Gather Her Round

by Alex Bledsoe

  In front of him, Bronwyn faintly hummed a tune that Max couldn’t quite catch, despite following her so closely, he could almost whisper in her ear. At last he said quietly, “What’s that song?”

  “Just something my daddy sings,” she said.

  “What’s it called?”

  “We shouldn’t be talking, should we? We might scare the hogs.”

  Max fell silent, but after a few moments added, “You live around here, don’t you?”

  “I do.”

  “So you’re a Tufa?”

  “I am.”

  “Is it true what they say about you?”

  Now she turned and gave him a skeptical glance. “Is this the best place for this conversation?”

  “It’s not the best place for any conversation,” Jack whispered harshly from the lead.

  “I didn’t mean anything by it,” Max said.

  “Of course you did,” Bronwyn shot back.

  “Well … I’ll admit, I’m curious. So did you learn to shoot in the army?”

  “I learned to shoot in my backyard.”

  “Is that where you learned the bow and arrow?”

  “No, I picked that up after my daughter got fascinated with it from catching glimpses of The Hunger Games on TV. I figured I should learn my way around so I could teach it to her when she gets old enough, if she’s still interested. Turns out I have a real knack for it.”

  “But how did you—?”

  “You know what I did learn in the army, Max?”

  “What?”

  “Not to talk on patrol.”

  “Will you two shut up?” Jack said.

  Bronwyn had told them that this path was known as the Devil’s Courthouse because a dense patch of rhododendron called a “laurel slick” made going slow and miserable, like waiting for a jury to decide your fate. It closed in around the creek once they left the ravine, and the way the light filtered through the trees overhead gave the whole area a strange, underwater vibe. The dense vegetation held the air still, and the late-summer humidity had them all sweaty and damp under their gear.

  There was also the very real danger of copperheads and rattlesnakes, and although they all wore snake-proof boots, they wouldn’t protect against a stray hand put down for balance or a stumble that sent a whole body sprawling into the undergrowth.

  The wild pigs, of course, could navigate this strange, almost tropical plant-sea with ease. And so could the dogs.

  “Great gosh a’mighty,” Max said. “Smells like a sewer line broke.”

  “Whoa,” Jack said as he stopped. The others fanned out around him.

  Ahead the relatively narrow stream had been recently widened. The ground was muddy and torn up, and the previously clean water was opaque with sediment and excrement. This was where the hogs wallowed to cool off in the heat.

  “Y’all check that out,” Bronwyn said, and indicated an enormous flattened area, bigger than any of them, at the edge of the bank. Something huge had rolled around there.

  “That’s our boy,” Dolph said. He took three long paces to measure the size of the impression. “Seven feet, at least.”

  Max looked around. “Think he’s watching us right now?”

  “Hogs don’t act like that,” Jack said.

  “Hogs don’t normally shove trees around, either.”

  “They went up the hill,” Dolph said, indicating the trampled vegetation. In one bare patch of mud they saw the tracks of several hogs, with two clear dog prints impressed over the top of them. Dolph swiped at the mosquitoes drawn to their body heat and blood.

  They followed Jack uphill out of the slick. About halfway up, they unknowingly crossed the very trail that Duncan had run down just minutes before. The dogs, locked on to the scent of the pigs, paid it no mind.

  As the air warmed, more insects emerged and swarmed them. They hadn’t wanted to risk any bug spray scent giving them away, and now they paid for it.

  Bronwyn continued to hum a tune that Max could not identify, so quietly it blended with the buzzing of the bugs and the birds chirping in the trees.

  “Look,” Dolph said softly. Jack held up his hand to halt, and they all gathered around the discovery.

  Protruding from the leaf litter was the lower jawbone of a hog. The V-shaped bone sported a pair of two-inch tusks and a row of angled, worn incisors at the very front. It was light and dirty-white, the edges worn down by rain, wind, ice, and snow.

  Dolph picked it up, examined it, and said, “Been here about two years.”

