Willa kept her focus on Lizzy, using only her peripheral vision to watch Otis extricate his arms from the tunnel and take aim at Lizzy’s back.
Whether Lizzy heard Otis or Harlan’s gaze darted to the rat corner, Willa would never know. The witch spun and fired a second round. It exploded through the right eyehole of the gas mask.
Another yell from Mama, then a pounding on the shed door as Willa reached for the Mossy.
“Don’t do it Willadean. I’d prefer not to kill you yet.”
Willa turned slowly. The witch stood in a square patch of weak sunlight. Her gun swiveled to point at Harlan now.
“I have no such qualms about your brother.” The grin unfurled again. A slender finger twitched on the trigger, but Lizzy watched Willadean’s face instead of Harlan. The witch wanted to observe Willa’s horror at the sight of her brother’s murder. She was drawing it out a few seconds longer than necessary. Absolute madness glittered in the poison-ringed orbs.
Willa’s mind rebelled. She’d already lost Cricket. She would never survive losing Harlan too. Flinging herself between the witch and Harlan would only take a second, and she was the fastest kid in the village.
“You’re a monster,” Willa hissed, hoping to distract the witch and give herself the second she needed. Time slowed to quarter-speed as she sprang.
A tendon jumped in Lizzy’s forearm, the one that controlled finger movement.
A thud from above might have been a wind-tossed branch, but a faint whiff of rosemary told Willadean something else had landed on the roof. The next second, crashing glass rained down on them from the skylight.
As Willa landed in front of Harlan, the witch’s head exploded.
Chapter 25
Fergus
“I got the crazy gal!” Skeeter said from the roof.
The shed door swung open. Serena Jo ran inside.
Fergus helped the old man climb down, postponing the moment he’d be forced to look upon dead children.
“I’m fine,” Skeeter said. “Go see if you can help.”
The storm passed to the north. A bright shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds, illuminating the interior of the shed.
Serena Jo’s arms were wrapped around Willadean in an embrace that threatened to suffocate the little girl.
Lizzy’s body lay on the ground, her face a grisly Halloween mask. Light reflected off teeth on one side of her gaping mouth. The other side was a nightmare of blood, flesh, and bone.
Harlan sat on the ground next to Cricket. Little-boy hands pressed against their best friend’s chest which still rose and fell in a shallow rhythm. Golden eyes lifted to Fergus, but they weren’t filled with sadness. They were filled with determination.
“Do you think you can do something for him?” Fergus asked as he squatted next to the boy.
Harlan’s blood-stained hands were preoccupied, so he chose this moment to vocalize for the first time. It wasn’t the cracking, rusty intonation of someone who never talked, but the perfectly normal voice of a boy who was anything but normal.
“It’s from my War Chest of Oddities, Mister Fergus,” he said. “It worked on a dog who’d been hit by a car back in Knoxville, and once on a baby squirrel that fell out of a tree.”
Fergus knew then that Harlan possessed enhanced langthal, the ability to heal other living creatures. This changed everything.
“I see. There’s a word for it, you know.”
“Yes, the Shift told me.”
“The Shift?”
“Yes,” he whispered. “That’s what I call the voice in my head that helps me work through things...decisions, stuff like that. She told me it was a type of langthal.”
“She?”
Harlan glanced meaningfully at his mother and sister. Serena Jo had released Willadean from the bear hug and was preparing to pounce on her son.
Fergus intercepted her. “Your son is fine. You can see that. But Cricket needs help. You will find medical supplies in Lizzy’s cabin. Bring them to me quickly.”
He watched the familiar stubborn expression blossom on Willadean’s tear-streaked face.
“Child, you can’t help. If you want to save your friend, go with your mother. Now.”
“Come, Willa. He’s right. This is our best hope of helping Cricket.”
Serena Jo ushered her daughter out of the shed.
Fergus turned his attention back to Harlan. “Do you feel heat in your hands?”
Harlan nodded. “Getting even hotter now.”
“You said the Shift was a she?”
“Yes. I think her name is...Amelia.”
