by Sara Clancy
“Can I come in?”
Desperation made her move before her mind caught up. Her hand clutched at the button with all of her strength, cutting off the line before Tristan could respond.
“No!” she shouted. “No, you can’t! Go away!”
She refused to let go of the button as she raced for the restaurant. A deafening silence pressed against one ear as the line remained open, the stillness only broken by the quickening rush of her blood. Her legs felt like stone and her lungs had been replaced with bags of fire as she finally reached the landing of the second floor.
Situated above the densest layers of fog, the restaurant windows were bathed in sunlit mist. The glow pushed through the glass and drenched the room in a buttery haze. She blinked against the glare as she searched every table for Tristan. The room was empty. You have to find him, she commanded herself as her trembling fingers squeezed the mic. He’ll say yes. He’ll let them in.
The pleas of her mind turned desperate as she ran across the room, the tiles still slick from their closing mop. She slipped more than once and was barely able to keep upright as she rounded the bar. In her crazed dedication to find him, it hadn’t occurred to her that he was crouched behind the counter. She ran straight into him.
Both cried out in pain as they toppled to the floor. The beer bottles he had been stocking flung from his grip, smashing on impact and releasing tiny tidal waves of glass and liquor. Pain shot up her right leg as she tried to break her fall but maintain her grip on the microphone button.
“God damn it,” Tristan said, his words distorting as they slipped through his clenched teeth. Pressing one hand to his temple, he glared at her. “Please tell me there is a reason you felt it necessary to knee me in the head!”
“Duh,” was the best she could muster as she clutched her ankle with both hands, struggling to keep it immobilized.
“A good reason?”
Ruby wet her lips as the spikes of pain ebbed away. Sitting there in the honeyed light, embarrassed and sticky with beer, she wasn’t quite sure how to explain any of this to him. So she kept her silence and let him mutter to himself.
“What is wrong with you?” he asked at last.
“We went over this. You looked it up on your phone.”
“I don’t mean–” He cut himself off and closed his eyes for a second. “Let’s try this again. What is wrong with your ankle?”
“I broke it a few months ago,” she hissed as she tested it slowly and eased some weight onto it. “I just fell on it wrong.”
“You didn’t break it again, did you?”
“No.”
“Good,” he waved out both hands in swooping gestures. “Just stay still for a second. Let me clean the glass up before we start moving you around. I’m not in the mood to clean up your blood.”
Terror cracked through her as she watched him move away. She snapped one hand out and latched onto his forearm.
“Don’t let them in.”
He blinked at her. “I have so many questions.”
“If they ask you to, don’t let them in.” She didn’t attempt to hide her desperation as she stared at him. “Please.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“The radio?”
The corner of his lips tipped down as he reached for his earpiece. Having taken it out, it was hanging limply against his shirt collar.
“You didn’t hear them,” she mumbled. Shaking herself from her shock, she dug her nails into his forearm. “Don’t invite anyone in. Not until I say it’s okay.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m asking you.”
“It sounds more like begging.”
“Tristan, please!”
“Okay, okay. You can be the gate keeper. Just let go of my arm.”
Sheepishly, she loosened her grip and allowed him to slip away.
Chapter 4
Pain vibrated along her shin like a plucked violin string. After cleaning away most of the glass, Tristan had helped her limp to one of the tables and prop her foot up on a chair. Unable to find an icepack, he had settled for giving her an icy bottle of beer before heading back to finish up.
As she watched the golden light wash over the wall, it was hard to believe what she had seen. Nor could she just dismiss it. Pins and needles still tingled across her fingertips, but she had let the button go. Static hit her ear, filled her head and made her question everything she knew. Not knowing what else to do, she lurched out of her seat and limped over to the windows. Carefully, she traveled around the room, checking to make sure every window was locked in place. It was only as she completed the loop that she realized none of them actually opened.
“Okay,” Tristan said as he came out from the kitchen. “I’m all done in there and ready for you to explain what is going on in that funny little head of yours.”
She looked over her shoulder to see Tristan absently sipping at his beer.
“So, your foot is doing better?”
“Are all the doors and windows closed?” she asked.
“Well, we’re at the top of a mountain, so none of the windows are windows as such. Mostly, they’re sheets of glass. And, since it’s not actually in my job description to lock anything, I’m going to say yes.”
She blinked at him, willing him to remember that she literally didn’t understand his humor. The moment didn’t come, so she pressed on.
“But you don’t know for sure?”
“That is an accurate statement,” he nodded.
“We have to make sure. Everything has to be locked.”
There are too many public areas. They won’t need an invitation. Her thoughts whirled, each one leading into a greater state of hysteria. Battling to keep her composure, she spoke with all the command she could muster.
“I need you to help me lock everything.”
“You understand that the rescue crew will need an open door through which to enter the building,” Tristan said, “and that entering the building is the whole reason they are coming here.”
