Primal Fear

by Boucher, Brad

  “Harry, what happened? What’s going on down there?”

  “Look, I’m sorry. I wasn’t straight with you about any of this. I should have been. I’m glad you’re okay, really, but it’s my fault you got hurt in the—”

  “I couldn’t raise anybody on the radio, and I was going to give you another half hour. I didn’t know what to do . . .” His hands were shaking violently again, the stress of the day too much for him to cope with.

  “Don’t worry about it, you did fine. You did the right thing by waiting, believe me.”

  “Those things, Chief. What the hell—”

  “Hold on. John is still down there, we need to winch him up.”

  Charlie blinked at him, as if Harry’s words were barely registering. Harry gripped him by the shoulders and gave him a couple of shakes. “Focus, buddy, I need your help. I need you here.”

  “John . . .”

  “John is still down there, at the mouth of the cave. We need to run the winch so he can get up the face of the cliff.”

  Charlie nodded, his eyes starting to clear. Having something to do, anything that might help, seemed to be bringing him back around. “Got it. Okay.” He moved to the front bumper of the Jeep and brushed the snow off of the winch controls. “Go over and shake the cable. Make sure he sees it and he’s holding on.”

  Harry nodded and fought his way through the snow, back to the edge of the quarry. He laid down on his belly, reaching along the cable’s length and swinging it back and forth as violently as he could. A moment later, its swing was stopped from below; John must have seen it and pushed his foot through the loop, ready to be pulled up.

  Harry rose to his knees and waved his arm toward Charlie, who immediately started the winch motor. The cable began to snake its way over the edge of the cliff, moving slowly past Harry toward the Jeep. Within a minute or two, the top of John’s head appeared over the edge, and then his hands, gripping the cable as tightly as he could.

  Once he was clear of the edge, Harry waved his arm again and Charlie killed the winch long enough for John to slip free of the loop and climb back to his feet.

  “You okay?”

  John nodded. “Remind me to never do anything like this, ever again.”

  “Yeah, you and me both. You got your bag?”

  John turned, just enough so Harry could see the pack slung across his back.

  “Good. Let’s get the hell out of here.” He walked back to the Jeep, where Charlie had just finished reeling in the rest of the cable and securing it to the winch.

  “Can you drive, Charlie?”

  “Huh?”

  “Are you okay? Do you think you can drive?”

  Charlie just blinked at him for a moment and Harry finally shrugged and gave him a pat on the shoulder. “I didn’t think so,” he said. “I’ll drive.”

  John moved to the Jeep and helped Charlie into the back seat. “We have to stop this thing,” he said. “But now we have to find it first. If we can’t, then all of this—everything we went through—it’ll all be meaningless.”

  “So where do we start?” Harry asked.

  “I’m guessing it’ll go into hiding somewhere,” John said, climbing into the Jeep and brushing the snow out of his hair. “At least for the time being. Long enough to gather its strength, to prepare itself for vengeance.”

  “And how long is that?”

  “I have no idea. It could be done already for all I know. But I have the feeling it was very weak when it escaped. Otherwise it would have killed us both.”

  Harry threw the Jeep into reverse, backing carefully away from the quarry’s edge. The deep snow around them made for difficult maneuverability, but the wide tires and four-wheel drive managed to keep them from getting stuck. “So where does that leave us? How do we find it? And once we find it, how do we stop it?”

  “You’re going to have to give me some time on all these questions. Our first priority should be to . . .”

  John trailed off, staring blankly out at the falling snow.

  “What?” Harry urged. “What’s the matter?”

  “I know where it’s going,” he whispered. “Oh, lord . . . I think I know where it’s going.”

  “Where? Tell me.”

  John turned to peer at him, his expression unreadable. He seemed to be holding something back, as if what he had to say was the last thing on earth Harry wanted to hear.

  “It’s going to go looking for the last piece of the tupilaq. If it finds that piece in time, it can regain its full physical form.” He swallowed hard, turning to gaze once more out the window. “It’s going for the P’oh Tarhei, Harry. It’s going to your house.”

  Laurie stared out into the falling snow, wishing there was more she could do than stand around and wait for Harry to come back. She felt useless, and terribly on edge, as though some unnamable danger lurked just around the corner, waiting to pounce.

  It was the story John had told that had gotten under her skin. Of that she was certain. And yet she normally wasn’t the type to let things get to her that way. It wasn’t so much the story itself, she supposed, but the look of complete conviction on John’s face as he’d unraveled it for her. His expression had spoken of a belief that was unwavering, one that made even the most bizarre details of his tale seem real.

  Those details had come back to taunt her imagination several times in the past few hours, coming to a head almost forty minutes before, when the electricity had finally given out under the storm’s wrath. It would have been worse in the dead of night, of course, but even now, at the height of the storm, the house was still exceptionally dark.

  And cold.

  She’d been too startled by the sudden blackout to think to start a fire, and had only done so ten minutes before. Now, standing in front of the sliding glass door, peering out into the blizzard, she said a silent prayer for Harry’s safe return.

  A fresh gust of wind shook the house, sweeping a blinding wall of snow straight past the door, cutting off her visibility completely. She jerked back a step as the door shivered in its frame.

