The Saint of Wolves and Butchers

by Alex Grecian

  Maddy made up her mind and snuck down the hall to where it widened out into the big communal space where they ate breakfast. She felt a soft presence and reached out, twined her fingers in the fur at Bear’s throat. She could see three figures, all in dark clothing, moving slowly through the living room, in and out of shadows. But they weren’t paying attention to the television or Emmaline’s antique vase or even the spare change in the jar by the front door.

  Maddy couldn’t tell whether they had guns. She moved to her right and into the kitchen and Bear followed her, massive yet insubstantial as a ghost. The back door was standing ajar, the tiny window above the dead bolt broken, glass and ice dusting the linoleum. Cold air blew hard against Maddy’s legs. Light from a street lamp pushed through the kitchen window, silhouetting a wooden knife block on the counter. Maddy reached out for a butcher knife, then pulled her hand back. She could barely breathe and her pulse drummed against her skull. Stabbing a grown man wasn’t something she could do, and she knew it.

  Then a creak in the hallway. Someone moving toward the front of the house. Her mother had a gun and was going alone against three burglars.

  Maddy saw her phone on the little table where her mother sat to pay the bills. She unplugged it and swept the phone’s home screen up, ducked and yelled “Hey, you guys!” Then she thrust the phone high above her head, aimed it at the pass-through above the counter, and snapped a picture.

  She ducked down and crawled toward the living room, hoping the flash had distracted the men long enough to give her mother an advantage.

  She could hear male voices shouting behind her, heard an earthshaking crash, and then Bear had the back of her pajama top in his teeth and she was off her feet, carried across the kitchen, over the threshold, and deposited on the frozen grass outside.

  6

  First, the temperature in the house had suddenly plummeted. Then there had been a flash of light and the sound of glass breaking. Skottie heard Maddy yell and she stood frozen in place, trying to pinpoint the sound. She couldn’t fire without knowing where Maddy was. She was carrying her shotgun, a Mossberg 500, which held five rounds, and her Glock was in the waistband of her yoga pants, at the back, giving her another seventeen shots if she needed them. There were two rifles in the open gun safe if she had to retreat to her bedroom. Unless an army had broken into the house, Skottie felt confident she could protect herself and her family. But the element of surprise would be useful. If she could get to the living room quickly and quietly, she might be able to get the intruders to stand down and end the situation peacefully. Unless they had Maddy. Maddy was supposed to be under her bed, out of harm’s way. But of course she wasn’t. Skottie silently cursed herself for letting the girl out of her sight.

  Skottie wished she could move her ears independently, the way Bear did. There were too many ambient sounds, and it was hard to pick out the exact location of the intruders.

  A shadow materialized at the end of the hallway and lunged at her, too tall to be Maddy or Emmaline. Skottie didn’t hesitate. She raised her gun and slammed it butt-first into the intruder’s gut.

  The shadow hollered and dropped, hit the floor hard. Behind Skottie, Emmaline’s bedroom door opened.

  “What’s going on out here?”

  “Get back in your room, Mom. Go!” Skottie jumped over the writhing shape on the floor and left the hallway in a crouch. To her right, across the kitchen, the back door was wide open and banging into the wall. She couldn’t see Maddy anywhere. She put her back to the end of the counter and poked her head low around the side. The dining room was empty. There was a short wall in front of her where the end of the hallway extended into the living room, making room for her own bedroom on the other side. Skottie crossed to it and flattened herself out, then snuck a look into the living room. The big picture window was broken and two figures stood beside the front door, in the act of pulling it open, their backs to her.

  She stepped out and pumped the shotgun to get their attention.

  “Step back from the door and raise your—”

  But she was too late. The door was open and the two men were through it before she could finish her sentence. She chased after them, across the living room and out onto the porch, the shotgun resting on her shoulder. She flicked on the light above the door with her free hand, knowing it would make her more visible to them, but wanting them to see that she was armed. She considered chasing them down, but halted on the top step. Maddy and Emmaline were still in the house with one of the intruders.

  Somewhere out in the darkness an engine started. Two car doors slammed shut and a vehicle squealed past her with its lights off. She saw a red streak on silver paint as the car turned the corner and fog swallowed it up.

  She went inside and closed the door, locked it and switched off the porch light, then turned on the lamp next to Emmaline’s favorite chair. Curtains billowed in the cold air from the broken window, but she didn’t see a lot of glass on the floor. She went through the kitchen to the back door and glanced outside, but the yard was empty. She closed the door and threw the bolt and walked back through the kitchen, turning on lights as she went.

  “Maddy?”

  No answer.

  “Maddy, you can come out now, baby.”

  Emmaline was kneeling at the near end of the hallway, holding one of the rifles from the safe. When she saw Skottie, she used it to push herself up from the floor and stand.

  “I took care of this one,” Emmaline said.

  The man Skottie had hit was lying on the floor in a fetal position. His wrists and ankles had been tied together behind him with a long orange extension cord, and he was grunting in pain, shouting into the throw rug beneath him.

  “Police,” he said. “I’m police!”

  “Deputy Puckett,” Skottie said, “what the hell are you doing in my house?”

