by Lukens, Mark
The seven of them walked down the street, their boots and shoes scuffing across the sand, the glow of the lanterns lighting their way.
A few minutes later, Karl stopped in the street. He stared at the dark two-story general store. “That doesn’t make any sense at all,” he said.
CHAPTER 13
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Karl said again as he stared at the two-story building in front of them. “Ingrid would have lit a lantern by now.”
Like the saloon and hotel, the general store had a front walkway with a porch roof built over it that hid the front doors and windows in shadows so deep they reminded Jed of the bottom of a well. A hitching rail ran along in front of the porch and a wooden sign supported by a few lengths of chain hung from the edge of the roof; Jed couldn’t make out what was engraved and painted on the wood sign.
“Look at the windows upstairs,” Karl said in a shaky voice, the slur gone from his words now as he sobered up immediately. “There aren’t any lanterns lit.”
“Maybe they just fell asleep,” Moody suggested.
Jed watched the upstairs windows—they were black rectangles against the wood planked exterior wall. There was no light in those windows, no sign of movement, no sign of life.
Karl didn’t wait any longer—he took off for his store, marching across the dirt street. “Ingrid! Boys!”
No answer from inside the general store and the apartments above it.
Jed had that prickling feeling on his skin again, like a creepy-crawly sensation after a terrible nightmare. Nobody had come out into the street yet. There were still no lanterns lit inside any of the buildings. With all of the noise they were making and with Karl shouting, surely someone would have come outside by now. Or someone would have at least come outside to survey the damage done from the storm.
Jed touched David’s shoulder, nudging him forward just a little. “Let’s keep up with them.”
Karl was already at the double doors of his general store as the others were walking up the wide wooden steps. Jed noticed that all of the rocking chairs along the walkway were tipped over.
Could be from the wind, Jed thought. But then he noticed that the last chair at the far end of the porch had been smashed to pieces.
Karl froze as he reached for the door handle. Both doors to the general store were ajar, a black line of darkness between them.
“Maybe we’d better let the marshal go in first,” Moody said as Jed and David walked up the steps to the porch.
Karl didn’t wait for Jed; he exploded into motion, pushing both doors open and rushing inside the store. The top of one door struck a little bell above it when Karl opened the doors, the bell making a jarring, ringing sound. The glass panels in the doors shuddered in their frames from the force of Karl pushing them open. Karl was immersed in a bubble of light inside the darkness from the lantern he held. He was already several feet inside the store.
“Oh God,” Esmerelda whispered with her hands up to her mouth. She was still on the walkway and staring into the open doorway.
Jed saw what she was looking at. Even from the front walkway, Jed could see that the general store was a wreck inside; contents of the store had been destroyed and strewn across the floor.
Moody went in after Karl.
“No,” Karl moaned from inside the store. “No. No. No.”
Jed and David followed Moody inside the store, their boots crunching on the broken bits of glass and ceramic and smashed pieces of wood.
Tables in the store had been tipped over, wooden bins broken apart, glass panels shattered, jars and plates shattered. The floor was a mishmash of goods: ripped-up pieces of clothing, candies, soaps, candles, bits of wood. And splashed here and there among the debris were dark smears of blood. There was more blood on the walls where pictures and artwork had been knocked down.
“Ingrid!” Karl screamed. “Boys!”
No answer from Ingrid and the boys.
They were all inside the general store now, Billy stayed close to the double doors. Moody handed his lantern to Esmerelda so he could use both hands to hold his shotgun, his body tense, his eyes wide and alert.
Karl darted around a wood counter that had been splintered apart. He tripped over the destroyed contents of his store behind the counter, stumbling over the debris like he was walking across deadfalls in the woods. He headed towards a doorway where a curtain had been torn down.
Moody hurried to catch up to Karl as he disappeared into the doorway. “Wait for us, Karl. We shouldn’t split up.”
