From the Woods

by Charlotte Greene

  “They could, but they don’t have to. All they had to do is wait for us to walk by. They knew we’d wait until dark before heading down the scramble, and beyond that, it’s probably a lucky guess. Who knows? Maybe they’re…doing something to make that woman scream on the hour, like an alarm clock, knowing that we’ll eventually pass by. We came to investigate the last time they called for us, after all, if that’s what they were doing.”

  “But if this is all a ruse, why bother going over there? Maybe that woman I saw in the mask earlier is the one that was screaming.”

  Fiona didn’t need to respond. Both had heard those screams, and unless the woman in the mask was an Oscar-level actress, what they’d heard had been real terror, more probably pain.

  Roz seemed to realize this, too. When she spoke again, she sounded almost chastened for suggesting otherwise. “So what’s your plan?”

  “I think they want us to go over there. They’ve been waiting for us to come to them. They’re anticipating that we’ll try the easiest route, the trail, and they set themselves up near enough for us to hear them again.”

  “But not near enough for us to see them.”

  “Exactly. They want us to leave the trail, right here, and come crashing and bumbling our way over there—announcing our arrival like lambs for the slaughter.”

  “So that means we can’t go over there.”

  “No. It means we can’t go this way. That’s the thing about a plan. One unanticipated move, and it falls apart—theirs or ours. We have to try to approach their camp, or whatever it is, from another side. They’ll be watching the woods this way.”

  “Okay, so what do we do?”

  Fiona didn’t immediately reply, a feeling of something like triumph rising in her chest. Her instincts were correct. Since this all began, some small part of her had been connecting these dots, and she’d finally put them together. Now came the hard part—doing something with this new information.

  “I say we go back to the clearing by the scramble, follow the tree line for another half mile or so, in the direction we’re hearing them now, and approach their camp from behind.”

  “That might work at first, but won’t they hear us when we’re that close?”

  “I don’t think so, not unless we’re really careless. They won’t have anyone watching on the far side.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “I’m not. I’m guessing. But we have to try something they won’t expect.”

  She could vaguely see movement in the dark, and she knew, without seeing her, that Roz was rubbing her mouth. The gesture was so habitual when she was worried about something, she didn’t have to see it to know it was happening.

  “It’s a good idea,” Roz said. “Even if all of what you said is conjecture, I think you’re right in assuming that someone will be watching this side of their camp. Sneaking up behind them is the right call.”

  Her heart gave another lurch of victory. “Let’s get going, then.”

  She started walking, not realizing for a long while that she was the one leading them back through the woods, back the way they’d come. If Roz minded, she didn’t say anything. This was the first time in a long time someone had listened to and followed her lead.

  Because of the bright moonlight, once they hit the clearing by the scramble, they were able to quicken their pace, almost jogging along the edge of the trees. Roz stopped them after ten minutes or so and pointed, wordlessly, into the woods. From here, they should be safely past the people from the woods, but that also meant they had to be as quiet as possible going forward. She didn’t need to be told this, or told not to talk. She simply nodded, letting Roz take the lead again.

  The moonlight helped somewhat. The trees were still thick here and blocked out most of it, but the light was so bright in the night sky, the branches acted more like blinds than curtains. Here and there the trees opened above them, and she could see in clear detail. It wasn’t long before her ears picked up on the sound of the chopping wood again, dim but persistent, this time somewhere straight in front of them. They were going the right way.

  After perhaps ten minutes of creeping as quietly as they could, Fiona glimpsed something in the woods ahead. At first, she thought her eyes were fooling her, but after a few more minutes, she was certain she was right. Somewhere ahead of them she could see the waving, dancing light of a campfire. Compared to the dampened moonlight, it was incredibly bright and clear, obvious from a good distance. Roz glanced back at her, the light bright enough for Fiona to see her face, and she put a finger on her lips. They’d been quiet all this time, but now they needed silence. Again, the brighter moonlight helped, and as they pussyfooted closer, the firelight finally helped as well.

  They stopped some ten yards from the camp, crouching behind two trees to catch their breath. Finally, as if they’d agreed to it, they peered out from behind their trees into the camp.

  There was a surprising number of tents. Fiona had noticed a few of these as they approached, but now, with the leisure to take it all in, she could count at least six, though possibly more behind the others she couldn’t see. They were the large, canvas wall tents she remembered from summer camp as a kid—big enough to stand up in with large, two-flap doors. They’d been set up around an enormous bonfire being tended or watched by three standing people, all of them, based on their height and build, men. Two of them had their backs to Fiona and Roz, but one was facing their way.

  Roz had described the masks before, but nothing had prepared her for the sight of them. Unlike the stylized Renaissance carnival masks she’d anticipated, the one she could see was crudely, almost childishly designed, with mismatched eye holes and a lumpy texture like bad papier-mâché—white and unadorned, some crooked, tall ears sticking up at the top like a rabbit’s. It was horrifying and somehow so wrong and visually disturbing that Fiona whipped back behind the trunk of her tree, terrified that the masked man would look her way.

  She glanced over at Roz, who was watching her, concerned, brows drawn. Fiona tried to shake off the creeps that had crawled all over her and made an okay with her fingers.

