He had to keep moving. He focused his thoughts on finding Julia. He’d investigate the scream, see if it had been hers. If it was, he hoped it was only a scream of fear and not pain. He thought of Perry, and how his screams had dwindled down to gurgling, and his breath caught in his chest. He couldn’t save Perry but he would save Julia. He wouldn’t let anything bad happen to her if he could help it. She was another one who’d seemed to trust in his abilities early on, to trust him by some intuition or instinct, and that meant so much to him. She was good like that. It was yet another thing about her that he lo—
Whoa. Love? Was he thinking that he loved her? The notion had come so easily to him. Was that at the heart of his obsession with finding her? Was it more than just needing something for his brain to focus on, a problem to solve to keep from panicking?
Of course it was, he realized. His brain wasn’t working so hard on Darren’s rescue plan. In fact, if he were to be brutally honest with himself, wasn’t there just the tiniest little part of him that hoped the forest had already taken care of the asshole?
He shook his head and almost voiced the denial out loud to make it seem more real. He wouldn’t wish what he saw happen to Perry on anyone, not even Darren.
Darren, who was competition. He felt a sudden and encompassing rage flash-flood his system. He hated the guy. Darren, who had gotten the honor of being able to touch Julia all over and then had actually made her feel bad about it! Darren, who had looked so smugly superior even in the presence of the restraining order he and Perry delivered. God, how he’d wanted to punch that smirk, cave it in along with the rest of that face. Darren, who had tormented the woman he—
Pete clawed at the collar of his uniform. The green all around was suffocating him, drowning him. These weren’t his thoughts . . . were they?
He had to keep going. He had to get himself and Julia out of there. Maybe he had never been made of the tough stuff like his father, and even now, his father might not see him as much of a man, but he wanted Julia to. God, did he ever want her to.
As he was walking, his boot kicked something heavy. Expecting to see yet another tree root or rock, he looked down. There was a glint in the grass. He bent down and was surprised to find an ax. He hauled it up by the handle. It was heavier than he expected.
An ax? He glanced around, half expecting to see the owner of the ax nearby. There was, of course, no one. Was it a real ax, then? Who would just leave an ax out in the middle of the woods?
In Nilhollow, he supposed, it might be any number of murderous crazy people.
There were specks of blood on the side of the ax head, but not the blade. Someone had been hurt near this ax, but not likely with it. He wiped the blood off on the grass. He hoped to God it wasn’t Julia’s.
He gripped the handle in both hands. It wasn’t a gun, but it was a weapon. A weapon tree-creatures just might be afraid of, unlike a gun. He hoped . . . He kept going.
* * *
It was disorientation or wishful thinking or both, but for a few perfect seconds before total consciousness, Julia thought she was home in bed, warm and safe. When she awoke, it took another second or two before everything—the rain, the cabin, the things in the interior dark, Darren’s corpse with an ax—came flooding back to her. She sat up and fought the urge to cry. She was still in those godforsaken woods. She hadn’t escaped. She hadn’t gotten anywhere. She was still trapped. How long had it been? She didn’t think more than two days had passed, but it felt like such a long two days. Damn it. Damn this place.
Her stomach growled. She had nothing left in her purse to eat, and even if she could identify what berries or plants were edible, she doubted she’d be able to find them before it got too dark to see. Besides, she wasn’t so sure now that it was a good idea to ingest anything that grew here.
Maybe that was part of how Nilhollow got to people—weakening them with starvation. Then it finished them off with silhouetted figures in the woods.
Her head and ankle ached, so she popped three more ibuprofen from her purse, finishing off the last of her bottled water. She unwrapped her ankle and winced at the swollen red flesh, then wrapped it up again. She didn’t know if it was good for her ankle or not, but it felt better tightly bound that way.
Then she checked herself, felt her face, checked her arms and legs and stomach. She didn’t know whether something she’d dreamed about but couldn’t remember was weighing on her subconscious, or those things in the dark had touched her while she slept, but she felt an overwhelming need to make sure she was still all there, still a solid part of the real world.
