The Chronicles of Trellah, Book One: The Perpetual Rain

by T. S. Graham

  “Sophina!”

  Sophina heard Mrs. Tanner’s call, but there was no time to answer. She was too busy dodging the massive legs of the creatures as they rushed by, seemingly from all directions. Then she glimpsed something smaller, and far more terrifying: a flash of a yellow raincoat.

  The old sailor attacked her, fast and brutal. One hand ripped through Sophina’s torso as the other sank into her throat, muffling her scream.

  And he wasn’t alone. As the last vacharo plodded by, dozens more necrahs descended upon her like vultures to a carcass.

  “Get away from her!”

  A streak of white-hot flames sent the evil dead reeling with a collective shriek, except for one, for the gruesome sailor refused to abandon his prize so easily. He jabbed his hands into Sophina’s spine and yanked her high into the air.

  “LET—HER—GO!”

  Another line of flames shot past Sophina’s face, but her watcher swerved away. She felt one hand slip from her back, but it quickly sank into her leg with a cold burn, spinning her upside down as they continued their wild ascent.

  “Fight them, Sophina!”

  The field below grew smaller as Sophina struggled to free herself. But just as she started to escape, more hands jabbed into her body. The rest of the necrahs had arrived to claim their share of her demise.

  She glimpsed Mrs. Tanner warding off an onslaught of necrahs as the grisly mob carried her high above the deadwood forest. Morbid screams battered her ears as the weight of her body pulled against their precarious grips. But for each hand that slipped from her flesh, two more entered, sending stabbing pains to her very core.

  Then, a burst of clarity overtook the panic that had paralyzed her mind. Make yourself smaller, she reasoned. There will be less for them to hold onto!

  Sophina summoned her last wisp of strength and drew her arms and legs toward her body. Untold fingers slipped from her arms as she pulled them tight to her chest. More hands withdrew from her legs as she raised her knees. The necrahs turned on each other as she curled into a tight ball, and she soon felt herself drop out of the bottom of the skirmishing horde.

  Her hair blew back as she plummeted toward the canopy of deadwood. She tore through a web of brittle limbs and—with a prodigious splash—was enveloped by a cocoon of thick, warm liquid.

  Dazed and disoriented, Sophina thrashed about in search of air. Her limbs were ensnared by a mass of ropey arms, clearly the tentacles of some malevolent swamp monster. It clung tighter as she struggled, dragging her deep into its watery world as her lungs ached for a breath.

  Just when she was about to inhale the slime, her fingers broke the surface and brushed against something solid and dry. She grasped it and pulled herself toward the unknown . . .

  Sophina’s first breaths were sharp and involuntary, fueled by the needs of her oxygen-starved brain. She took stock of her surroundings, aided by the soft light of the drahtuah that was diffused throughout the ghostly flora of the bog. The root she had snagged was one of hundreds that reached down into the cesspool she’d landed in. What she thought were tentacles were actually strands of fibrous vegetation that stuck to her skin and cloak like threads of a giant spiderweb. They sank back into the odiferous sludge as she peeled them off in disgust.

  There was no sign of the necrahs, but they were out there—probably closer than she wanted to know.

  A chirp rang out of the thicket as she pulled herself up onto solid ground. Another more boisterous chirp came from a muddle of branches to her right. Something scurried across the tree in front of her, but it moved too fast to discern its shape or size.

  Shree-ee-eep!

  A protracted call resonated through the swamp, far louder than the previous two. Then, all at once, hundreds of invisible creatures expelled their piercing shreeps, creating a wall of sound so intense that Sophina felt it in her bones. She covered her ears and scanned the scrub, focusing on a thin spot in the underbrush that appeared to lead to a clearing.

  She crawled toward it, ignoring the pain in her ears as best she could. She was halfway there when something scuttled onto her shoulder. She grabbed its prickly body and hurled it aside, somehow stifling her scream. Maybe the organism was venomous, or a bloodsucker drawn to her body heat.

