Empire of Wild

by Cherie Dimaline

  All she needed right now was a nap and a new plan, and maybe some better painkillers, not an angry twelve-year-old. As she parked and turned off the car, she saw him in the front window, a scowl on his face. Jesus, he looked like his mother right now.

  She was too tired to get her bag out of the back of the Jeep, so she left it and trudged toward the mudroom door. He confronted her as soon as she walked in, leaning in the doorway of the kitchen with his arms crossed over his chest. “Real nice, Joan. Real nice.”

  “I don’t need this right now, Zeus. I’m exhausted. And aren’t you supposed to be in school? It’s not even two o’clock.” She pulled off her sneakers and tossed them at the rack.

  He pointed at her. “You don’t need this right now? You?” They stood there for a few seconds until he dropped his hand. “You know what, fuck it.” He turned and walked away from her.

  “Hey! Don’t swear at me. Not in my own house.” The curse shook her into movement and she followed him. “Are you listening to me?” She grabbed his shoulder, wincing at the pain in her hand but holding tight, and turned him around.

  He wriggled out of her grip, stifling a wet sniff. She pulled off her sunglasses and looked at him. “Zeus, are you crying?”

  “No, you big jerk, I am not.”

  But he was. New tears were starting to fall, following the shiny trails the old ones had left on his dark cheeks.

  “Zeus, listen, man, I had to go alone.” She reached once more, this time with her left hand, rubbing his arm gently. He pulled away from her again.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “I just—I had a bad day.”

  He sat on one of the high stools by the counter that separated the kitchen from the living room. Joan put her sunglasses and phone down and filled two glasses with cold water from the tap. She slid his over like a bartender, leaning toward him from the kitchen side of the counter. “So, what happened?”

  “You first.” He wiped his face with his sleeve. “Did you see him? Victor?”

  “Nope. They weren’t there.” She pushed out her lips and slowly shook her head. “And I have no idea where they went.”

  “Bummer.”

  “Yeah, bummer. But that’s okay. We’ll keep trying.” She took a long drink from her glass, rubbed her forehead where the hangover lingered. “Now you. What happened?”

  “Fought with my mom.”

  Joan nodded. That wasn’t so unusual. “Well, you and Bee have a bit of a tumultuous relationship.”

  “Yeah, but this time was different. It, it went too far.”

  “What do you mean, it went too far?” Dark, red images moved into her brain. She wasn’t above driving over to her cousin’s and smacking the shit out of her if she had laid a hand on this kid.

  “I was really mean.”

  “How so?”

  He flushed red to the tips of his ears. “I told her I hated her.”

  Joan wanted to laugh, she was so relieved. She thought of all the times she’d said the same thing to her own mother. But Zeus, even at twelve, was more thoughtful than she’d ever been. So this was different.

  He continued. “I was late for school this morning and she started in on me. I tried to walk away from her but she just kept following me. Zeus, why are you so lazy? Why can’t you be more responsible? You’re more like your father every day. Maybe you should go stay with him instead, maybe that’d teach you to listen. She followed me out to the backyard, even. I kept telling her to stop, to leave me alone, that I was sorry, that she didn’t have to drive me, that I’d just ride my bike to school—it was fine. But she wouldn’t stop.” Water blurred his eyes again.

  “It’s okay, man. Bee can be a little much. I’m sure she knows you didn’t mean it.”

  “That’s the thing, Auntie.” He looked up at her with sombre eyes. “I do mean it.”

  Just then, her phone buzzed, shuddering against the countertop. Zeus glanced at the lit screen. “It says you have a new Messenger request from…Cecile Ginnes.”

  “Who the hell is—” Joan froze. It couldn’t be. The phone buzzed again and this time she jumped.

  “What’s it say?”

  Zeus picked it up. “Same request, same person.”

  “Fuck. Oh fuck.” She pushed herself away from the counter and nervously shook out her hands. “What do I do?”

  “It’s easy. Just swipe the notification open. What’s your passcode?” Zeus tapped at the screen.

