Dark Horizons

by Dan Smith

  ‘What are you talking about? Let us go,’ he said again. ‘We can put this behind us.’

  ‘You’re begging,’ said Kurt. ‘That’s what you’re doing, right?’

  ‘No.’

  Kurt went to the rock and put his hand on it. ‘Begging for your life.’

  The man beside Danuri said something in Indonesian, the pitch of his voice rising, panic in his eyes. Danuri ignored him, locked eyes with Kurt.

  Kurt ran his hand over the surface of the rock, as I had once done, and I remembered the night he told me about it – how he and Michael had built the stone circle themselves. But this rock had always been here. This rock had seen life. And death.

  Danuri shook his head. ‘You don’t have to do this.’

  Kurt smiled at him.

  ‘We’re not going to die,’ Danuri said. ‘You’re going to let us go.’

  ‘He doesn’t think so,’ said Michael, pointing his unsheathed parang at Danuri’s partner. The man was a sweating wreck now, his eyes flickering this way and that like a frightened animal looking for a way out. He had been digging and carrying all night but his body would be preparing itself, supercharging his muscles for flight. He was searching for a chance to escape and it reminded me of how I felt. I, too, wanted to get away from here and although I didn’t expect to die here, it wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility. I had stepped into an insane world where almost anything could happen. It wouldn’t take much for Kurt and Michael to turn on me.

  ‘If you’re trying to frighten me, it’s not working,’ said Danuri. ‘Let me go, Kurt. We can make a deal.’

  Kurt walked around the rock, staring at him, then coming away, stalking towards his prey.

  ‘Let us go. Please.’ Danuri finally accepted Kurt’s commitment to this task. ‘You don’t have to do this.’

  Kurt came closer to him, their bodies just inches apart. ‘Of course I do,’ he said.

  ‘What about you?’ Danuri looked at me. ‘Are you going to let them do this? Do you think they’re going to let you go after this? What makes you think you’re so different from me? They’ll kill you, too. They’ll kill me and then they’ll do the same thing to you. They can’t let you tell anyone about this.’

  If it hadn’t been in their minds, it was now. Kurt and Michael both looked at me, but Domino spoke for me. ‘He’s one of us. Aren’t you, Alex?’

  ‘Yeah. Yes. I am.’

  As I said the words, though, Danuri’s partner let out a loud scream. The sound was alarming, shocking us all, giving the man a few seconds before anyone could react. He used those precious moments to take a few steps away from us, moving like a rabbit, bolting for the trees. If he made it in there, he stood a chance of outrunning Michael, losing himself, saving his life. If he was fast.

  And he was fast. But not fast enough.

  Michael squatted low as the man passed him, hefting his unsheathed machete, catching him in the hip and bringing him to the ground in an instant. The man yelped and curled himself into a ball, bringing his arms into his waist, one hand going to the spot where Michael had hit him. Almost immediately, blood began to darken his shirt.

  As Kurt stepped back and swung the rifle up to point at Danuri, Michael took one of the other man’s hands and hauled him to the rock, leaving a bloodstained scrape in the dirt. Michael leaned him against the rock, breathing hard, and turned to Kurt. ‘This one first. And you’d better get on with it or he’s gonna bleed out.’

  Kurt nodded.

  ‘I reckon you got a few minutes, then he’s drained.’ Urgency and excitement in his voice.

  Kurt turned to look at Danuri. ‘Criminals and volunteers,’ he said. ‘That’s who lies over this rock. And you … what you did to our friends … to my sister.’ Kurt shook his head. ‘You know how this happens, right? You know what they used to do?’

  I had the sense that Kurt was drawing this out, making Danuri wait longer for the inevitable. Kurt wanted to frighten him, make his last few minutes unbearable.

  ‘If you think I’m gonna eat any part of him …’ Michael said.

  ‘Time to judge them.’ Kurt turned to the rest of us. ‘Domino?’

  ‘Guilty,’ she said.

  ‘Michael?’

  ‘Guilty.’

