by Michael Bray
“He was a monster. You don’t have to be that same thing.”
“I know what he was. He was flawed. He didn’t give himself fully to them.”
“He was an animal,” Melody whispered.
“You were no better.”
“What do you mean?” she said.
“They told me what you did. How you flirted with him and drew him in, then rejected his advances. That hurt him. He didn’t like that.”
“He tried to rape me!”
“No, that’s not how it was. You were the one being provocative. You answered the door to him half undressed. How else do you think something like that would be perceived?”
“Are you trying to justify it?”
“You led him on.”
“You’re insane.”
“You offered yourself then rejected him when he tried to take it. That drove him mad. Clouded his judgement. They couldn’t use him anymore after that. They were just waiting for a new vessel to do their work.”
“You?” she said.
She felt his sharp smile by her cheek.
“Why are you doing this? Why can’t you just leave us alone?”
“You started this. Before you came to Hope House, no child had been conceived on these lands. You changed that. Everything that’s happened since is your doing.”
“And you don’t think I’ve suffered enough? I lost my husband. My son. My life.”
“It’s still not enough.”
“What more do the Gogoku want?”
“Is that what you think?” Henry said. She could hear the amusement in his voice, which triggered a fresh surge of fear.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“This is bigger than them.”
“What does that mean?”
He didn’t answer. They wouldn’t let him. The secret must remain. Instead, he pulled away from her and walked around the back of the tree, out of view. She felt him manipulating the rope holding her in place, freeing her. She staggered away from the trunk and fell to the ground. Marshall appeared next to her, filthy and wild-eyed.
“Come on,” he said, holding a grubby hand out to her.
“Where are we going?”
“You know where.”
Melody nodded and got to her feet, letting Marshall lead her, knowing that one way or the other, it was about to end. He led her to the clearing, which was bathed in pale moonlight. She paused at the edge, too afraid to commit to stepping inside its boundaries. Memories long repressed reawakened. She remembered Donovan, stalking like a caged beast on its perimeter when she’d escaped his rape attempt. Even now, she could feel the malevolence emanating from the area. It almost seemed to hum with a power far more amplified than when she’d last been here. Marshall shoved her forward, sending her stumbling into the clearing. Immediately, the trees on the edges began to sway and hiss, the wind building, further reminding her of the horrors of the past.
“Do you feel them?” Henry asked as he stood in the center of the clearing.
Melody nodded. It was true. She could sense them probing at her; dark, formless things. Gooseflesh raised on her arms.
“They want to know if you can feel how strong they’ve become.”
“Why did you bring me here?” she asked, doing all she could to ignore the supercharged energy surrounding them.
“You need to see. To appreciate how many there are, you need to see like I saw.”
She shook her head, eyes flicking between Marshall and the trees. “I don’t want to see.”
Henry grinned, his mouth a sharp, bloody, hellish thing.
A shark’s grin, she thought, and a wave of nausea surged through her.
“They want me to show you. They want me to show you what will happen to your son.”
He put a hand on her shoulder. There was no way to stop the images being fired into her brain. Sent by the dark things that surrounded her and channeled by Henry Marshall, they were incredibly graphic. Nothing could stop the scream ejecting itself from the pit of her stomach. Fed by her terror, the trees swayed in appreciation.
II
Petrov heard the scream rolling to him through the trees. He glanced in the direction from where it came, then to his car, noticing the rear door was open and Emma and Isaac missing.
“You two stay here. Don’t move!” he grunted.
“Wait, what’s happening?” Truman called to him through the window.
“Stay there!” Petrov snapped as he sprinted toward his car. Kimmel was on his knees, the back of his head bloody.
“What happened? Where the hell are they?” Petrov said as he helped the General to his feet.
“How the hell would I know? Someone hit me on the back of the head. When I came to, they were gone.”
“Goddamn it! Get in the car!” Petrov snapped, running to the driver’s side. Kimmel climbed in beside him, pausing to close the rear door.
“You know he’s going to be waiting for us up there, don’t you?” Kimmel said as he carefully touched his wound then examined his bloody fingers.
“I know. That’s why we need to find the kid first.” Petrov gunned the engine, flooring the accelerator and snaking away down the dirt road toward town.
Truman and Mrs. Alma sat and watched as the twin red taillights disappeared around the bend.
“Screw this,” Truman said, climbing out of the back and into the driver’s side.
“The officer took the keys.”
“Don’t worry about that, Mrs. A. It’s covered.” He flipped open the glove box and pulled off the spare key taped to the underside of the door. Starting the engine, he set off after Petrov.
CHAPTER 35
Emma and Isaac plunged through the trees, quite unable to believe that Dane Marshall was with them. He’d said little as they made their way through the underbrush.
“Why are you here? Why did you help us?” Emma asked as the ground started to slope upwards, slowing their progress.
“I have my reasons,” he replied, looking over his shoulder.
“That’s not good enough.”
“This isn’t the time to talk about it.”
