The Dominant Hand

by Charles Martin

  “Bullshit, this has nothing to do with the Prophecy, this is just for power,” Robbie said.

  Brian closed the phone and tossed it toward Ashley. It bounced on the tile and slid to her feet. The followers dropped Billy to the ground, and Brian knelt down over him. Billy was still breathing, but unconscious. Blood seeped out from a cut above his right eye, a jagged tear in his scalp and out of his nostrils.

  Brian smiled then turned to walk away.

  Ashley rolled to her hands and knees, trying to follow them, but a sharp kick to her ribs sent her back to the ground in pain. Two men pinned her to the floor, and she tried to jerk away and claw at their eyes. They pushed her back down to the ground.

  “Give him back to me!” she screamed.

  Brian turned and watched her. He grinned and approached Ashley, knelt to the ground and kissed her on the forehead.

  “If your husband does what he promised, then you will have your son tomorrow, and you will be free of your obligations to us. Don’t bother with the police, the boy will be hidden where they cannot find him, and we will kill him before we turn him over. Just pray your husband does what is expected of him.”

  “The play goes on,” Brian sang softly. “We’re all playing our parts, the lights are bright, the hero dies and everyone applauds.”

  Brian was singing one of Jim’s songs. She hated when people did that.

  Brian straightened and sauntered through the turned tables, pools of blood and the tipped-over buffet. He playfully danced over scattered dead bodies like Gene Kelly.

  The men released Ashley and followed behind Brian’s promenade. They opened the front door for Brian and then helped him into a truck outside. The men hopped into the bed of the truck and it sped away. Ashley ran to Billy whose eyes were open, but weren’t focusing.

  “Billy!” she called, holding his head up.

  His eyes shot over to her as he jolted awake. He tried to stand, but his legs folded.

  “Stay down,” Ashley said. She laid him on his back and then scrambled for her phone. She brought Robbie’s number up and called him.

  “What’s happening?” Robbie’s voice erupted.

  “They’ve got him!” Ashley screamed. “Where are they taking him?”

  “I’m not sure,” Robbie said. “I’m coming home, I’ll be back tonight and I will get Sean.”

  “If they hurt him, I’m going to kill every fucking one of you!”

  ******

  Billy’s head began to roll down and over to the side. It nodded back against the headrest and his eyes slowly closed. The streetlights were flickering on as the sun set.

  “Wake up!” Ashley snapped, nudging him but keeping her eyes on the road.

  “Sorry.” Billy straightened up and rubbed at his forehead.

  “You can’t go to sleep. You’ve got a concussion—you’ve got to stay up, okay?”

  Billy nodded, without saying anything. Ashley looked him over and frowned.

  “How do you feel?” Ashley asked.

  “Better, a little tired—my head still hurts.” His words slurred, which troubled Ashley.

  “Look, Billy, I’m sorry for taking you along, but I’ve got to get to Sean.”

  “I know, Ash,” Billy said, leaning over slightly as if to kiss her, but then leaning back in his seat.

  “I can drop you off at the Norman Medical Center, but I’ve got to get to Sean.”

  “You’re not getting rid of me that easy, Ash.”

  Ashley smiled, but she didn’t look over because she was afraid she would start crying.

  “Get out of my way, you fucker!” Ashley growled at a semi in the inside lane. Ashley weaved from lane to lane, and then finally swerved onto the shoulder and pulled around a Cavalier, leaping back into the outside lane before it broke away to an exit ramp.

  “Are you okay, Ash?” Billy asked, his hands latched onto the dashboard. “Do you need me to drive?”

  “I’m just trying to keep you awake,” Ashley sighed, glancing back at the semi before she swept in front of it, barely missing a minivan.

  “Do you even know where they are taking Sean?” Billy asked.

  “No,” Ashley said. “We have tonight and all of tomorrow to look. If we can’t find him, then we’ll find someone at the concert who knows.”

  “The cult will be there too, Ash.”

  “Well, what do you want me to do?” Ashley yelled. She looked over at Billy who frowned and then looked ahead.

