Frozen Stiff

by Sherry Shahan

  She knelt down and drew her finger through the damp earth.

  A third set of prints trudged down the trail; smaller than Wildman’s, but pressed by the same type of homemade boot.

  There could only be one answer and she knew it. Wildman had a partner.

  Until now she’d tried not to think about what she would do after she caught up to Derek and Wildman. She’d counted her steps, her breaths—anything to not think about it, hoping she’d come up with a plan and spring into action when the time came.

  Adrenaline will kick in. The whisper came on the edge of consciousness. Instinct will take over.

  Now everything had changed. There was another person. But she still had to find Derek.

  Fog moved in on the mountain in front of her, from the ocean end of Russell Fjord, where the Pacific Ocean filled Yakutat Bay. Fog from the sea, but as white as bleached bones in the desert. It moved like water tumbling down the mountain, wiping out vast sections of trees. Seconds later it lifted and framed a rock outcropping, then dropped just as quickly and obliterated the entire scene.

  Cody spun around, startled by a sound shattering the mountain silence. The sound was foreign. She listened, clinging tightly to the straps of her pack.

  Her gaze scanned the nearby woods. She could see up to ten feet in some directions, depending on light and vegetation. She made herself smaller, squatting down.

  The noise grew in intensity.

  Cody jumped up and let the sound of rotary blades wash over her: a helicopter. “I’m down here!” she yelled at the chopper, hearing it somewhere above her.

  “Here I am!” Her leg began bleeding again. She quickly untied the T-shirt bandage and waved the bloody flag in the air. “Down here!”

  First I’ll tell them about Derek, then Wildmen. They won’t stand a chance now. Their game is finished!

  Cody dropped her pack. She thought about climbing a tree and tying the T-shirt on top like an SOS. But even the lower branches were too high, so she just waved the bloody shirt, screaming, “I’m down here!”

  The sound grew less intense.

  It’s looking for a place to land, she told herself. There has to be a place somewhere!

  The pilot must have seen the fire and the tent. He must have spotted the kayak. The sound of whirling blades faded to a flat hum, like that of distant bees. Looking for a place to land; looking for a place!

  They know I’m down here. We’re down here.

  Don’t panic!

  Finally the sound vanished into the mist.

  She laughed like someone on the verge of madness. Back to Yakutat for reinforcements—that must be it!

  Cody collapsed on the ground and rubbed fresh mud over her wound. The T-shirt again took its place as a bandage. It would have been easy to make an arrow with rocks. An arrow in the clearing near the tent pointing to the stream, leading them to the abandoned pots, eventually to Wildmen’s trail.

  The neglected fire and empty tent would tell them the camp was deserted.

  Cody shrugged into her pack. She saw a feather on the ground in a bed of leaves. Probably a buzzard feather. Picking it up, she recognized it as belonging to an eagle. An eagle?

  “I can’t even tell the difference between a buzzard and an eagle!” she said aloud.

  And then to herself: I don’t belong out here alone.

  Up the mountain, the fog parted again. This time the opening highlighted a section of trail on steep, rugged terrain with few trees. Three beetle-sized dots stuck out against the pale granite: all three moving, hunched over, as if searching the ground for something lost.

  “Derek,” she muttered.

  Then the fog returned and swallowed them up.

  At least he wasn’t hurt. The rescuers would be coming soon. Don’t worry, help is on the way.

  Hour after hour Don’t worry, Derek repeated itself in Cody’s mind as she walked the trail that no longer climbed up the mountain. She was now walking parallel to the fjord and moving in the direction of Hubbard. In some places the ground was so wet that it was like walking on a soggy sponge.

  Still, no sounds.

  No chopper or airplane.

  It didn’t make sense.

  Maybe the windswept water was too rough for a seaplane. Maybe the fjord was too narrow. She strained to hear the sound of a boat or plane engine. Then she stopped and looked around for a place to hold up. She knew she’d have to sleep under a roof of branches. Parcel out jerky and berries for dinner, save some for tomorrow. Suddenly the tent back in camp seemed like a five-star hotel.