  “Don’t touch it!”

  Zeus put the phone down and raised his hands like he was at gunpoint. “Easy, Auntie. She won’t know you saw it unless you accept the request.”

  “Oh God, Zeus, it’s the woman from the ministry—remember? The blonde one.” Joan paced in the small space between the fridge and the doorway. “What do I do? What could she want?”

  “Well.” Zeus slowly picked up the phone again, eyes on her in case she lunged at him. “You can open it up and look at her message. Then you’ll know what she wants. Problem solved.”

  Joan rounded the counter and came to stand beside him. “Okay. Okay, go ahead.”

  Zeus clicked Messenger open. When Joan saw Cecile’s name she tried to slap his hand away. Her phone had become a time bomb. What if Cecile was watching them? What if she was messaging from the 5 Star Motel, the cowboy by her side, his bloody mouth full of laughter? What if she were sending another picture of herself with the Reverend?

  Instead, the message opened to a small map marked with a red pin. Somewhere near Leamington, Ontario, right near the perforated line of the US border. Underneath the image was a single word that was both instruction and request and suspect as all hell. It jumped into her ribs and set her heart thrumming. It could be misdirection. It could be a cruel joke. But what if they didn’t pay attention? What if they ignored it and Victor disappeared forever? Maybe the ministry was crossing into the States as Joan stood here, maybe Victor would be all the way to Mexico by week’s end. She saw him getting smaller and smaller, pulled away down unfamiliar highways.

  The clock was ticking. Her bag was still in the Jeep. She moaned. What should she do?

  She reread the message and paced the linoleum, Zeus watching her in unusual silence.

  HURRY

  * * *

  This time there had been no leaving Zeus behind.

  It was after seven when they finally arrived at the Leamington Deluxe Motel, its neon lights already lit and buzzing. Stepping across the threshold of their room, Joan felt some of the stress leave her. They were here—close to the ministry and whatever that meant. As Zeus settled on his bed, she went for a shower. And as soon as she got out, they began to argue over whether he should go with her to rescue Victor.

  “It could be dangerous, is all I’m saying.”

  “It was always dangerous,” Zeus said. “I want to come. You need me—you’re practically crippled with one hand.”

  She turned away from him. “I should go alone.”

  Zeus protested, “But we’re a team.”

  “Yeah, and you’re too young to lose. Ajean, me? We at least have had some life.”

  He stared at her with narrowed eyes. “I’m not ten years old, you know. You don’t have to be condescending.”

  “I do know.” She sat heavy on her bed and picked up a brush to attack her hair, buying time.

  “Well then, what?”

  She threw the brush down and slid to the floor in the space between their beds. “Okay look, here’s the truth. Ajean told me that to rescue Victor I would have to seduce him. I might have to seriously Sleeping Beauty him, but like, without clothes.”

  “Really?” Zeus pulled his legs up and tucked them sideways.

  She nodded.

  “We came all the way here, through all this, so that you could get into his pants?”

  She nodded again.

  “That’s the shittiest end to an adventure I’ve ever heard.”

  “Could be worse.”

  “Not really.” He picked at his big toe nail, deep
in thought. “I could stay in the Jeep.”

  “I have to ditch it so no one in the mission will spot it and then walk in. I don’t want to leave you alone in the park.”

  “What if we just do a recon mission tonight? Figure out if he’s actually there or not.”

  It was a decent idea, but she felt like she couldn’t be careful that way. Not anymore. “We don’t even know if this is real. I don’t want to waste any time. We might have to book it back up north if this was just Cecile misdirecting me.”

  “Exactly, and it’d be faster to leave directly from the park. We shouldn’t take the time to come back here.” He swung back to stubborn. “I’m coming. I’ll close my eyes if it gets weird. But I’m not letting you do this alone. We’re a team, for god’s sake.”

  He leaned over, feeling for his shoes under the bed.

  She was pretty sure that if she didn’t have to have sex with Victor, she might at least have to break Cecile’s arm. She didn’t want Zeus to witness either.

