by Sara Clancy
“We’ve done our two nights,” Tristan cut her off. “And now we’re getting the hell out of here.”
“Any idea on how we do that exactly?” she asked.
“I don’t know. But I’m willing to try anything. Honestly, I don’t care if I die trying. At least that way I get to rob the little shits of the joy they would get from killing me. And that would make it all worth it.”
The beginnings of a smile crossed Ruby’s face as she released a breathy laugh.
“Come on,” he said as he extended his hand down to help her up. “Let’s go find a way out of here.”
Her smile turned into an agonized hiss as she let him pull her to her feet. Having been still for so long, her body revolted against the sudden movement. It was only then that it occurred to her that both her knife wound and her injured ankle were on the same leg. She couldn’t decide if this was a blessing or not as she tried to put some of her body weight onto it. The pain it provoked was like a branding iron under her skin, and she brought her foot back up with a cry. You can endure it if you have to, she told herself sternly and forced her foot back down. Prepared, she managed to place a little bit of weight on it, but not much.
“Did I do that?” Tristan’s wide eyes were focused on the blood stains that covered her thigh.
She shook her head and gripped his forearms tightly, using him for balance until the crashing waves of pain ebbed into something more endurable. “No. It was an accident when I fell over. But I need to clean it up. Help me to the kitchen?”
Draping her arm over his shoulders, Tristan kept the injured limb between them, protecting it from any outside attacks. They made quick time crossing the small room, but then hesitated at the door. Glancing at each other out of the corner of their eyes, neither said a word nor made a move for the handle. With the throb in her leg forcing her hand, she carefully turned the knob. The little click of metal sounded like thunder in the tense silence. She pushed it open. It barely made it more than an inch before it disappeared within the gathered fog.
Neither could believe what they were seeing. They stood in horror as the door swung wide. The fog filled the hallway and the glowing white oblivion streamed into the threshold. It filled every inch, churning it into a wall before them. With the current, it took her a moment to notice that the fog was squirming. Within seconds, it was as if the mist was filled with a writhing horde, each person desperately attempting to claw their way free. Screaming faces pressed against the confines, pushing out towards them before fading back into the hellish landscape.
Tristan’s hand shot up, instinctively reaching for the door with the intent to slam it shut again. In the last second, he thought better of it, and stopped before he could touch the demonic cloud. Unable to close the door, all they could do was limp back from the threshold, only stopping once the edge of a table pressed against their thighs.
“We’re trapped,” he muttered.
She didn’t know if he had simply needed to hear the words aloud or if he was hoping she would correct him. Resting her weight against the table, Ruby breathed deeply and tried to control the pain that was rattling through her.
“Do you still have the radio?” she asked.
His spine straightened as he began scrambling at his waistband. The moment it was in his hand, he clicked it on. It released a little happy tune as it powered up. Holding it between them, Tristan pressed down on the button and called for Nina. It took a few tries for her to reply. There were a few voices in the background, all of them sounding sharp and precise, instructing her on what to say. Ruby couldn’t recognize any of them.
“Who’s there with you?” Tristan demanded before Ruby could.
“The police,” Nina said quickly. “Are you both okay? We’ve been trying to reach you all night.”
Tristan kept his eyes on the writhing fog. “You guys can’t get up here, can you?”
“No,” Nina said reluctantly. “The cloud cover is still too thick. Are the intruders still trying to get in? Tristan, are you both okay?”
Tristan met Ruby’s gaze before answering that they were. The conversation carried on without any need for Ruby to speak. Tristan carefully edited the events, keeping some of the finer details to himself, but still offering enough for their would-be rescuers to know just how bad their situation was. It allowed Ruby to draw her attention away from what was happening around her. She didn’t have the strength to recall the events of their night in hell and keep her wits intact. Looking for a distraction, it was easy for the threshold to keep her captivated. The faces howled at her with unheard torment, their eyes sunken holes, their jaws twisting up into distorted angles.
“We need to get out of here,” Tristan said, the crisp words drawing her attention.
She found that his focus was also centered on the door. His subtle attempts to retreat further made the table jolt under them.
“They might be able to get up there late this afternoon,” Nina said.
“Today,” he cut in. “Before nightfall. We’re coming down to you.”
It seemed like everyone on the other side of the line started talking at once. The combination of voices crammed into the radio until it all became a garbled mess. Still, the overall message was clear. Hiking down the path in this weather was essentially suicide. There were too many blind corners and sheer drops. One wrong step would be their last. As they listened to the onslaught of commands, they turned to each other. While his face was a blank slate to her, she could almost feel the question he was putting to her. Do you want to make a run for it? Biting her lips, the pain hardly noticeable against everything else, she nodded.
“Is there a manual for the gondola?” Ruby asked once the others had subsided in their warnings.
“You think that you might be able to fix it from up there?” Nina said before quickly instructing them to which locker in the gondola room they would need and the shelf it should be stored on.
“We might not be able to see enough through the fog to do anything,” Ruby said.
“Radio me as soon as you’re there. I’ll try and talk you through it.”