  Four days earlier she’d poked fun at Derek for dividing trail mix. Now she was doing the same thing.

  Fog. Maybe that was why no one had come back. Fog was as dangerous as thunderstorms, and grounded just as many flights. Boats and cars piled up in the pea soup.

  She tossed her pack under a tree, spread her slicker on the ground. Sitting on her sleeping bag, she untied the bandage to look at her leg. Dried blood mixed with dried mud. She winced, knowing that the pain that had left her eyes had now settled into her thigh.

  The next day rescuers would wind their way down the fjord. The next day Derek would be saved and Wildmen would have to face the authorities.

  The next day would be marked The End.

  She’d tell Derek, “You can drive the old pickup when we get back.”

  Cody pulled down No Fear, trying to cut out the menacing night sounds. She shivered down to her bones. Was it the night air or her own anxiety? She tried sleeping on her side, then on her back, always keeping the pressure off her leg. She wadded up her sweatshirt but it felt more like a rock than a pillow.

  This only happened to people on the news. Not to normal people like her and Derek. Then she remembered Ginny Martin.

  The strange night sounds reminded her just how alone she was and how little she knew about anything. She looked in the direction of the sunset, a faint glow setting off jagged peaks blacker than night itself, and worried about Derek.

  They’ll have to take care of him, she tried to reassure herself. Otherwise he isn’t worth anything to them.

  Cody just couldn’t unwind, couldn’t turn off her brain.

  The night went on and on.

  Cody moaned in her sleep when something told her that she was surrounded by water, that she wasn’t just dreaming about drowning but was actually inhaling salt water and choking. She didn’t have any idea where she was or what was happening.

  Dial 911.

  But her finger punched in a different set of numbers, seven digits plus an area code: three-one-zero. Her finger kept slipping on the last number.

  More than once she’d actually dialed all seven digits without fumbling. After an agonizing number of rings a stranger answered, “You’re looking for Mr. Lewis? He moved three years ago. And his new number is unlisted.”

  She’d had the same dream off and on since the divorce. Calling her dad now didn’t make sense. Even in a dream she should have been dialing the lodge in Yakutat.

  It took several minutes before she fully awakened, drifting in and out of a foggy reality. One second she was in the kayak battling four-foot waves, the next she was staring into the face of a masked madman. Then it was all reality. She was sleeping out in the open in a remote Alaskan wilderness.

  Cody rolled over and cried out when her weight pressed her thigh. Her first instinct was to check her watch. Stupid. She knew first light meant it was four A.M. And besides, her watch was broken and she’d thrown it away.

  The blue-gray clouds hung in layers stacked across the mountains where the sun would make its first appearance. Even without sore eyes, the sky was so alive behind the weaker clouds that she had to look away. Cody usually liked the hours between first light and sunrise.

  Her sleeping bag was damp on the outside. Still, she pulled it over her torn clothes and willed her body to make heat. She imagined the pilots in Yakutat in the tavern, filling mugs with steaming coffee. Her mom would be scrambling eggs and frying sausage,
which would be gobbled while planes were being fueled for the rescue flight.

  Eggs and sausage. Strange that the idea of food didn’t make her hungry. No gnawing pangs or grumbles. Her stomach remained a dead void taking up space in her body.

  The pilot must have seen their camp yesterday. Soon, she thought.

  She snuggled deeper into her bag, barely aware of her aching muscles, bruises, and scrapes, focusing on wiggling her half-numb toes.

  Cody wondered if Derek and Wildmen were working their way down the trail. Holding the sleeping bag around her shoulders, she sat up and cringed at the pain in her leg. She couldn’t believe she’d slept through the night.

  The air held its usual dampness, heavy with its own wet weight. The bottom of her bag had slipped off her rain slicker; in places it was as wet and muddy as the rest of the landscape. Everything around her was shiny with dew.

  The clouds were dissolving over the horizon. She blinked at the brightening sky and pulled the brim of her cap down. Her eyes only burned a little today. They certainly weren’t hurting as badly as the heat in her leg.