  ‘Helena?’

  Helena was silent. She opened her mouth but no words came out. Like me, she wanted no part of it. She didn’t want to be here. She didn’t want to see men die.

  ‘I …’ Helena looked at me, her eyes pleading, looking for the answer, looking for the way out.

  ‘Don’t look at him,’ Michael shouted.

  ‘I need an answer.’ Kurt kept his eyes on Danuri. ‘Now.’

  ‘I can’t,’ she said.

  ‘You can’t? What do you mean you can’t?’

  ‘Just say “guilty”,’ Michael said. ‘Let’s get it done.’

  ‘It’s not right.’

  ‘Not right? Were you here when they came to our home?’ Kurt asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did you see what they did?’

  ‘Some of it.’

  ‘And you saw them kill Freia? The others?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you saw them beat Domino. And you know what they did to her down there. You saw.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So he’s guilty.’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Good enough,’ said Kurt.

  Then he turned round and looked at me. ‘Well?’

  I stared at him. I looked across at Michael, the bloodied machete in his hand. I glanced at the others, Helena and Domino, both of them watching me, waiting for my answer.

  ‘You said you’re one of us. Prove it.’

  I didn’t know what I was going to say. This man was guilty. He had done the things they accused him of, but we were not judges. We were not gods. We were barely even men and women. It was not our position to punish him. ‘This isn’t right,’ I said, feeling as Helena must’ve done. ‘It isn’t up to us.’

  ‘Of course it’s up to us,’ said Kurt.

  ‘We should take him to the police.’

  ‘He is the police.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘He was going to kill you,’ said Michael. ‘He was going to cut your throat.’

  So was Michael. He, too, had threatened to kill me, and I suspected he had already killed before. His friend Sully. The words were on my lips but I stopped them, knowing what consequences they would bring. I hoped Helena would have the sense to do the same.

  ‘Screw him. Four out of five is enough,’ said Michael.

  ‘It’s supposed to be unanimous,’ said Kurt.

  ‘And if he says no?’ asked Michael. ‘You telling me you’re going to let them go? He’s not one of us, Kurt. He doesn’t belong here.’

  Kurt considered for a moment. ‘You’re right. We’re going to do this anyway.’

  He nodded to Michael, who grabbed the wounded man by the scruff of his neck and dragged him to his feet. Limp as he was, the man was nothing more than dead weight and, although Michael was strong, he could not keep hold of him with just one hand. As soon as Michael turned him round and tried to force him, face forwards, over the rock, the man understood exactly what was about to happen. Despite being wounded and afraid, he was not ready to give up. He summoned his last reserves of strength and began to twist and writhe, forcing Michael to drop his parang and hold on to him with both hands. Michael managed to turn him round and push him down onto the rock, leaning across him and holding him as he jolted and bucked like a rodeo horse.

  ‘Alex,’ he shouted. ‘Get over here.’ His voice was uneven with the struggle.

  I stayed where I was, rooted to the spot.

  ‘Now. Hold him down.’

  I couldn’t comprehend what they wanted to do. After everything I had just said. Michael was asking me to hold down a man while he cut him open, hacked off his head with a machete. It was almost too much for me to process and I was unable to move. It was as if t
he message from my brain was interrupted somewhere on the path to my feet.

  ‘Help him.’ It was Kurt this time, a voice from somewhere outside the place I was now retreating into.

  ‘Fucking get over here,’ Michael said again as the man struggled beneath him, desperate to escape.

  I tried to shake my head, to make some sense of how I was feeling, but the movement was nothing more than a slight turn to one side. I was underwater, drowning in air.

  Michael was trying to hold the man with one hand. He had one foot on the ground, the other one raised because he had his knee in the small of the man’s back. His left hand was gripping the base of the man’s skull, pushing his head forwards onto the rock. Blood was spilling from his wound, washing the grey rock, soaking into it, joining the blood of those who had been executed here before him.

  With his right hand, Michael was stretching, searching blindly for the handle of the parang.