  7

  Donnie saw the girl and he slowed the car, followed her at a walking pace down the street with the headlights off. They were a block over from the trooper’s house and there wasn’t a light on anywhere. He figured she heard the car, but she didn’t look up.

  “That’s the statie’s kid.”

  “Go,” Lance said. “Just get out of here.”

  “No,” Donnie said. “If we got her kid, we got the upper hand.”

  “Fuck you, that’s federal. Besides, my arm hurts, man.”

  Donnie knew what he meant. So far, they were guilty of breaking and entering, probably a home invasion. If they got caught, kidnapping would carry a much higher sentence. But playing it out in his head, Donnie thought they could get away with it.

  “Get me to the hospital, Donnie,” Lance said.

  “It’s not that bad. If you didn’t stick your arm through the window—”

  “I got startled.”

  “One thing at a time,” Donnie said. “If we got her kid, the statie’s not gonna call the cops,” he said.

  “Hell she won’t. She is a cop. They look after their own.”

  “She’s a state trooper. They got their own territory out on the highway, not here in town. Hell, they don’t even know the regular cops, the ones who respond to 911 calls.” Donnie wasn’t sure this was correct, but he needed Lance to calm down long enough to listen to his newly hatched plan. “Anyway, she won’t call the cops because she’s gonna get fired if she causes any more trouble. The reverend’s lawyers made sure of it.”

  “This is us causing her trouble. Why wouldn’t she call for help?”

  “Well, she won’t call right away. She’s gonna wanna see what we have to say first.”

  “So we can trade her the kid for Christian.”

  “We can’t leave him in there. But we’re not gonna hurt anybody. She gets the kid, we get our friend. And this whole thing might be scary enough she decides to leave town. Mission accomplished.”

  “What if she doesn’t wa
nna do what we say?”

  “It’s her kid,” Donnie said.

  “Those people don’t care about their kids like we do.”

  Donnie shrugged. “Everybody cares about their kids. Even animals. On YouTube one time I seen a mother giraffe chase a buncha lions away from its baby. It’s some kinda instinct.”

  “Pride.”

  “Just nature, I think.”

  “No, a buncha lions is called a pride,” Lance said.

  “Oh, yeah. I knew that. Anyway, you in?”

  “Yeah, I guess. Long as she doesn’t call the rest of the cops.”

  “I’m telling you, she won’t,” Donnie said.

  “But then we gotta go to a hospital. My arm, man.”

  “After this we’ll go see the reverend and he’ll fix it up hisself.”

  Donnie pulled the car to the curb and put it in park, left the motor running. Lance got out on the passenger side and Donnie turned on the headlights. At the same time he popped the trunk open from inside so they’d have a place to put the girl. When the lights hit her, the girl stopped and turned around with a scared look on her face. Donnie chuckled and jumped out of the car to help Lance grab her.

  The fog closed in around him as soon as he stepped away from the car, but he could see a moving shape off to the side that he assumed was Lance. Donnie moved out into the street so he could flank the girl. She was backing away more slowly than he was advancing, holding her phone up close to her face.

  “Hey, girl, whatcha doing out so late?”

  She held the phone up. “Waiting for you to get close enough I could do this,” she said. There was a flash of light. “I already called the police and I just got your picture.”

  Donnie didn’t figure she’d called the police. If so, they’d still have her on the line. “Too foggy,” he said. “You got a pic of fog, is all.”

  That confused her and she looked down at the phone. As soon as her eyes weren’t on him, he leapt at her and grabbed the phone out of her hands. He got his elbow around her neck to hold her still and glanced at the phone’s screen. She’d already exited the camera app, and there was a green bar directing her back to her phone call. His stomach turned over. She really had called the police. He threw the phone to the ground and stomped on it with his boot heel, hoping that would end the call, that the police hadn’t traced the phone. At the same time, somewhere off to his left, Lance started screaming.

  “Lance?”

  “Get it off me!”

  “Where are you, man?”

  “Donnie!”

  Donnie held tight to the girl, who was struggling harder now, digging into his arm with her fingernails, and dragged her along with him through the fog.

  “I can’t see you,” he said. “Lance?”

  Lance had gone silent.

  The girl bit into his hand and Donnie yelped, let go. She ran and disappeared in the darkness. Donnie froze in place, listening for her footsteps.

  “Donnie, where you at?” Lance’s voice was no more than a step or two away.

  Donnie gave up on the girl for the moment, shuffled to his left until he almost tripped over his friend. He squatted and put his hand on Lance’s chest.

  “You hurt?”

  “Can’t tell. My arm’s real bad, though. Feels cold, but like it’s on fire.”

  Donnie squinted, looking his friend up and down. The arm really was bad. There was a pool of blood under Lance, and it was growing.

  “Can you get up?”

  “Shhh. It’s still out there, man. It attacked me.”

  “What attacked you?”

  “It was like a werewolf,” Lance said. “Swear to God, running around out there in the fog.”

  “There’s no—” But Lance grabbed him and cut him off, pointing at something behind Donnie.