  Jack nodded. “So they’ve been in Half Pea Hollow for a while.”

  “Long enough for one of ’em to grow to be a monster,” Max said. No one argued.

  But Jack still couldn’t believe a hog had grown that large on what it could find in the wild. He suspected there was something else, a layer of secrets that the hog’s presence would reveal once they found it.

  He looked around at the heavy forest and changed that last thought. If they found it.

  * * *

  Duncan crept slowly along, suddenly unwilling to force the confrontation. It was all up to fate and the night winds now: if he saw Adam first, then it would clearly be their will that he got his revenge. If not, then he’d made a good-faith effort to restore his besmirched honor; he could hold up his head at the old cave, and he could look Junior in the eye.

  Thoughts of honor brought that song back to the front of his brain.

  One evening as I rambled, down by a shady grove,

  I saw a man of low degree conversing with my love.

  They were singing songs of melody, while I was sore distressed,

  O faithless, faithless Mary, the Lily of the West.

  Something stirred in the undergrowth ahead, and before he could even raise his gun, an emu with two striped chicks stepped out. The birds looked just as surprised to see him.

  He’d seen them crossing the road before, and at least one that had lost that race to a barreling semi. But he’d never come across one in the wild, this close.

  It stared at him, and he slowly raised the gun. He’d heard they could viciously kick, and he wasn’t about to get laid open by one like Panel Barton’s award-winning coonhound.

  The emu—was he remembering right that it was the fathers who raised the young?—defiantly ruffled its feathers and bobbed its long neck. Duncan took a step back. If he fired, the noise would bring Adam running. Isn’t that what he wanted?

  The emu grunted repeatedly and kicked detritus and dead leaves at him. Duncan backed up another step and prepared to shoot.

  But, apparently satisfied that its point had been made, the emu turned and led its chicks off into the forest. Within moments they were lost to sight.

  Duncan’s heart thundered so hard, he glanced down to see if the front of his shirt vibrated. He took several deep breaths and wiped sweat from his eyes. Then, moving even more slowly, he continued into the forest.

  * * *

  “Stop,” Jack hissed, and held up his hand.

  They watched the emu and its two chicks emerge from the forest and move across their path. The adult turned in their direction once, but either didn’t see them, or didn’t think them a threat. In a few moments they were gone.

  “That is one big mama bird,” Max said.

  “That’s actually the daddy,” Dolph said. “Mamas lay the eggs; daddies raise the chicks.”

  “Huh. They’re from Australia, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “They must do everything backwards down there.”

  “My husband,” Bronwyn said with narrowed eyes, “is home watching our girl right now so I can be out here pig hunting with you. Is that backwards?”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “I think we can have this discussion later,” Dolph said.

  Jack glared at them. “Is the concept of ‘quiet’ too complicated for you three? Because if it is—”

  “My bad, Jack,” Bronwyn said. “Sorry.” She looked directly at Max with the intensi
ty that had given her, in her teen years, the nickname “the Bronwynator.”

  * * *

  The song grew in Duncan’s head. He could hear the plaintive voice of Aoife O’Donovan now, as clear as if he’d worn earbuds.

  One evening as I rambled, down by a shady grove,

  I saw a man of low degree conversing with my love.

  They were singing songs of melody, while I was sore distressed,

  O faithless, faithless Kera, the Lily of the West.…

  He shook his head. It was Mary, or Flora, depending on the version, not “Kera.” But he swore that’s what the voice sang in his head.

  And then he spotted movement ahead. He froze.

  At first he thought it was another emu. It was certainly too tall to be a wild pig, even the monster they supposedly sought. But then Adam stepped into a shaft of sunlight.

  Now all the questions he’d asked himself roared back. Should he fire from hiding? Or should he confront Adam, so the son of a bitch would know why he was being killed? Did he offer to make it a fair fight, with knives or fists? Or did he just scare his friend, make him think he was about to be killed, and then walk away?