Jed felt that Moody’s warning was meant for all of them, and he and David fell in behind Moody, walking as carefully as they could over the broken and smashed bits and pieces of what used to be the goods in Karl’s general store. Billy and Esmerelda brought up the rear with the other lantern.
Moody followed Karl up the set of narrow steps, the walls close, like a claustrophobic tunnel up to the second floor.
Upstairs, they checked all three bedrooms. All of them were destroyed. There was no sign of Ingrid and her children . . . no sign except for the smears of blood everywhere.
Just like David’s house. Just like David’s family.
Ingrid!” Karl screamed even though she was obviously gone. “Ingrid!”
Billy Nez plucked the eagle feather from his hat as they all stood in what used to be Karl and Ingrid’s bedroom. He waved it back and forth, chanting softly.
Karl glared at Billy, his blue eyes rimmed in red, the little bit of bleached-blond hair he had left sticking out in wild tufts. “Stop doing that!” He rushed at Billy.
Moody stepped in between Billy and Karl, holding Karl back. Billy made no move to defend himself, and he kept his eagle feather in his fingers.
“They’re gone,” Moody whispered to Karl, still holding on to him.
Karl stopped struggling with Moody. He looked around at the wrecked bedroom as tears fell from his eyes. “How? How can this be?”
Moody looked at Jed. “Someone took them.” He stared at Jed like he was waiting to be backed up by an expert.
Jed didn’t answer.
“You think it was Red Moon’s gang?” Moody asked Jed, his words more forceful now. “You think they took Ingrid and Karl’s boys?”
Jed still didn’t answer.
Moody looked at Billy like he might have an answer for him.
Karl walked away from Moody, stopping at an overturned bureau, the drawers pulled out. He sank down to his knees and set the lantern down on the floor beside him. He searched through the clothing all over the floor. He pulled a pistol out from the clothing and checked to make sure the cylinder was loaded with bullets.
“They didn’t take anything,” Jed said.
Everyone except Karl looked at him.
“They tore everything apart,” Jed continued. “But they didn’t take Karl’s gun. And it looked like they left behind plenty of supplies downstairs.”
“They took my wife,” Karl said from the floor. “And my boys.”
“Yes,” Jed agreed. “But they weren’t robbers. They came here only to take your family.”
“And your horses,” Moody reminded him.
It sounded like an accusation to Jed, like Moody was trying to blame him for the plague that had descended upon their town. And maybe it was true.
“They came with the storm,” Esmerelda said in a whisper, her face lit up from the lantern in her hands.
Moody glanced at her but didn’t bother to ask what she meant by it. He looked back at Jed again. “We should check the other buildings.”
Jed just sighed—he already knew what they were going to find: more wreckage, more splatters of blood, but no bodies.
Moody hurried over to Karl who was still on his knees, cradling his pistol in his hands, his face a scowl, an equal mixture of rage and sorrow. “Come on, Karl. We need to search each building and look for Ingrid. Maybe she took the boys and ran. Maybe they’re hiding somewhere.”
Jed didn’t think so. He looked
at the smears of blood on the walls and knew there was little hope of finding Ingrid and her sons alive. About as much hope as finding David’s family alive.
“I’ll kill them,” Karl said through clenched teeth as he wiped at his eyes. His face was red from crying, the skin underneath his eyes baggy and purple. He found a small box of bullets under some clothes and slipped it into his pants pocket.
“Let’s go back down there and look,” Moody said as he helped Karl to his feet. Moody picked up the lantern and ushered Karl towards the doorway.
“Something’s wrong here,” Esmerelda whispered to Jed as they followed Moody and Karl out to the hallway.
Jed didn’t reply.
Downstairs, Moody walked Karl out onto the front porch. The buildings across the street were still shrouded in darkness, the town still deathly quiet. Karl held the lantern in one hand and his pistol in the other. Billy and Esmerelda were the last two out of the general store, Esmerelda’s lantern adding to their little bubble of light as they gathered together on the walkway.
