Thrall

by Mary SanGiovanni

  She picked up on Murdock’s and even Tom’s tension; it emanated from them like a low, almost audible hum. She thought back to what Tom had said as the squeaking gate had groaned to a close behind them: “They come out at night. Not a party you want to get invited to, if you can help it.” She had no doubt that was true. She wanted to believe the dead quiet was a good sign, but then she’d see a glimpse of rock like a head and shoulder or a curve of branch like an arm and think of that woman Carolyn. The silence meant nothing. The town was deadly, an asp waiting to strike. A crouching beast, biding its time.

  “So Murdock,” she said, more to break that awful, unearthly quiet. “What do you think Carpenter has stashed here?”

  “I haven’t the faintest idea, my dear, although I certainly hope it’s either very big or very powerful.”

  Tom laughed. “A BFG of E.T. proportions, eh, Murdock?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Do you guys think Carpenter’s okay?” she asked.

  They both seemed to consider this, and then Tom said, “Of course. Carpenter can move through Thrall better than any one of us. I’m not worried at all.”

  “I agree,” Murdock said. “If anyone can get away with a nighttime stroll around Thrall, I believe your friend Carpenter can.”

  “Do you think he’ll really come back?”

  “Absolutely,” Tom said. “Carpenter may be a little crazy, but I think he’s loyal. He’ll be back.”

  A breeze grazed her neck and she shivered. “I hope so.”

  The guard tower was about 200 square feet of slowly rotting wood leaning just slightly to the left. The growing darkness seeped out of its interior as well as into it, saturating the frame of the house with a malevolence that splintered the surfaces.

  “You first,” Nadia said to Tom. “You’ve got the big gun.”

  Tom nodded and tried the knob, but it wouldn’t turn. “Locked. No surprise there.”

  “Wait a moment,” Murdock said. He pulled something out of his pocket that Nadia couldn’t quite make out in the dark.

  There was a shuffling sound and a series of small clicks, and Murdock swung the door open inward. “Voila! Ladies and gentlemen, entrez.”

  Tom laughed. “Where’d a guy like you learn to pick locks?”

  Murdock sniffed. “I was young once. Besides, you can do nearly anything with a Swiss Army knife.”

  Inside, Nadia shined the flashlight around the room. Cobwebs hung thick and fluffy in the corners of the room by the ceiling. Something small and furry scurried out the open door as she swept the light across the floor. A single window in the far wall would have looked out over the park, but it was coated in dirt and grime so thick she could not see out of it. In the center of the room was a desk. Its surface was bare except for a bundled up piece of dirty cloth and a smashed CB radio. Next to the desk was a broken chair. A telephone half hung off the wall, and a calendar with bikini pin-up pictures of Elle MacPherson hung next to it. A small TV (Nadia guessed by the design and the V-shaped antennae sprouting from the top that it was a leftover from the late ’70s) sat on a foldout card table next to the desk.

  Murdock tugged at the corner of the cloth bundle and three fingers rolled out onto the desk, their long brown fingernails coated in chipped blue nail polish. Nadia cried out, the arc of light jilted away from the fingers.

  “Cozy,” Murdock said.

  Nadia threw him a look. “Christ. This place is disgusting. And I don’t see anything here we can use at all. I hope he didn’t drag us out here for nothing.” She wrinkled her nose as the flashlight picked up an oily stain in the corner where the back wall met the ceiling. “What could Carpenter possibly want?”

  “Beats me,” Tom said. “But until he gets back and tells us, we might as well make ourselves comfortable, right?” He reached into his backpack and pulled out some candles, lit them, dripped some wax on the floor, and stuck the ends of the candles in the wax to hold them upright. Nadia switched off the flashlight and sat down.

  They waited, listening for sounds of movement outside, signs of life, something to indicate their friends were okay and on their way. But as the minutes ticked by and each drifted to their own places in their heads, Nadia worried. What if Jesse doesn’t make it back? If he does, what the hell do I do about Mia? What will I ever say to her?

  Nadia shook her head. She had to get her mind off him—off them. “Dr. Murdock.”

