldn’t, and her questions were forced to remain in the echoing chambers of her mind.
“Once your soul is extracted, your life will be nothing more than a shell. An empty shell.”
Amy’s breath became quick and shallow, but while her breathing was heightened, her heart rate slowed. Every beat made the next one longer to catch. And as her pulse slowed, every beat of her heart became stronger than the one before it. It rattled her bones and organs, thumping like a heavy bass.
“Find a memory, Amy,” the medicine man said. “Something that belongs to you, and only you. Find it for me, and I will use it to connect me to your soul. But it must be powerful.”
Amy shut her eyes, and images flashed across her mind. Birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, random work days. She saw moments of herself as a child, and then in high school and college. She saw her first dates with Terry.
The moments passed in the blink of an eye, but slow enough for her to remember every detail. She had complete control of time, speeding up and slowing down moments that she chose at random.
But Amy felt herself being pulled into one direction. The deeper she tunneled through the memories, the more she knew that she was getting to the truth.
“Yes,” Running Water said. “Show me.”
And while Amy was able to see the millions of moments throughout her life, this one wa
s reluctant to show itself. It was like her body knew what its reveal meant, and her soul was doing everything it could to ward her off and keep the medicine man out. It was self-preservation, the last defense of her subconscious mind.
The harder she tried, the more the memory resisted. Amy dug deeper, forcing herself into the memory, and after a final push, she was able to force her way inside. Suddenly, all of the numbness that she had experienced vanished. Her mind and body came alive as a warm sensation flooded her senses.
“I have it,” Running Water said.
Amy opened her eyes and saw the medicine man’s hand clasped around a glowing ball. The light from the memory pierced through the cracks of his fingers, and he rotated it through the air.
Voices, muffled and quiet, escaped. Amy wanted to reach up and grab it. She wanted the memory back.
The feeling snowballed, and it festered in her mind like an obsession. She needed to grab it, she needed to get it back, she needed to see what was inside. But when she tried to peel her body off of the floor, she found that her limbs and back were still glued to the blanket where she lay.
Amy struggled, her mind on fire and alive as she desperately and vigorously tried to reach for the memory that eluded her. And the more she struggled, the more she felt other memories slipping away.
An entity within herself was slowly separating itself from Amy, and the higher it reached, the more pain rippled through her body.
A translucent hand separated itself from the Amy’s real hand, slowly revealing an entire arm. Internally, Amy screamed, but the only physical sign of her pain were tears rolling down her cheeks. And then, through her blurred vision, Amy saw a shining beacon of light take shape.
It was her soul, and it was reaching for the memory and out of her body.
“Follow it, Amy,” Running Water said. “You must follow it!
The medicine man kept the memory just out of reach, taunting her as he continued to pull it away as the shining hand transformed into an arm and shoulder.
