Children of the Mountain (Book 2): The Devil You Know

by R. A. Hakok

  A single withered tree still pokes through the snow on the other side of the road. I dig the handsaw from the pocket of my parka and cross over to cut a few limbs but I’m having trouble gripping the handle and it’s slow work. When I think I’ve finally collected enough wood for a fire I head inside.

  The Hogtied’s not a big place. To one side there’s a bar. The shelves are empty, anything that could have been drunk or been used to start a fire long since removed. The wall behind was once mirror but the few shards that still cling there now just throw back crazed reflections as the beam from the flashlight slides over them. Across the room a dozen or so booths crowd around a small pool table, the balls arranged haphazardly as if a game had been interrupted.

  There’s no sign of the kid. Maybe I should have given some thought to that but I figure his mouth and mittens are taped and right then I’m too cold and too tired to go looking for him. I make my way over to the nearest booth. Snowmelt must have found its way in through the ceiling at some point, because the floorboards are buckled; they flex and groan under my boots. I dump the firewood and sit on the ground next to it, already fumbling in my overladen pockets for the squeeze bottle of gas. I know I should really check behind the bar before using it; there could be a bottle of liquor back there that’s been missed. But the shelves look empty and now I’m down I’m too tired to get up again. I fumble off the cap and squirt a measure Private Kavanagh would have been proud of over the blackened branches. Within minutes there’s a small fire going, steam rising lazily from the hesitant flames.

  I dig out Weasel’s radio to see if there’s any news on the search but all I get is static. As I set it down I spot a corner of a newspaper that’s been missed underneath the table behind me. In different times that would have been treasure, but now I just twist the pages into tight twirls and feed them to the fire. I hold my hands as close as I dare, desperate to catch whatever heat’s thrown off before it’s lost to the cold.

  The soft hiss from the radio is somehow soothing and I feel my eyelids growing heavy. I can’t afford to nap; if I do I may not wake for hours. I dig the tin mug from the pocket of my parka, fill it with water from my canteen and set it among the flames. We’re making better progress now I’m carrying the kid. If I can keep it up there’s still a chance I might catch up to Mags and Hicks before morning.

  When I reckon the water’s as hot as it’s going to get I tear the top off a packet of coffee and dump it in. The dark, sour aroma mixes with the smoke from the fire and the damp, moldering smell of The Hogtied. I put on my gloves and fish the mug out of the already guttering flames. I need to drink the coffee to wake me up but right now the warmth soaking into my frozen fingers feels good. I lean back against the booth.

  I’ll just close my eyes for a moment.

  *

  HE SITS IN THE CORNER in darkness. The restroom is small, windowless, a single stall occupying most of the available space. Its door is missing, or maybe there never was one. A steel urinal runs the length of the wall opposite; holes dot the space above where a vending machine once hung. Graffiti spreads across the crumbling plaster, competing with the sprays of black mildew that climb from the tiled floor.

  The air is musty, stale, freighted with a decade of enclosed decay, but he doesn’t notice. His hood is pulled back and his goggles lie discarded among the garbage strewn across the floor. He purses his lips and drags the back of one mitten across the tape at his mouth, trying desperately to lift an edge.

  A door opens in the next room and he looks up. The boy has come back inside. The door closes again, the sound of the storm abating. There’s the creak of boots on floorboards and a few moments later the sweet cloying smell of gasoline and then the damp smokiness of fire.

  None of these things are important.

  He resumes his work on the tape.

  There was something on the boy’s jacket. He smelled it earlier, in the restaurant, and afterwards, when they stopped in the bank. Outside the wind was strong and it carried the scent of it away into the swirling darkness. But now they are back inside the heavy, coppery aroma sings to him.

  The blood, on the tiled floor of the kitchen where they left the soldier; somehow some of it must have gotten on the boy’s jacket. Just thinking about it now causes the hunger to well up in him, so sudden and strong the muscles in his stomach twist and coil with it.

