Petr took his eyes from the sight and looked over at Gretel, whose hand was frozen on the door knob as she was about to enter the Klahr house. She was staring back at Petr, eyes wandering, listening for the sound again.
She gave a pointing motion toward the house indicating that she was going inside, and then gave another to Petr instructing him to head around to the back. Petr shook her off furiously. They had to stay together, and he certainly didn’t want her trapped inside.
Gretel pulled the pistol from her waistband and nodded. She was going in, and no look he gave was going to stop her. She gave Petr the five-minute hand sign, indicating that she would head in, get her brother and Mrs. Klahr, and be back in that spot in five minutes.
Petr frowned and nodded, knowing it would never work out that way.
AFTER GRETEL MADE HER decision, she moved quickly, entering the house in a sprint and ascending the stairs two at a time. At the top of the staircase, she ran headfirst into Amanda Klahr, nearly knocking her to the floor of the upstairs hallway. Only Hansel, who was standing directly behind her, kept them both on their feet.
“Mrs. Klahr!” Gretel blurted, and then lowered her voice to a whisper. “You are alive! I knew you would be.”
Mrs. Klahr bear hugged Gretel and then released her in one motion. She then spun her and pressed her hands to Gretel’s back, guiding her down the steps. “I know, my baby. I knew you would know. But now we have to go.”
“Hansel, are you okay?” Gretel asked, looking over her shoulder.
The shattering of glass in the bedroom seemed to answer Gretel’s question, and before she could scream, Marlene was standing in her line of sight. Her face was wild, smiling, and she was holding up her hand to show the nubs of where her fingers had been.
“Gretel go!” Hansel screamed. He was at the back of their small pack, and he would have been the first one skewered by the nails of the flying psychopath who had just plunged in from the sky.
“Come here, boy.” The woman spoke with a terrifying confidence, as if she were reaching to grab a lobster from a crowded tank.
As Hansel would tell it later in his life, after the images of the woman started to fade and he could finally speak about the events, that the moment when he felt the woman’s fingernails rake across the back of his head, down his neck, and between his shoulder blades, just missing the collar of his shirt, that he was as certain of his own death as he had ever been in his life. Even more certain than when she had held him as a negotiating pawn and Ben Richter had saved his life.
If she latched on this time, he knew it would be fatal. At that point, there would have been no more negotiation; Marlene was on a rampage.
Gretel leaped down the remaining four or five steps to the bottom, retained her footing, and then turned toward the stairs with the gun raised. She waited for Mrs. Klahr and Hansel to reach the floor and clear the way, and then she fired three rounds through the empty space into the wall at the top of the stairs.
Marlene was gone.
Gretel stared up the stairwell, allowing a moment for the terrible face to appear one last time. Just one more chance so she could shoot a bullet through the woman’s cranium. But there was only silence from upstairs.
“Gretel, let’s go,” Mrs. Klahr said.
“She can’t live, Mrs. Klahr. Not past today.”
Hansel, Gretel, and Mrs. Klahr stood paralyzed in the foyer, waiting for the sound from Marlene’s location to dictate their next move. She was fast, faster than any of them had realized, and she was capable of flight, so it wasn’t as easy as just running out the door into the open space of the orchard. From there Marlene could pick them off easily, like grubs exposed in an opossum’s den.
For now, they would stay huddled at the bottom of the stairs with gun in hand. That seemed like the safest play.
As if a test to the theory, the front doorknob began to turn, slowly pulling the latch from its casing. Preemptively, Gretel grabbed the knob and snatched the door open. She pulled back the hammer of the pistol and held it skull high as she swung the door wide, and then pushed the barrel against the forehead of Petr, who stood on the other side of the threshold.
“Gretel!” Mrs. Klahr snapped a whisper at Gretel, who lowered the pistol to her side. Mrs. Klahr then pushed past the teenage girl and grabbed Petr by his shoulders, bringing him into her arms. “Thank you, God.”
“Gretel was right, Mrs. Klahr,” Petr sighed, the relief in his voice palpable. “She always had faith you would be okay.”
