The Mountain King

by Rick Hautala

  The impact sent an electric jolt up his arms to his shoulders and neck. Accompanying the loud crack that sounded as if the rifle stock broke was an ear-splitting howl of pain. Mark ducked to one side as the creature staggered past him, its legs wobbling like those of a prizefighter who had just been nailed with a solid haymaker.

  “There, God damn yah!” Mark shouted, his voice ragged and broken. “How’d you like that?”

  Mark was panting heavily as he watched the creature, obviously stunned, turn and glare at him. Less than thirty feet separated them, and Mark now had the time to look at what he was facing. The sight froze his heart. Although the beast looked an awful lot like a huge ape, it also had a certain bearish appearance. Thick, brown fur—slouched shoulders—large head with sloping eyebrows—long, massive arms that had huge, clawed paws. Its eyes glistened with mingled pain and anger as it peeled back its thick lips and snarled, displaying an array of long, sharp teeth. Its left shoulder drooped down, the fur matted with the fresh flow of blood.

  “Come on! Come on, you ugly son-of-a-bitch!” Mark yelled.

  He braced his feet and readied himself for another charge. Holding his rifle back over his shoulder, he took a few threatening steps forward.

  The creature regarded him with a hateful glare and then started backing away from him, uttering a low, guttural grunt that sounded almost like a word. Mark sneered, almost laughing out loud as he lowered the rifle, bolted it, and raised it to his shoulder.

  “So, you know what this is, do you?” he said, drawing a steady, careful bead on the animal. “Well, then, come on, motherfucker! Eat shit and die!”

  The creature raised its arm high above its head, leaned its head back, and let loose a terrifying roar. The sound was deafening. A cold, hard knot tightened inside Mark’s stomach, freezing him for a moment. Then, before he could react, before he could think to squeeze the trigger, the creature darted into the dense brush and disappeared in an instant. Mark pulled the trigger, and the rifle went off, kicking back hard against his shoulder, but he knew he had missed.

  The beast was gone!

  “Shit! Fuck!” he shouted as he slammed another round into the chamber and started off after the creature. He was confident, now, that he had hurt it, and it wasn’t going to fight back . . . not unless it was cornered. When he got to where the creature had been standing, he looked down at the ground and saw a thick splotch of fresh blood.

  “God damn! I hurt you more than I thought,” Mark muttered as he stared into the eerily silent woods where the creature had disappeared like a shadow. The trail of crushed and broken brush was obvious, easy enough to follow, but better than that was the trail of blood. Mark knew he could keep on this trail even if it went up above the tree line, if that was where the creature was headed. And something deep inside him told him that was exactly where it was going. The wound was bleeding much more than it should have been. Maybe that one hit with the rifle butt had done the damage, but more likely, Mark thought, he might have reopened an old wound.

  Either way, it didn’t matter.

  The creature was hurt and running back to its lair, wherever that may be, and Mark was going to hunt it down and kill it if only because now he was positive that this . . . this thing, whatever the hell it was, had been responsible for the death of his friend.

  “But, Jesus Christ . . . what about Sandy?” Mark whispered as his gaze shifted back to the dirt road where the dust had long since settled.

  It was late afternoon. That must have been her, driving off in such a hurry. She must have seen the creature, too—maybe it had even attacked her first; but Mark told himself that she couldn’t have been seriously hurt. She had gotten away, driving like a bat out of hell.

  So she must be all right!

  He quickly scanned the area, studying the fresh tire tracks scuffed in the dirt, trying to figure out from them exactly what had happened. The sprinkling of broken glass on the ground convinced him that the creature had attacked the vehicle.

  But she got away, he kept telling himself. I saw her driving away!

  So he could put aside any worries about Sandy’s safety and concentrate instead on tracking the creature back to its lair. The blood spoor was going to be easy enough to follow. The only problem he saw was if he ran into any more of those men who were out here looking for him.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Dark Walk

  Like dark, rolling waves beating against the shore, consciousness came back in stages, and with it came the awareness of burning pain and the deeper ache of bruised and twisted muscles and bones. One particularly bright spot of pain was centered in Sandy’s head. She raised her hand to her left temple and felt something sticky and crusty that was matting down her hair. Her eyes flickered open, and she held her hand up close to her eyes but could see only gauzy grayness. Groaning deeply, she let her eyes drift shut again, content that, if she was dying—or already dead—at least she was going to go without a struggle.

  But she wasn’t dead, and she didn’t die.

  After fading in and out of awareness several times, she became aware of cold air circulating around her. Her disoriented mind turned the air into icy water, and she dreamed that she was swimming in Moosehead Lake, where she and her parents used to vacation before the divorce.... She had dived down deep and now, tangled in the reeds, she was struggling to push herself off the cold, slimy bottom of the lake. She could feel the slick, greasy water weeds and slime underfoot, and the swirling water, tugging her downward.

  “. . . Ahh . . .”