  “Let’s start on Indian Hill Road, then,” Billy said. “I’ve got some friends that hunt all around Oklahoma, I’ll see if they can help us track down the campground.”

  Charles

  “How do you deal with situations so dire?” Charles mumbled to himself.

  “Well, you learn to deal with the darkness,” Charles answered. “I think I was surprised by how impossible it was to sleep. Sure I was hog-tied and forced to kneel down, and that did hurt, especially in the knees—I can still feel that ache, like the tendons were about to snap … Are those tendons in the knees or muscles … Well, at any rate, the pain was excruciating, but it was the darkness of the blindfolds that was the most difficult, that darkness that just got more bleak once the sun set.”

  “Shut the hell up, you crazy sonofabitch,” Oscar grunted.

  Charles kept forgetting he wasn’t alone. His head wasn’t working quite right. He’d tried to occupy his time by imagining what his kids were wearing to go out trick-or-treating. Then he’d imagine what his wife would be wearing once they got the kids into bed.

  Oscar, the old man from the pawn shop, coughed and hacked, probably blood. He’d come out here with his son to avenge his daughter’s severed left hand. They hadn’t fared much better than he had. Oscar’s daughter wasn’t with them; Charles wondered if she’d given them up. Probably.

  The old man shifted, tugging at a rope that connected them by the arms. Charles had wanted to lie down for a while, but every time he moved, he would pull Oscar with him.

  “Why didn’t you put up a fight?” Charles whispered, resuming his interview.

  “It’s interesting, I’m not really sure,” Charles replied. “I was with the man called ‘Herb Hefner’ and I remember a sharp pain, like a needle or something—it was real small and quick. I was fine for a few moments, but when I turned to see what happened, I saw I was surrounded, and then after a few more moments, the world began to get … heavy.”

  “Heavy, what do you mean by that?”

  “It’s hard, almost like the sky collapsed in on me like a house of cards; everything seemed to just roll in and over me. I woke up when they were hog-tying me. I saw the man from the pawn shop and his son, and then a clearing out ahead of me that had a circle of dead grass. Then nothing.”

  “Shut up, goddammit, someone’s coming,” Oscar murmured.

  Charles heard footsteps and a dragging sound. He heard a cackling moan along with the crackle of a fire.

  “Was it from torches?” Charles asked, only moving his lips.

  “Probably, it gave the moment a sort of medieval feel. I was more curious than I was afraid.”

  Strains of light surfaced through Charles’s blindfold. He’d had hallucinations before, but he recognized real light when he saw it. The footsteps were close, almost right in front of them. Whatever they were carrying, it seemed heavy from the sound of it sliding through the grass.

  Charles thought about the clearing and guessed where it was in front of him. Maybe the people were taking whatever it was they were dragging to the clearing, like it was an altar.

  Charles heard a thump and then footsteps retreating away quickly. The moaning continued once the footsteps faded into the night.

  “Did you have any idea of what was happening?”

  “Not at all. I knew that the concept of sacrifice was important to them, so I’d guessed that there was some sort of human sacrifice. They’d run away, so whatever was going to happen, it was going to happen fast.”

  “Hey,” Ch
arles said louder. “Something’s going to happen, something bad. Can you move?”

  “Hell, no,” Oscar said.

  “I can’t either,” Junior called.

  “We need to do something,” Charles said, then began working on the ropes around his wrists. He’d had no luck in the hours he’d been there, but it made him feel like he was at least making use of his time.

  A stiff breeze spun around him. A light flashed, bright enough to shine through the blindfold. It flickered, and the wind swirled harder. The only sounds were the gush of wind against the leaves and the man’s panicked moans. The light continued flickering.

  Charles began working his head against his shoulder, hoping to loosen the blindfold.

  “Can you see anything?” Charles asked.

  The two didn’t answer, but he heard them breathing quickly.

  “I’m going to lean toward you—see if you can get my blindfold off,” Charles said.

  “Okay,” Oscar answered.

