And was there, here, all over the place, and Jennie and Rain alike were looking this way and that trying to find it.
It lies, Ridley said with a sense of desperation. Their trap hadnt worked. They knew that by the simple fact that the thing hadnt been sending for a moment, having conscious control of whether it did or didnt: that was a larger brain at work, larger and cannier; hed become increasingly sure how the creature imaged where it wasnt, catching pictures from minds around it and just throwing those moments back at the hearera little different from a horse, that tended to displace terrain sideways to your visionthis thing imaged a scene without itself in it. What they hunted was dangerously intelligent in that regardif he understood what it was doingreplacing land-now with land-as-it-was. It could go silent at times, and rarely got so confused it began to locate itself. There and then not thereand he didnt know how long or with how much complexity coming at it in the ambient it could shut down like that. There were thirteen dead down at The Evergreen. There was Sergedead. There was Earnest Riggs dead; because he hadnt any doubt now that the same creature had gotten in that night, too, with its uncanny gift for stalking absolutely silently. Carlo Goss had been innocent, and there couldnt be any doubt of it, now, in anyone whod seen both the Schaffer porch and the tavern a moment ago.
He wanted Jennie to come with him, and collected Callie to go up to the church and regroup, taking a course as far as possible across the broad uptown street from the Schaffer house, which all along they had avoidedthe horses actively hated it, and Rain wanted to go over there and pick a fight, to harass Brionne Goss, out of reach mentally as well as physically. Hed never seen a horse that determined on giving a potential rider grief, and he was anxious all the time he had Jennie in any wise near that place, for fear she might not hold him.
He was relieved when Callie was by him again, the other side of their defense of Jennie and Rain; and the three of them went up toward the porch of the village hall, next to the church where the hunters, having failed to hit the beast, were coming up from the small enclosed access to the passages.
The ambient prickled then with coming outside the village hall in Petersons wifes company, Randy and the wife and then the daughter all armed with shotguns, as the defense of the administrative buildings. Reverend Quarles came behind them, not so evidently a preacher in his snow-gear and carrying a rifle.
Didnt work. Peterson said the obvious.
Its tricking us, Ridley said. Its diverting us in what it sends.
Then move the horses back from us! Petersons wife said.
That wont work, Callie said. This thing sends. This thing sends. You dont need a horse near you to hear itbut its going to lie to you most when it isnt sending at all. Hope it sends and we pass it to you, or you wont know where it is.
That girl talks to it, Jennie said, completely out of turn, but Jennie was as hell. So was the horse. She wants it. I hear her.
Its the truth, Ridley said, and an uncomfortable silence followedbroken by another young voice.
She rode the rogue, down in Tarmin.
No, someone began to say, but Randys voice overrode it.
Shes my sister! She killed the whole villagebut she couldnt get the door open to get us!
Shock followed. Deep, unsettling shock. And the thing seemed to ricochet around the street, here, here, here, with no settling point.
Lord save us. That from the preacher. The childs only thirteen.
So Im fourteen! Randy cried indignantly. She blames us! She wants Carlo dead!
It is the truth, Ridley said. I think it is the truth, preacher, as true as I can tell.
There was, surprisingly, no panic about the matter, just a settling of a very uneasy regard toward that house with the large wraparound porch, with its shutters thrown, with, in the ambient which he wasnt sure anyone but Callie understooda ravening hunger for presence, a hunger for the ambient itshecouldnt ever satisfy, because no sane horse would have her.
Dammit, he thoughtit took a fourteen-year-old and an eight-year-old to understand the reasons behind what it did: it wasnt adult desires they were fighting. It wasnt a hunter after food or a beast after a lair. It was a thirteen-year-old kid supplying its ideas and playing damnable, bloody pranks down at the tavern and through the passages while it mapped the place, damned well mapped the village the girl had never seen with her own eyes.
