“What happened‽ Where’s Sophie?” Her voice was high-pitched and cracking.
Just then Thomas realized how he must look, standing there, a large man covered in water and blood. He was surprised she hadn’t turned and fled right back out of the house.
He couldn’t bring himself to say anything, he simply pointed toward the bathroom. Then went and collapsed back down on the couch in shock. His mind reeled, trying to grab hold of any possibility that might make some sense, but he was grasping at straws. There was no sense to be made from a situation like this. His sister went into the bathroom near ready to burst and in about a half hour was suddenly, what? Unpregnant? A baby can’t just disappear into thin air.
Reluctantly his mind started to move toward some very morbid thoughts. He could never imagine his sister doing anything crazy but there were cases with new mothers under stress doing gruesome things to their children. Had she flipped out? Lost her mind and disposed of her newborn child somehow? No, he refused to believe something like that. There would have been signs on the toilet of such a thing, anyway. If she had flipped out, that would have been the only possible method of disposal.
In the next room, he could hear Stacy talking softly to Sophie, cooing almost. Then the water came on and he could hear splashing. He guessed his sister must be letting Stacy clean her off. That would be good. That would help her calm down a bit, if a girl can be calm after her baby has disappeared. What the Holy Hell.
Thomas sank further into the couch and tried to get his mind right. Something needed to be done but he wasn’t entirely sure what. He could call the police but best-case scenario they would haul Sophie off to the police station for questioning and he didn’t want to see that happen. Best if he just waited for his sister to come out and see what she had to say about it. It took another fifteen minutes.
Sophie walked out of the bathroom looking somewhat normal. She was clean of blood and whatever else she had been covered in and dressed in a robe. Stacy had her arms wrapped around her protectively and guided Sophie over to the recliner, where she sat gingerly, keeping her eyes downcast. She looked to still be in a glassy-eyed state of shock and her skin was pale he’d ever seen it. Thomas met Stacy’s eyes and she returned his questioning look with one of her own. Thomas shrugged and shook his head, letting her know he had no clue what the hell was going on. He moved to the side to allow her plenty of room next to him.
They both waited patiently for a few minutes to allow Sophie to come around in her own time. Eventually she did, looking up slowly at them both, her hands in her lap twisting and rubbing at each other. She stared at them, looking back and forth between the two, as if trying to decide who to talk to or what to say. Finally, she just looked straight ahead and started talking, as if speaking to an invisible classroom in front of her.
“Both of you have asked about what happened to me out on the island almost nine months ago. Neither of you got any answer worth giving. I just couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t talk about things. But after what just happened …” she rubbed her face with her hands vigorously and kept them there for a moment while her audience waited in rapt silence. “Jacob was a bit troubled.” She looked up then, eyes burning. “A bit troubled, but an amazing person! He just had a hard life is all and it was for me he went off the rails a little. There was the other man we were traveling with when we went to the island, Chris was his name. He seemed nice, good fun actually, but he didn’t stay that way. When we got there, we planned on spending the day having an enjoyable time on this island we would have all to ourselves, but before we even got off the boat Chris tried to rape me.”
At that, Thomas interrupted by jumping up off the couch. “Sonofabitch! That bastard, if he wasn’t dead I’d kill him right now.” He was about to say plenty more until he caught his sister’s look and felt Stacy’s hand on his arm. Slowly he sat back on the couch, feeling the heat in his face, and took some deep breaths. “Sorry,” he muttered.
“Luckily,” she said, “Jacob heard what was happening and rushed to my aid, but he felt no different than you did Tommy, and he showed it. He beat Chris to death. Right there in front of me.” Her eyes stared in silent horror at the floor, reliving the gruesome event, then she continued. “I think he just lost it and didn’t even realize what was going on. He was yelling at Chris, but calling him Gerald the whole time he was beating on him. I still don’t know who Gerald is, but if I had to guess, it was probably his father.” She paused to wipe tears away from her eyes with the sleeve of her robe. “I panicked and ran out up to the top deck and Jacob followed not long after me, but he was,” she paused, looking for a word, “I guess you could say a switch flipped and didn’t switch off. He jumped from the boat and ran off into the jungle.”