For a long time after, she sat on the floorboards, holding her purse in her lap. That little purse. Thank God for that. She’d come to think of it as almost a companion now. She petted the fabric with soft, affectionate strokes. It was there for her, offering her its contents when she needed something, hanging on no matter how far she ran or what the forest threw at her.
“Thanks,” she said to it. “Thanks for being here. Thanks for staying.”
She flinched as the wind creaked through the pines looming above her. It drew her out of her daze, and when she finally glanced around, she almost laughed. She didn’t, though. It would have sounded crazy, too loud and too desperate, even to her.
Most of the cabin was gone—but not all of it. The front porch remained, though the overhang was gone, as well as the posts to hold it up. The cabin’s door frame still stood, though most of the front wall of the house was also gone. The few remaining boards surrounding the doorway were jagged and splintered, like something very large had bitten through them. Perhaps strangest of all were the interior floor boards. Enough of them remained to support her body, jutting outward like diving boards from the door frame, but the rest of the interior, including the furniture, the somewhat-stairs, and whatever unimaginable structures might have been under the floor, were gone. It looked to her like a tornado had touched down right on the cabin and ripped away everything but her and what she had touched.
She was glad most of the cabin was gone. If she had to spend another night in the woods, she thought she’d actually prefer sleeping under the trees again. An old song popped into her head, one she remembered her grandpa singing when she was little, and only the one part:
Where did you stay last night?
I stayed in the pines where the sun never shines
And shivered when the cold wind blows
This time she did giggle out loud, and then was wracked with a trembling that took a minute or two to go away. Sure, she’d stay in the pines and shiver when the cold wind blew. She’d stay there tonight, and maybe the next night, and the next night . . .
Around her, little sounds of movement like crackling, creaking, and muffled thumps made her head dart in different directions. They were everywhere, all around her. They were watching, waiting, the eyes from the in-between places and the faces in the trees. And she giggled again, louder, because even she knew that sounded like the delusion of some paranoid person. It wasn’t though . . . oh no. They were coming to take her away, ha ha, hee hee, ho ho, like the other song said.
But not if she could get away from them first.
Julia breathed deeply, inhaling the scent of pine and old wood. She slung her purse strap over her shoulder and got unsteadily to her feet. It would be getting dark soon. It was Nilhollow; it could be dark any minute, on a whim. She had to be ready.
She glanced out toward the endless span of pines, cedars, and oaks, spindly sentinels already gathering darkness to them like cloaks. Between them, she could already see glinting pairs of eyes igniting in the dark, just like in her dream. It was more than feeling them watching her. Now, she could see them. She turned back to the doorway.
Then she spied the ax. It was still stuck in the door frame, a tooth caught in the muscle of the cabin’s old carcass.
“Well, look at that, purse,” she said to the little bag hanging by her side. “I think we’ve found ourselves a weapon.” She limped over to i
t and after a couple of tries, managed to wrench it free. Her ax now. Let something just try to fuck with her when the darkness came.
* * *
By degrees, the shadows deepened around the trees. The manëtuwàk felt the Turning seeping with renewed vigor from the Chasm. They thought they knew how the Kèkpëchehëlat felt. The Turning engulfed them in waves that ignited directionless rage. It caught them up on its currents and blew them through the forest. The leaves rustled in aggressive expectation and the tall grasses, ferns, and bushes, shook in their passing. They felt nothing, thought nothing but the Turning. It was more binding, more compelling than the far-moving ones’ ritual words and gestures had ever been.
The far-moving ones had called it Mahtantu, the spirit of death. The ax-wielding ones had called it the Devil. Some of the manëtuwàk believed the Turning was a force of nature, just as they were, but one from a void where creation and destruction were no longer held in balance. Some of them believed it was a force of un-nature, from a place beyond the access of even nature spirits. Either way, the manëtuwàk agreed on one thing: The moving and wielding ones, who thought the Turning was part of an ultimate evil, had no idea how right they were.