  Donnie turned and saw a black lion step out of the mist. Donnie stiffened. The beast stood silently, watching him for a moment. He didn’t realize it, but Donnie was waiting for the animal to growl, to snarl, for some warning that it was going to attack. When that happened, his fight-or-flight response would kick in and he would act. But when it finally did move, there was no signal or sign. It was on them in an instant, its hot breath in Donnie’s face, its black lips drawn back, its fangs dripping. Lance was screaming again, but that was the only sound Donnie could hear. His bladder let go, warmth spreading down his left leg, and he fell back, smacking his head against the pavement.

  “Bear!” The little girl’s voice, somewhere out there behind the curtain of fog.

  And the beast was gone, responding to the girl’s summons, a dark blur, gray upon gray, and then nothing.

  Donnie lay next to Lance in the middle of the street, waiting for his friend to calm down. When Lance’s screams turned to gasps, Donnie rolled over and pushed himself up.

  “Shut up,” he said.

  “Huh?”

  “Shut up and lemme listen.”

  Lance stopped whimpering, even held his breath, while Donnie stared into the fog and concentrated so hard that he gave himself a headache. At last he got to his feet and held out his hand to help Lance up.

  “C’mon,” he said. “Unless your arm’s falling the fuck off, we gotta get moving.”

  “The werewolf,” Lance said.

  “That’s the guy’s dog.” Donnie was embarrassed that he’d thought it was a lion, but at least he wasn’t blubbering about it like Lance was. His wet jeans were starting to feel icy cold, and he kept his body angled away from Lance so he wouldn’t notice the dark spot. “The foreign guy. It’s a big damn thing, but it’s just a dog. I killed dogs before.”

  “What are we gonna do?”

  “We’re gonna hurry the hell up. That dog’s so big, it can’t move quiet in this. The crust of ice on the snow. It’s breaking through every time it takes a step. You can hear it, you listen close, but we gotta hurry or we’ll lose it.”

  “I don’t think I wanna find it.”

  “You wanna get Christian back from the statie or go back to the reverend empty-handed? That’s his nephew or something, man.”

  “We can’t go faster than a dog, Donnie.”

  “We can if it’s going slow. Like if it’s trying to stay close by a little girl.”

  8

  “Mom, I can’t find Maddy!”

  Emmaline glared at Deputy Christian Puckett, who wasn’t looking at anyone, just rocking back and forth trying to get his arms free from the electrical cord wrapped around them.

  “Where’s my granddaughter?”

  “I don’t know, I swear.”

  “Your friends took her?”

  “No way!”

  “Check her room,” Skottie said. “I told her to hide under her bed. Maybe she went back in there.”

  Emmaline nodded, her angry expression replaced by one of concern. She turned and scampered down the hall to Maddy’s room. Skottie propped her shotgun against the wall in the living room and went to where Christian was lying, braced herself behind him, and yanked him up by the arms. He squirmed, but she kicked him in the back of his knee and he went limp. Skottie retrieved her gun and leaned against the wall.

  “What was the plan here, Deputy?”

  “We weren’t gonna hurt nobody.”

  “That’s why you break into my home? So you won’t hurt me? So you won’t hurt my daughter?”

  Emmaline emerged from Maddy’s room and stood at the other end of the hall for a moment before crossing into Skottie’s room. Skottie poked Christian with the barrel of the shotgun.

  “Don’t move,” she said. She walked past him and glanced in through Maddy’s bedroom door before looking in her own room. Emmaline was on her hands and knees, her head under Skottie’s bed.

  “Mom?”

  Emmaline pulled her head out and sat back, smoothed her nightgown over
her knees. Her hair was in a net and her face was free of makeup. She looked small and vulnerable, something Skottie had never noticed about her before.

  “I can’t find her. She’s not here.”

  Skottie went back down the hall. Christian had just gained his feet, sliding himself up the wall, and she kicked his leg again as she passed him, forcing him back down. He stifled a yelp.

  She hurried through the rest of the house again, checking behind the sofa, under the dining room table, and opening the cabinet doors. She unlocked the back door and stepped outside too fast, skidding out onto the patio, snow arcing up over her bare feet. Moonlight through the fog made the backyard glow as bright as sunrise, but there was no sign of movement, no sense of a living creature anywhere. Bear’s paw prints were everywhere, crisscrossing over themselves, but the only human tracks she could see were her own.

  “Maddy?”

  No answer. Nothing moved in the floating white.

  “Maddy? Baby, are you there?”

  If Maddy had been hurt, she might not be able to respond. Then again, she might not be alone.

  “Bear?”

  The quiet dog didn’t materialize.

  “Bear, come. Come here, boy.” She wished she knew the right words, the right language. But she didn’t think the dog was there. The yard had an empty feeling.

  Fighting her rising panic, Skottie backed away from the door and closed it. She went back through the kitchen to the hallway, where Christian had regained his feet and was hopping as fast as he could from an angry Emmaline, who had found a broom and was swatting him with it. Skottie grabbed him by the collar of his uniform jacket and hauled him forward, faster than he could hobble. She stood aside and let him fall on the living room floor where there was more room to maneuver than there was in the narrow hallway. Then she turned him over and pulled his face up to hers.