“They know we’re here,” Isaac said, feeling a rush of nausea.
Whispered voices, disjointed snatches of words surrounded them, calling to them.
Emma yelped and stopped.
“What is it?” Dane said, pulling his hood back and turning toward her.
“My arm.” She rolled up her sleeve to show four scratches welling up on her forearm, one already seeping blood.
“What the fuck?” Dane said, nervously glancing around him.
“They’re trying to scare us,” Isaac said, subconsciously reaching out to hold Emma’s hand.
“I’d say it’s working.” Dane fell back in line with the others. “We have to get out of the trees.”
“Agreed. This is taking way too long,” Emma said.
“We should meet the road somewhere up ahead.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I know this area. I was going to shoot my show here, remember?”
“Yeah, I see that worked out well for you,” Emma snapped.
He stopped and faced her. “Look, let me get something straight. What happened then, back at the hotel, wasn’t my fault. I was as much a victim as you were.”
“Don’t give me that shit. You think you can buy forgiveness by helping us?”
“No,” Dane said, shaking his head. “I don’t. I just want you to understand things from my side. You think it’s easy living with what my brother did? He destroyed the lives of so many people and left my family to deal with the consequences. We lost everything.”
“You still have your life. Your brother still has his. My friends lost theirs. Isaac lost his father.”
“I know. But I can’t do anything about that now.”
“You sound just as cold as your brother.”
“I’m not him. Don’t you dare say I am.”
“Both of you, stop
it!” Isaac shouted. “It’s them. The things in the trees, they’re making my head hurt.”
“You alright kid? You don’t look so good,” Dane said.
He was right. Emma could see it too. Isaac was pale, his hair sticking to his forehead with sweat.
“He’s fine. Just scared like the rest of us,” Emma said. “Come on, we need to keep moving.”
They went on in silence. The voices in the wind were easy to ignore after a while. Harder not to acknowledge were the shapes; the shadowy figures that flitted in their peripheral vision, darting between branches. The scratching continued, increasing in ferocity, only Isaac remaining untouched. Their journey felt as if it would last forever, the woods never ending.
“I see the road,” Emma said, lurching ahead, eyes wide and afraid. She’d been stretched to breaking point. Crashing through the undergrowth, she was desperate to put some distance between herself and the torment the trees had inflicted upon her. She escaped the stifling canopy, stumbling and falling onto the hard surface of the road, knocking the wind out of lungs. Isaac and Dane arrived seconds later and helped her up.
“Are you alright?” Isaac asked.
She started to cry. Years of repressed grief had finally found its way to the surface, cracking the cold exterior she’d built for herself. Dane stood awkwardly at the side of the road, kicking his feet in the dirt. He was the first to notice the light approaching them.
“Hey, heads up,” he warned.
The light grew brighter and more intense, banishing the dark. Under ordinary circumstances, they would have run, yet in this case, none of them had any inclination to go back into the trees and subject themselves to the horrors that waited for them in there. It was then they heard the engine piercing the wind.
“Shit, I bet it’s that cop,” Dane said, turning toward the woods but unable to commit himself to entering them. Either way it was too late; they knew they’d been seen. The vehicle skidded to a halt, leaving a great cloud of dust in its wake. Petrov climbed out of the vehicle, gun drawn.
“I wondered if I might stumble across you two. I take it your friend here helped you escape?”
“Detective, please, you have to let us go,” Emma said.
“I don’t think so. If there was any doubt before, let me make this clear. You’re all under arrest. Now get in the car.”
“Detective, please…”
“I wouldn’t test my patience any more than you have already. In case you didn’t know, there’s a madman on the loose and I don’t want any more deaths. You people might think it’s safe to run around in the woods, but I’m not prepared to let you get yourselves killed. Now get in the damn car.”
He pointed the gun at them for emphasis as he opened the door with his free hand.
Emma and Isaac got in, heads hanging low. Dane went to follow, when Petrov closed the door.
“Not you. We’ve met before, haven’t we? Back here when the massacre happened. Dane, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“This day just keeps on giving. Lose one Marshall brother and find another. Hands on the roof of the car please.”
Dane did as he was told, placing his palms on the roof and spreading his feet.
“I see you know the drill. That’s good. Makes things easier. Now, if I search you, am I going to find any weapons?”
“I have a gun in my jacket,” Dane said.
“Alright, I like the honesty. I’m going to reach in and take it. I don’t want you to make any sudden moves that might make me shoot you. Got it?”
“Understood.”
Petrov took the gun then stepped back.
“Okay, now turn around.”
Dane complied, staring at the ground.
“You’d better start talking. What the hell are you doing out here?”
“My brother called me. He told me if I wanted to stop the killings, I had to come here.”
“When did this happen?”
“Last night.”
“And you didn’t think to report it?”
“No. He didn’t stay on the line long enough for me to talk to him. He just said I had to come here. I reacted.”
“So what took you so long to get here?” Petrov asked.
“I got here as quick as I could. I was out of town.”
