I raised the wrecking ball high in the air where it hung at roof level and I began to twist the controls. There wasn’t much cable to work with, but the first swing caught the side of the brick chimney and it shattered like it was made of glass. Bricks rained down the roof and onto the lawn. I shoved hard on the controls and the Swinger spun nimbly around as I released a little of the cable. The next blow was to the middle of the roof. Cedar shake shingles exploded into the air and I laughed like a madman. A ruined dormer crashed to the ground. Again, I jammed the controls ahead and the Swinger began to spin around for another pass. I dropped more cable and set my sights on the top floor of the old house.
Soliah’s face suddenly appeared on the other side of the windshield, not a foot away from my own. His eyes were wild with anger and he slammed his fist into the glass. The glass spider-webbed and I turned my head just as his red fist brushed past my nose. I stayed in my seat and the Swinger continued to spin. Soliah screamed with rage as the next blow took great chunks of the upper wall with it. A bed and dresser fell crashing to the ground.
“Stop!” Soliah ordered, baring his pointed teeth at me.
“Go to hell, you bastard!” I screamed back at him.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to do!” He shouted as he bashed his forehead into the ruined windshield. I was peppered with glass and I had to close my eyes for just a second. But a second was all that it took for him to find the release for the cable and the ball wrecking plunged straight to the ground. He then grabbed me by the neck and ripped me right out of the cab. My forehead banged hard against the roof on my way out. His strength seemed to have no limit and he threw me across the lawn like I was a ragdoll. I lay there bleeding from a gash on my forehead and stunned from the blow. A freight train seemed to be roaring between my ears.
Soliah clomped down from the cab and he bounded over to the wrecking ball. He took the loose cable in his hands and he pulled it taught. He then gave a mighty heave and every nut and bolt of Swinger seemed to scream in protest. The trusty crane began to fall over, but Soliah began to turn on his two hoofs and impossibly, my Swinger began to slowly spin in the air like an oversized discus.
“Leave my buddy alone!” Buster bellowed. He then found that strange highway gear and he raced at Soliah like he had been shot out of a cannon.
Soliah spun one more time and then he launched Swinger toward the calm waters of Spirit Lake. I could hear Swinger give a terrified scream as it flew to an unbelievable height. It arced across the sky and landed with a huge splash, a full football field out into the lake. Buster was on him in a second, but Soliah had seen him coming and he dropped down to meet the charge.
“You rotten bastard!” shrieked Buster in a voice that I barely recognized.
What happened next is hard to describe. Buster was traveling at freeway speed and he dwarfed the red devil squatting on the lawn. I thought Soliah would be flattened like a spider under a heavy boot. The next thing I knew, Buster was cart-wheeling high in the air.
“No!” Buster bellowed as he followed Swinger’s flight path over the water. I could just see the top of Swinger’s mast poking out of the water. Buster landed directly on top of it with a sickening splash. A huge geyser of lake water shot into the air and Soliah began to roar with laughter. I had been sitting up, helpless to do anything but watch with horror as the beast destroyed the last of my equipment. The loss was too much for me and I fell to my back and prepared to die.
“Huckleberry?” Soliah asked in his sweetest voice. I could feel his hot breath in my face and I opened my eyes. I found myself staring directly into his. “Huckleberry, do you know what I am going to do now? No, of course you don’t. I can tell you this much, grandson or not, you are a dead man. I have given you every opportunity to save yourself, but I could never trust you in my world. I know that now. What a waste. What a terrible waste.”
“I could never be like you,” I croaked, my voice too clogged with emotion to speak with any force. Tears dripped from my eyes and I shook them from my cheeks. I didn’t want him to see me cry. I tried one last ditch effort to grab my earrings, but Soliah plopped his hairy self on my chest and pinned my arms with his knees. He smelled like sour milk and mildew. His weight felt like a Mack truck was sitting on my chest.
“Get off of my grandson!” ordered a familiar voice.
“Oddfeather!” shrieked Soliah, spinning off of me.
“That’s Odd Whitefeather to you!” Crooked Walker shouted back at him.
“This is good,” laughed Soliah as he faced his attackers. “You boys are saving me the trip to find you.”
“Well, you have found us,” said Dog Breath in an even tone.
Soliah spun again. Dog Breath was standing on the other end of the triangle of my relatives. Soliah laughed again and he suddenly stopped as he was swept off his feet by an unseen hand. Odd Whitefeather had swatted his hand as if he was swatting a fly and Soliah tumbled nearly twenty feet across the lawn. “Do not mess with the family,” growled my grandfather.
Crooked Walker let out a whoop and he gracefully swung his arms before him. They pointed to the sky for a second, before the entire third floor of the old house came crashing down upon the dazed devil. “How do you like them apples?” Crooked Walker shouted, brushing his hands together and looking very satisfied.
From out of the rubble, Soliah poked his head up and he began to try to stand up. Dog Breath stooped forward and picked up a brick. He then tossed it like a Nolan Ryan fastball. The brick connected with Soliah’s head and it took one of the devil’s horns with it. Soliah roared with pain and rage.
I had hoped that the brick would take his head off. I got up and stood on wobbly knees in the morning sunshine. My grandfather stuck his hands up in the air and chanted to the sky. Soliah was suddenly violently attacked by as many as fifty bald eagles. They were larger than life and they came at him with their sharp claws, tearing chunks of skin off of Soliah with their talons. Their mission complete, the eagles soared off into the blue sky.