“No blood out here,” Billy said. At some point he’d stuck the eagle feather back into the band of his hat.
“He’s right,” Esmerelda said, shining the lantern down towards the floorboards. “No blood out here at all. How did they get the . . . how were they taken out of there without a drop of blood anywhere?”
Jed remembered thinking the same thing when he had stood on David’s front porch yesterday.
“No tracks in the dirt,” Billy announced.
“We’re not accomplishing anything by standing here,” Moody snapped, already moving towards the other end of the walkway where another set of steps led down to the dirt street. “Let’s check the dining hall next door.”
Moody and Karl were already on their way, Karl’s lantern lighting up their path to the doorway of the building next to the general store. That building was just as dark as the others.
Jed nodded at Billy and Esmerelda and then guided David towards the end of the walkway.
Moments later they all stood inside the dining hall. Like Karl’s general store, the dining hall was wrecked. Tables and chairs were smashed to pieces, even the counter at the other end was destroyed, like someone had taken an ax to it. More splashes of blood were smeared along the walls and floors, even a splatter along the ceiling ten feet above them.
“It doesn’t look like anything was taken in here either,” Esmerelda said. “Just destroyed. What kind of outlaws don’t steal anything?”
“The kind that just want to kill,” Jed said.
“Ingrid!” Karl called out, walking deeper into the darkness.
“Mary!” Moody yelled for the owners of the dining hall, following Karl. “Charlotte! Anyone here?”
No one answered from the doorways that led to the back. Moody and Karl ducked through the doorway, the light from the lantern fading as they worked their way deeper into the building, looking for any survivors.
“Look,” Esmerelda whispered to Jed. She pointed at the wall closest to them where four finger marks of blood trailed along the wall, the blood growing fainter as the streaks went along the wall boards. The streaks of blood went up and then down in another area, curving, almost like someone had tried to form letters, or words. They walked over to the wall, Esmerelda shining her lantern onto the wall so they could see better. “You think they were trying to spell something?” she asked him.
Jed stared at the bloody streaks, trying to make sense out of what the person might have been trying to spell. “That looks like it could be the letter C, and then an O.”
“Yes,” Esmerelda nodded. “I see it now. And then an L and an E. I think that word is Cole—like someone’s name. And this other one. That looks like an S and then a T.” She frowned, studying the squiggles of blood on the wall. “Maybe the name Stella.”
“Is there someone named Cole in this town?” Jed asked her. “Or Stella?”
She shook her head. “No one that I know of.”
Jed wondered why someone would write these names on a wall. Were they written by the victims? The murderers? But one of the names was a woman’s name—she wouldn’t be one of the murderers, would she? And certainly the skinwalkers wouldn’t have these names. But the names must mean something, yet it wasn’t making sense to him. He stared at the woman’s name a little longer. The letters written in blood were smeared. Maybe it wasn’t Stella, but some other word. He stared at the word for a long moment.
“I don’t understand how they took everyone out of here,” Moody said as he and Karl entered the dining hall again from the back rooms.
Jed and Esmerelda turned around and looked at Moody and Karl as they approached in their sphere of light. And then Jed noticed that David wasn’t standing near him anymore.
“Where’s your boy?” Esmerelda asked. “And Billy.”
They were gone.
CHAPTER 14
They all stared at the open door of the dining hall, the darkness outside the door seemingly impenetrable.
Panic blanketed Jed immediately, the weight of it heavy on his lungs, making it difficult to draw in a full breath. That tingly feeling of fear danced along his skin. His mind buzzed with panicky thoughts. How had David disappeared? How had he not seen David leave? Or heard him? He wondered for just a second if he had blacked out for a moment while staring at those words written in blood on the wall; he wondered if he had blacked out just long enough for David to walk out the front door.
Karl was in his own catatonic state of loss now; he stood right behind Moody. Jed wondered if Karl was in the process of blacking out at this very moment. Was Karl standing there with his mouth open, still breathing, his heart still beating, his bodily functions still working . . . but his mind was blank?