“You haven’t visited your brother since he was first locked up in Creasefield. Why would he decide to make contact with you now?”
“Because my brother is a manipulative asshole. He thrives on this. On being the center of attention. Whatever he has planned, he wants me to see it.”
“Alright, say I buy that. Why did you free these two from custody?” Petrov said, nodding toward Isaac and Emma.
“He told me I had to. He said he knew you would have them and that I had to bring them. I was trying to do the right thing and save a life.”
“That’s not your job. It’s mine.”
“You sure about that?” Dane said, sneering at Petrov. “The way I see it, my brother might well slaughter you or any of these other people without a second thought. He might not be so quick to do that to me, which I think gives me an advantage.”
Kimmel rolled the window down. “Detective, we don’t have time for this.”
“Come on, all of you. In the car.” Petrov opened the door and waited for Dane to get in, shutting it after him. He turned the key in the ignition, and swung back onto the dirt road, the car bouncing and jostling in the ruts.
“Here’s the deal. When we get to the hotel I’m going to call this in and get some officers up here. You all stay in the car. No exceptions.”
“I thought you said you already had people in the area?” Emma said.
“I don’t have backup, I moved them off to search for Marshall after the car accident. I lied so you wouldn’t run. Right now it’s just me.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Dane said.
“I was about to call it in when you helped these two escape,” Petrov replied. “Trust me, this place will be swarming before you know it.”
“This is crazy,” Dane muttered. “You know how dangerous my brother is.”
“He’s still just a man,” Petrov fired back.
“No he isn’t,” Isaac said from the back. “He’s one of them now.”
“Detective, look out!” Kimmel yelled.
Petrov slammed on the brakes, the car struggling to decelerate on the loose surface.
The scene ahead of them was thrown into harsh light by the car’s headlights. Emma pulled Isaac close to her, shielding him as best she could, but it was too late. He’d already seen it.
Either by design or at the hands of nature, two trees had fallen from opposite sides of the narrow dirt road, meeting in the middle above the car, forming an A-frame of sorts. Hanging from the upper branches in a sick display was a woman, or more accurately, what was left of her. It was tied there with bungee ropes, obviously left for them to find. Only the upper torso remained, skin sheared back to expose white shafts of ribs, stomach cavity hollowed out. Her arms were outstretched on the branches, her intestines wrapped around her like a gruesome scarf, the slick innards glistening in the moonlight. Her head hung to one side, mouth agape in a silent scream. Worst of all were her eyes. They were nothing but bloodied sockets, each containing a single red rose. Around her neck was a cardboard sign, the writing on the front penned in bloody finger smears.
Find me.
The wind pushed the disgusting display back and forth, swaying it provocatively. Emma screamed then, releasing the pent up terror she’d held on to successfully up to that point. The wind rose in a mocking scream of its own, one much louder than hers.
Petrov and Kimmel exchanged glances. Both of them knew who was responsible for the display. If there was any doubt, Dane vocalized it, breaking the silence.
“Henry.”
Petrov put the car into gear, inching forward.
“Nobody look,” he said as they passed under the bloody, broken corpse. Nobody spoke, even
as Petrov picked up speed and headed toward the hotel.
CHAPTER 36
The hotel grounds were deserted. Petrov got out of the car, drew his weapon and scanned the landscape. Kimmel followed after him, staring into the trees, aware that in the dark, there were almost limitless places where Henry Marshall could be hiding. Petrov ducked back into the car. “You wait here. I have to go and find the source of that scream.”
“It was my mother,” Isaac said. He was drenched in sweat now, and his eyes were lidded and heavy.
“How do you know that?” Petrov asked.
Isaac shrugged. “I just know.”
“Are you alright, kid?” Dane asked.
“My head hurts. They’re close,” Isaac mumbled.
“Look, just wait here. I’ll be back soon.”
“We need some form of protection,” Dane said. “Let me have my gun back, just in case we need it.”
“No. I can’t do that,” Petrov said.
“Well you can’t just leave us here without any protection at all,” Emma added.
Petrov hesitated, torn as to what to do. “Damn it,” he grunted, opening the car door. “Come with me and stay close. Keep behind me at all times, got it?”
Emma had to help Isaac out of the car. He was holding his head and muttering under his breath.
“What’s wrong with him?” Kimmel asked.
“It’s this place,” Emma replied. “He’s sensitive to it.”
Petrov was on the radio, trying to call in backup. “Goddamn it. Reception is awful up here.”
He eventually managed to get through, and although weak, he was able to call in the backup they urgently needed. He tossed the radio handset on the seat and turned to them. “They’re on their way. As soon as they arrive you’ll be safe.”
“What about my brother?” Dane asked.
“We’ll find him.”
“Detective,” Kimmel said quietly.
Petrov looked in the direction in which Kimmel was staring. The steel shutter covering the door to the hotel had been pried away, exposing the black maw and whatever secrets lay beyond. Penned on the shutter was the same message as was on the sign around the girl’s neck.