Fergus couldn’t help himself. He laughed. “I should have known. Very well, connect with Amelia now. If there’s anyone who can help save your friend, it’s her.”
“You know her?”
“Oh yes. A very old friend. Focus now, son.”
***
“I don’t understand,” Willa said. “I saw blood. A lot of blood.”
The group stood outside the shed in the light that couldn’t decide whether to be cheerful or ominous. They must be positioned right on the ragged edges of the storm. Fergus could smell the rain in the air, but for now it was skirting them. He hoped it continued to do so. The notion of taking shelter inside Lizzy’s cabin was distasteful.
Cricket spoke then, sounding tired, but otherwise normal. “The bullet just nicked me, I guess. It stings a little, but I feel okay. My breathing is better too. Listen!” He took a deep breath in, then blew it out.
“Let me see your wound,” Willa demanded. “Please,” she added, more gently now, noting Cricket’s pallor.
Fergus used his stern voice. “Absolutely not. It’s cleaned and bandaged. I won’t have your grubby little fingers anywhere near that wound. It could get infected.”
Clearly Willadean was exhausted because she merely shrugged and yawned.
“Let’s go home,” Serena Jo said, stifling her own reflexive yawn. “You sure you can make it, Pops?”
“Yep. What should we do about Otis?” he said.
“We’ll let the tunnel air out before we go in after him. Then we’ll take him home and give him a hero’s burial. Same with Ray,” she added with a small catch in her voice.
Skeeter nodded, brushing at his watery blue eyes. Fergus intentionally looked away and down at Harlan. He gave the boy a conspiratorial wink. It wasn’t lost on Willa.
“You gonna start talking full-time now?”
Harlan shook his head, then signed. No. That was an exception. He grinned.
A whistled melody emanated from the outskirts of the woods.
Skeeter whistled a quick five-note response. “It figures the cavalry would arrive after the battle is over.”
Four men and two women emerged from the trees, hillbilly wraiths shrouded in faded denim and flannel. There was to be an escort back to the village, it seemed. Fergus hoped they would make the journey in silence.
He needed some time to gather his thoughts about what had just transpired and how much of it he would report to the Ancients at Cthor-Vangt.
***
Thirty-six hours later...
“This is the most delicious repast I’ve enjoyed since my arrival,” Fergus said. He dipped the fried cornbread torpedo into its accompanying blackberry chutney, then popped it into his mouth with a moan.
Blue eyes framed by wrinkles sparkled in the firelight. “Them fritters is just the appetizer,” Skeeter said. “Wait’ll we get to the main course.”
Whitaker Holler’s entire population attended the evening’s celebration. A colossal cooking fire crackled next to the kitchen house; its flames licked a hog the size of a Harley Davidson slowly rotating on a boy-powered rotisserie. The scintillating aroma of roasting pork wafted throughout the lamp-lit village. Discordant notes of fiddles being tuned floated from every direction. Children squealed and ran along the dirt-packed boulevards, playing hide-and-seek for a while, then organizing into teams for Red Rover. Willadean, Harlan, and Cricket were am
ong them. Willadean orchestrated the activities like a pint-sized four-star general.
Fergus smiled.
Otis and Lizzy’s remains had been retrieved and buried earlier that morning. There had been some grumbling about giving a murdering psychopath a proper burial, but Serena Jo had insisted. When they had gone back for Ray’s body, all they’d found was blood and mountain lion tracks. According to Skeeter, the big cats had been making a comeback since the pandemic. Fergus tried not to think about the body being dragged up into a tree and slowly devoured. Did mountain lions even do that? Or was that just a leopard thing?
“Shame about your friend, Ray,” Skeeter said, interrupting his morbid thoughts.
“Yes,” Fergus sighed. “Still, it could have been a worse outcome.”
“Yep.” Skeeter’s gaze latched onto the twins as they dashed by, then the bald head dipped forward. Fergus’s scythen caught a whiff of prayer.
They sat in the old man’s handmade kitchen chairs, carried outside for the occasion like dozens of others on the sublime autumn evening. Now that he’d gotten used to the moonshine burn, known in the holler as ‘Satan’s Kiss,’ he found it almost palatable.