The skinwalkers can get inside a man’s mind, Red Moon had said. They can make a man do things. They can call him, make him walk towards them.
Were the skinwalkers really witches? Were they casting spells? How much was real, and how much was a hallucination?
Billy was gone. Had Billy walked away in a trance like David had? Was Billy a living puppet now, controlled by the skinwalkers? Again Jed thought of what Red Moon had said when Jed had asked him what had happened to Roscoe in the middle of the night.
He walked into the woods, Red Moon had said.
Had Billy and David just walked away like Roscoe had done? Or was Billy going to hurt David?
Jed ran for the door. Esmerelda was right behind him. Moody was trying to get Karl moving again. They shouldn’t split up, but Jed wasn’t going to wait for Moody and Karl—he couldn’t leave David outside alone.
Oh God, I’m supposed to protect him.
Jed rushed out onto the walkway in front of the dining hall and stopped cold.
Billy stood in the street ten feet beyond the dining hall’s walkway. And standing a few feet in front of Billy was David. Both of them were facing the same way, both of them staring down the street towards the white church in the distance.
Jed rushed down the steps. He passed Billy and went right for David. He grabbed the boy’s shoulders, afraid that he would see the milky eyes of a zombie rather than David’s dark eyes. But David was alert. “What’s wrong, David?”
David stared at Jed with fear in his eyes.
“What are you doing out here?” Jed snapped at David. “You can’t go off by yourself, you hear?”
David didn’t respond.
Jed let David’s shoulders go. He walked the few steps back to Billy, ready to blame Billy for David being outside. “You take him out here?”
Billy stood with his arms down by his side, his body loose. “No,” he answered simply.
The others rushed up to them, bringing the light of their lanterns with them.
“I followed David out here,” Billy said.
Jed stared at Billy. “Followed him out here?”
Billy didn’t offer an explanation. Jed looked at David who was staring at the church in the distance again. The walls of
the church were ghostly white in the moonlight, its steeple the highest point in town, a cross on top, reaching up into the night sky.
“What are you two doing out here?” Moody asked Billy, moving closer to him. “We need to search the other buildings. Look for the others.”
“They are all gone,” Billy said.
“You don’t know that,” Moody answered, his face scrunched in disgust.
For just a moment Jed thought Moody was going to strike Billy with the butt of his shotgun.
“There might be some survivors,” Moody said. “There could still be some people hiding in the buildings. Maybe they’re in one of the abandoned buildings.”
“They got them all,” Billy said in his deep voice, his eyes back on the church in the distance.
“No way that’s true.” Moody barked the words out, spittle flying as he yelled. “No way they could have gotten them all.” His voice was rising, his Irish accent even thicker now.
Billy didn’t answer Moody. He walked forward to stand beside David.
Jed had his Colt .45 in his hand, his eyes darting around at the buildings, looking for any sign of movement. But he already knew he wasn’t going to see the skinwalkers. A coyote yipped and cried somewhere in the hills outside of town.
“Don’t you walk away from me, Indian!” Moody yelled at Billy.
“Moody, wait,” Esmerelda said, trying to grab Moody’s arm, trying to keep him away from Billy.
Moody brushed her off of him and stomped towards Billy.
Jed had been standing next to David, and he stepped in between Moody and Billy. “Nobody’s fighting right now,” he told him.
Moody stopped. He looked ready to explode with rage.
“We need to be careful,” Jed said. “Whoever did this could be watching us right now. They could start picking us off at any time.”
The anger melted from Moody almost instantly. He looked at the dark buildings all around them, clutching his shotgun even tighter. “So what do you suggest, marshal?”
“I think we need to get back to the saloon. It seems to be the only safe place in town so far. We hole up there for the night and wait for daylight, wait until we can see what’s going on.” He looked at Karl. “I know you want to look for your wife and sons, but we need to be cautious right now.”