“Right,” Tristan said. “But we need to save the battery so we’re going to have turn this off now.”
He threw the switch and the sharp click of the radio cut off Nina’s voice. Once more, they sat alone in the silence, each trying to come to terms with the course of action they had committed themselves to. For perhaps the first time in her life, Ruby felt herself perfectly understood without the need for words. They had agreed that, live or die, this would be their last day on the mountain.
Chapter 14
“This is a really flawed plan,” Tristan said as they stood before the threshold. “To say the very least.”
“Can you think of anything better?” she asked.
He tilted his head to the side. “No. But that doesn’t make it any better.”
“When the time comes, I’ll go first. That way, if it doesn’t work, at least you’ll know.”
“And you’ll plummet to your death,” he noted. “That doesn’t exactly make me feel better.”
“That’s sweet,” she teased. After a moment of staring into the abyss, she added. “You do know where the tablecloths are, right?”
“Yep,” he nodded quickly.
“We could split up to save time. I can go to the first aid kit while you get the sheets.”
“Remember last time we got separated?”
Her stomach rolled at the memory of the phantom hand within her palm. She wasn’t sure if Tristan was injured, drained by the sleepless nights, or just terrified. And she didn’t ask. Especially because any question could lead back to the knowledge that the black eyed children could move him like a meat puppet. She couldn’t begin to fathom the ways it was tormenting him. But she knew that she lacked any of the skills necessary to help him if she opened a mental wound.
Tristan clicked on the heavy flashlight and trained it onto the mist. Each particle seemed to shine with its own light, giving it an almost
delicate beauty, even with the faces still writhing against the surface. Swallowing thickly, she forced her feet to shuffle closer. The figures of mist were quick to respond. Tristan’s arm tightened around her shoulders, bringing her to a stop.
The ghostly hands swelled out, beckoning them closer. It’s just a trick. They want to keep you trapped. Her self-reassurances didn’t quiet her rampaging heart, but it did allow her to take that final step through the doorway. The cold ravaged her instantly, showing no mercy to her wounds. Her muscles seized and she clutched Tristan to keep from crumbling to the ground. After barely a step, he had to return the favor.
A thousand hands grabbed her, their ghostly fingers yanking her in a dozen directions at once, each one trying to push or twist her around, attempting to disorientate them. Tristan fought against the hold, dragging himself and Ruby towards the cupboard with unwavering determination. The haze distorted the dimensions of the room. One moment, the hallway traveled on forever. Then, just as suddenly, they were colliding into walls and toppling frying pans down upon them.
Tristan kept to his set path, trusting in his memory more than his senses. Ruby clung to her faith that he knew what he was doing. Abruptly, Tristan made them drop to their knees. The mist concealed the cupboard before them, but she could hear him battling against them. Ruby set to the task, but the doors refused to budge. The hands clawed at their backs, attempting to drag her away as she reached into her pocket and pulled out her knife.
Careful of the blade, she fumbled her fingers over the door to find the edges and slipped the tip into the gap. With a solid push, she had just enough leverage to crack the door open. The wooden frame splintered apart and she ripped the door almost off of its hinges. Instantly, she began to drag the tablecloths into her arms. The crisp material didn’t seem real as it pressed against her palms. A part of her expected them to disappear from her grasp. Tristan’s scream made her jump. She whipped around but couldn’t see anything. Couldn’t hear anything. They can’t be here, she told herself. It’s daylight. Slowly, she got to her feet, her numb fingers clutching her knife and sheets tightly to her chest.
“Tristan?” she whispered anxiously.
His name passed her frozen lips, distorted and strained.
“Tristan?”
She spun herself around and pressed her back against the wall of the cabinet. There was nothing to see, but she couldn’t stop her eyes from restlessly shifting around. The mist was in constant motion but revealed nothing.
“Ruby.”
The breathy voice crept over her like a swarm of spiders. Don’t drop the tablecloths! The words screamed within her head and she obediently tightened her grip. She knew that they were trying to force her to abandon the material and perhaps leave behind their only chance to get out of here.
“Tristan!”
“What?” his question came from just beside her, the sudden proximity making her shriek. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Where did you go?” she asked.
“I didn’t go anywhere.”
He thumped against her side as he awkwardly lurched to his feet. If it wasn’t for the bundle in her arms, she wouldn’t have been able to keep herself from slashing wildly at the contact.
“It’s just me,” he whispered. “Come on, we need to get back.”
His assurances didn’t ease her nerves but she couldn’t stand to wait any longer. It was hard to believe, even as she huddled close to his side and followed him to the first aid kit, that it was really him. Her heart slammed against her ribs as she heard him struggling to open the metal box. The disorientation played upon her paranoia.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ve got what we need. Let’s get back.”
The moment they began to retreat, the hands returned. They gathered in her jacket and tried to draw her back. Her shoes squeaked as she was forced back. Digging in her heels, she pushed forward, the effort producing a new level of pain. Despite it all, she wouldn’t have been able to make it a step further if it wasn’t for Tristan’s hold.