“I didn’t know what to do at the time. I was falling in love with him and he had just saved me, but the sheer violence of it, and him yelling out some stranger’s name, I was freaked out. I didn’t know whether to be grateful to him or scared of him. I thought about trying to leave, trying to radio for help, but I didn’t know the first thing about any of the equipment. Finally, I decided to follow him, thinking I’d talk to him, tell him everything was okay, then we should get back to the boat. I thought we could radio for help, explain what happened, and everything would be okay.”
Sophie leaned back then and stared up at the ceiling, slowly shaking her head side to side. “It’s difficult to say what happened after that. I remember following his path into the jungle, and then …” she paused, searching the hole in her memory for something concrete to offer, and found only empty spaces.
“I woke up naked on a stone altar inside a weird pyramid type building that looked really old. It was on a small little island in the middle of a lake that was on the bigger island. When I woke up, Jacob was there and it was as if he didn’t know who I was. I truly believe he didn’t. It was in his eyes. There was no recognition there. He said he had been on the island for four or five days and he didn’t know how I got there. At first, I didn’t know whether to believe him. I mean, who else would put me out there?” She looked at Thomas and Stacy as if hoping for an answer. None came and she continued. “Anyway, I believed him. I thought if he did put me out there he honestly didn’t realize it, like maybe he was blacked out. For all I know, I was blacked out and did it myself. No matter, I was there and I left with him. I didn’t tell him about the boat though. I was nervous to, just in case it would trigger something in him. He seemed so normal then, like nothing bad at all had happened, and I didn’t want to ruin it. My thought was to give him time, let him remember the events slowly. We spent time together there that was so wonderful, eating fruit and swimming and just being happy. For a little while it was almost as if there weren’t a dead man out on a boat not far away.”
“Things didn’t stay like that though.”
Sophie stood and began to pace back and forth in the living room before going to the kitchen and getting a glass of water. Thomas and Stacy just waited in silence, both feeling like there was nothing to say then anyway. When she returned from the kitchen she didn’t sit back down, only resumed pacing. Then she started to talk again, picking up where she left off as if there had been no pause.
“Anyway, something happened to Jacob one day. He returned from the pyramid thing out on the little island, his head was bleeding, and he was frantic to get away. He thought he was going crazy. He thought I needed to get away from him. There were things he’d seen, he told me. Hallucinations, I assumed, and he thought maybe that was the case. Either way, he felt like I was in danger being near him. I told him then. I explained everything that happened and why he was feeling and seeing these things. It was just a traumatic shock he wasn’t dealing well with. I understood and I just wanted him to understand! I think he was even beginning to, but then something happened. He saw something, one of his hallucinations, and freaked out and told me to run.”
“And I did! His panic was contagious, I guess. There was a moment where I even felt like I heard screams in
my head. It startled me and I ran and he ran with me. I was so frightened I just kept going, to the boat, back to the mess where it all started, hoping we could just get onboard and leave.”
She looked up at Thomas. “That’s when we ran into you, and …” It was all she had, the memory was too close and talking it all out made it seem real again. She broke down in great heaving sobs and instantly Thomas and Stacy were at her side, hugging and talking to her, trying to offer comfort.
“I’m so sorry, Sophie.” Thomas had his big arms wrapped tightly around his sister, his heart aching at her pain and broken with the knowledge of finally knowing who this man was he had killed. “Sophie, I didn’t know, I saw you running and screaming at me and a man running after you. I had just seen a bloody massacre on the boat. I thought you were next.” He squeezed her tight, thankful beyond anything now she was accepting his embrace and not shrinking away.
Sophie didn’t pull back from her brother, instead she embraced him in return and held on tight, wetting his shoulder with her tears. She clung to him as if he were all that kept her from disappearing.