Despite herself, Gretel basked in the credit and then allowed the reunion of Petr and Mrs. Klahr to last just a moment longer than she should have.
Finally, Gretel grabbed the bottom of Petr’s shirt and pulled him fully inside the house.
“She was in here, Petr,” Gretel debriefed, her voice barely audible. “At the top of the stairs. I don’t know where she’s gone. We didn’t hear her leave, so she may still be inside.”
Petr matched Gretel’s volume. “I didn’t see anyone outside. Maybe she’s flown off.” He made a flying motion with his hands, like a bat. “She probably wasn’t expecting us to fight. Maybe she’s decided to quit for now.”
Gretel was quick to kill any hope in Petr. Complacency meant certain death. “No, Petr. She knew. She came to the Back Country fully expecting a battle. She surprised us by coming across the lake.” Gretel avoided Hansel’s eyes, not needing to call attention to his dereliction of duty at this point. “But she knew we would be prepared to fight. It’s part of her nature. It’s her disposition to engage this way.”
Petr was shaking his head before Gretel finished speaking. “What? How can you know this, Gretel? How can you know her like that?” Petr was unsold, weary.
“Because it’s how I feel about things. That need to always struggle, even when there are easier options. Even when the struggle isn’t there at all. I can’t explain it, but trust me, she’s not gone.”
“Maybe we should go before she comes back.”
“Are you listening, Petr? She’s not gone.”
“So are we just going to stand here then? In a circle in the foyer? Our backs to each other, waiting for her to come down the stairs or through the front door?”
Gretel dropped her head, looking down at the floor, and then stepped to Petr until she was only an inch away. She stared up into his face, breathing heavily, her eyes fire. “Did you see her fly?”
“Yes, I saw her, but...”
“She could be waiting for you on the roof right above us. And the second you step back outside she’ll collapse on you like an avalanche. And devour you.”
Petr stepped back toward the window, holding the rifle next to him with the butt on the ground in a resting pose. “Okay, Gretel. I’m with you. I want to get out of here as badly as you do. I just want us all to make it out of here alive.”
“Death is coming,” Gretel said to no one.
Petr, Hansel, and Mrs. Klahr let Gretel’s words hang in the air for a moment before Mrs. Klahr finally picked up where Petr left off. “So what do you want to do, Gretel?”
Gretel sensed a bit of defensiveness from Mrs. Klahr for her adopted son.
“She was up there, and I haven’t heard a sound since.”
“Shhh!” Gretel whispered, stepping away from the group with the pistol raised, her gaze slightly upturned. “Did you hear that? It came from the kitchen, I think.”
Gretel took a step toward the kitchen and stopped. She took another, all eyes on her as she crept toward the sound.
On the third step, the sound of chaos detonated into the house from behind her, inches from where Petr stood. The bow window that looked out toward the lake shattered inward.
Hansel and Mrs. Klahr stood in shock, showered with glass. The light refracted through the shards, giving them a dreamlike essence. Gretel looked past them, past Petr, and there she was.
Marlene.
She was standing at the window, her arm reaching through the destroyed frame, grabbing for th
e barrel of the rifle that was leaning against the wall next to Petr. She coiled her long fingers around the metal tube and pulled it toward her.
Petr’s instincts were fast, and he clutched down onto the butt of the gun before Marlene could pull the rifle entirely through the window. He couldn’t quite get his finger steady on the trigger, but he was holding his own in the tug of war for the weapon.
Gretel turned to Hansel and Mrs. Klahr. “Go to the kitchen and call the System!”
Gretel lifted the pistol and aimed several feet to Petr’s right, eliminating any chance of hitting him with friendly fire. She squeezed off two shots in Marlene’s direction.
The first shot missed, hitting the right frame of the window. The second was purer and struck Marlene just below her left shoulder, dropping her from the square of the window, her body disappearing as if the ground below her suddenly imploded. There was a delightful howl of pain left in her wake. Gretel knew it wasn’t a mortal shot—unfortunately—but it was injurious. Maybe enough to give them the advantage they would need to finally finish her.