  Before he could begin to sort through all these questions, the rage exploded, Hulk-like, and he raised the gun. He knew exactly what to do to the backstabbing son of a bitch. Surprisingly, his hands did not shake.

  I stepped up to my rival, my rifle in my hand.

  I caught him by the collar, and boldly bade him stand;

  Being driven to desperation, I shot him in the head,

  But was betrayed by Kera, who once shared his bed.…

  He blinked. In the song, Mary, or Flora, betrayed the singer to the law. But how could Kera do that to him? She was dead, after all. Dead and gone.

  Dead and gone. Because of that motherfucker. The rifle was rock-steady as Duncan sighted down the barrel.

  And then a rancid, appalling smell washed over him.

  * * *

  They were halfway up the slope of Dunwoody Mountain and had finally emerged from the ankle-snagging undergrowth into a no less overgrown, but easier to navigate, forest of old trees. These were mostly white oak, and the team knew that their mast, consisting of white oak acorns, was a favorite of wild hogs. This might explain why they’d taken up in Half Pea Hollow in the first place. Certainly the ground was bare of any acorns in the immediate vicinity, and there were older piles of scat.

  “Hog heaven,” Dolph observed.

  “And it looks like the angels have been having a high old time,” Bronwyn agreed.

  “Let’s hope we add at least one devil to the choir,” Dolph said.

  “Hey. Hey!” Max called from back down the trail. He pointed into the dense growth they’d just left. “Look!”

  They joined him. In a dozen places, the weeds were pressed down in roughly oval-shaped patches. The hogs had used it for a bedding-down area, and recently, too. The trees showed evidence of rubbing as well, with bare patches of bark. None were so large as the one they’d found at the trap site, though, and none of the beds looked suitable for their monster.

  Max slapped at his neck. “Man, everything in this hollow bites.”

  They resumed their climb until Jack once again held up his hand, and the team stopped.

  “What?” Max asked. Bronwyn slapped his arm for quiet.

  Jack sniffed the air. If there was one odor he recognized, it was the smell of wild hogs. “They’re close,” he said so softly, he wondered if the others heard him.

  Dolph and Max quietly closed the breeches on their guns, and Bronwyn smoothly drew and nocked an arrow.

  Dolph shouldered his rifle and pulled the Glock from his belt holster. From the butt hung a small dove feather, and as they watched, the wind moved it, showing that the breeze came from the south. The hogs were that way, farther along the slope, possibly back down in the laurel slick.

  “It smells like a pig’s ass, all right,” Max observed in a whisper. Brownyn rolled her eyes.

  Jack knelt and put a hand on the ground. Sometimes he was able to feel the approach of pigs, if there were enough of them, or if they were big enough. It wasn’t a rational ability, but it had proved itself. This time, though, he felt nothing.

  The team formed a square, each facing a different direction, ensuring nothing would sneak up on them.

  Jack wondered, why hadn’t the dogs cornered them yet? If they were close enough for a human being to smell, then the dogs should have gotten to them long ago. Unless something had happened to the dogs—

  Then the distinctive squealing reached them from down in the valley.

  And then they heard a gunshot.

  Followed by a scream.

  11

  “Hey,” Janet Harper said as she entered the Pair-A-Dice. This early, the kitchen wasn’t up, and except for the coffeepot on the end of the bar, there were no beverages available. Most of the tables were empty as well, with the chairs still stacked upside down from Friday night, and Janet made her way to the little stage in the corner.

  Mandalay and her boyfriend, Luke Somerville, sat side by side on the edge of the stage. They were four years younger than Janet, an eon by teenage standards, but Janet had not hesitated when Mandalay asked her to come jam with them. You didn’t turn down the leader of the Tufa, no matter how old she appeared to be.