  The sound was distant. It echoed as though whoever had spoken was shouting to her from deep inside a cavern. It reverberated like a long roll of thunder that hurt her ears as it got louder, but it also brought her closer to awareness. Her arms and legs began to thrash like those of a swimmer who has lost the strength but not the will to live.

  “. . . Where . . .”

  Stop shouting at me!

  . . . am . . .

  I told you, you don’t have to shout like that!

  “. . . I? . . .”

  If you don’t stop shouting, I’ll have to leave!

  “Where would I go?”

  Although it was broken and weak, this time she recognized her own voice. It resonated with a cheap, tinny echo in her ears.

  “What the . . . what the hell happened?”

  She opened her eyes to narrow slits and saw all around her a darkness as rich and deep as black velvet. A vague memory of driving off the road returned. For several panicked heartbeats, Sandy thought that she was indeed dead or that she had been struck blind; but then, through the spiderweb crack in the windshield, she saw the jagged line of dark trees against the dusty brightness of the night sky. The skyline was at an impossible angle, but after a while she realized that she was still in the Jeep, which was lying on its side. She was rolled over to one side and hanging from her seat belt.

  For a moment, she lay still, trying desperately to collect her thoughts, wondering how long she had been unconscious in the wreck. It was too dark to see the dial of her wristwatch. For all she knew, it could be after midnight. Every bone and muscle in her body felt sprained or broken; she was unable to move, but— finally—she determined that she had to get herself out of the wreck.

  The cold night air made her shiver as she fumbled in the dark for the seat belt release. She tried to click it, but her weight was holding the latch fast, trapping her. She banged on it and jiggled it furiously, but it wouldn’t give. Panting heavily, her body racked with pain, she managed to wiggle herself free of the restraining strap and swing her legs down. She had lost one of her shoes in the crash, so she stepped barefooted onto a pile of broken glass. A stinging cut made her cry out. Balancing on one foot, she felt around on the Jeep floor until she found the missing shoe and slipped it on.

  She thought her arm would break before she could push the driver’s door open, but she managed to swing it open and clamber up out of the overturned Jeep. In the darkness, she couldn�
�t make out any details of where she was. All she knew for certain was that the Jeep was a twisted mess of metal, lying at the bottom of a deep gully. Whimpering under her breath, Sandy skittered up the steep slope and back onto the road. Once there, she bent over, put both hands on her knees, and took several deep, gulping breaths of the night air, hoping it would help control her panic.

  The silent woods pressed in on her from all sides like huge, enfolding arms. Ahead of her and behind, the narrow dirt road was little more than an indistinct gray blur that was soon lost in the surrounding dark in either direction.

  A tingling jolt of fear shot through her as she considered what she should do next.

  She was confused and disoriented.

  How far was it back to town?

  Should she start walking?

  Or would it be better to wait until morning, if only to make sure she started off in the right direction?

  What if she ended up back at the Round Top Trail head?

  And what if that horrible monster was still back there, waiting for her?

  Or—worse!

  What if it was nearby?

  As if to justify her rising fear, just then a mournful howl drifted to her out of the darkness. It started out low, but quickly built to a rising, wavering yelp that was immediately answered by another howl, this one sounding much closer. Sandy had been camping enough times with her father to know that these were either foxes or coyotes, but the first question that popped into her mind was: What are they hunting?

  “Okay, okay,” she said, speaking out loud to bolster her courage. “Don’t get panicky! . . . Gotta stay calm. . . . Think things through, here.”

  As soon as another chorus of howling began, she decided that the first thing she needed was a weapon. Too bad her father hadn’t left one of his hunting rifles on the gun rack in the Jeep. She wouldn’t have felt half as vulnerable if she had a loaded gun. Somewhere in the wreckage was a whole box of bullets, but what good would they do her? Right now, even a decent stick or club would feel good.

  She skidded back down the embankment to the Jeep, reached up into the cab, and felt for the knob to turn on the headlights. She hadn’t really expected the lights to work, so she squealed with surprise when the flood of bright light illuminated the gully and the thick wall of brush and pine trees.

  Moving around to the front of the Jeep, Sandy rolled back her sleeve, amazed to see that it was well past eleven o’clock—almost eleven-thirty.

  Would Polly be at all upset that she hadn’t come home from school yet?

  Would she be concerned or relieved that she was out this late on a school night?

  Would she even bother to call the police?

  Or would she simply assume that she was staying overnight with one of her friends?

  Sandy couldn’t stop the bitter thought that, if Dennis Cross were still alive, Polly would no doubt take the opportunity of having an empty house to do a little bit of cheating.

  “Two-timing little slut!” she muttered.

  She scrambled into the brush and searched around until she found a long pine branch that would serve her purposes. She broke off one end to make a four-foot length, then trimmed off the remaining branches with her foot. Satisfied that she now had a serviceable walking stick which—if she needed it—could double as a weapon, she went back up to the road, prepared to start walking.