That accounted for the occasionally true and occasionally skewed direction-sense: it was frolicking around, exploring the village and getting the upper hand over everyone trying to stop it.
Never ask how Earnest Riggs had crossed the girls notice.
Wait for daylight, the marshal said into the silence. Just let it settle down. Weve got aboutwhat time is it?its got to be toward dawn.
I can go look, his daughter offered.
No! Peterson said sharply. And more quietly, No. Not a good idea. Peterson didnt want his family scattering out, and neither did Ridley.
That thing is running us wherever it likes, Jeff Burani said. Weve got people down there at the bottom end of the street. Miners in barracks. Loggers in the hostel. The riders dont want to split up, but we cant be everywhere and we cant move fast enough. We cant protect just our houses and our families, the minersll lynch us!
All those things were true. But those things were only half their danger. The marshal was advising they wait for daylightbut Ridley didnt think it was going to hole up, if he had his guess. It might go right over the wall again and come back for more mischief tomorrow night.
Which might give them time to do something about Brionne Gossbut they had as close to agreement in present company as they were going to get on that issue, tonight: the key people knew nowand the panic he had feared if they knew the danger in Brionne Goss wasnt, thank God, happening. The event was with them, and this one select group of villagers were at least willing to use their heads and try to out-think the beast that had come in on them
Which wasnt a horse, wasnt Carlo Goss, and wasnt a rogue cat. This thing was a better climber. It was smarter around structures, very fastwhich might be human intelligence feeding images into itbut it also figured out the tunnels as a means to play a hideous game of hide-and-seek so that they hadnt gotten a clear shot at it. That was smart. And a rogue of whatever species didnt by all he knew acquire abilities, it just lost all sane braking on the abilities it had until it killed itself. So this thing wasnt a rogue. It wasnt any threat Rogers Peak had ever seen, and the only reasonable conclusion was that a stray from the outback, maybe attracted by the crisis in the ambient, had come into the area like a willy-wisp to the smell of blood.
Its attracted to the girl in Darcys house, he said. Its concentrating its mischief up at this end. But never therebecause its being elusive and that would give it away. Thats what Im thinking. The girls attracted it and the girls guiding it, consciously or unconsciously. Shes got to be silenced. Stopped. Put out cold.
Thats pretty hard-minded, John Quarles said. That poor child, rider-boss,
I dont say do her any lasting harm, but if we quiet Brionne Goss it might forget why it was here. At least it wont have a human mind steering it. Slip her something. Darcys a doctor, for Gods sake. Shes got to have something in the office that wont hurt her. This things mapping the village for that girl. Its going all around the village, but not there. It will. And then what happens?
You cant even tell us what it is, the marshals wife said.
I can tell you its not from this side of the mountains. I can tell you its damn smart. I can tell you while were arguing, its picking up our intentions in the ambient and telling a thirteen-year-old girl what were apt to do, and its only begun to do its work on this mountain if we dont
stop it here, Lucy. Ill swear that to you.
Ill go put it to Darcy, John Quarles said. Shell listen to me.
Not alone, Ridley said. Line of sight. Rifles lined up and us watching.
Im aware the beast is dangerous, the preacher said. But if your theory is right, diminishing the threat to the girl and the beast might actually lessen the danger.
Ill have that porch in my rifle sights. Listen to me, preacher. Im asking you, dont endanger anybody including that girl. Trust my good wishes and if you hear anything untoward on that porch, drop flat instantly and Ill shoot right over you. Dont confuse our aim. Trust us. All right?
Ive every confidence, Quarles said, and handed his shotgun to the marshal. But most of all, Ill trust in the Lord.
Quarles walked out through the falling snow, then.
Brave, Ridley gave him that, as he slid down from Slips back and lifted his riflenot the only one drawing a bead on that area.
Stay still, Callie was saying to Jennie, and to all the people around them.