  Besides, Mandalay was one of the few Tufa musicians who could really keep up with, and sometimes challenge, Janet. It wasn’t bragging to say that Janet Harper was the best musician alive in Cloud County; despite her heavily diluted Tufa blood, thinned by marriages to humans over the past few generations, something in her was true beyond belief. She could play any instrument, learn any song almost at once, and jam with anyone. Some folks could best her on their specialties, like Page Paine on the fiddle, but none approached her versatility.

  She put her guitar case down on the stage and said, “Good morning.”

  “Hey,” Mandalay said. “How are you?”

  “A little preoccupied,” Janet said as she took out her guitar. “I can’t get my brain going. Like there’s something weird in the air, you know?”

  “I know,” Mandalay agreed. She turned to Luke. “See? It ain’t just me.”

  He shrugged, unable to look at her. “I guess not.”

  Janet dragged a chair away from a table and sat down facing them. She picked along with the song Mandalay strummed, even though she didn’t quite catch the melody at first. At last she asked, “Hey, what exactly are we playing?”

  “You don’t know?” Luke said.

  “Nope. Sounds familiar, but I can’t quite place it.”

  “But … you’re playing it.”

  “I’m just following along.”

  “It’s ‘Poor Ellen Smith,’” Mandalay said. “It’s been in my head all day.”

  “Ah-ha!” Janet said. “Now I recognize it. The Neko Case version?”

  Mandalay shook her head. “Nope. Mine.” When the verse came back around, she sang:

  Poor Ellen Smith how she was found

  Shot through the heart lying cold on the ground

  Her clothes were all scattered and thrown on the ground

  And blood marks the spot where poor Ellen was found.

  Luke strummed rhythm, simply trying to keep up. Mandalay played broad, open lead, which Janet filled with soft picking like the sound of tears hitting the concrete floor. Janet nodded to Mandalay, and she sang:

  They picked up their rifles and hunted me down

  And found me a-loafing in Mount Airy town

  They picked up the body and carried it away

  And now she is sleeping in some lonesome old grave.

  Mandalay slowly stopped playing and stared off into the distance, as if receiving some message that only she could hear. Janet picked a harmony rhythm with Luke, waiting, but eventually even the two of them stopped. They sat in silence, waiting for Mandalay to speak.

  Finally Luke said, “You all right?”

  Ma
ndalay blinked, then gave him a luminous smile. His genuine concern for her always made her feel warm and special. “Yeah, I’m all right. It’s just…”

  “Something in the air,” Janet said.

  “Yeah, exactly.”

  “Think it has anything to do with Kera Rogers’s getting killed?”

  Mandalay chewed her lip. “Maybe.”

  “I’m covering it for the school paper. Care to give me a comment?”

  Mandalay grinned. “No, ma’am, I would not.”

  “You believe she was killed by a wild hog?”

  “I believe it until somebody proves different.”

  “And you think that’s why you’re all twitchy today?”

  Mandalay thought that over. “No. That’s something that already happened. This feels … impending.”

  “Should we tell somebody?” Luke asked.

  “It’s all too vague,” Mandalay said. “I wouldn’t know who to tell.” She began to strum again, going back into the song. Luke kept watching her, concerned, while Janet immediately picked back up where they’d left off.

  Then, with no warning, Mandalay set her guitar aside and said, “Sorry. I have to go.” And she did.

  * * *

  Two things happened at once, and even after the panic had burned off, Duncan couldn’t quite believe it.

  He raised his gun and put the bead at the end of the barrel right over Adam’s face. He deliberately filled his mind with the selfie from the phone, of the two of them snuggled together in Adam’s bed. He let the rage come, the stinking jealousy that enveloped him so strongly, he really could smell it. He waited for Adam to look his way; he wanted the smug bastard to know who’d blown his head off. As the rage increased his heart rate, the end of the barrel trembled, and he gritted his teeth as he fought to hold it steady.

  But then he realized he really did smell something vile and rank. He had a moment to puzzle over it.

  Then a shadow drifted out of the forest behind Adam. Because it came down the slope toward him, it appeared to loom over him, squat and huge, almost elephantine.