  He drags the mitten across his mouth again and this time a corner of the tape lifts. He feels for it with his fingers but it is too small yet for them to find purchase. Soon. He goes back to work with the glove.

  It is stronger now, the thing inside him; it will not allow itself to be confined much longer. It is a large animal, straining on a fraying leash, a tether that cannot hope to hold. He has felt its claws, raking his insides, desperate to tear its way out. He is ashamed of what he will do when that time comes, and yet giddy with the anticipation of it.

  More of the tape lifts and this time when he reaches for it with his mittens his fingertips grasp it. He rips it off, letting the spent tape fall among the litter scattered at his feet. His small teeth set to work on his mittens. Soon they too lie discarded.

  He shuffles over to the door and opens it a crack. Over by one of the booths the boy is sleeping. He will do it now. But as he steps through lightning flares, for a moment bathing the inside of The Hogtied in stark white light. He raises his hands to his eyes to block the light, but he is too late, and for a second the blinding glare pushes the thing inside him back.

  He blinks and looks around, unsure of how he came to be here, but certain of what he had been about to do.

  Outside the storm is getting worse. The wind is shrill; the door shudders in its frame with the strength of it.

  The soldier with one eye was right.

  He must go now, quickly, before it is too late.

  *

  THERE’S A CRASH of thunder, loud enough to rattle the Hogtied’s remaining windows in their frames. I wake with a start.

  This time when I pulled the trigger I saw her face. It takes me a moment to figure out it was just a dream and there’s an instant where relief washes through me. But then the lightning flashes and I see him, crouched on the other side of the fire, his small shoulders hunched up like whatever carrion bird is etched into the handle of Hicks’ pistol. He shrinks back at the flare and his eyes close to slits but they never leave me, and as soon as it darkens again he inches forward, taking a cautious step around the dying fire. The tape on his mouth’s gone and as I look down at the small hands splayed out in front of him I can see that so too are his mittens. His palms rest flat on the water-buckled boards but the fingers are curled into claws.

  I fumble in the pocket of my parka. The forgotten mug of coffee slips from my lap, spilling its now-cold contents across the floor. His eyes flick to it for a second, but then return. My fingers close around the grip; I feel the compact heft of the metal as I pull it out. The round’s already chambered from earlier. I level it at him and flick the safety forward.

  He tilts his head to one side, regarding the gun with animal interest. I slip my finger inside the trigger guard, feeling it curl around the cool metal. I shout his name and he pauses, like some part of him remembers. But then he sniffs the air and takes another step forward. I can see the muscles along his jaw working, clenching and unclenching like he’s grinding his teeth.

  Hicks told me this moment would come, and that when it did I shouldn’t hesitate. I push myself back against the booth and take aim at his head. I squeeze gently, feeling the last of the slack go out of the mechanism. But at the last second I shift the barrel to the left. There’s a sharp crack, loud in the Hogtied’s single room. The muzzle flares and he flinches. I drop the gun and hold my hands up, ready to hold him off. But his face has softened. He blinks and looks uncertainly at me and then at the door.

  After that the kid and I have a chat. He promises to warn me if he’s feeling he might get like that again, although if Hicks is right and it’s like a swit
ch being flipped I'm not sure how much stock I can put in that. I need to start being a lot more careful than I've been so far tonight.

  I fetch his mittens from the restroom and he puts them back on and then I tape them to the cuffs of his jacket and hand him an extra strip for his mouth. I use a little of the water from my canteen to scrub the front of my parka and then I mix up a paste with coffee powder and the contents of one of the little bottles of Tabasco that comes in the MREs. I work it into the material everywhere I think Weasel’s blood might have gotten on it. It smells really bad, but then that’s the point.

  When I’m done I hold out the parka and ask him if it’s any better. He sniffs it and nods his head warily. I’m not so sure though. I suspect the kid may not have long now ’till whatever’s inside him takes over for good. I feel his tiny body stiffen as I haul him onto my back, just like the girl in the closet did when Marv held the knife with his blood on it under her nose.