  The shreeps went silent as a guttural moan cut through the swamp. The utterance had the intonation of a question rather than a mindless groan.

  Then, an answer came. She sensed movement to her left, and turned to watch as a contorted face appeared through the interwoven branches. It was a man, draped in the remnants of a tuxedo, complete with a bow tie and cummerbund. His eyes seemed more alive than those of the others, serving as an eerie reminder that he was once living—perhaps not all that long ago.

  There was no point in dashing for the clearing; the necrah would surely cut her off. Even if she got there it wouldn’t matter, for not a hint of sunlight came from the sky. Right now, only one thing could offer her a fighting chance.

  Sophina slid her fingers down the necklace strap until she found the vial. It was a wonder it was still in one piece after her fall, but she was too scared to feel relieved. The stolen vial pressed against her thigh through her cloak pocket, but she doubted there would be time to use it if her first attempt failed. She could only hope that the necrahs had carried her close enough to the river so that the portal she was about to open would expose air rather than a wall of dirt or subterranean ledge.

  The labored calls of approaching necrahs tortured her senses as she removed the cork from the vial’s neck and lowered the vessel into the black water of the pool.

  A wall of light shot up before Sophina’s eyes as several necrahs recoiled with shrieks of agony. They had crept closer than she realized, their deathly hands about to touch her when the reaction ignited.

  With no lead walls to confine it, the drahtuah dispersed quickly, leaving behind a huge, smoldering-edged window into her world. Dozens of wide-eyed faces stared at her from a well-lit room on the other side, each frozen in an expression of shock and awe.

  A nightmarish bellow ripped through the swamp as Sophina leapt toward the cowering crowd and felt the chill of the old sailor’s hands numb her back. She crumpled onto the cold floor of the Grange Hall as the white flash and ripping sound that marked the portal’s collapse played out to the dismay of everyone in the room.

  The old sailor’s hands were gone. For a moment she allowed herself to hope that he hadn’t made it through from the other side, but that hope was dashed when the screams of the people grew even shriller.

  It didn’t take long for her to find him, crawling on his belly across the floor, severed in half at the waist by the dying wormhole. He clawed his way toward a group of trembling parents and their children as his face and body began to wither away in a smoky haze, making him look more heinous than ever.

  Mothers and fathers snatched up their children as the old sailor lashed out at anything that moved. They all escaped the lunges of the fast-dissolving entity—except for one: a boy who stood frozen against the wall, his eyes as wide as dinner plates.

  Andy Dresden—the boy who had shoved Erickson aside to escape the microburst—screamed like a banshee as what remained of the bearded specter clambered up his body and blew back his hair with a sickening shriek. Then, the old sailor collapsed onto the floor in a fast-shrinking pile of writhing body parts.

  He can’t exist here! Sophina thought with joy as the last of her watcher’s body evaporated into wisps of gray smoke. Only as a ghost—and ghosts can’t hurt anyone.

  Through a blur of retreating bodies, Sophina saw Erickson step out from behind his mother. He took a tentative step toward her, but Mrs. Harrington latched onto his shirt, stopping him in his tracks. His expression reminded her of the condition of her eyes, so she reached up to pull the sopping cloak hood over her head.

  But she was too late, for a hand had already fallen upon her shoulder. This time, though, the fingers that touched her were firm and warm.

  9
FRONT-PAGE NEWS

  Sophina turned to Mr. Harris, whose face looked ashen in the orange firelight.

  “Sophina, I—” Mr. Harris gasped. “What’s wrong with your eyes?”

  “They’re red contact lenses,” she said, finally pulling the hood over her head so that it hid her face.

  “Contact lenses?” parroted Mr. Harris. “But . . . they’re glowing. . . . Why are you wearing glowing contacts?”

  Sophina couldn’t think of another lie. Thankfully, Mr. Harris was distracted by the crush of people moving toward the exit.

  “Folks—please!” he called as he hurried to put himself between them and the door. “Think about what you’re doing; some of you have children. It’s extremely dangerous out there!”