  She peeled back her bag, startled by the sight of her clothes. Ripped, muddy, spotted with dried blood. Her hands appeared to have battled barbed wire and lost. Her nails were jagged and torn.

  She studied the bandage, still in place and wrapped loosely around her thigh. It untied easily enough but refused to loosen from her skin. Maybe a scab was forming. She inspected the skin around the bandage. It wasn’t pretty but the swelling had started to go down.

  Cody retied the T-shirt, careful not to yank on it. She forced herself to choke down a strip of jerky, then licked the last of the squashed berries off the deerskin cloth that had held them. The berries were sickeningly sweet now, too ripe. Scooting out of her sleeping bag, she stood up and laughed as her shorts nearly fell off. She couldn’t believe she’d lost that much weight. She used the filthy bandanna as a belt, then hooked on the bear horn.

  At least there aren’t any mosquitoes, she thought, pulling the slicker over her sweatshirt for added warmth. She forced her feet into her dirty socks, then slipped into her boots and found a couple of walking sticks.

  Moving down the trail, she concentrated on the sky, which would soon be filled with planes and helicopters. Soon, Derek. She no longer dreamed of a hot bubble bath or brushing her teeth. None of that mattered now.

  For the first time since she’d left camp the day before, she started making plans. The bear horn. It could be used as a diversion, drawing Wildmen away from Derek. First she’d have to figure out how to set it off without touching it. If only she had some fishing line; she could tie it around the trigger, string the line over the ground.

  Cody noticed her steps slowing; she was relying heavily on the walking sticks. Sometimes she’d catch a whiff of her own breath. It was just as disgusting as she’d always imagined a bear’s breath would be. Bears. She fingered the horn. She wondered why they weren’t bothering her.

  Lost in thought, she hardly noticed the miles falling behind her. She searched the sky for rescuers. Maybe she hadn’t really seen a helicopter the day before. People stumbling around in the desert saw all kinds of things that weren’t real. Maybe that happened to people in the wilderness.

  There had been signs of life on the trail earlier. But she couldn’t tell how long ago the prints had been made. Some of them were filled with heavy dew; others were little more than muddy smears.

  Were Derek and Wildmen still ahead of her? Or had they circled back?

  The answer seemed as clear as dew dripping off leaves. Steal the tent and kayak. Destroy all signs of life. Make it harder on the rescuers. She leaned against a tree, resting a minute. But if Wildmen wanted to get rid of our gear, they could have done it before now.

  Suddenly her questions and answers seemed as muddied as a muskeg bog. She wasn’t sure of anything.

  Back on the trail, a thinning stand of trees in the distance was being invaded by ground fog. Her heart sank. Fog could halt rescue efforts. Please don’t roll in. Not now.

  As she moved down the trail, closing in on the white mist, she realized it wasn’t fog at all. Smoke—from a campfire! It rose from the ground, twisting and licking the air above the trees. Wildmen.

  More alert than she had been in days, she sloughed off her pack and shoved it under a tree. Derek? The smoke wasn’t more than two hundred yards away. Still, she wasn’t about to rush into Wildmen’s camp. She had to move up on them slowly, quietly.

  Like a predator stalking its prey, she crept through the trees toward the fire.

  Cody picked her way over the soggy ground toward the smoke. She kept herself small, aiming from tree to tree. The cold had a sharper bite this morning. Summer was finally waving the flag, surrendering to autumn.

  Then voices hit her. They absorbed her, played against her skin. She held her breath.

  Voices. Low and dull. She couldn’t understand the words. She strained to hear Derek.

  Closer, I’ve got to get closer.

  She let herself breathe slowly through her mouth and inched her way through ferns and rusty manzanita.

  The talking stopped abruptly.

  Cody stood still.

  She listened.

  A glacial wind whipped around the trees. The cold sapped her strength. The body used a ton of energy to keep warm, burned a ton of fat to make heat. She hadn’t had much fat to begin with. Suddenly she understood why people in subzero climates ate whole cubes of butter.

  Fire and smoke.

  She crept closer.

  Everything was suspended, as if the earth had stopped spinning.