  I watched, still rooted, as Domino stepped forward, reaching down, making contact with the dark blade, pulling the machete closer as Michael tried to secure his grip on their victim. Then Domino curled her fingers around the wooden handle. She began to lift the weapon, raising it high over the man’s neck.

  Domino had been everything I wanted to be. She was without constraint. She faced the world and the things it threw at her with her head high and her feet firm. She was freer than anyone I had ever met, but I realised, now, that it was not so admirable after all. Domino and her friends were too free. They were so untethered that they felt able to act in any way they wished. They were not confined by the same rules as I was, and they were prepared even to break their own. Their almost limitless freedom and their taste for experience had led them to this.

  I managed to open my mouth, hearing myself speak one word, ‘No,’ then the man twisted to one side, a violent motion that unbalanced Michael, releasing the pressure of his knee. The man slipped from the rock and Michael’s knee crashed down on it, giving no support, and he fell forwards, hitting his face, then slipping to one side, knocking into Domino.

  Danuri took advantage of the distraction, making a break for the trees. Kurt raised the rifle and fired after him, a burst of shots, which crashed around the policeman. Danuri faltered, stumbled, clipped by one of Kurt’s bullets, but he carried on running. Kurt held the rifle tight to his shoulder, aimed and fired again, a rattle of reports. Danuri jerked, twisted, fell and disappeared from view. As the echo of the shots dissipated, Kurt ran to the edge of the forest, searching this way and that before he stopped and pointed the rifle towards the ground, where Danuri was lying. He paused for a moment, then fired another succession of shots.

  Seeing his opportunity, the second man took off in the other direction. Despite the vicious wound in his hip, he had spotted his chance to save his life and he intended to take it. Michael scrambled to his feet and threw himself at the wounded man, but he was out of reach and within a few seconds, he was safely among the trees. Michael snatched his machete from Domino and chased after him.

  Kurt left Danuri’s body in the undergrowth, coming back to us, stamping his foot in frustration and pointing the rifle into the trees, but both Michael and the other man were now invisible, as if they had never been there.

  47

  ‘Why didn’t you help him?’ Kurt came to me, wanting someone to blame. ‘Why didn’t you fucking help him?’ He waved the rifle in front of my face as if deciding whether or not to point it at me.

  ‘Leave him alone,’ said Helena. ‘It wasn’t his fault.’

  ‘It wasn’t anyone’s fault.’ I flinched away from the weapon.

  ‘Yeah?’ Kurt pointing the rifle at me now. ‘You reckon? You could’ve helped, you know. This would all be over.’

  ‘Killing Alex isn’t going to make you feel better.’ Domino still had feelings for me even though mine for her had evaporated. I was no longer infatuated. I was afraid of her. And I was afraid of her brother.

  Kurt lowered the rifle and turned away from me. ‘Why couldn’t they just leave us alone?’ Almost childlike in his anger. Someone had spoiled his game. Someone had ruined his kingdom. ‘Why couldn’t they just leave us in peace? This place was perfect. Fucking perfect. I just wanted it to be … Shit, we’ll have to leave here now. If he gets away.’

  ‘We have to leave anyway,’ Domino said. ‘It’s finished.’

  ‘We could’ve started again.’

  ‘No,’ said Domino. ‘It was finished when—’

  A single shot. A flat report from somewhere among the trees, making us all stop, listening to the silence that followed. Even the insects were muted by its intrusion. An empty space in our world that gaped for a while before it began to close as the insects resumed their chorus and time started once more. Then the distant sound of disturbance in the undergrowth.

  Domino cocked her head. ‘You hear that?’

  We all listened to the approaching footsteps.

  Kurt raised his rifle.

  Heavy footfalls moving among the trees.

  ‘Michael?’ Kurt called. ‘Is that you?’ He tucked the rifle to his shoulder and waited. ‘Michael?’