Shes just real mad, Jennie said quietly, her thoughts rising very softly to the top of the ambient. She knows were here. She knows Randys here. She knows about the preacher coming to the door. Shes not happy at all. She wants it to come and drive us away.
Jennie was sending too much, Ridley realized that too late. Jennie and Brionne were trading far too much, and what had been a quiet struggle between two kids was suddenly reaching after all of them. The rifle wanted to shake in his hands as he stared down the sight and widened his focus to the whole porch, any movement in the snow-obscured night.
Then he knew something elsea wider ambient than had existed. It had direction. Distance. Outside the wall.
Horses. On the road.
, it was. More than one rider. But that was definitely And Jennie and Callie knew it from him.
hit the ambient and shivered in the air, force added to their force.
He thought then of calling out to the preacher to come back. But he thought if a preacher could ever be in the ambient, John Quarles was there right now, and if ever they had the chance to reach Darcy, they had it now. Quarles knew something had changed just now, surely. He had to be aware of the arrival.
and had run riot and crazed the ambient.
They wanted, too. They wanted to be there, and around the next turning of the road, obscured in a thin veil of snow, Danny saw the village wall. He knew then theyd arrived and he pushed himself despite the ache in his side to keep running and not even to waste time getting up on Cloud. A jarred and frantic portion of the working brain said that in a crisis no one might be able to reach the gate to open it for them, and he might need to be on the ground to try to open it from outside. If the village had left the rope outside that made that possible.
He ran, he told the ambient as he stumbled down the last of the road. Cloud wanted , Cloud wanted
They reached the lesser gate through a trampled space that said that this gate at least had openedbut not in hours, Danny judged by the rounded edges of the prints. Horses were , at the other end of the street, no one was near the wall, and neither village gate had budged since yesterday.
Bad business. And the pull-cord wasnt out.
Damn it! Tara said, and with her knife through a gap in the timbers tried to raise the heavy bar inside. Danny lent his hands to the effort, both of them pushing and struggling until finally it was lifted as high as they could hold it, and it wouldnt clear the trip-latch.
They were at Evergreen, there was all hell broken loose inside as they listened to it, and nobody could let them in the gate.
He let off a rifle shot. It echoed off the mountain and into the ambient in a massive wash of and as everyone in Evergreen, deaf to the ambient or not, realized there was someone outside.
came, too. Someone elsewas fiercely
They were shooting again, and Darcy flinched, though this shot was far away. Listen to me, John Quarles was saying through the closed front door. Darcy? Darcy, just for safety, I want you to find a sedative. I want you to find a strong sedative and get the girl calm. I know you want to protect her. You have a sedative, dont you, Darcy?
Yes, she admitted. But she didnt want to do that. She didnt want to lose the girls trust. Brionne was suspicious and afraid. Brionne suspected everyone out on the street, and John said terrible, incredible things, how something was prowling the village passages and it had killed people down at The Evergreen and it had killed Earnest Riggs.
She knew it was true, though. She knew the way she knew that people were outside and that they had designs on Brionne. It was as if pictures of everything were pouring in on her, John coming with the marshal, bringing her Fayes body. Shed heard gunshots going off and it conjured that single shot that had echoed through the house, that moment she had known it came from downstairs, from Marks office. There were memories of blood, so much blood. Mark was a doctor. And hed chosen that way, when there were easier ways in the locked cabinet. Mark had wanted violence in the leaving of his life. Hed been so quiet. And hed chosen violence for her to deal with.
Hedaredleave herthat unspeakable sight to remember. It was his anger. It was his spite. It was his blame. It was Mark saying again as hed shouted at her the day before he died, Damn you, Darcy, shed a tear! Yell! Blame me out loud, dont just look at me like that!
She wasnt sitting on the couch, with John talking about Gods mercy, she wasnt rocking back and forth like a fool, and still not able to cry, and John talking inanely about what colors to use at Marks funeral, as if anyone gave a damn. She was standing at the front door, and John was on the other side, begging her to drug the child senseless, when Brionne knew, she was sure Brionne knew people were betraying her. Pans were flying about the kitchen, crockery was breaking.