The look on Soliah’s ruined face was a terrible thing to see. I knew what he was capable of and that as long as he still drew breath, we were all in serious danger. Crooked Walker must have known that, too. He pointed at one of the towering pines and then to Soliah. There was a terrific crack and the huge pine toppled, and then fell directly on top of the enraged Soliah. He was driven into the earth like a sixteen-penny nail.
“Are you all right,” my grandfather asked.
I opened my eyes and found that I had passed out. The three old men were standing over me. “He has bleeding under his skull,” Dog Breath said. “He is dying.”
My vision blurred and it occurred to me that I must have hit my head a lot harder than I had thought. The sky seemed to be spinning and I closed my eyes to keep from being sick to my stomach. “Soliah?” I croaked.
“Right here,” replied Soliah in his best southern drawl.
I screamed as I saw the red bastard grab Dog Breath by the hair. There was a whoosh of air and suddenly Dog Breath was sent flying out into the lake. There was a long moment of silence before I heard the splash. “Devil!” cried Crooked Walker as Soliah began to do the same thing to him. Everything happened so fast that I could scarcely believe it was happening at all. My grandfather charged Soliah and they both were sent sprawling onto the lawn.
I could feel the life draining out of me and I was powerless to stop it. I tried to see what was happening on the lawn, but the two had become one in my eyes and they continued to exchange blows.
“Huckleberry,” whispered a sweet voice into my ears. I opened my eyes to see Man Killer kneeling at my side. I tried to manage a smile. “I love you,” she said as the tears ran down her face. She held my head in her hands and kissed me full on the lips. I had never tasted anything sweeter.
“Save yourself,” I moaned. “Run, Man Killer, run!”
“I will never leave you again!”
I heard a loud cry in my grandfather’s voice and I tried to focus my
eyes on the source of the sound. I was rewarded with the sight of him flying high in the air. He crashed to the water with a sickening plop. I dropped my eyes to Soliah; long ribbons of skin hung from him loosely, revealing thickly corded muscles. He was looking directly at the both of us and he was smiling.
“Take the earrings,” whispered a man’s voice from out of thin air. I immediately recognized it as belonging to Abe Steinman. “Man Killer,” he pleaded. “Do it now before it’s too late!”
Man Killer looked around, then she suddenly tore the earrings from the lobes of my ears. “What am I supposed to do?” she cried.
“Put them on and live up to your name,” Abe’s voice instructed her. “Put them on!”
I fell back to the ground as I became even weaker. I saw Man Killer attach the first of the earrings to her right ear. She quickly followed with the other.
“Give those to me!” ordered Soliah. “They are of no use to you!”
I could see him leaping towards us, bounding high in the air with blood in his eyes. I tried to warn Man Killer, but he was on top of her before I could draw a breath. I groaned as I saw him take my woman by the hair and yank her off of her feet. Man Killer was slammed violently to the ground. Soliah then reversed directions and she was sent flying in the air before crashing down to his other side. Man Killer screamed in pain.
“The earrings!” I managed to scream to her. She lay not five feet away from me, hanging by her long black hair that Soliah held like a rope on a sack. I could see that her legs were badly broken and blood streamed down her face. Somehow she was able to command her hands to take hold of the earrings and she closed her eyes.
“This is your last chance, Melody. Give me those damn earrings or I’ll tear your head off!”
Man Killer then screamed something in the old tongue and Soliah dropped her as if she were made of molten steel. He quickly backed away. “No…” he cried. “Melody, we can have a beautiful life together. You can keep the earrings…”
“My name is Man Killer!” shouted my beautiful bride. “Feel my wrath!”
Soliah howled with pain as the hanging skin was peeled off of his body by an invisible hand. The skin stretched before it ripped free and fell to the ground in red chunks. I pumped my fist. “Get him, Man Killer!” I hissed. “Kill the bastard!”
A brick suddenly struck Soliah full in the face. Teeth flew and blood poured from his shattered mouth. Man Killer continued to chant and while I didn’t understand a word of it, I knew what she was saying. A four-foot long splinter of timber was suddenly sticking out of Soliah’s red belly and he roared with agony. He dropped his hands to try and pull it free, but it didn’t budge an inch. He strained at it until the muscles on his arm shook.
“You’re a dirty rotten bastard!” Man Killer shrieked at him. She then pointed the earrings directly at Soliah and lightning shot from the ends of the bear’s magical teeth. The lightning hammered Soliah squarely in the chest with a brilliant explosion of light.
“No!” cried Soliah, trying to fend off the continuous bolts of lightning with his bare hands. “No!”
“This is for all of the brave animals of the forest!” Man Killer screamed.
Major Soliah, the all-powerful murderer of man and beast, the devil’s own son, glowed bright orange as he continued his tortured scream, and then he was no more. He exploded into a million tiny pieces that littered the earth before bursting into flames.
I wanted to stand up and cheer, but my strength was gone and death was calling me. Man Killer crawled her way over to me, pulling her ruined legs behind herself like a salamander. She collapsed next to me and I have never seen a face filled with so much sadness. She pulled herself close and she kissed me as the tears fell. We were both crying now and she trembled as our lips met. “Man Killer,” I whispered as she pulled back a few tender inches. “I love you.”
“I love you, too, Huckleberry Brindle,” she whispered back.
And after that I was sent plunging into the blackness.
Chapter Thirty-One
Brindle's Odyssey Page 42