  Then he appeared from the thick forest, grotesque and horrifying, like some untamed savage. He was out of breath and sweating, the moisture glistening on his skin. Michael still held the parang in his right hand. The blade was dark with blood, his naked torso splattered. In his left hand, the trophy, which he raised to show us, as Perseus might have raised Medusa’s head. The hair was tangled in his bloodied fingers, matted and vile. The man’s eyes were open as if to turn us to stone, and his mouth was contorted in a scream of fear and panic. Among the broken teeth there was a glint of gold.

  ‘Got the little fucker,’ he said to Kurt with a grin. ‘Had to use the pistol to stop him running, but I got him.’ Then he looked over at me, his body becoming tense. ‘And as for you …’

  Michael dropped his grim prize and strode towards me with great purpose as my mind reeled in horror. Without pausing, his right fist still clenching his weapon, he came at me and crashed the butt of the machete into the side of my head. For a moment everything was numb.

  Then nothing.

  It was the third and last time Michael hit me. I’d never been hit before I met him. Never been in a fight of any kind. I’d seen fights. Seen them on the streets at night, when the pavements were wet and the streetlights were reflected in shop windows. Ugly and blunt and unpleasant.

  I hadn’t even had time to register it was going to happen when Michael hit me. And when I opened my eyes, I realised he must’ve knocked me out this time. The feeling in my head was much the same as it had been when I woke from the bus crash that had led me to this point. A pounding beneath my skull, the sensation that my brain was swelling like a sponge in water, ever expanding, pushing against its containment, determined to break free.

  Everything was ending as it had begun.

  I opened my eyes and looked up, the treetops swaying and spinning above my head.

  ‘Get off him. Michael! Jesus Christ, you trying to kill him?’ I think it was Domino who was shouting, but I couldn’t be sure. Her voice was distorted, reverberating. I tried to turn my head to see if it was her, but my neck was stiff and painful and refused to do what I asked of it.

  I blinked hard, opening my eyes in a stare, taking in too much light and immediately feeling a sharp pain behind them, forcing me to close them again.

  ‘If that’s what it takes,’ said another voice. ‘Yeah. Why not? Everything’s gone to shit since he turned up.’ A man speaking. Could have been Michael. Or maybe Kurt.

  Then someone was beside me, putting their hands on my head. I opened my eyes, not much more than a slit, and looked at Helena. She showed me a reassuring smile, but Michael yanked her away before I could focus on her face. ‘Get away from him.’ His temper burning beyond control, his lust for blood heightened to a frenzy. Helena lost her balance as she spun round and fell at his feet. Her place at my side was filled by Domino.
/>
  I concentrated on fighting the dizziness that brought on the feeling of nausea. I swallowed hard, determined not to throw up.

  ‘Help him up,’ Domino said. ‘Help him.’

  ‘I’ll fucking help him.’ Strong hands were on me, rough and unkind. I was lifted into a sitting position and dragged backwards.

  ‘Be careful.’

  I was propped against something hard – the rock, I assumed – and hefted up, hands under my arms. When I was turned round, I knew what they were going to do. I had seen what Michael had done to Danuri’s man and I knew he intended to do the same to me. I put my hands against the smooth surface of the execution stone and resisted, but I was weak. They pressed me against the rock, hard so it restricted my breathing, my cheek against the cold surface.

  I knew that men had died here. I could smell the death.

  ‘Please …’ was all I managed before a hand was on my head, pushing my face harder to the rock. I felt my teeth against the inside of my cheek, and then something touched the back of my neck. Something sharp.

  ‘Stop it,’ someone shouted behind me, and I was jostled as the hands left me and I heard the sound of a scuffle. Free to move, I twisted myself round, tried to stand, but the pounding in my skull beat harder. So hard, so hard. My legs buckled beneath me and I slid to a sitting position, leaning back against the stone as I had done that night with Kurt.

  I closed my eyes again and waited for the drunken feeling to pass while I listened to the garbled voices talking, arguing, just out of my range of understanding.

  When I had the strength to move again, I raised my hands to my face and rubbed some life into it. I looked up at the others – three of them staring down at me, Domino beside me, asking if I was all right.