  “Alright, alright. Go grab a shower, though. I don’t want to go until it’s dark, and you have road stink.” She pulled herself off the floor and grabbed the brush again, turning her back to him and starting back in on her hair.

  Since he’d got his way, he simply said, “Okay.” He fished around in his bag for clean clothes and disappeared into the bathroom, which was still steamy from Joan’s shower.

  When the door clicked shut, she moved fast. Her phone. Her bag. She left behind her red coat and her wallet; she didn’t want him to think she’d abandoned him completely.

  She was wearing a black stretchy skirt and a black sweater Mere had knitted, proud of herself for making her granddaughter something “goth.” Joan gave herself a once-over in the mirror: the real Victor thought she was hotter than hell in her work clothes, so this should be good enough. She threw a tube of red lipstick into her purse just in case. Then she slid into her boots and opened the door, closing it softly behind her.

  She waited until she was out of the parking lot, down the street, and just about to take the ramp back onto the highway before she texted him.

  Sorry, my boy. I can’t risk you. I’ll check in ASAP. STAY THERE and keep the door locked. This could be a trap.

  She felt a sick lurch in her stomach as she pushed send. Zeus would be pissed—maybe for months, maybe forever.

  Twenty minutes later her phone started buzzing. She looked over: Zeus, King of all gods. She flipped it over onto its face and ignored it. When the texts started pinging, one after the other, she flicked the volume button to mute.

  * * *

  She turned off at the exit for Great Heron National Park just after nine thirty. She followed the road into the park, past the official welcome sign and the closed ranger’s station. She stopped to check out the wooden post with the colour-coded map for campers and day trippers. She snapped a picture of it with her phone, guilt making her lungs hurt when she had to swipe past the string of texts from Zeus:

  How could you do this?

  Answer your phone!!

  I’m calling Ajean!

  THIS IS SHIT

  You’re as bad as my parents

  She didn’t have service out here so she couldn’t text him back even if she wanted to. That gave her a bit of relief. It was out of her hands.

  She turned right toward the campsites, which were closed to the general public this time of year. According to the map, there was a stretch of forest between them and the community lodge. The lodge was where he was supposed to be. Adrenaline made her face numb, made her ass all pins and needles.

  She parked the car in a circle of pines near an old firepit, easing the nose under the lower branches. When she got out, she pulled some of them over the roof. Good enough. She would go the rest of the way on foot. Between the weight of her bag and mud from the rains, it wasn’t an easy trip.

  But soon enough she saw lights peeking through the trees. The lodge. She dropped her bag by a fallen log and edged as close as she could get to the clearing. Parked out front were three blue vans and a minivan with a white decal on the back of a stick-figure woman with four stick-figure cats.

  The door opened and she crouched among the branches as her heart jumped into her ears. She couldn’t hear anything but its thudding. It was a young woman in a long, yellow T-shirt that went to her knees. Might have been a nightgown. She came down the front steps, looked around, and took two quick hits off a vape, blowing the clouds above her head and waving them away frantically. She went back inside.

  Joan’s eyes filled. That did not look like someone from the mission. Of course not. She’d fallen for it. She’d been a fucking idiot. Why would a woman who was sleeping with her husband help her? Honestly, Joan? You’re a moron. You fucked this whole thing up. It’s over.

  Then the door opened again. This time, it was him. Actually him.

  She sprang to her feet, ready to run to him, when a large man with a white beard appeared behind the Reverend and put his hand on his shoulder. The Reverend turned and the two began to chat. Then in the window just to the right, a figure moved. A woman…Cecile. She and Joan locked eyes and for a moment Joan was sure she would scream. But she didn’t. Instead, she lifted a finger to her lips, then mouthed one word: Wait. She dropped her hand but stayed in the window, watching. Joan crouched again, once again out of sight.

  Eventually, she heard the Reverend and the big man go back inside. She stood slightly to get a better look as, one by one, the lights winked out until only the light in the small window where Cecile had stood remained. Oh, it was torture. Joan could hear time shedding itself into memory all around her. She couldn’t just stay here and wait.