Petr pulled the rifle in and held it ready, looking at Gretel, wonderstruck. “Nice shot.”
Gretel nodded, a bit surprised at her own acumen.
“I’m going after her, Gretel.”
“No.”
“Yes, Gretel. We’re trapped in here. And you’re out of bullets. Or close to it. And she’s hurt. Now is the time. If we wait, we’ll die in here.”
“Petr, wait!”
But he was already out the door, and within seconds of leaving, she heard a round shot from the rifle, and the wails of Marlene’s distress had turned to laughter.
GRETEL WAS NAUSEOUS now, and for the first time since she’d returned from the Old Country, she had no idea what to do next.
Mrs. Klahr ran back from the kitchen and stood next to Gretel, staring wide-eyed toward the window. “What happened? Where is Petr?”
Gretel was silent.
“Where is Petr, Gretel?” Amanda Klahr shouted at Gretel, her anguish unlike anything Gretel had ever heard from the woman.
“Don’t you fret, Amanda. Petr is just fine.” Marlene was as clear as crystal from outside the door, her voice dripping with disdain as she grotesquely drew out the word ‘fine.’
Judging by the volume, Gretel estimated the woman was only ten or twelve feet from the house.
“His tender neck feels wonderful beneath my boot.”
Hansel had now arrived back from the kitchen and stood with Gretel and Mrs. Klahr; the defeat on his face terrified Gretel. He didn’t look afraid—that was the old baby Hansel—he had the more frightening look of disappointment. Whether it was directed at Gretel, she couldn’t have said, but it was as clear to her as anything she’d ever known that Hansel’s faith in the world had been broken.
Gretel hugged her brother. He kept his arms by his side.
She turned now to Mrs. Klahr. “I’m going to get him back, Mrs. Klahr. It’s me she wants, not Petr. And not you either.”
“Gretel, you will do no such thing!”
“This will be okay. I know it will.” Gretel studied the woman’s face for understanding. Okay, Mrs. Klahr? Just stay here. There isn’t anything else to do.”
Gretel embraced Mrs. Klahr, kissed her on the forehead, and then walked to the door. She opened it, stepping out to a beautiful day in the Back Country.
As Gretel knew before she looked, Petr was in as desperate a position as Marlene described. His cheek was pinned down in the gravelly dirt of the driveway, and Marlene was leaning forward, her foot on the side of Petr’s neck. Gretel could see he struggled to breathe, was begging for oxygen. Marlene stood like a hunter with a trophy kill below her, the rifle on her hip and a smile on her face.
“I’m proposing this trade, Marlene, and you will take it as it comes. You will let him go, and I will go with you to the Old World. With no resistance. I’m sure you have a sedative with you, so just to be safe, I’ll take it and go quietly. You’ve won. Just leave him and my brother and Mrs. Klahr in peace.”
“I don’t need your deals anymore, Gretel, but I do need your gun. Drop it to the ground.”
Gretel had forgotten about the weapon in her waistband. She had no intention of making a desperate play in this situation. Negotiation—the exchange of her own life—was the only hope she had of saving Petr. The System had been called, but they would likely take hours to arrive.
Gretel tossed the weapon to ground.
“Of course you need my deal, Marlene. You can’t make the potion if I’m dead, and if you hurt Petr, that’s the only way you will ever take me. But you have a choice: if you let him go, I promise you I’ll come with you, and you can use me for your liking.”
Marlene stared hard at Gretel, considering.
“It’s not good enough, Gretel. Your deal, that is. There are two Aulwurms here. And another one, as I understand it, is on the way. My Source. I need all you. I need all of it. I could never leave that much behind.”
Gretel closed her eyes, fatigued, her will as frail as talc. She now understood that this woman was mad beyond even the most basic logic. She couldn’t possibly expect to take them all. Her mother too? And take them where? How? It would be nearly impossible to wrangle three people back to the Old World. Or wherever she was planning to take them. She hadn’t shown the ability to maintain even one prisoner in her own home.