  The screaming began then, sending a chill so deep through Fiona’s soul that she almost called out in response. Some of this had to do with the screams’ proximity. They were so much closer, it was as if the woman were screaming right next to them. This close to the shrieking, a stone’s throw, Fiona was suddenly struck with an idea so deep and horrifying she had to bite down on her tongue again to keep from voicing it. In fact, she wondered then why she hadn’t thought of this before. If these people had abducted the men and horses from camp the first night, who on earth had they taken now? What women were in these woods but her, Roz, and her friends?

  It was one of her friends.

  Chapter Sixteen

  There was no way to share this insight with Roz, but she gestured wildly, still hidden behind the tree. Roz lifted her hands dramatically, obviously not understanding. Fiona was desperate to convey her thoughts somehow, but unable to talk, she couldn’t do much beyond mimic her horror. Roz nodded and pumped her hands up and down in a dampening motion, palms toward the ground. She glanced over at the camp and motioned for Fiona to do the same.

  The three men had moved away from the fire several feet toward the far side of the camp, their backs to her and Roz. They seemed to be watching for something, all of them staring out into the woods away from them. Roz gestured for Fiona’s attention and pointed to the right at one of the tents. It was Fiona’s turn to shrug, confused, and she saw Roz throw her hands up before she moved, quickly, away from the tree and toward the tents. Fiona was so surprised she almost missed her chance, but she managed to follow, staying close to the ground in a kind of half-bent, spidery crawl.

  She sat down, hard, next to Roz by the side of the tent, almost sliding into place, breathing harder than the short jog merited. As they sat there, catching their breath, Fiona realized something. Like last time, when they’d still been on the trail,
the screaming had stopped, which, to Fiona, suggested that they were doing something to the woman to force that noise out of her. This added further proof to what she’d thought. They meant for Fiona and Roz to hear the woman and come searching for her. They couldn’t make her scream all night—they had some kind of pattern.

  Roz gestured to their left, to the back of the tent, and the two of them scooted around, staying low, almost walking on their hands and feet.

  A square patch of light streamed from the back of the tent—a window, Fiona realized. The two of them knelt on either side of it. Roz leaned over to her, her lips brushing her ear, and whispered so low Fiona almost didn’t catch what she said.

  “It’s this one.”

  Fiona was surprised. When the screaming started, she’d been hidden behind the tree, unable to think straight. Somehow Roz had been with it enough to determine the source. This tent was next to another one some five or six feet away, and the other tents had been on the other side of the fire, so she supposed that as long as you knew which side the screaming had come from, it would be easy to make an educated guess. Now here, she could see that this tent had light coming from the inside. Roz pointed up at the window and shakily got to her feet, keeping out of the line of sight. Fiona did the same, her legs weak and quaking below her, suddenly terrified.

  The window was almost opaque—a thick, reinforced plastic designed to let light in as opposed to offer a view. Peering through it was like looking into a funhouse mirror, the image distorted and fish-bowled. She could see movement, however, and the longer she squinted inside, the more sense she could make of what she was seeing.

  Two people stood with their backs to them, one much shorter and slighter, another quite tall and broad. She could hear the murmur of their voices and tell that they were talking to each other by the way they turned their heads toward the other person, and though she could detect that one of the voices sounded feminine and higher and the other masculine one lower, she couldn’t make out their words. Whether they were speaking low enough, or the heavy canvas masked the sound, she didn’t know, but they were having an intense but quiet conversation. She saw what she presumed to be the woman gesturing with both hands and the man’s mumbling reply. Whatever she was gesturing at was blocked by their bodies.

  Roz motioned for her attention and then pointed into the woods, away from the tent. She then pointed at her mouth and ear. She wanted to talk.

  The two of them headed out that way, moving more certainly and surely with the amplified light from the fire and the window. Fiona was still watching her footsteps as carefully as she could, certain that if she stepped on something like a branch or twig, someone would hear and investigate—one of those bulky guys by the fire, perhaps. They hadn’t been armed, at least not that she could see, but that didn’t mean their guns weren’t within easy reach.

  When they’d gone perhaps fifty feet, far enough away that it was getting hard to see again, Roz pulled her behind a large, gnarled cottonwood and down into a crouch. Even if someone did look this way, they would be hidden. Still, Roz kept her voice low, barely above a whisper.

  “The woman who was screaming is in that tent. The smaller person talking to the bigger one must be the woman I saw earlier. She kind of seems like the leader.”

  Fiona nodded, forgetting that she could respond out loud.

  “What were you trying to say earlier?” Roz asked. “Back by the other trees.”

  “It must be one of my friends. Who else could it be?”

  Roz nodded, clearly having thought the same thing. Her lips were pinched, brows furrowed, as if reluctant to agree. Maybe she’d hoped Fiona wouldn’t make this connection.

  “Do you think they’re all here?” Roz asked.

  This possibility hadn’t occurred to her. For some reason, she pictured only one person. The idea that all of her friends were here, possibly in the other tents, was so awful she couldn’t immediately reply.