Deeper in the forest, at the source of the Turning, the Kèkpëchehëlat waited. The manëtuwàk hadn’t seen the forest god since it had torn up the ax-wielding one, but they could feel it. They knew the Kèkpëchehëlat fed solely on the Turning now, and had swallowed as much as it had been swallowed. They could feel its rage-sickness like a heat that singed the trees. It was becoming something else, something more powerful and deadly with the help of the Turning.
They wondered what it was waiting for. What did it know that they didn’t? What was coming? They supposed soon enough, once the Turning swallowed them, too, they would understand. There was some Plan, and the Kèkpëchehëlat was an instrument of that Plan. Soon, they would be, as well. And they were just at the point where they had begun not to care.
It was then that they sensed that the two moving ones, who they had given indifferent passage through their woods, were now armed with axes. Their howls of rage shook needles from the pines. Twigs snapped and smacked. The tidal wave of rage crashed over them again, wiping away thought, and they sped through the forest, bent on destroying.
* * *
A bruise-colored dusk had settled on Nilhollow by the time Pete stumbled into a clearing. He blinked several times, believing the wooden structure he was seeing was a trick of his eyes. It looked like a cabin that had been mostly torn down. A door frame and the platform of part of a floor still remained, as did most of a porch. It was hard to tell in the fading light, but he thought he saw movement beyond the door frame.
His heart sped up.
He took a few steps closer, clutching the ax more tightly. There was most definitely someone, something there. It leaned against the door frame, rocking a little. He was tempted to call out to it, to ask it if it was okay. It was possible the figure was the source of the scream, and might be hurt. Hell, in that forest, it was probable that anyone he came across, any real person, of course, was hurt in some way.
He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again, remembering the thing that had pretended to be Perry. He didn’t think he could trust his eyes. Maybe not even his thoughts. The forest could use both against him.
He moved a little closer.
The figure swung around the edge of the door frame and into the feeble light, and Pete’s heart leaped in his chest. It was Julia! The ax dropped to his side and he ran to the porch in spite of his misgivings. He stopped short, though, when he saw a similar weapon in her hands.
“Julia?” he asked softly. Had the woods already gotten inside of her? He thought of Todd Mackey with the bloody vines and branches snaking out of him and shivered. “Julia? Are . . . are you okay?”
She was glaring at him from beneath a lock of leaf-and-twig-strewn hair. Her clothes and hair were soggy, as if she’d been caught in the rain, though it hadn’t washed off the dirt that smudged her face and arms. He also noticed that her T-shirt was torn. The strip of fabric, he saw, was wrapped around her ankle. In both hands, she clutched an ax so tightly that her knuckles were colorless; for a moment, Pete thought the bones were actually protruding through the skin. Then saw it as a trick of the light.
“Julia, it’s me. It’s Pete.”
Her posture softened a little at his voice, and recognition dawned in her eyes. “Pete? Is that really you, or are you a . . . another part of the forest?”
“It’s me, hon. It’s really me, I swear.” He climbed the stairs and extended a hand to her, approaching her like a wild animal. The ax in her hands trembled, but didn’t lower. As he got closer to her, he could smell faint traces of her perfume. He touched her shoulder, and her whole body relaxed. Tears rolled down her cheeks and he pulled her into a hug. He could feel the edge of the ax digging into his ribs; her grip remained tight on the handle.
After a moment she looked up at him. “Thank God you’re you. And you’re here. How’d you find me?”
“I honestly don’t know,” he admitted. “I saw the report about your abandoned cars and came looking. I just had a feeling you might need help.”
She laughed, but it was an uncharacteristically harsh, bitter sound. “You were sure right about that.”
“You’re tough, though. A survivor. I knew you’d be okay.” He squeezed her hand, and she looked grateful.