  “Out there?” responded Mrs. Winthrop, the crossing guard at Eliot’s school. “You saw what happened. We can’t stay here!” With her young daughter in tow, she pushed past Mr. Harris and hurried outside into the rain.

  “Yes, something just happened that I can’t explain,” Mr. Harris said to the others. “But that doesn’t mean we’re in danger. I’m sure there’s a logical explanation for—”

  “Everyone is safe!” Sophina shouted, bringing silence to the room.

  “There, you see?” Mr. Harris said, in a manner that in no way exuded confidence. “Sophina can explain what happened.” He stepped toward her as everyone else backed away, at least those who weren’t still headed for the door. “Everyone, Sophina has something to say.”

  Sophina peered through the narrow hood opening. Many familiar faces stared back at her, and every one of them looked as though they’d run if she stepped one inch closer. What could she possibly say that would change that?

  “You don’t have to leave,” she said in as relaxed a tone as she could muster. “You’re not in any danger.”

  Her words sounded hollow, even though she knew they were true. How could she expect them to believe her? She certainly wouldn’t if she were in their shoes. Their eyes bore down on her as she realized one simple truth: The sooner she left here, the better. The damage was done. Nothing could change that.

  “I’m sorry, I have to leave.”

  “Sophina—where are you going?”

  Sophina ignored Mr. Harris as she strode toward the exit. The sun must have at least peeked out around the moon in Trellah by now, and the beach at Glacier Lake should be a perfect place to use the stolen vial of powder and make her return. If Mrs. Tanner was right, and the erosion of Jagged Mountain had truly made the ground higher here than there, then the portal was sure to expose open air—even if she had to jump down some distance to get her feet back onto that green sand.

  Sophina stopped cold. She had just probed every pocket of her cloak, and they were all empty. The vial was gone!

  Andy Dresden collapsed in the throes of hysteria as she retraced her steps, sweeping the floor with her eyes as people rushed to back out of the way. The vial had been there before she’d jumped; she had felt it against her thigh. It must have fallen out when she hit the floor. But where was it?

  “Sophina!” This time, Mr. Harris’s voice commanded her attention. “We need to talk—in my office.”

  “I can’t talk now.”

  Sophina kept searching for any sign of the lustrous powder. Maybe it had gotten kicked aside in the confusion, or worse, picked up. She was about to drop to her hands and knees when a familiar voice cut through the crowd noise: “Get that camera on her, now! This is going to be huge!”

  Sophina looked up to find Spike Branson creeping toward her through the crowd, trailed by his bewildered cameraman. The last thing she could afford right now was to have her red-eyed image burned into the digital memory bank of a news camera, so she turned and walked away from Spike, with little thought as to where she was going.

  “Sophina—please,” Mr. Harris called out. “I just want to help you.”

  Sophina wanted to leave this whole mess behind but knew she couldn’t—not until she was certain the drahtuah wasn’t there. Her tolerance to its radiation had grown too strong for her to sense where it was, so she had to keep searching and hope she got lucky.

  “Excuse me—young lady!”

  Spike stepped before Sophina and thrust a microphone into her face.

  “I’m Spike Branson of Channel 6 News, and—holy mother!”

  Sophina turned away, but not fast enough. Spike had already seen her eyes.

  “Jake, get in front of her!” he ordered his cameraman. “I need a close-up of this!”

  “Leave me alone!” demanded Sophina, pulling the hood even tighter.

  “Leave you alone?” said Spike with astonishment, as if he’d never been denied before. “Look, kid, I just witnessed something that’s off-the-charts freakish. And those eyes of yours just brought it to a whole new level. You should talk to me, because the questions these folks have aren’t going away anytime soon.”

  Sophina kept scanning the floor for the vial. It was like finding a needle in a haystack with all the feet shuffling about.

  “Are you even listening to me?”

  Sophina had to decide what to do—and soon—but she couldn’t think straight with that pompous windbag hounding her. She needed a moment to clear her head, and could think of just one way to make it happen.