  She had to get a grip on herself. She felt as though she was jumping out of her skin at every little sound.

  She narrowed her eyes, suddenly positive she could see something out in the field behind the house, something glimpsed only for an instant through a break in the falling snow. But the wind picked up again and concealed it from view, whatever it was. Stepping back up to the glass, she stared hard into the storm, hoping for another gap in the snow fall.

  The house shuddered again, but this time she didn’t move, too intent on what she’d seen moving through the yard. It had been huge, at least that was the impression she’d had after the quick flash of it she’d seen. It had been moving, too, or—

  No, not moving, not exactly. It had been more of a flurry of activity than an actual movement, something that looked more natural than physical.

  But now there was nothing.

  She turned away from the glass, taking a single step towards the kitchen.

  A soft thumping sound came from behind her, from precisely the same spot where she’d just been standing. It came again, louder this time, and even a third time before she turned completely to peer out onto the back deck.

  There was no one there, and yet the sound continued, like the soft drumming of fingers upon the glass, fingers that she couldn’t see, that—

  She dropped her eyes, spying a sudden movement further down the door, and found the source of the sound.

  It was the ghostly image of a hand, its fingers grotesquely long, its entire shape inhuman. But it was unmistakably a hand, formed entirely from the swirling snow. The individual flakes were still in motion—she could see them dancing wildly about within the shape of the hand—and yet they were somehow maintaining enough solidity to retain the form they’d been fashioned into.

  The tips of the fingers danced across the glass, this time more forcefully, as if testing its resilience. Laurie took a quick step backward, h
er breath catching in her throat.

  And even while her mind insisted that what she was seeing was clearly impossible, just a freak whirl of snow in the cross winds of the back yard, a voice in her memory told her what it was.

  The demon of the wind, John had said. That was what he and Harry had gone out to look for, and that was surely what was coming to call on her right now.

  “No,” she whispered. “Oh, please, no . . .”

  Because if the demon had found its way here, if it was roaming free, that meant Harry and John had failed. And if they’d failed, that meant they were dead.

  The hand pulled slowly away from the door, vanishing into the white sea of wind-driven snow. It moved with a terrible grace, like something alive, like something capable of more speed and more strength than it had demonstrated thus far.

  Something was wrong. She could feel it, could feel the tension building up in the air, like a bomb waiting to go off.

  Like a snake ready to strike.

  She moved as quickly as she could, taking three steps away from the door.

  The motion saved her life.

  No sooner had she moved away than the hand streaked out of the storm, smashing through the sliding glass door as if the barrier was scarcely a match for its strength. The wind found the hole, sweeping into it, forcing the rest of the glass inward.

  Laurie dove toward the kitchen, falling hard onto the floor just beyond the spray of glass. She felt the sting as a dozen tiny shards of the window tore into her legs, felt the rush of wind from outside as it invaded her home.

  She turned and peered over her shoulder, pulling herself further away from the gaping door on her hands and knees.

  The hand was gone, or at least the physical shape of it. She was certain the beast was still raging around outside, perhaps only seconds from finding its way in completely. Why wouldn’t it, now that such a reliable access had already been opened?

  Only the wind rushed into the room, however, pushing aside anything it could lift, upending anything it could get its fingers under. A blizzard of icy snow came with it, stinging Laurie’s eyes, cutting the visibility in half.

  She heard the crash of a table lamp as it was flung to the floor, and glass shattering as an antique lantern was hurled from the mantle. A bright flare of light drew her attention: the fire in the hearth roaring back to life, the flames fueled by the eager wind, pushed in every direction. A wash of glowing embers was swept outward through the fire screen, coming to rest only when the wind had had its fill of them. Tiny fires sprang to life on the rug and curtains, spreading quickly as the wind fed their hunger.

  Through it all, her eyes searched the gloom for any sign of the demon. There was nothing that even hinted at its presence, no half-hidden shape moving within the spiraling snow.

  She climbed to her feet, clutching the wall for support. To her left, the shattered door frame shivered in the wind, the heavy drapes flapping from their rods. But nothing else was coming through; just the fury of the storm.

  No, there was definitely something else out there, waiting to get in. Hungry for—

  For what? What did it want with her?

  Far overhead, the roof creaked. She heard it clearly, the rafters groaning under some interminable weight, the squeal of wood as the stress became unbearable. The house shuddered violently, hammered by something beyond its endurance.

  Laurie peered upward. A stress crack slithered across the ceiling, slowly running the breadth of the room. The question surfaced in her thoughts again: what does it want with me?

  An answer formed, or at least the shadow of one, a glimmer of half-heard conversation. Something John had said to Harry, something she’d overheard while they’d been talking in the kitchen. But what?

  She struggled with the memory, positive now that it held the key to the answer she needed.

  From upstairs she heard the sound of glass breaking as a window exploded inward. The noise forced her into action, drove her to examine her already limited options.

  The memory of John’s warning wouldn’t do her any good if the house came crashing down on top of her. She couldn’t stand here thinking all day. On the other hand, it would be suicide to venture out into the storm.