“They can knock!” Schooling her voice back into something resembling calm, she added. “Please. It’s important.”
Her heart hammered against her ribs as Tristan watched her, his face an unreadable mask. Finally, he nodded.
“Fine. We’ll do a check on everything,” he said as he moved to the staircase. “Of course, since I’m the only one able to move about freely at the moment, it’s more accurate to say that I’m going to check the windows while you sit here.”
“Are you stating facts or complaining?” Ruby asked.
Tristan paused at the top of the staircase. He tipped his head back to stare at the ceiling for a moment before he took another sip of his beer and finally answered.
“I’m complaining. And now I’m leaving.”
“Tristan.”
“Yes, Ruby.”
“Just be careful. The mist is coming in.”
He descended the stairs and disappeared from view without comment. She heard him rushing back up a second later. His head popped around the corner with a wild swing of golden curls.
“Did you just warn me about mist?” he asked.
Ruby nodded.
“Right,” he said and walked off again.
She waited anxiously until the sound of his footsteps dulled and disappeared. When she was sure he wasn’t about to bolt back up, she burst into action. Ignoring the searing pain in her ankle, she rushed into the kitchen and set about searching what would serve as a weapon. Finding a knife was easy. Locating one that was small enough to fit in her pocket was harder. By the time she found a paring knife, she could already hear Tristan making his way back up the stairs.
The thin blade bent as she shoved it into her pocket. She could feel it poking her thigh as she hurried out of the kitchen and lumbered back to her selected table. Tristan, apparently bored with his walking pace, started to move faster. The chair legs scraped across the tiles as she flung herself into it. Her chest heav
ed with every breath as she arranged herself. There was still no way she could look composed by the time he got to the top of the stairs.
It was then that he decided to slow his pace. Swinging his legs loosely with every step, he inched closer to her. In that moment, she wished that she could tell just what his expression meant. Swallowing the last of the bottle, he gracefully collapsed into a nearby chair and regarded her with a flash of his teeth. Smile or sneer? she wondered.
“What were you up to?” he asked.
“Just checking the windows,” she said.
“Sure, you were,” Tristan said with a flash of his teeth.
“Is the mist still inside?” she asked quickly, eager to change the subject.
“It’s pretty much filled the lower floor,” he said. “Which isn’t exactly a rare event.”
“Oh,” she said.
It could only have been a few moments, perhaps fifteen at most, but the restaurant had dimmed considerably already. As the last top of the sun dipped below the horizon, the lingering rays tarnished the mist an alien pink that looked like a smothered wound. She could feel sweat prickle at her hairline and self-consciously swatted at it. After her last encounter with the children, she had cut her hair short. The point had been to make sure there wasn’t enough for anyone to get a handful. After assuring that, she had left the rest to spike up as it pleased. She hadn’t realized until much later that she actually had a nervous habit of toying with her hair. As Tristan continued to watch her, she couldn’t decide what she should do with her hands.
“Why do you look so scared? I mean, you’re always paranoid. But this is new,” he said.
She decided not to reply to that and instead looked around the restaurant again. It was getting dark. Why aren’t they here yet?
“Are all the doors locked?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“I mastered the art of flicking a lock a while back. It was a big accomplishment. I threw a party.”
She looked at him and he rolled his eyes.
“I locked them,” he said. “And I recall you promised to tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s a long story,” she mumbled.
“Oh, if only we had some time to kill.”
Her brow furrowed as she tried to decipher his tone. “You’re teasing me, again?”
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
Ruby glanced back at the windows. The light had dimmed even more, the pink clouds burning bright with the final rays. “We need to go. Now. I have to be home before dark.”
“Do you have nyctophobia or something?”
“What?”
“A pathological fear of the night,” he said.
“How do you know all these things?”
“My parents used to punish me by making me memorize the dictionary,” he said quickly. “But let’s keep on topic, shall we?”
“I’m not afraid of the dark. It’s just that, well, there’s a lot more hiding in it than you know.”
“So enlighten me.” He hooked one arm over the back of the chair and gestured to her with the other.
She balled her hands into fists in response. It was all she could do to not keep patting her pocket for reassurance that the knife was still there.
“You can’t make statements like that and not expect some follow-up questions.”
Still, she refused to respond, clenching her jaw until she felt the tension in her teeth. Then the sun slipped away. Darkness rushed through the room like a physical force, murdering any lingering traces of light and warmth.
“We need to go,” she muttered. She hadn’t realized she had been repeating the statement until Tristan spoke.
“The search party isn’t here yet.”
“They were supposed to be here before sunset,” she mumbled, unable to set her eyes on any spot for too long.“Ten minutes before.”
“Yeah, I was also made aware of that information,” he said.
“We should go. We can leave one of the doors open. They can get in that way.”
“And how exactly will they get down the hill?”
“We’ll leave the gondola on. They can figure it out. Or they can spend the night here.”
“Why don’t we give them fifteen more minutes?”