“I know Tommy, I know, I know that now. It took me a while to get past it, but I know. You were protecting me. You’ve always protected me. The whole thing was a fucking mess. It’s nobody’s fault.” She pulled back then and stroked his face, like caring for a version of her brother that was much younger than he really was. “There’s more now. Lots more, and you both need to hear it, because I can’t be the only one to know. I think I’d go crazy if I was.”
She waited for them to disentangle themselves from her and return to the couch. Once they were composed and their faces both dry again, she continued.
“For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been having dreams … disturbing dreams. Different. Not just nightmares like I’ve had before, these are entirely alien experiences, where I feel lucid, and they’re all centered around the island.
Some dreams have involved Jacob. He tells me not to come back to the island. He believes I’ll return to look for him and he doesn’t want that to happen. A normal way for my mind to process the grief, I’m sure.
Then there are other dreams, more disturbing, where I’m confronted by the things Jacob described to me, the hallucinations he had. Mainly, a very frightening and hideous creature, like a huge man with burning hair and a face that appears like a swirling black hole. I’ve had dreams where,” she glanced over at them, feeling embarrassed, “where he had his way with me and I was helpless to fight back. I’ve had other dreams where I saw the history of the island in paintings and through it all, he was always there, this creature.”
“In the bathtub earlier, I fell asleep and another dream came over me. This time the creature came back and put me on an altar. I felt like I was in a trance, not quite there, but not fully absent.” She paused and took a few deep breaths, keeping herself calm. “I had the baby, in the dream. It’s what the Thing wanted. The baby. I don’t know why, but It did. When I woke up, the baby was gone. As if I gave birth in the dream and the baby stayed there for real.”
She looked up frantically at her brother and her friend, waiting for a response. Suddenly it was as if saying the thing out loud made it true. Before, she was reasonably calm, now the panic was like a rat, clawing its way up from deep in her stomach and into her throat.
Thomas saw it coming and was instantly back in front of her, on his knees, with his hands placed on hers. He was about to tell her it was okay, it was only a dream. A dark and disturbing dream. Any mother would feel they were going crazy if they dreamed of having a baby and losing it. Then the thought changed and he remembered just what was happening. The baby was gone. He knew it, but somehow felt it couldn’t be real and his mind was letting that part slip, but now he regained it. The baby was gone! Either his sister did something terrible and disposed of her newborn child, or what she was saying was true and there was some dark magic involved. He wasn’t sure he could believe either scenario, but he also knew there was no way for her to get rid of a newborn child. It just wasn’t feasible.
“It’s okay, Sophie, just relax. We’ll get to the bottom of this, whatever it is. We’ll find the answers, somehow.”
“Thomas, there’s only one way we’re going to find my baby. We must go back. We have to go back to the island.”
5
Bolo reached over the side of his small, wooden boat to cup some cool water in his hand and splashed his face, feeling instant relief from the heat. The sun was hot, shining down on him, but it was something he was used to. The life of a fisherman isn’t just a life spent on the water, it was a life spent under the sun and sky, exposed to heat and rain and all the elements. It was a life he loved.
In the bottom of his boat, near the front, was a brown sack sitting in a half-foot of water. Bolo looked upon it with pride, for it had been a good day and a better catch. Eleven fish he had pulled from the sea, more than any recent time he could remember, and they were still coming. What a beautiful day!
He’d come upon the fish early, not an hour after dropping his line in the water, and had been in the thick of them ever since, following their trail North and West. It seemed that if he kept this heading they kept biting, taking him further and further from Kabara. He surely didn’t mind though, he had a wife at home and soon, a newborn son to feed. No man was prouder then Bolo, and his wife would be proud of him too. This would be their first child and both he and his wife were the most excited parents the village had ever known, he was sure of it. Every day when Bolo returned from the sea he took any opportunity he could find to share his joy with any man or woman who would listen. They all listened, because Fijians were a happy people who loved a reason to celebrate.