As they surged forward, she heard his voice calling to her from far behind. She tried to ignore it. To block out the cries and pleas and screams of pain. To just keep moving forward, trusting the Tristan at her side was the real one. The sheets slipped from her hands to tangle around her legs as she lumbered forward. Her bones rattled as she hit floor, and if it wasn’t for the sheets, she may have impaled herself. Desperate, she pushed herself onto the knees and began to crawl forward, pushing the tablecloths before her. Blindly, she reached out. Joy washed over her when her fingers hooked around the edge of the staff room doorway.
Her fingernails clawed into the wood as a hand latched onto her injured ankle, squeezing until she screamed in pain. She dragged herself forward. But for every few inches that she won, the hand dragged her back, keeping her locked within the arctic mist. Kicking wildly, she squirmed and shook, every attempt for freedom only adding to the agony within her leg.
Hands grabbed her wrist. She didn’t know if it was Tristan or not, but they were pulling her in the right direction and she gave herself over to them. The phantom fingers on her leg scraped along her skin, the tender flesh peeling back under the rough grip. Dragging herself forward a little further, she was finally able to hook her arms over the doorframe. Emerging from the mist, the florescent lights seemed as powerful as the sun. She squinted against it as Tristan dragged her inside the room. With one final whisper of her name, the hand let go. It was only once she was inside, curled on the floor and cradling her ankle, that she realized she was sobbing.
“Let me see,” Tristan said as he gently touched her leg.
The slight touch transformed the sparks of pain into a blazing inferno. She screamed as her vision blurred. Hot blood bubbled up around her fingers while Tristan tried to soothe her. Pushing up onto her forearms, she had to force her hands away to see the wound. Despite what she had felt, a clear human bite mark tore open the skin of her ankle. She only had a few moments to stare in shock before Tristan wrapped a bandage around her leg in an attempt to stop the slowly flowing blood.
“You’re okay,” Tristan said between his panted breaths. “You’re okay now. We got what we needed.”
Ruby didn’t answer. Instead, she slumped back, willing her heartbeat to slow and her mind to clear. The new angle brought the wailing mist back into her view and she curled away from it.
“Can you stand?” Tristan asked.
“It hurts,” was the only response she could get past the lump in her throat.
“I know.”
She could hear him bringing the tablecloths closer and he shifted to sit by her side. If he intended to or not, he blocked her line of sight to the door and she would be endlessly grateful for it.
“Let’s get started on this,” he said as he passed her the knife that had slipped from her grip.
Carefully, he began to rip the sheets into long, thick strips. Watching him work helped her settle and she sat up to do her part. Once they had a decent pile of ribbons to work from, Ruby took to knotting the ends together, creating an ever-expanding rope.
“How far down is it to the gondola room?” she asked.
It was the first words she had spoken in a while and they seemed to catch him off guard. “I’m not sure.”
“Do you think we’ll have enough?”
He tilted his head to the side before ripping off another chunk. “Maybe. We might have to jump the last bit.”
They both knew what was being left unsaid. Even though one whole side of the gondola room was opened up to the elements, climbing down to it from the roof wouldn’t be the easiest thing. And if they missed, there would be nothing to catch them before they landed on the rocky slope below. Still, this had been the best plan of all the ones they had thought up. Mostly because it allowed them to bypass the hallway. After yesterday, neither of them were ready to venture through it again. And given how much stronger the figments in the mist had become, plummeting down a cliff edge sounded a l
ot more appealing to her than being trapped within the endless hallways.
Tugging the last knot into place, she instructed Tristan to lift up the other end so they could evaluate their work. Their rope was long and looked to have some decent strength to it. But there was no way to know if it could actually hold their weight. Not until one of us tries it, she thought.
“So,” Tristan said, snapping her from her thoughts. “How are we going to get to the roof without running into those things?”
Chapter 15
Ruby tested the knot one more time, making sure that the rope was securely tied around her waist before she headed towards the door. She knew that she was just stalling, trying to hold off the inevitable for a moment longer. But time wasn’t something they had on their side. Their radio check in with Nina had proven that. It had only felt like a few hours to them but, according to her, it was well past midday. If they didn’t move soon, she and Tristan would be better off getting ready for another night in the staff room.
“Okay. I can do this,” Tristan muttered to himself as he bounced on his toes. He nodded quickly. “I know the way.”
“I know you do,” she said in a way she hoped sounded reassuring. “You lead the way. I’ll follow.”
Still staring at the door, he tightened the knot against his stomach. They had used the rope to tether themselves together and wrapped the excess around their shoulders. It was awkward and cumbersome to move around while tangled up like that, but it was better than struggling with it piled within their arms. Ruby shifted her weight onto her good foot, trying to relieve some of the pain that the pressure created. The wound on her thigh had already begun to puff and swell, becoming tender enough that the slightest touch made her want to weep.
“Can you make it up the stairs?” Tristan asked.
“I don’t have much of a choice,” she replied.
Tristan nodded hard enough that his curls bounced wildly. “If we stick together, we’ll be okay.”
“As long as you know the way,” she said with a smile.