Every shadow seemed to move. Every breath of wind held a whisper. A startled cry escaped her as Tristan reached across the table and snapped his fingers to regain her attention. She stared at him, barely able to draw in air around the lump that was forming in her throat.
“Please, I want to go home.”
“Who are you afraid of?” he asked.
The question made her shuffle in her seat. She searched the room once again, half expecting one of the children to be there, like her nightmares seeping into the living world.
“Ruby, do you have a stalker? An ex that can’t let go? A random weirdo that latched onto you?”
“I don’t know,” she said at last. It was almost a physical pain to get each word past her lips. “I don’t know what they are.”
“They?”
She was rattled by the strength of her gratitude that he had picked that part of the sentence to follow up on.
“Three people.” What are you doing? Shut up. He won’t believe you.
“Three?” he prompted. “Did these three people each come to you separately, or are they working together?”
“They came after me together.” Don’t say it. Don’t say it. “They tried to kill me.”
Tristan’s eyebrows inched up his forehead. Whether in shock or disbelief, she couldn’t tell.
“Is that how you broke your ankle.”
“It was only a hairline fracture.”
“But it was during the attack?”
She nodded.
“What happened to them?” he asked.
Ruby pressed her lips into a tight, thin line.
“Did they get arrested?” he asked.
With a thick gulp, she mumbled in a soft voice. “They died. I think.”
“You think?”
“The police never found the bodies and I didn’t stick around to see if they’d try again.”
He jerked back as she suddenly snapped her head up. Reaching across the table, she grabbed his hand in a vice-like grip.
“That’s who I thought I heard on the radio. The voice sounded so much like them. I’ve seen what they do to people that invite them in. You can’t say ‘yes’.”
“So, you think that they’re coming here to kill you, but are still going to radio ahead to give you a heads up?”
A sharp laugh escaped Ruby as she turned her eyes back to the window. “They never came in without permission. In some ways, they were very polite.”
Chapter 5
Fifteen minutes turned to twenty. Twenty slowly crept to an hour. And still, the search party hadn’t arrived. Ruby gnawed on her fingernail until each pass of her teeth came with a pang of pain. The slightest traces of blood began to smear against the tip of her tongue. Tristan had turned the overhead lights on, but it hadn’t made it any better. Now, she could see all the spaces within the room, but the windows were giant slabs of consuming darkness, all of which mirrored her anxious expression back at her.
She shifted in her seat. Pulling her legs up to hug them only to slide them back down to bounce the balls of her feet against the floor. Steadily, the pain in her ankle grew, becoming sharper with every passing second. Every throb cast her mind back to that night. It was getting harder to keep her thoughts in the moment and she was losing the battle.
Fear and adrenaline had kept her going that night. The mix of hormones had allowed her to lumber on despite the searing pain that sparked in her joints and crackled up her leg. It had only been as she was on the train, bathed with the light of the sun, that she had asked the staff for first aid. Longer still for her to reach the next town over and manage to get an x-ray. It hadn’t occurred to her that she had damaged the bone. Luckily, the fracture had been minima
l and had healed quickly. But now, as she sat staring at the mirrored walls, waiting, the pain in her ankle felt like a dark omen.
Finally, Tristan had been satisfied with her limited answers and allowed them to lapse into silence. Eventually, he had gone back to his phone, scrolling through his Facebook feed to see if there had been any posts regarding the skiers. Pulling up her legs again, she felt the knife tip poke at her as she wrapped her arms once more around her knees. Rolling his shoulders, Tristan lifted his head and tried to stretch out his neck. He blinked rapidly, as if trying to force his eyes to adjust to the dimmer light of the room instead of the glare of his mobile screen.
“Huh,” he said. “It’s been an hour and a half.”
“I know,” she said tensely. “Can we please go?”
He waved her off and tapped his other hand against his microphone button. She could hear the line crackle as he opened up the channel.
“Hey, Nina. Are you there?”
“Didn’t she go home?”
“She has a master radio at home in case of emergencies,” he said before opening the line again. “Nina! Are you there? Pick up.”
Ruby’s insides melted and froze as she waited for the response to come. A gasp escaped her as a child’s voice whispered into her ear.
“I’m here.”
Tristan flashed his teeth. “Good evening, Ralph. Go get your momma.”
“I got to take my turtle in for show and tell today,” the boy said.
“That’s awesome. Hey, I bet I can shout ‘Nina’ louder than you can.”
“No you can’t.”
“We’ll see on the count of three. Ready?”
There was a sudden crackle and Nina’s voice came over the line.
“Stop teaching him to do that.”
“Then answer the radio when I call,” he said.
“Why are you even on the radio?”
“Because we’re still up on this rock, waiting for the search party to arrive,” Tristan said. “Have you heard anything on your end?”
“They haven’t checked with me. Not really. I heard some crackling a bit back so I just thought that the fog was messing around with the reception.”