  “Yes, my dear?”

  “Assuming everyone makes it here okay and we actually do make it out of Thrall, how are we going to fit seven people in a four-seater car?”

  Murdock frowned. “Hadn’t thought of that. I guess we’ll have to sit on each other’s laps, at least until we get to Wexton.”

  Tom grinned. “Works for me. I call Nadia’s lap.” He winked at her, and she giggled.

  When the warm pink had faded from her cheeks, she said to Murdock, “I hope you’re right about the car. About Carpenter being able to drive it, I mean. I want to go home.”

  Murdock nodded, shifting his back against the wall. “I hope I am, too.”

  Tom leaned his head against the opposite wall, under Elle. “Home. Funny thing, home. I’m about all partied out in New Jersey. Think Ohio will have me for a while?”

  Nadia nodded. “Ohio would love to have you. What about you, Dr. Murdock? Where do you want to go?”

  “Haven’t given it much thought lately. In fact, I really hadn’t planned on ever leaving the museum.” Murdock shook his head. “See, home isn’t where you are, I don’t think. It’s who you’re with. And if that’s the case, I guess my home is in God’s Hand Cemetery.”

  Nadia and Tom remained quiet, watching him.

  “I’m sure Tom’s got one of these stories, too. Everyone who’s survived this place does. Mine is about Staci. She was twenty-two, and a little punky, I guess you could say. Wild but brilliant. She worked with me in the lab. We were discreet. It wasn’t the relationship that was frowned upon, you understand, but the appearance of a relationship. So at work we were all business but at night, we had Chinese food and watched foreign films and talked about languages and archeology and anthropology. She wore mini-skirts and spiked her black hair and had the most infectious laugh.” Murdock caught himself, cleared his throat and continued. “I loved her. She was home to me. She was the world to me, and when she died, I had nothing. Nothing but the past and the languages the dead speak and the places the dead call home.”

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Murdock.”

  “Me too. Me too. You know, after her death...nothing was the same. Food didn’t taste the same. Colors didn’t look the same. You can call it melodramatic, but it’s founded in truth. Life faded when she died.” Murdock sighed. “Staci had told me once that she had a sister who worked at the library. I’d never met her. Sometimes I wonder if she’s anything like Staci, if she knows about...what happened. I always thought I should make my way out to the library one of these days and meet her, and be the one to tell her. But I wanted to be able to bring her something comforting first, you understand? I wanted to tell her that where Staci was, the sickness and the depravity and the pain couldn’t touch her. That those things out there that carry malevolence around inside them could never hurt Staci again. I wanted to tell her that I had done my best to protect her, and even though I couldn’t in the end, I could say with some degree of certainty that she is safe now.” He sighed. “But I haven’t been able to bring myself to go there, mostly because even if I made it that far, I don’t know if I could say the words. I don’t know if I could tell Carolyn that her baby sister is...well, you know.”

  Tom and Nadia exchanged glances, and with an infinitesimal shake of his head, he told her not to say anything.

  “Anyway,” Murdock said, “I don’t have anything comforting to report, anyway. Heaven’s a sham and Hell is out in deep space and the demons that fall to earth are as big as towns. Souls are devoured by the least of them and the greatest temptation of all is death. Despair and death. And God
’s too big and far away to care.”

  “That’s pretty heavy, Murdock,” Tom said.

  “Truth hurts.”

  “It’s not all like that,” Nadia replied indignantly. “Tom, tell him it’s not as bad as all that.”

  Tom was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “I don’t know if there is a Heaven or a Hell. Maybe God’s just the circumstance that gives you an opportunity to change. Maybe Heaven is food you don’t have to kill and a bed you can sleep in without keeping one eye open. Maybe Heaven is the chance to remember the dead without sadness. And maybe Hell is never having a shot at Heaven. Never having a second chance.” He shook his head. “I don’t know. This shit’s too much for me.”

  Nadia wasn’t sure what to say. For several long seconds, the guys wouldn’t look at her, or at each other. Lost, she supposed, in their own memories, their losses, their ideas of Eden beyond the confines of Thrall. She found their silence and their expressions both endearing and disconcerting.