Almost.
“When are you thinking about leaving?” Skeeter said, giving him a sideways glance. His bandaged hand lay in the lap of his overalls. No matter how quickly these people healed and no matter how high their pain tolerance, humans could not grow new fingers.
At least as far as Fergus knew.
“Who says I’m leaving?” There was no point bothering with a more robust denial. Skeeter would sniff out any lie.
“I’ll miss you,” Skeeter said, looking away.
“And I shall miss you as well. There are a few things I need to take care of before I go, however.”
“You want to talk to my daughter about that warehouse.”
“That’s one item on my checklist.”
“You want to talk to my grandson about going someplace where his talents will be understood and cultivated.” It was always interesting when Skeeter shed his bumpkin dialect and embraced proper grammar.
Fergus began to speak, but Skeeter waved his good hand.
“I don’t want details. And I’m not sure it would be such a bad idea. He’s special, that one. Even more so than his sister. But before you decide, take a look around. Let it sink in what you’d be taking him from. What he’d be missing in that strange underground place.”
Fergus had been contemplating just that. What childhood could be more perfect than one spent here, in this place of intense natural beauty, nurtured by a loving family, encouraged in all creative endeavors and personal choices? Would the Cthor allow Harlan to remain mute, or would they see it as a quirky shortcoming to be stifled? Fergus already knew the answer.
Maybe it was the moonshine, or perhaps it was seeing Serena Jo’s gaze follow the twins as they raced around like child-shaped tornadoes. Whatever the reason, Fergus knew he would not be taking anyone anywhere. The Cthor would pick up on the fact that he was keeping something from them, and it may well get him kicked out of Cthor-Vangt. The defining moment...the second he made his final decision about not taking Harlan there...was when he realized he didn’t mind expulsion.
Amelia had made a similar choice and even now was living her best life — out of many lifetimes — in a tropical paradise. She would enjoy another forty or fifty years doing exactly what she wanted to do, where she wanted to do it. Fergus could picture himself in Whitaker Holler someday when he was ready to settle down. Maybe he and Amelia could become snowbirds, spending the warm months in the Smoky Mountains and the winter months in Jupiter, Florida.
The notion was intensely appealing on many levels, but foregoing virtual immortality was a decision one didn’t make lightly or impulsively.
He would ponder further. Later.
“I’ve been wondering about something,” Fergus said, glancing down to Skeeter’s injured hand. The one with the narrow gold band.
Skeeter’s jaw twitched. “The subject of my wife is off-limits. For now, at least. Maybe when you come back for a visit, and if you bring some more of that top-shelf whiskey in your flask, we’ll get into it.”
“Fair enough, sir,” Fergus replied. “I need to talk to your daughter for a moment. Would you excuse me?”
“’Course. Come on back ‘soon as yer done. We got some drinkin’ to do.”
Fergus laughed. Hillbilly Skeeter was back.
Epilogue
“I don’t care about what’s in here,” Serena Jo said as Fergus punched numbers into the keypad bolted to the entrance of Ray’s warehouse.
“Yet you gave me the code. Interesting.”
“I promised Ray before he died.”
“And you’re grateful to me for my part in rescuing your children.”
“Yes, but my gratitude only goes so far, and I’ve already agreed to let you leave the holler with your hide intact.”
Fergus chuckled as the door screeched open.
For the next hour, they walked the corridors of one of the nation’s largest Strategic Stockpiles; the echoes of their footsteps bounced off the high ceiling. It was a lonely sound. How had Ray been happy here, Fergus wondered. Then he realized the answer lay in the man’s psychology: career bureaucrat obsessed with organization and routine who also happened to be an agoraphobic introvert. Here he had no need to venture out for food beyond the perimeter of the complex, so the set-up became the perfect storm of contented isolation. At least until Lizzy had injected herself into this one-man utopia. If not for her, Ray might never have left the warehouse, living blissfully in the enormous space for the rest of his life.