  Roz sighed and sat down on her butt, leaning her pack against the tree. Fiona sat down too, happy to get off the balls of her feet. Once again, they faced each other, near enough that their knees touched.

  “What if they all are?’ Fiona finally said. She hadn’t wanted to ask.

  “Then this is going to be a lot harder to pull off.”

  “Maybe not, though,” Fiona said, scrambling for some other option. “Would they have had enough time to go all the way back to camp and bring all three of them here? Only one person was screaming.” She was reaching here, but she needed something to hang on to. The thought that all her friends were somewhere in those other tents was too much to take in.

  “But there’s a lot of tents over there.”

  That gave Fiona pause, and she remembered something obvious they hadn’t mentioned yet.

  “Do you think the guys are here, too?”

  “Jesus,” Roz said, her surprise suggesting she’d momentarily forgotten about them.

  If more of their friends were here, they could do little about it. In fact, they could do almost nothing for the woman in the tent. No way would they be able to get in there and out without someone seeing them. Not unless—

  “Hey!” Fiona said, barely holding in her excitement. “Do you still have your Leatherman?”

  Roz fumbled in her pockets and pulled it out.

  “We can’t bust her out, cowboy style and guns blazing, but we might be able to sneak her out.”

  “How?” Roz asked.

  “Out the back.” She took the Leatherman from her and unfolded the longest of its knives. She made a cutting motion, and Roz smiled in understanding.

  “Genius.”

  “We can’t get to all the tents, but we can at least go in the back of the one with the light and maybe the one next to it.”

  “It’s a plan. We have to wait until that woman and that guy leave, though.”

  “They can’t be in there all night, right?” Fiona asked. “What time do you think it is?”

  Roz tilted her head back and forth. “About one, maybe a little later—two, two thirty tops.”

  “They have to go to bed sometime.”

  “But if they’re calling to us, like you said, don’t you think they’ll keep doing it? In shifts, like?”

  Fiona hadn’t thought of this, and the little flame of hope she’d been nursing died out. After all, who were they fooling? Even if they managed to stay quiet enough for no one to notice them slicing up the back of the tent, what then? That screaming woman, whoever she was, was probably hurt. Their situation would be the same as with Carol—someone hurt and no way to take them back to safety.

  Roz took the Leatherman back from her, folded the blade down, and stowed it in a pocket. Then she grabbed Fiona’s hand in hers, squeezing it.

  “Don’t you give up on me, Fiona. We’re going to do this. We only need a few minutes to get her out. We don’t even have to cut the whole back—just enough to slip in and out. But we need—”

  “A diversion,” Fiona said.

  Roz smiled again and squeezed her hand harder. “Exactly. A diversion would do it. Some people will probably stay in camp, but I’m almost positive the two people in that tent will leave and wait outside. They’re not going to keep on with whatever they’re doing if they might have more victims to truss up.”

  They were quiet again. Roz had likely realized the major flaw with this idea. What on earth could they do that would divert enough attention for these people to go investigate? It would have to be big.

  “It’ll have to be me,” Fiona said.

  Roz shook her head. “No. It’s too dangerous. You’re fast, but I’m faster. Whoever does it will have to run like hell, hide somewhere for a while, and then catch up to the other somewhere safe.”

  “But you’re stronger. I might not be able to get her out of the tent on my own.”

  “She might be tied up. If you cut off—”

  “And if she’s hurt, she’d have to be dragged out of there. I can’t do it, Roz. Don’t you
see? Even without my hurt shoulder, I’m just not strong enough.”

  It was bright enough that she could see Roz rubbing her mouth again, and she touched her knee. Roz stopped, putting her hand on top of hers, brushing her thumb lightly against her wrist.

  “I don’t like it,” Roz finally said. She sounded hurt, almost angry.

  “Neither do I, but we don’t have any choice.”

  “These assholes have been forcing our hand this whole time. Now it seems like they’re doing it again.”

  It was light enough here that Fiona could see the sparkle of Roz’s eyes and the contours of her strong, square jaw. Her fingers went there almost of their own accord, and she traced the edge to her chin and down the length of her throat to her collarbone. She rested her hand there and then they moved, as one, to kiss. Something about this kiss was sweeter than earlier. No hint of sadness or desperation now, just a shared, mutual warmth.

  Roz moved back a little, and they rested with their foreheads together in the dark. Then, almost as if she hadn’t stopped talking, she continued.

  “So what are you going to do to grab their attention?”

  “Well,” Fiona said, “it has to be something major, or at least major enough to make a few of them check it out. It also can’t be so important that they close ranks, so to speak, and station guards in every tent. I want something that makes them curious, but not necessarily scared.”

  “A fire,” Roz suggested.

  Fiona laughed and then realized she was serious. “Really? Won’t it…cause a forest fire?”

  Roz shook her head. “Not likely, not with all this rain we’ve been having. You could dig a little trench around it, too, clear the branches back a couple of feet. It only needs to be a small one. It’ll be obvious out there in the dark.”

  “If someone is looking that way.”

  “Exactly. You’ll have to start it on the far side—in the direction they’re watching now, toward the trail.”