  The rope between them was short, and it was difficult for Charles to tuck his head down to the old man’s hands. He leaned farther, and then tipped himself and the old man over. Junior grunted as he fell, too. Charles struggled, but couldn’t get back onto his knees.

  “Good job, ass,” Junior grunted.

  Charles heard heavy footsteps, like a large animal, larger than a human. He felt the old man stop struggling.

  Garbled screams erupted from the human sacrifice, yet it seemed incapable of forming words. There were rustles of fabric, a smacking sound, like someone got punched or kicked hard. There was a loud, meaty crack, then clucking sounds and a lot of shuffling.

  The heavy footsteps approached Charles and he moved his head away and tried to hide it under Oscar. All three of them began squirming away from the footsteps only to get tangled.

  The thing hovered, and when it bent toward them, Charles could hear thick fur or fabric tussling and a slight clink, like a necklace.

  A warm, moist breath swept over Charles’s face. It smelled like sulfur and menthol cigarettes. Charles felt tickles of long hair reaching down to his arm.

  The thing sniffed him with quick snorts, like a dog. Then it grumbled incoherently. Saliva dripped down on Charles’s cheek, and Charles dug farther under Oscar.

  Something cut against Charles’s neck, and he grunted and jerked away.

  The thing backed away slightly, it sniffed again and then the heavy footsteps retreated. It grunted and something rustled. Another snap, this one with more of a sharp crack. A few drops of something warm hit Charles’s arm and chin.

  Oscar shifted his shoulder, and Charles’s blindfold loosened and lifted. Charles jerked his head away and the blindfold rose up to his forehead.

  Light flashed brightly, before Charles’s eyes could focus and he had to turn his head away. His eyes burned and he saw a red glare, like he’d looked up at the sun.

  His eyes cooled, and Charles lifted his head and glimpsed back where the light had been.

  Daylight.

  There was dew on the grass, the sun barely peeked over the trees—it was morning. There was no beast, but blood was seeping slowly out of Charles’s neck.

  There was no sign of a human sacrifice, no bones, no blood, no proof that a living person had been butchered there.

  “Are you finally awake?” Oscar growled. “Now get the fuck off me.”

  Charles rolled over to his other side. He craned his head up and around. The cut in his neck burned, but it didn’t feel deep.

  “Did you say I was asleep?”

  “For hours, buddy,” Oscar said. “I kept trying to wake your ass up.”

  “I didn’t feel like I was asleep,” Charles mumbled. “My blindfold is off. I saw the light. Did you see it, too?”

  “We saw some light, but not much of anything,” Junior said. “Did you see what that goddamn thing was?”

  “No, my blindfold was still on when it happened,” Charles said. “I felt it over me—it cut me with something. It sounded like it tore that body apart, but there’s no blood.”

  “Do you think they were fuckin’ with us?” Oscar asked.

  “Maybe,” Charles mumbled, more to himself.

  Footsteps approached from the tree line. There was a child crying. Charles glanced down at the blindfold but knew he couldn’t get it back on.

  A small group of figures emerged from the forest, a blindfolded child being led out in front. The three men all wore kilts. Two of them had beards and the third had patchy stubble. The boy’s panicked moans made it hard for him to walk. Fury flooded Charles’s body. He grit his teeth and dug his fingernails into his palms.

  “I had to be smart about it,” Charles whispered to himself. “I had to keep my cool. I’m a journalist. I talk for a living, that’s what I do best.”

  “Can I talk to you for a moment?” Charles called to the men.

  The child turned toward the voice. He was a light-skinned African American, perhaps eight years old.

  “Did you see it?” the man with the patchy stubble asked, his eyes wide and curious.

  “I saw the light, yes,” Charles said carefully.

  “And what did you see?” the man asked, walking toward him with a wide smile. He had long stringy hair tied into poorly kept braids. He had two eyebrow piercings that looked infected and there was an obviously fake bone-handled knife stuffed in his belt.

  Charles forced himself to take a moment. He realized that the men had never seen whatever it was that had happened last night.

  “What’s your name?” Charles asked.

  “Firedog,” the man grinned.