“I’ve been looking all day. I’m lucky I did find you. I’m just glad I got to you before . . . uh, well, you know . . . before dark. But, um, I have to ask . . . are you here alone? Is Darren with you?” He glanced around the remains of the cabin but saw no sign of anyone else. Part of him was secretly glad for that.
Her expression darkened, but there were no fresh tears, he was glad to see. When she spoke, her voice was flat and soft. “He attacked me. Out on the road. He . . . he wanted to kill me, Pete. He tried, but I ran. I just kept running and I lost him. I don’t know where he is now. He had an ax.” She eyed his suspiciously, and he set it down for the time being against the door frame.
“Okay . . . okay,” he replied, glancing around. “First things first—let’s get ourselves out of here, and then we can figure out where he went.”
“Pete,” she said, and loosed one hand’s grip on the ax to grab his arm, “there’s something out here. Something evil. I . . . I don’t think it’ll let us leave. It’s not a person, not exactly, but . . . something. I know it sounds crazy, and I know I’ve been under some stress, but you have to believe me.”
Under some stress? He wanted to hug her again. He had no doubt she’d been through hell and survived more than many better-prepared people who’d gone into these woods. He was damned proud of her. “Hon, I know. I believe you. I do. I’ve seen things, too. Spirits . . . tree-creatures. The souls of these woods and, I think, maybe the thing that has been poisoning them. Perry and I . . .” His voice trailed off. “It’s not safe out here. We have to try to get out.”
She nodded, clutching the ax again. “Whatever it is, I’m going to kill it if it comes near us.” Then, seeming to think of something, she said, “Pete, where is your partner? Is he with a search party or backup or something?”
He hesitated in answering, not sure how to tell her about what happened to Perry or that Pete himself wasn’t in any better a situation than she was. He didn’t have to; she read it on his face. She deflated a little, and so did he. He hated to disappoint her.
“Okay,” she said, more to herself than to him. “Okay, let’s do this. We can do this.”
He picked up the ax again and noticed that she flinched slightly.
“Right. Uh, can you walk?” he asked, glancing at her ankle. “Do you need to lean on me?”
“No, I’m okay. But thanks.” She took the hand he offered, though, and followed him with a little limping shuffle through the doorway and down the porch steps.
Pete got out his flashlight and shined it into the gloom ah
ead. It offered a bright beam of light that cast odd moving shadows along the tree trunks from leaves and branches. For a moment Pete thought he saw faces in the shadow-shapes, but then the flashlight flickered and went out. Pete smacked the end of it against his palm, trying to jar it to life again, but it remained dark. Behind him, he heard Julia giggle.
“Sorry,” he said, heat flushing his cheeks.
Her hand wrapped around the crook of his elbow. “No, don’t be. It’s okay. If we were stuck in a regular forest, rescuing me would be easier.”
He wanted to say something witty or at least reassuring, but didn’t have the words. He squeezed her hand and felt her smile at him.
They walked awhile in the darkness. Pete couldn’t quite remember when the sun had set, but he thought they were heading east, in the opposite direction from where he’d last seen it. East was where the road was. They just needed to find the road.
Both of them jumped when the little flashlight in Pete’s belt suddenly came on, and they giggled nervously to each other.
“Well,” Pete said with a grin, “maybe that’s a sign that things are going to go our way, huh?” He unclipped the flashlight and shined the light on the woods in front of them.
Julia screamed as they took in the sight. Hanging from ropes among the trees ahead were several bodies, which looked flayed of all skin. Actually, they were more than just skinned, but turned inside out. Inexplicably, loops of intestine and brownish or reddish lumps of organs hung from exposed bone or muscle. Eyes hung low from stringy messes above what Pete thought might be lumps of tongues. In many cases, the brains sat freely on top of the bowed heads while hair wove indiscriminately around them. Many of the atrocities had lungs plastered to their chest. The worst thing to Pete was that on the few chests where his trembling hand could focus the light, those lungs were still weakly expanding and contracting.
Savage Woods Page 15