  After giving herself a quick check-over and finding no serious injuries, other than the slice on the bottom of her foot that hurt with every step she took, she started out. She knew the Jeep was a total loss anyway, so she didn’t care if she left the headlights on. At least they would illuminate the first hundred feet or so of her hike. She tried to whistle a carefree tune, but her lips were too dry to produce a sound, so before long she gave up.

  As soon as the diffuse glow of the headlights was lost around a curve in the road, darkness closed around her with an almost audible rush. Sandy immediately wished she had decided to stay with the Jeep until morning. She could have made herself as comfortable as possible inside the overturned vehicle and waited out the night. But already it seemed just as easy to forge on ahead as it did to return. The howling foxes or coyotes or whatever sounded more distant now, a little less threatening. She actually began to feel a slight measure of confidence buoy her as she focused on the dull glow of the road ahead, determined to make it home before dawn.

  She had no idea how far she had walked when a sound in the woods off to her right drew her attention. She stopped short in her tracks, her body tensed. The hairs at the back of her neck prickled as she strained to hear the sound again. She tried to convince herself that it had been nothing more than a raccoon or a rabbit or some other harmless creature, but the heavy snapping of a branch underfoot had sounded like it had been made by something big.

  Now the woods were silent . . . too silent.

  Shouldn’t there be birds singing, or crickets and frogs? she wondered. The only sound was the hissing of the wind high in the pines.

  “It’s nothing,” she said aloud, trying to shore up her flagging courage, but her voice sounded frail, pitifully small in the engulfing darkness.

  Sandy tried to swallow the hard lump that was growing in her throat, but it wouldn’t go down. All she could imagine was that a pack of wolves or a black bear or something much worse was out looking for something sweet and tasty to eat. Her pulse began to race with a high, fast throbbing in her ears.

  Calm down! Just calm the Christ down! she told herself, but it did no good. Suddenly, it seemed as though all the woods around her were filled with glowing, green eyes that watched her, stalking her . . . just waiting to pounce.

  Uttering a low, little cry, Sandy clenched her fists and began to jog. Within seconds, the jog turned into a full-blown run. Her feet slapped hard against the dirt road, and the wind whistled in her ears, blocking out every other sound. She tried to convince herself that she just had to get a move on, cover some ground so she wouldn’t be wandering around on this deserted dirt road all night, but the panic that was building up inside her only got worse. Before long, she was convinced that there was indeed someone—or something—following close behind her, just waiting for the opportunity to strike. She increased her pace until she was running full-tilt down the road. She was so lost in her flight that she didn’t notice the group of men ahead of her on the road until one of them, hearing her footsteps, turned and yelled, “What the hell is that?”

  Sandy drew to an abrupt stop, but even before the echo of the man’s shout had faded, there came a flash of light followed by an explosion. Something buzzed past Sandy’s ear like a hornet. Panting viciously, Sandy dropped to the ground and shouted, “Hey! Hold it! Don’t shoot!”

  “What the—? Who the hell is it?” a man shouted.

  “What’re you doing out here this time of night?” someone else said.

  Sandy tried to answer, but her stomach suddenly squeezed, and hot vomit shot out of her mouth and nose. Bracing her hands on her knees, she leaned forward as wave after wave of nausea gripped her, wringing her out like a damp washcloth. A flashlight beam snapped on and swung around until it found her.

  “I’ll be a son-of-a-bitch!” one of the men said as they started back up the road toward her. “Is that you, Sandy? It’s me, Tim Farrell.”

  “Tim—” Sandy said, still choking on vomit. Her throat was burning with a horrible aftertaste, and her knees threatened to collapse as she stood up as the men grouped around her. She could see now that there were three of them.

  “I was just—” That was all she could say before another wave of dry heaves gripped her stomach.

  “I know what you was,” Tim said as he placed his arm around her shoulder and held her. “You was just about to get yourself killed. I’ll bet you came out here looking for your daddy, like we did, didn’t you?”

  Sandy could only see a vague silhouette of Tim’s face as he supported her, but she felt immense relief, knowing that she was safe with one of her father�
�s hunting buddies.

  “Me and a couple of the boys from the mill didn’t like some of the attitudes we’ve been hearing ‘round town,” Tim went on. “ ‘Specially at that meeting at the police station this morning, so we came out here ourselves to look for your father, too. We was hoping to hell we’d find him before some trigger-happy asshole—pardon the expression—found him first.”

  “Speaking of trigger-happy assholes ...” one of the other men said. Sandy recognized the voice of Willis Franklin, another one of her father’s friends. “Umm— sorry ‘bout shooting like that. I guess I was kinda spooked.”

  “Damn good thing you’re such a piss-poor shot, too, Willis,” Tim said. “Come on, Sandy. We’re a bit late getting off the mountain ourselves.” He sniffed with laughter. “I’m parked a mile or so down the road here. I guess we’re all in this together, huh?”

  “I guess so,” Sandy said weakly.