  The wind’s strengthened while we were inside. It shrieks around The Hogtied and I have to lean my weight into the door to open it. As I step outside I look up into the skies. I’m not sure how long I was asleep but the storm’s used the time well. It’s almost on us now.

  I point us north and we set off. Lightning strikes all around, the intervals between flash and clap so short as to defy the counting. At least when it flares I can see though, and for the next hour I search those half-seconds of light for road signs, telephone poles, abandoned cars; anything to mark our place in the world.

  The cold is raw, an onslaught. It claws my fingers inside my mittens, threatening to crack the bones there with the sharpness of it. I pull the zipper up as far as it will go and tuck my chin to my chest but I have no defense against it; it slips inside the parka with absurd ease. The muscles across my shoulders and back tighten; soon they ache and grind like the cogs of a long-neglected machine.

  There’s another strike, so close that for an instant it smells like the air has been charred, and the road in front of us is briefly bathed in stark white light. The heavens crash, like they’re being torn asunder. The kid starts, but then he grips my shoulder and I know this is something different. I set him down and he crouches there, wrestling with whatever other thing is locked inside his head. He’s like that for a while and I'm beginning to wonder if he’s ever coming back but then he looks up and nods inside his hood and I bend down and let him clamber back up again.

  We don’t make much more than a handful of miles before the storm finally catches us. Soon heavy flakes are tumbling and twisting out of the tortured sky. The wind picks them up and drives them, swirling them around us in furious flurries.

  I can’t see worth a damn now and the cold’s so bad I’m struggling to wind the flashlight’s stubby handle. We’re nowhere near as far as I’d like us to be but we’ll have to take shelter. There’s a town up ahead. I figure we’ll stop, get another fire going, maybe let the storm blow itself out for an hour or so.

  I feel the kid squeeze my shoulder. I reckon he needs some more alone time so I start to bend down to let him off but instead he lifts one mitten from around my neck and points. A flash of lightning illuminates a sign close to road that says Pikeside Bowl. I ask why he wants to go that way but even if he can hear me over the wind he can’t answer through the duct tape. He just keeps pointing in the same direction.

  We need to get inside and I guess this place will do as well as any so I turn off the road. I pick my way between the cars in the parking lot, heading for where I assume I’ll find the bowling alley. Another flash illuminates a long, low flat-roofed building straight ahead of us, the only feature along its squat length a covered entranceway. In the instant before it goes dark again I spot a single familiar figure, sitting in a chair behind the glass.

  I stagger up to the entrance and push the door open; a flurry of flakes follows me in. As I bend down to let the kid off he raises an eyebrow but doesn’t pass further comment on it.

  ‘Been watching for you. Figured you’d get off the interstate once you saw the storm coming.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  He motions behind him and I look over his shoulder. There’s a fire going by the counter where you rent shoes. Mags is curled up tight inside her sleeping bag next to it. I go to step around him but he holds one gloved hand out to stop me.

  ‘Best let her rest. She’s had a long day.’

  He looks down at the kid.

  ‘You had any problems with it?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Alright. Let’s get it tethered then.’ He reaches down but the kid takes a step back and moves behind my leg. All I want now is to sit as close as possible to Mags and the fire and sleep but instead I find myself saying I’ll take care of it.

  ‘Suit yourself. There’s places at the back you can tie it.’

  The glow from the fire doesn’t stretch much beyond where Mags is sleeping. I wind the flashlight and head down the way Hicks said. Screens hang from the ceiling, their gray surfaces thick with dust. Behind them rows of wooden lanes stretch off into darkness. I take the kid to the nearest one.

  ‘Alright here?’

  He nods and sits on the floor next to one of the machines that returns the bowling balls.