Ive got to go, Darcy said.
Will you do it? John shouted through the door.
I dont know, she said. And then thoughtif she did thatif she did that, John would be on her side. John was her arbiter of what the village thought. What John said was what they thought was good.
And if she quieted Brionne down, then everything would be quiet and John would help her.
So she went to the cabinet, and turned the key and shook powder into a prescription vial. Her hands were shaking, but she got it in, knowing fairly accurately the girls weight. She thought shed make another pot of tea and put it in that. She stopped the vial and tucked it in her waistband, under her sweater.
Then she went to the kitchen, where Brionne was having a tantrum.
The crockery was all broken in pieces all over the floor. The teakettle was lying against the wall. Brionne was crying and had a metal plate in her hands.
Honey. Put it down. Its all right. I told him go away.
Youre lying! Brionne clanged the plate down against a chair, and bent it, and flung it away against the wall. I hate you! I hate all of you! Theyre all talking about me! My brothers out there, and hes telling lies about me and everyone believes them!
Im sure I dont believe them. I think its all rather silly. The playing cards were all over the floor. She crossed the kitchen and picked up the teakettle. She wasnt sure there was a whole cup in the kitchen.
My friend will come for me, Brionne said. You just watch! Hell come.
Not a horse?
Ill have a horse. Ill have a horse when I want one! And everybody will be sorry.
Darcy felt such an anger from the girl, from somewhere, so much anger and confusion
Brionne headed down the three steps to the passageway door.
No! Darcy said sharply, expecting obedience, but Brionne didnt stop. Brionne flung up the bar, and Darcy crossed the kitchen in four fast strides, reached to stop Brionne and slam the door shut.
The door banged wide. A black shape was there, yello
w-eyed, yellow-fanged. It reached a shaggy arman arm!around Brionne, snatching her away, and the other arm swept with a force that flung Darcy back against the wall. It hit her again, and again. She was numb, and astonishedtotally astonishedto see the blood spatter wide across the wall. Like Marks, that day
Very much like that day.
Danny was trying to move Cloud into line with the gate to use Cloud for a ladderbut he people coming then, a that very soon he and Tara could hear aloud, swearing and encouraging each other.
Open the gate! Danny and Tara yelled, almost with one voice, and that reassured the people on the other side. Someone opened the gate, and Danny got through first, rifle in hand, the pain in his side grown acute, and his throat so raw he immediately went into a coughing fit. Cloud was behind him, and then Tara and Flicker, but the people in front of him, shadowed by the wall, were faceless to him, a mob, a massmen from the barracks, villagers, he didnt know.
He did know , and he didnt waste time trying to understand the shouts about and and , he just got control of his coughing enough to swing up to Clouds back, feeling the wobble in himself and the wobble in Clouds legs as he landed. He started moving through the crowd, aware of , and it was a measure how frightened the crowd was that people bunched around two riders on horseback and pressed up close to the horses as a point of safety.
Cloud wasnt used to that kind of treatment. It was a question whether they were going to get through before or after Cloud bit somebody, but the instant there was an opening Cloud jumped forward, instinct-driven toward the of him, and Clouds rider was along for the ride for an instant, Cloud knowing beyond any doubt there was
Flicker was close behind them as Cloud ran, and Flicker might not know the horses ahead, but they were a band Cloud knew: was the presence at the mountain-end of the street. flung the ambient wider and louder than Danny intended, but it was five horses now, with one mare in foal and a boss horse aggressive as hell toward whatever threatened their vicinity.
They came in where Ridley, Callie and Jennie were holding the area across from the doctors house. Randy was there, with a couple of armed women Danny didnt know, with the marshals deputy, some of the hunters, and a very shaken-looking preacher, whose total contribution to the ambient was a roiling chaos of and at them being there.
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