Fergus sighed, then shot a covert glance at the unflappable Serena Jo. She was impressed. Not that she said anything, but those mesmerizing eyes widened when they scanned the food pallets and then again next to the armory. The sight of the pharmaceuticals summoned a disbelieving head shake.
“So you can understand why Ray was insistent that you come here. Think what a difference these items would make to your people.”
“I am. But consider how well we’re doing without all this.” Her gesture encompassed the treasure within the warehouse.
Fergus nodded.
“Also, consider our society from before. Did all that technology make us happier? Did smart phones expand our world, or did they shrink it down to a tiny screen? Modern medicine might have added a few years to the average lifespan, but if those years were spent in a recliner with eyes glued to a television, why bother?”
“I had no idea you were such a philosopher,” Fergus replied. “I thought you were a flesh and blood, life-size, action figure.”
Serena Jo gave him a half-smile. “Believe me, it’s tempting to utilize all this. We’ve experienced a few winter months when I worried about food shortages. One of the elders died last fall of dysentery, and a weakly child soon after from tetanus.”
“There’s medicine here that could prevent deaths like those.”
“Yes, I see that. But that’s my point. Maybe those deaths shouldn’t have been prevented. I have some antibiotics, but I chose to save them for future events. Sometimes it’s best to let nature run its course.”
“Would you feel that way if the tetanus victim had been your child? You brought antibiotics and other medicines with you from Knoxville. Why would accepting these gifts be different?”
Serena Jo sighed. “That is what I’m grappling with now. A lot has changed in the three years I’ve been here. I’ve come to see how a simpler existence is actually a superior one. I watched you last night at the celebration. You were having a good time. Can you imagine having done that before the plague? Rubbing elbows with a bunch of backwoods hillbillies and actually enjoying their conversations?”
“Yes, I can. I’ve never discriminated against folks because of their education. I’ve run across plenty of fascinating people who didn’t make it past the third grade.”
The golden eyes narrowed. “I’ve been meani
ng to ask you about that. Exactly what was your former profession? I know you lied about being a professor.”
“Lie is a strong word. Perhaps I bent the truth a bit, but it all turned out for the best.” He was eager to change the subject. “How about this: don’t decide now. Memorize that code in case you change your mind. The setup here is automated. I know Ray performed regular maintenance checks on this place, but I have a feeling all these goodies will be preserved for at least another decade or two. Maybe even consult with some of your people back in the holler. Form a consensus...”
“Absolutely not,” she said, cutting him off. “This is a decision for one person, and for now, that person is me. We’re not a democracy, Fergus. That’s why everything runs so smoothly.”
“Benevolent dictatorship?”
“Call it what you want. I know what’s best and what works for the holler folk as a society. The grumblings of a few short-sighted people don’t matter.”
“They’ll matter if they foment rebellion.”
Serena Jo didn’t reply, but a deep line formed between her eyebrows. The notion had evidently occurred to her before.
“Very well,” Fergus said. “It’s your decision. I’ve satisfied the moral obligation of presenting my case, and now it’s time for me to move on. Before I go, though, I’m curious about your escape from Knoxville three years ago and what led up to it. The contents of the U-Haul were impressive in their detail and foresight. Is this something you’re willing to talk about? I know the journey itself must have been harrowing. I too was out there when the world fell apart.”
He watched her wrangle with the question for a few moments. Finally she began talking.
“I started planning the day US deaths hit thirty thousand, just above a hundred thousand globally. The CDC said the mortality rate of the disease was around two to three percent, but I didn’t buy it. I made a list while the kids were asleep that night. For the next three days, I didn’t slow down for a minute. I rented the U-Haul and gathered every item on my list, in whatever way I could. Everything went into the cargo hold. The kids, wearing jammies and sneakers, were tucked into the back seat. I gave them Benadryl so they’d sleep. I decided to wait for dark before leaving, even though safety-wise, it seemed counter-intuitive. People were getting buggy by then and the real freaks tended to emerge at night. But I wanted the cover of darkness.
What Befalls the Children: Book 4 in the Troop of Shadows Series Page 26