  I take out Weasel’s knife and make an incision in the tape around one cuff so it can be lifted then I rip it off. Once he has a hand free he removes the tape from his other wrist and finally his mouth and then he feeds his arms through the rack. I pass him a cable tie that’s already looped and he slips his hands through and ratchets it tight with his teeth. When he’s done he holds them up to let me see.

  I walk back to the lobby. I just want to sleep now but there’s something I need to know first. Hicks is still sitting in the chair by the entrance, where I left him.

  ‘How’s she doing?’

  He holds the thermos up to his lips and takes a sip, like he’s considering the question.

  ‘This is as far as we could make it.’

  I’m not sure what that’s supposed to mean. I’m deciding whether I want to know more when he speaks again.

  ‘Virus has gotten a good hold of her, son. I’m not sure how much longer she can hold out, even on Doc’s meds. Only hope now is we get her to that scanner of yours quickly.’

  I look back at where Mags is lying by the fire. We haven’t come as far as I’d hoped but if the storm clears overnight and we start out early I reckon we can still make it to Eden by tomorrow night. I just need one more day.

  Hicks gestures in the direction of the bowling lanes where I’ve left the kid.

  ‘Any problems finding it?’

  I look back at him and shake my head.

  ‘I ran into Truck and the others as we were coming back on to the interstate.’

  He raises an eyebrow.

  ‘And how’d that work out? I guess not so bad seeing as you’re here and they’re not.’

  I tell him about following the soldiers off I-81 at the Fairfax turnpike and how I accidentally bumped into Weasel while trying to steal their snowshoes.

  He takes another sip from the thermos.

  ‘So what happened to him? There still a round in that weapon I gave you?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘There isn’t, but Weasel’s still alive if that’s what you’re asking. Or at least he was when I left him tied him up in a KFC out by the interchange. I figure Truck’ll find him eventually; might just take him a while though. I dumped his snowshoes off the overpass. Unless they’re carrying spares that should slow them down a bit too.’

  Hicks just nods.

  ‘You did good. Mind if I take that pistol from you now, though? Firearms make me nervous.’

  I dip my hand into my parka and fish Marv’s gun out. He pulls the slide back and tilts the Beretta forward so he can see the chamber’s empty, then he thumbs the switch and ejects the magazine. When he’s satisfied he slips it into his pocket.

  ‘Alright, best you get some rest. It’s only a few hours till dawn and we
’ve got a long hike ahead of us tomorrow.’

  I head back to where Mags is sleeping, unfurl my sleeping bag and climb into it. The fire’s dying down and I don’t have it in me to go out for more wood to build it up again. I pull the parka over the top and close my eyes.

  I’m already drifting down in to that place where thoughts no longer cohere when something in my pocket squawks. It occurs to me I never told Hicks about the radio, but when I look up he’s no longer in his seat and I’m too tired to go searching for him now. The last thing I think I hear before the weight of exhaustion pulls me under is a staticky voice that can’t possibly be right and then I’m gone, dragged into a deep and mercifully dreamless sleep.

  *

  IT’S STILL SNOWING when I wake, large ashen flakes drifting down out of a sullen sky, but the storm seems to have mostly played itself out. Hicks is back in his seat by the entrance, keeping watch over the humped gray shapes in the parking lot.

  I’ve slept longer than I intended to. I sit up and look around. Beside me Mags is still curled up in her sleeping bag. I’m desperate to wake her but I figure Hicks is right; it’s best if she rests as much as she can. We have a long day ahead of us if we’re to make it to Eden tonight.

  A few lumps of charcoal are all that’s left of the fire so I pull on my boots and parka and make for the door. I mutter a good morning at Hicks but he just looks back at me from behind those blinkered shades and goes back to staring out at the lot. When I get back Mags is sitting up, the sleeping bag wrapped around her. She’s got her back to me but I can see she’s rubbing her temple.

  I sit down next to her and start building a fire.

  ‘How’re you feeling?’

  She lets her hand fall back inside the sleeping bag and turns to offer me a wan smile.