  “I’ll talk to you,” she conceded, “after I speak with him.” She motioned toward Mr. Harris, who looked like he feared she would lunge out and bite his throat. “And I need to do it alone.”

  “He can’t help you,” said Spike with a dismissive glance at Mr. Harris. “He’s as scared as everyone else—I can tell just by looking at him.”

  “That’s my condition,” Sophina insisted. “Take it or leave it.”

  She turned to Mr. Harris, who tried to look bold in the face of Spike’s disparaging remark. “Can we talk now?” she asked.

  “Of course we can.”

  “Fine,” Spike conceded as he leaned closer to Sophina. “But keep this in mind if you’re thinking of ducking out the back: I have all these people to interview, and I can spin this story any way I want. So, unless you want to get raked over the coals, I suggest you don’t cross me. Got it, Sophina?”

  Sophina had a swelling urge to punch Spike square in the nose, but she knew that doing so would likely kill him. She didn’t know how long it would take for the drahtuah to disperse from her body, but she could tell that there was still plenty of it left for her fist to pack a serious wallop. So she simply turned and followed Mr. Harris toward his office. On the way he stopped and knelt down before Erickson, whose eyes remained fixed on Sophina.

  “I need you to stay here with Mom,” he said, with a hand on his son’s injured arm. “Sophina said we’re safe, and I believe her. She’d never lie to us about that, right?”

  Erickson nodded. As Mr. Harris stood, Erickson pointed subtly to his right. Sophina gave him a tiny nod, informing him that she understood his signal.

  She then followed Mr. Harris into his office, and he shut the door behind them.

  “Those aren’t really contacts, are they?” he said with a twitch.

  “They are, and I can’t take them out.”

  “Why not?”

  I can’t talk about it right now. . . . Have you seen my mother?”

  “Yes, I have,” Mr. Harris informed her with a slight shake of his head, as if trying to force his mind out of a daze. “I should have told you that right from the start.”

  “When did you see her?” Sophina asked, unable to stem her anxiety.

  “She left here twenty minutes ago. She’s not doing well, Sophina—and who could blame her? I tried to talk her into staying, but of course she went back out to look for you and Eliot. I’d call her, but even cell service is down now.”

  Sophina’s breath hitched. She was elated to hear that her mom wasn’t hurt, as her watcher disguised as Mrs. Emerson had claimed, but she was also beset with guilt, knowing that her mother continued to risk her life searching for children that, until now,
she had no hope of finding.

  “Where was she going?”

  “Everywhere,” answered Mr. Harris with a shrug. It was clear that her appearance still bothered him, for he would only sporadically look her in the eye. “You didn’t come in here to explain what’s going on, did you?” he asked.

  Sophina shook her head.

  “I see.”

  “I want to, but I can’t.”

  “It’s because of Eliot, isn’t it, and the other children; are they in danger?”

  Sophina nodded.

  “Are you in danger?”

  “Not as long as I’m here.”

  “But you’re not staying here, are you?”

  Sophina hesitated. The answer to that question had yet to reveal itself.

  “Not for any longer than I have to.”

  Mr. Harris looked to the floor. “You came in here to get away from him, didn’t you?” he asked, nodding to the door in reference to Spike Branson.

  Sophina nodded again.

  “I hope that you can appreciate the position I’m in,” said Mr. Harris as his eyes finally found hers. “I offered this building to the public as a shelter, which means that I’m responsible for the safety of everyone here. With what you’re telling me, there’s only so much I can do to help you.”

  “I know.”

  Mr. Harris examined her with discerning eyes. He was the one teacher who was Mrs. Tanner’s equal when it came to intelligence, and he always knew when he was being played. Thankfully, the look he gave her now was a compassionate one.

  “I’ll keep him at bay as long as I can,” he offered, “but I need to know something first. There’s a lot of anxiety in town about the missing children. People are risking their lives to search for them—people we both know and love. Is there anything I can pass along to them, something that might help the cause?”

  Sophina knew that she couldn’t tell him the truth, and the guilt of it was crushing.