The situation trended toward hopelessness. The deal Gretel had offered was sincere—even fair, in a maniacal way—but it wasn’t enough. It would never be enough. Her addiction, her dependency on the potion, was absolute.
“My mother isn’t here,” Gretel said.
Gretel hoped Marlene could at least reason as far as that. That she couldn’t simply make a person appear from nowhere.
Marlene nodded and rubbed her chin, a motion suggesting Gretel had a good point.
“You’ll just have to take me alone. I’m sorry. The deal I’ve proposed is fair.”
“But your brother is here. Your young, delicious brother.”
“Just me,” Gretel snapped, landing each word solidly, leaving a pause between them. Her tone made it clear that notion was off the table.
“You haven’t the leverage to hold such a strong position, my dear. And I’ve little more patience for this place. Hansel will be coming with me. As will you. Or your lover below me dies.”
“No!”
Marlene lowered the barrel of the rifle until the muzzle was snug against Petr’s temple, her finger hooked around the trigger.
Gretel began to cry. “No...please. Don’t. You can’t take Hansel. I...” She had nothing more to offer.
Marlene smiled now, displaying her infamous fangs. “So be it.”
Petr closed his eyes in anticipation.
“I’ll come with you.”
Hansel stood at the door, his eyes as cold as iron.
“Just let him go.”
Marlene smiled wider now and then broke into satanic laughter. It sounded so horrible Gretel wouldn’t have been surprised to see the leaves behind her turn brown and drift to the ground.
Hansel walked over next to his sister and grabbed her hand. “Here we are. You have us as you asked. Now let Petr go.”
Marlene’s laugh ended abruptly and she snarled, “I don’t think so.”
She repositioned the muzzle on Petr’s head and put her eye to the sight.
“No!” Gretel screamed.
And then a blast shook the air around her, and blood, bone, and brains exploded everywhere.
GRETEL CLOSED HER EYES and screamed, falling to her knees. She was coughing and crying into the dirt, blood from the blast dripping from her face.
“Gretel, are you okay?”
It was Petr’s voice. How was that possible?
Gretel looked up and saw Petr on the ground, miraculously unharmed. Beside him was Marlene, half of her head and face gone. She moved her mouth as if trying to speak.
“What? How?” Gretel stared dow
n at the scene on the ground in disbelief, shaking her head clear, making sure it was all true before forming any hope. She felt Hansel pull away from her and head in the direction of the lake.
“Mother,” he said once, his voice squeaking on the first syllable. And then he started laughing like the child he was.
Gretel looked up. “What? What do you...?”
And then she saw her standing like an infantry soldier, the last wisps of smoke dissipating from the shotgun. Her hair and clothes were dripping wet. Mother.
“Are you all okay?” Anika asked.
Gretel just nodded and then ran to her mother, almost tackling her and Hansel to the ground.
“Petr? Are you okay?”
Petr stood and stared at Anika, his eyes captivated by the woman before him. He swallowed hard and nodded. “I think I am.”
“Mother, how did you? I don’t understand.”
“Your friend Ben told me you were here. I didn’t have a car or a boat, so I swam. Thankfully, he had a spare shotgun.”
Gretel considered this explanation and asked, “So you’re...cured?”
“We’ve a lot to talk about, Gretel. Not now though. Has anyone called the System?”
Gretel didn’t like the deflection, but she knew her mother was right. Now was not the time. “We called them.”
A gruesome liquid sound sputtered behind them.
“She’s not dead,” Petr said. “Look at her. She’s still breathing.”
Gretel placed her hands on the shotgun in her mother’s hands, and Anika let it go with little reluctance. Gretel strode to the woman’s damaged body and stood over her, assuming the position Marlene had taken over Petr just moments earlier.
“Gretel wait,” Anika said. Her tone was unconvincing. “Think about this, honey.”
Anika Morgan had blown the right side of Marlene’s head out from the back; the witch’s face was little more than a pile of smiling red flesh.
“You had a choice, Marlene,” Gretel said, the pitch of her voice almost sympathetic. “You should have taken it.”
The Gretel Series: Books 1-3 (Gretel #1-3) Page 58