  Then she saw it, about seventy-five feet away. An opening in the trees much like the clearing that had held their tent so many miles back.

  Derek was settled on a boulder near the fire pit, holding a stick over the blaze. Breakfast. The idea was slow to sink in. It seemed so ordinary. He’s cooking breakfast!

  Just seeing him, knowing he was okay, gave her more strength than any amount of food, sleep, or warmth. She let out her breath, unsure what to do next.

  No one else was in the clearing; at least she couldn’t see anyone. She wanted to shout, but she didn’t dare. Not yet. She had to watch for a while. Watch them. Where were Wildmen?

  Derek was wearing a crude animal-skin poncho. His hands weren’t tied, but she couldn’t see his ankles. The fire pit blocked her view. She wondered who had been talking. Where were they now?

  She studied the shack on the far side of the clearing. Four sides with a wooden roof. A door of stripped limbs tied with rawhide. The shack had a few scraps from the old cabin. She recognized the same rotten, worm-eaten wood.

  It looks like it’s been here for years, she thought.

  The smell of meat reached out to her. Fat dripped in the fire, spitting and sizzling. The void in her stomach begged for something fresh to eat. Derek pulled a piece of charred fat off the meat—chewed bite after bite, licked grease off his fingers, wiped grease off his chin.

  Cody swallowed hard.

  She heard the door creak before it opened. Derek turned his head toward the person backing out of the hut. One of the Wildmen. She touched the bear horn, an automatic reflex. If nothing else she could throw it at him.

  Wildman turned, set a pot on the fire.

  Where was the fur mask? The gloves? The wild mangy hair? This guy was dressed in the same skin pants and homemade boots. But no, it wasn’t possible.

  Cody closed her eyes, not believing the picture: Her hair was gathered in a neat braid.

  It didn’t make any sense. It made perfect sense.

  The second pair of prints, like Wildman’s only smaller—a woman’s boots. The woman was short but sturdy looking, her face smooth and round. Seashells were stitched in double rows along a wool poncho where the dark blue came together with the red material. Larger shells and bones dangled like bells from the top of her mukluks. Sealskin, it looked like.

  Cody recognized her as Tlingit, a member
of the largest native population in Southeast Alaska. Half of Yakutat had Tlingit ancestry.

  Derek didn’t seem bothered by her presence. Maybe it’s some kind of act. He’s just playing it cool until he can get away.

  The woman’s mukluks rattled when she walked back to the shack. Cody leaned closer, trying to see inside when the door opened. But it was too dark.

  Derek! She willed him to look at her. Derek!

  He poked his stick through another slab of raw meat without even a glance in her direction.

  Cody decided to sneak back to her pack, settle in, and wait. Maybe there was a little jerky left. She’d just started to turn when the chilling wind on the back of her neck turned hot and sticky.

  She knew without turning that Wildman stood behind her.

  Grabbed from behind. It happened so fast that she didn’t have time to react. She kicked wildly and fought with what little strength she had left. But she couldn’t nail her target.

  “Get away from me!”

  Another noise, the sound of footsteps crushing brush. “Cody, stop! Don’t fight him!”

  “Derek!” Cody’s fists lashed out aimlessly as Wildman’s arms tightened around her. “Derek!” she cried over her shoulder. “Help me!”

  She could smell Wildman. Actually smell the dirty stink of his unbathed body. It made her want to puke.

  “Let go!” she screamed again.

  “Don’t fight him, Cody!” Derek sounded as desperate as she felt. “You’re making it worse!”

  Wildman pinned her arms to her side. She struggled as sweat dripped in her eyes, stinging as before. She couldn’t wipe them. Her shouts died to whimpers. Save your breath. Her kicks fell to pathetic shuffles. Save your energy. Her whole body went limp.

  “It’s okay,” Derek said. “You can let her go.”

  It sounded as if Derek was telling Wildman what to do. Wildman’s reply was a grunt, followed by mumblings from the Tlingit woman, who must have been nearby.

  “Cody?” Derek said again. “We’ll let you go if you promise not to run away.”

  We?