  Suddenly, Tom sat upright. “I think we have company.”

  Murdock gave a quizzical glance to the door. “You heard something?”

  “What, is it Jesse? Or Carpenter?”

  “Don’t know.” Tom rose slowly, drawing out the shotgun. “I don’t think so.”

  Then Nadia heard it, too, a dull roar like wind over the mouth of a cave. And above that, its meaning lost in the feverish jumble of sound, came whispering.

  “Oh God,” Murdock said. “The words...the words are awful.”

  “What are they saying, Murdock?” Tom held the gun on the door.

  “Awful things. Pain and death. Names.”

  “What are they, Murdock? Murdock?” Tom snapped his fingers in the man’s dazed face. “What are we dealing with here?”

  It was the meaty smell permeating the air that finally triggered the recognition in Nadia’s mind.

  I am become death, shatterer of worlds.

  Nadia was sure that referred to the town. Thrall and others like it destroyed worlds. But the thing in the bathroom—the thing outside now, making that terrible whispering—what was that?

  Murdock looked terrified. “Agents of death. The eyes of Thrall.”

  On the desk, the fingers started to tremble and then jump, their long nails scraping and skittering across the surface.

  ***

  Caitlyn lay asleep on a blanket Mia had produced from the duffel bag. Another lighter blanket, pink and white with Barbie and friends waving from Barbie’s convertible, lay across her. Jesse was struck by how small she looked. How fragile. How completely and utterly trusting in their ability to protect her from harm while she slept.

  Mia stroked the girl’s hair. Her long legs stretched out in front of her. She and Jesse had been munching on handfuls of Cheerios, and now passed a bottle of water between them. The candle they’d lit flickered at Mia’s feet, played with the shadows and highlights of her hair, and glowed softly on her skin.

  “So do you like working for UPS?”

  Jesse shrugged. “Sure. The pay is pretty good, the benefits are excellent, and my boss is cool. Can’t ask for much more.”

  Mia gazed at the candle. “I wanted to work in the museum.”

  “I remember that. We went there looking for you.”

  “I saw it outside. I thought that was a good sign.” She shook her head. “When the police station picked up and moved, I was terrified. I thought I’d never see Caitlyn again. I ran after it. Ran until I thought my lungs were going to pop, and then I kept going a little farther. I wanted to kick myself for leaving her alone. I was so afraid of bringing her outside, and we were both so hungry...but when I saw her gone, I panicked. I’ve had no one but Caitlyn for so long.... Anyway, when I couldn’t run any more, I followed the dirt trail all the way to the station. And when I saw the museum across the street, I knew. Somehow, I just knew you’d made it to the station and were in there with her, keeping her safe.”

  When she looked up at him, there were tears in her eyes. “I can’t keep her safe anymore. This place, it’s making me sick, Jesse. Somewhere on the inside, it’s making me sick. Angry. Scared. I’ve had the worst dreams.”

  Jesse touched her hand. “We’re going to get out of here, Mia. All of us. And we’ll go so far from here that New Jersey won’t even be a speck on the horizon.”

  Mia tilted her head and studied him a moment, as if considering what Jesse said was even possible, and then inched around Caitlyn to sit next to him. He put an arm around her and she snuggled against his chest.

  “So tell me about Nadia from Ohio.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “How you know her. Who she is to you.”

  “Oh. Okay, well, I met Nadia at a party we threw for a friend of mine from work. She seemed pretty cool. After that, I’d see her at bars, or at people’s houses, that sort of thing. We got to talking one day and....” His voice trailed off.

  “Did you date her?” There was no accusation in Mia’s voice, only genuine curiosity. Still, talking about Nadia with Mia made him just about as uncomfortable as talking about Mia with Nadia.

  “No, not really. It wasn’t like that.”

  She looked up at him with a small smile. She knew he wasn’t being totally honest with her. Jesse had never been a great liar. He could read her thoughts in her eyes: “What was it like, then, Jesse?”

  “She, uh...well, she caught feelings, but—” He sighed. “There’s nothing going on with me and Nadia. She’s a good friend, but I haven’t been serious about anyone since you.”