The baby would be here soon, only another couple of weeks to wait. This gave him a renewed sense of purpose to his days. Before the pregnancy, he enjoyed his time on the water, he would fish some and relax some. No nap was as good as a nap spent out on the ocean under a cloudless sky, with the soft waves rocking you to sleep. Now, however, Bolo wasn’t concerned with naps. Catching three or four fish no longer satisfied him. He needed to be prepared. He was going to be a provider now. So, if the fish were biting, he would keep his pole in the water and pull them in just as long as he could. It was generally dark these days when he returned to home. Instead of returning mid-afternoon to have some beers with his friends or the occasional kava, he was staying out on the ocean for as long as he could and going right home to his wife upon his return. Bolo would be the best father and the best husband.
His wife Sala was a beautiful woman, young and happy. She always had a smile for him when he returned from a day of fishing and her nose never wrinkled at the scaly smell that always clung to him.
While he was away she did her own share of providing too. Not only did she take care of the home but she weaved mats and made coconut milk for their use and for bartering with other families. Fijians loved coconut milk but not all of them loved to make it. It took a lot of work to shave the meat from the husks, then it needed to be worked with a hot rock, and finally it must have the milk wrung from the meat. It was a long and arduous process, and Sala was traditional. She only made true coconut milk, never adding water to make it easier and more plentiful. There was always lots of fruit for him at home, as well. Sala was a good woman.
Just as Bolo was reveling in the blessed fortunes of his life another stroke of good fortune hit and the tip of his fishing pole yanked suddenly down toward the water. Number twelve, and it was a big one! He set to work battling the fish and for nearly three quarters of an hour he worked at it until finally he had it close enough to grab it in his net and haul it in. Another nice tuna. Beaming with satisfaction he placed it with the others, not in the bag though, the bag was full. He’d never had a day nearly as successful as this one.
As he considered whether to bait his pole for another cast he realized just how late it was getting. The sky was beginning to turn the color of ash and he had traveled much further than he realiz
ed since this morning and since hooking that fish. Looking out ahead of him he saw he was getting near the forbidden place. The place all fisherman were careful not to get too close to. Never had he been this near, only a half mile away or so, but neither had he been in such a bountiful school of fish. Despite the proximity to the forbidden island he was sorely tempted to cast one more time. A man never knew when the fish might stop biting and tomorrow may bring him nothing at all. For now, God was granting him a full boat of food and he felt he should take advantage.
One more, he thought. Just one more fish and I’ll be satisfied and return home to my dear wife and unborn child. There’s light enough and I’ll wait only a short time if nothing bites.
So what if he was near the island anyway? Only the old people really had any fear of the place anymore. They told stories to all the children of the Devil who lived on the island, only to scare them into being good, but Bolo wasn’t a child anymore. He was a man and he didn’t fear fairy tales.
Besides, he wouldn’t set foot on the island, and would only get as close as the fish might take him, but no closer. He wasn’t scared, but there really was no reason to tempt the old Gods. He might be a man now but nobody would say he was a foolish man.
He baited his line and cast it out, letting the current take it deep before stopping the line and hunkering down to wait. Just fifteen or twenty minutes would be enough. If he didn’t have a fish by then he would bring it up and head for home. Bolo settled in and got comfortable, letting his eyes close and his mind relax. He wasn’t worried about missing anything. If there was a bite, he would know it.
Minutes passed and built upon each other until soon they became an hour. Early evening gradually gave way to late evening and the warmth from the sun slowly cooled as it made its way down toward the distant horizon. The soft grey light had creeped in before Bolo had dropped his eyelids to relax, grabbed a deeper foothold, and soon overtook the brightness that preceded it. When Bolo next snapped awake the water was still and the fishing pole remained unmoved. He looked around in surprise, realizing then just how much time had passed. It wasn’t the only change either, he saw. During his sleep, the boat had drifted considerably closer to the forbidden island than it was before, making him just a little nervous now. The sun was now partially covered by the distant line where it met the water and if he wanted to make it back before dark he would have to get moving.
Cave of Bones (Dark Island Series Book 2) Page 4