  The last alternative, then, was to find shelter, to hole up somewhere that might withstand the destruction of the house.

  The cellar door was only fifteen feet away, and she made a run for it, her hands already rising to slide back the bolt and twist the knob.

  And then it came to her.

  Laurie stopped short in the middle of the living room, the wind pounding at her from all sides, the snow whirling around her like a swarm of angry bees. She knew what the demon was after, knew the motivation behind its attack.

  She changed her course, moving as quickly as she could toward the spare bedroom.

  Minutes later, Laurie was making her way toward the far end of the cellar, moving carefully through the darkness. This end of the house, facing east, had comprised the original foundation, constructed out of rock and then years later fortified with concrete when the home had been expanded to both the side and back. Here, where the relatively new foundation had been fused around the old, would surely be the safest place to be if the house collapsed.

  It seemed as if that was inevitable now. Outside, the demon’s attack had grown more and more furious with each second that went by, and with each impact against the upper floors, the thunder of falling wood grew louder. It wouldn’t be long, she thought, before the house was reduced to a pile of rubble.

  But at least she’d found what she’d been looking for. It had been in John’s bag, wrapped in a stained length of animal skin and then tied securely with twine.

  John had called it the P’oh Tarhei, and had said something about it having both a physical and spiritual connection to the demon. And whatever power it held, he’d stressed that it would be better off left behind when he and Harry had set out for the quarry.

  It must surely be what had led the demon here.

  Her first instinct had been to give the creature what it wanted, to heave the P’oh Tarhei out into the snow and be done with it. The demon would leave her be then, wouldn’t it? It would end its attack and disappear while the house was still standing. At least she would be alive.

  But then she’d changed her mind, struck by the realization that such a simple surrender would mean letting Harry down. If by some miracle he was still alive—a possibility that she clung to stubbornly despite the odds to the contrary—then relinquishing the one weapon that might be able to help him would be the worst mistake imaginable. Perhaps its magic might even serve as protection, at least until she could plot her next move.

  So she’d taken the artifact deep into the cellar, grimly aware that she might very well be digging her own grave in the process.

  From high above she heard the sound of timber being twisted apart, a groan of tearing wood as the demon slammed into the house once more. A shower of dust settled over her as part of the roof collapsed. She huddled further into the corner and eyed the bulkhead door further along the foundation wall. It would be her only means of escape if worse came to worst, and she was well aware of the fact that it would be covered outside with a thick layer of snow. Getting out wouldn’t be easy, but at least it was a possibility.

  Clutching John’s artifact closer to her chest, she wondered what secret powers lay within its bony length. How could they be extracted and used as protection? She had no idea. She only knew that if something didn’t happen soon, if the demon didn’t suspend its assault and move on, she wouldn’t survive to see the power of the P’oh Tarhei.

  There was a sudden lull in the commotion from above, a short moment of almost complete silence in which she imagined the demon must be preparing itself for its final attack. But then a distant hum reached her ears, a familiar sound that seemed terribly out of place in this impossible situation. It was the sound of an engine, a truck maybe, getting unmistakably louder as it drew closer to the
house.

  She listened for several seconds more and felt a small spark of hope. It was clearly getting closer, the whine of its motor the most pleasant music she thought she’d ever hear.

  It wasn’t just another snowplow. She could tell by the sound of its engine that it was a much smaller vehicle. And no one else would be out driving around in this mess, at the height of the blizzard.

  That left only one other possibility.

  Someone was coming for her. Someone was coming to help.

  She only hoped they made it in time.

  Chapter Twenty Five

  The Jeep topped a small rise just beyond Harry’s property and he got his first glimpse of his house through the falling snow. The damage was clear even at this distance, the lines of the roof smashed in, the entire eastern end leaning steeply to one side. Flames flickered at the downstairs windows; something inside was burning.

  “Oh, Jesus,” he whispered, his heart suddenly in his throat. He gunned the engine, eager to close the rest of the distance as quickly as he could.

  True to his word, he and John had confessed everything to Charlie on the drive over from the quarry. The truth was out now, as impossible as it seemed, and although Charlie had kept shaking his head in denial, he’d absorbed the bulk of the story without argument. Harry thought it was the weight of everything Charlie had witnessed in the tunnels that allowed him to believe so quickly. Or maybe it was a side effect of the intense shock he’d suffered, warping his sense of reality so badly that at this point any story would have seemed plausible to him.

  Either way, it wasn’t difficult to convince him of what they were up against. And when they set eyes on the wreckage of Harry’s house, it only served as further evidence of the power of the demon they’d set free.

  At first it seemed as if the attack had already ended, as if their arrival was already much too late. But then Harry saw a huge shape moving in the wind above the house, a twisting figure formed out of the swirling snow. It slammed into the roof as he watched, its force as strong as the driving wind, as fierce as the storm itself. Another section of the roof collapsed, crashing down into the interior of the house and through the second floor. Harry screamed, pushing the Jeep to its limits across the final expanse of snow. He sped towards the house, his thoughts teetering on the edge of panic, his mind numbed by the possibility that Laurie had been buried alive somewhere within the falling rubble.