  She settled back onto his chest. “Me either. But I guess that’s obvious, huh? Nothing’s really been the same since you left.”

  “I know.”

  The silence between them was not altogether unpleasant. There was a certain comfortable groove there, a remnant of familiarity from when they were dating that Jesse found easy to slip back into.

  He stroked her arm. “Mia.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “For what?”

  “Leaving you here. You and Caitlyn. I wanted you to know that I’m really, really sorry. I know it doesn’t mean—”

  “Jesse, don’t.” She slid her hand over his. “Look, I’m not going to lie. I felt terrible when you left. But I understood. I’ve always understood.” She giggled softly. “And I kind of always thought you’d come back.”

  “I wouldn’t have, if you hadn’t called.”

  She nodded. “But you came when I needed you. I knew you would.”

  Jesse frowned down at the top of her head. “You have more faith in me than you ought to.”

  “No, I don’t. I have faith that you keep your promises, no more and no less. You promised me once that you would never let me down.”

  “I broke that promise.”

  “No, you didn’t. But you fulfilled it by coming back. That’s how I see it.”

  Jesse swallowed hard. “Thanks. I really needed to hear that.”

  She tilted her head up and he suddenly wanted very much to kiss her. With her there in his arms, the whole venomous town around them faded into muted background. When his tongue slid into her mouth, he felt heat every place her body touched him. His hands slid up over her stomach, her breasts, then down over the shallow dip in her waist. She responded with enthusiasm, and that sparked fresh jolts of desire. She reached down and stroked him through his jeans, and he grew hard under her touch. Jesse pulled her pants over her hips. Her underwear was white, silky soft under his fingers.

  He wanted her; the intensity made him hungry, desperate, clouding all other thoughts. He wanted to please her, to make up for leaving her. He wanted to feel close to her again.

  But he sensed her pulling back, and he stopped kissing her. “You okay?” he asked, his breathing hard in her ear.

  “Yes,” she whispered, but she sounded scared.

  “We don’t have to do this now, if you don’t want to.” He meant what he said, too. Still, by God, he hoped she di
d want to.

  “I do,” she replied, glancing over at Caitlyn. “But I’m not ready. It’s been...Jesse, it’s just been such a long time, and with Caitlyn here I—”

  “It’s okay, Mia. I understand.” He did understand, but that dark little Thrall-soured part of his brain was angry and hurting.

  She scooted out from under him and slid her pants over her rear end. “I’m sorry, Jesse.”

  “Please, don’t be.” He worked up a smile for her and pulled her into a hug. “Doesn’t matter what we’re doing. I’ll take being close to you any way I can.”

  She kissed his cheek. “Thanks. Thanks for understanding.”

  She fell asleep some ten minutes later lying next to him with her head on his chest. That felt good, too, just the closeness of her, the smell of her hair.

  It felt so good, in fact, that the words upstairs didn’t matter, the hatesexdeath words, the promises of pain for....

  Shit. Oh shit. Frantic whispering at the top of the stairs, faint at first, pressed itself into his conscious mind. He froze, craning his neck and holding his breath. It was mostly just verbal static, but it gradually fell into a rhythm. He picked up the occasional word (hollow, general, sever), and the dull sound like wind in a tunnel.

  “Mia,” he whispered. “Mia, wake up.”

  The voices grew closer, more insistent (eviscerate, tiles, voice).

  “Mia, I think we have trouble.” He inched slowly out from under her and drew his gun from his backpack.

  Mia turned over. “Is it morning?”

  “No, baby. But we have to move. I think we’ve got to go now.”

  She opened her eyes, cocked an ear toward the stairs, then leapt up. “Damn it.”

  “What is it, Mia?”

  “The eyes,” she answered, extinguishing the candle and throwing it in her bag.

  “The what?”

  “The eyes. Thrall’s eyes.” She shook Caitlyn gently. “Come on, baby. Come on. The monsters are here. We have to go.”

  Caitlyn stirred and sat up, rubbing her eyes and pouting. “I’m sleepy.”