  She ran through every possible scenario in her head. They all dead-ended in the same problem: How would she get him to come to her, or stay with her, long enough to change him? Heiser would be sure to give chase. She couldn’t outrun a rogarou, especially not while she was dragging a full-grown man along with her, most likely against his will.

  Then she remembered the little bag of bone salt. She went back to the log, dug around in her bag, and pulled out the fabric pouch. She picked her way back through the brush to her lookout spot, took a deep breath and ran softly toward the building. She crouched by the wall and untied the pouch. In the soft light from that single window, she sprinkled salt as close to the front door as she dared. Then she walked backwards, toward the woods, shaking a faint line of salt on either side of her, making a path, almost invisible to the naked eye, that ended in an uneven circle she drew on the ground. She’d made a small holding cell for Heiser. If Ajean was right, that is.

  She took just one more little moment, praying to her mere for this to work, and then she crouch-ran back to her hiding spot. She bounced the small weight of the pouch, estimating what she had left, her mouth dry with nerves. If Heiser did get trapped in this circle of salt, she couldn’t be sure she wouldn’t run him through with her blade where he stood.

  From the lodge, someone yelled: “Fire!”

  She jerked in shock and the salt bag dropped, spilling dust at her feet. Fuck! She pinched what she could see back into the pouch and jammed it in the front pocket of her sweater. Then she snapped open the blade of her knife. She was ready. Or at least as ready as she could be.

  “Everybody out! The centre is on fire!”

  She recognized the voice. It was Cecile.

  19

  CLEANSE ME WITH FIRE

  After dinner everyone had taken a turn in the showers, and now the group was settled down in sleeping bags on the floor in the big main room, fanned out in a circle like a flannel daisy. Except for Cecile, who had taken over the office as her due. She had been keeping watch out the window for almost an hour, but so far no Heiser and, worse really, no Joan.

  And some of the volunteers were still restless: one of Ivy’s girlfriends had just tiptoed out the door and within a minute or two, Cecile smelled marijuana coming in through the office window, which she had opened just a crack. Yet an
other reason why the group needed new leadership, and fast. “Godless hippies,” she muttered to herself.

  The girl crept back in, coughing into her fist, and climbed back into her bag. And then another body moved in the darkened room. God, would they never just go to sleep?

  This time it was the Reverend, heading for the door with his sleeping bag under his arm. No, tonight he couldn’t wander away to sleep among the trees. She had plans for him.

  She crossed the floor on sock feet to where Garrison lay on top of his sleeping bag, reading a pamphlet on speedboats by the light of his phone.

  “Garrison?”

  He sat up quick, tucking the brochure under his bag, as she crouched beside him. “I need you to persuade the Reverend to stay indoors tonight,” she said. “You heard Mr. Heiser. We have to keep a close eye on him in case someone comes to tempt him back into his old ways.”

  “On it, boss.” Garrison was on his way in his pyjamas before she could even stand back up. Garrison was one of the good ones. There would definitely be a place for him in her ministry, after his conversion therapy, of course.

  Cecile went back to the office so she could watch the men out the window. And just then she spotted her at the edge of the clearing: Joan. The woman was pacing a tight line, visible to anyone who looked her way. What was she doing? Did she intend to run straight for the Reverend, even with Garrison there? She really was crazy.

  Cecile waved her hands and, thank god, got Joan’s attention before she screwed everything up. Wait! she mouthed at her, and after a nerve-wracking minute that tried her Christian patience, Joan slunk back into hiding among the trees. Soon enough, Garrison was leading the Reverend back inside, having persuaded him that being in a building in the middle of the woods was almost as good as being in the woods proper, or that, given that they were on retreat, they needed their spiritual leader among them, or something, because soon they both settled down again on the floor.

  Cecile gently closed her office door, then watched for any movement through the frosted glass panel. Nothing. She went back to the window. No sign of her, but she had to trust Joan was still waiting in the bush like the coiled snake she was.