  “No one calls him that,” one of the other men corrected.

  “Shut up!” Firedog snapped. “It’s my jousting name!”

  “Jousting name?” Junior grunted. “You’re a bunch of medieval fair freaks?”

  “Shut the fuck up, man!” Firedog growled, pulling out his knife.

  “I survived a fucking war just to get killed by a bunch of guys who can’t even get laid.”

  “That’s enough!” Charles shouted.

  Firedog gripped his knife tightly as he stared down at Junior.

  “Okay … Firedog,” Charles continued. “It’s okay, he didn’t mean it. We’re just tired.”

  “He better watch his mouth,” Firedog hissed. “I’ve always wanted to kill an army boy.”

  “Firedog,” Charles said. “You need to take me to whoever is in charge here.”

  “Oh, um,” Firedog mumbled, putting away his knife and glancing back at the other men.

  “Here’s the situation, Firedog,” Charles stated. “I’m a journalist with Spin Magazine, ever heard of it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I take it from your reaction that not many people have seen the light and the beast without dying,” Charles said. “If you check the back of my neck, you can see that it even cut me.”

  “With the blessed spear?” Firedog asked. All of the men had completely forgotten about the boy.

  “Yeah.”

  “You called it a beast?” one of the other men asked.

  Charles tensed when he realized his mistake.

  “I see why Jim called it an ogre, but it wasn’t,” Charles said, carefully navigating around the truth. “Take me to your leader.”

  Charles winced at the cliché.

  “We need to talk.”

  “Um,” Firedog stammered, glancing back at the others.

  “Firedog!” Charles growled in his drill instructor voice. “Now! It is your duty.”

  “Okay,” Firedog nodded and untied Charles from the old man. He then untied his legs. Charles grunted as he forced himself up on his feet. His joints creaked, his legs wavered and nearly gave way. Firedog grabbed Charles by the waist and helped him stand up straight.

  “What are you doing?” one of the other men asked.

  “He saw it, man,” Firedog stated. “He needs to talk to the Lions.”

  “You’re doing the right thing, Fir
edog,” Charles said.

  Charles’s hands were still tied tightly behind his back, but Charles didn’t need them as long as he could talk.

  Charles glanced over at the boy. Charles thought of his own kids. He needed to get home to them. Charles considered his options, knew the right answer was to ignore the boy, but couldn’t leave it alone.

  “Who’s the kid?” Charles asked stiffly.

  “It’s the son of the Prophet,” Firedog answered enthusiastically.

  “Sean,” Charles gasped. He hadn’t seen the boy in years.

  Sean’s head jolted up.

  “It’s me,” the kid called desperately.

  Charles’s body sparkled with adrenaline. He bit his lip and looked over at the men. They all had knives; his hands were tied.

  Charles smothered the impulse to fight. His eyes began to water, his fists curled in tightly. He searched his options, but always came back with the same answer.

  “Help me,” the boy said.

  “Shut up!” one of the other men yelled. “Tie him to the others.”

  Charles wanted to fight, but couldn’t think, couldn’t plan. Didn’t know what to say. Sean was shoved down and then tied to the pawn shop owner’s son. Charles’s mouth moved, but he had no options. He knew he could only save himself.

  ******

  Firedog strutted as he led Charles through the sprawling campground of tents. It was early in the morning, perhaps around seven a.m., but there weren’t many sleeping. Some were clearly stoned, others looked away as the men in kilts walked by. There were jugs and two-liter bottles everywhere, filled with an emerald-colored liquid. The prostitute had called it “Mean Green.” Charles thought it looked like the lime green Kool-Aid his kids refused to drink, so it would sit in the pitcher for a week before it just got dumped out.

  An older man was putting up Halloween decorations on his tent, including a giant spider that appeared to be crawling up the side. A girl sat in front of the tent and stared intently at the spider.

  Despite the decorations and mind-altering substances, Charles could sense the unease throughout the camp. The anxiety and fear reminded him of the plane ride to boot camp. Overwhelming fear blended with a sliver of hope that they were doing the right thing.