Nat looked away from the horrific sight to Max, who stared at his older brother. His matted hair hung about his face. His lower lip trembled.
“No!” wailed Alcazar behind him. He waded through the water and stood beside. “They can’t… they…” His words trailed off as tears slid down his grimy cheeks.
“Where’s Edgar?” said Max, still staring. Only his lips moved, the words quick and quiet.
Jenkins barked.
Nat turned her back on the brothers to search for the dog.
Alcazar cried with an increased urgency and held onto Max, his face pressed into his shoulder. Max remained staring; his grief had paralysed him into a statue of sorrow.
Jenkins stood on a pile of rubbish heaped in the corner. His tail beat the air; the dog looked up and grinned as Nat approached.
“What’ve you got there?” she asked in a soothing voice. Her words nearly choked at the back of her throat. The grief in the room was a palpable gravity. “What you got?”
Jenkins replied with another yap. The water lapped its filth-encrusted coat, and he sniffed around the floating debris. He dipped his head in the water, grabbed a floating length of blue rope between his teeth and pulled back. Out of the water, Jenkins placed the rope by its front paws and looked up, tail wagging again. The end of the rope remained hidden, suspended in the water.
Unsure why—maybe simple curiosity or to avoid the scene behind her—Nat bent down and touched the rope. She nearly recoiled from its slimy, spongy feel.
Probably just been in the water for too long.
Jenkins watched as Nat turned the rope over. Its underside was lined with pale white circles the size of bottle caps.
She held the rope higher for a closer look and dropped it.
This isn’t a rope.
She swallowed. “I… I think you need to come over here.”
Her knees trembled, and she wiped her hands on her top.
“Max, I said I—”
“We heard you,” snapped Alcazar. Nat flinched. “Can’t you give us a moment? Herman is… Herman is…” He squeezed his eyes shut, gripping Max even harder.
“Please,” she said. Her own grief soared from the aching pit of her stomach.
Leaving Alcazar to mourn over the body, Max crossed the chamber. His eyes glazed over. A frown creased his brow, and he reached down.
He followed the tentacle, running it through his hands. It led him into the centre of the chamber.
Max peered through the murky depths. He dropped the long, thick strand and closed his eyes.
“Max?” asked Alcazar.
He covered his face with his hands. His shoulders hunched, racked with shakes. Nat heard the muffled sobs.
“Max?” Alcazar wiped his cheeks with the back of his hand.
Silently, Max plunged his hands into the cold water. He pulled out a small, dripping body. The tentacles hung beneath it, limp and motionless, dangling in the water. Max held the baby to his chest and bowed his head.
“No,” said Alcazar, his arms weak at his sides. “They… they wouldn’t have…”
Max didn’t reply and remained still, holding the tiny corpse in a tight embrace.
Sitting down on a pile of rubbish, Nat allowed Jenkins to hop onto her lap. She stroked the dog’s back, trying to keep it calm. It seemed to sense the sadness in the chamber and grew restless.
Alcazar hugged his brother, the baby sandwiched between them. Besides the gentle lapping of the water, the lair was silent.
Nat closed her eyes, not wishing to see the grief of the brothers, nor the body in the corner. Jenkins squirmed in her lap.
A loud splashing sounded from the chamber’s entrance, followed by a deep growl.
Oh no, thought Nat.
“Man gone,” said Jacob, voice echoing in from the tunnel. “Thrown in pit. No one find.”
Nat opened her eyes and clutched Jenkins harder.
The entrance darkened, and Jacob clambered through. His body slid through with surprising ease.
“What happen?”
He looked at Nat. She shook her head, eyes welling up with tears.
“Where…?” His head twisted to the right. He gazed into the corner at the battered and bloody body of Herman. His broad chest swelled in a deep breath, and a thick vein in his neck pulsed. He clenched his fists. “Edgar?”
Alcazar, staring at the floor, stepped back.
Hands tangled in tentacles, Max held up the baby. Tears poured down his face and met the pool of snot trickling from his nose. His body swayed, ready to fall at any moment.
Nat tasted the salt of her own tears.
The floor vibrated with Jacob’s roar. He hooked a hand around the upturned pram and flung it across the room. The carrier flew through the air between Nat and Max and struck the wall with a loud clatter. One of the wheels jumped off and landed in the water with a high splash. The rest of the pram fell on a pile of junk, its metal frame bent out of shape.
Jacob had already gone to work on a set of mouldy drawers. His fists punched through the rotten wood leaving large, jagged holes. Blood sprayed from his knuckles. With another painful cry, he picked up the chest of drawers and smashed it against the wall.
“J-Jacob,” started Alcazar. He stepped forwards, his arms held up. “Please!”
He ducked a flying chair. It exploded in a shower of splinters behind him.
“Jacob!” he said, firmer.
Jacob screamed and clutched his bald head.
Nat shuffled back against the wall.
Alcazar pressed his hands against his brother’s pumping chest. “Stop it! Why do you have to do this?” He burst into a new fit of tears. “Destroying your home achieves nothing!”
Jacob howled and raised his arms.
From atop the pile of rubbish, Nat watched, her mouth hanging open.
Before Jacob struck, Alcazar punched him the chest.
“Why?” he screamed, face glistening. He rained blows against Jacob, who stood rigid, staring down.
“Stop!” cried Nat. She clamped her hands over her ears. “I can’t take anymore. Just stop it! Both of you!”
Jacob’s arms dropped to his sides. “Who care what you want,” he growled. “Should kill you when had chance, girl.”
Max spoke, his voice barely a whisper. “Shut up, Jacob.”
They all looked towards him. He clutched the small body to his cheek.
“We’ll get our blood. Even if we all have to go to the surface, they’ll not see another sunrise.” He closed his eyes.
A whistle drifted in from the tunnel outside, and a figure stepped over the crumbling wall and through the hole.
Jacob growled.
“Stop!” Max cried.
Jacob ignored the plea and pushed Whistler back against the wall.
Whistler, shooting panicked glances around the chamber, released a high-pitched note of pain, striking the wall a second time.
“Where?” Jacob accused.
Alcazar leapt onto Jacob’s back, but uselessly slid off and stumbled back in the water. He toppled in with a splash.
“Jacob!” said Max, still holding the body of Edgar. “It wasn’t his fault. We weren’t here either.”
Jacob grabbed Whistler’s multicoloured jumper and yanked him upwards.
He slid up the wall, feet kicking in the air. He clutched Jacob’s thick wrist and frantically shook his head.
“Your fault,” Jacob hissed. He turned slightly and, with a massive heave, flung Whistler across the chamber.
Nat watched the thin body soar past, arms and legs circling like he was swimming through the air. Whistler’s head dipped, body following. He crunched against the far wall, his back hitting the brick. Whistler plummeted into the shallow water below.
“Brother!” Alcazar rushed over.
Whistler jerked up and spat out a mouthful of water. He gagged.
From the other side of the room, Jacob jabbed a finger in his direction. “Where?” he demanded again.
Whistler emitted fast and agitated notes.
“This is pointless!” screamed Max. “It doesn’t matter where he was! This happened, and nothing will change it. Where are the twins, Jacob? Are you going to try and kill them when they arrive? We’re all equally to blame for this; we promised Herman we’d be back by dawn.” He gave the body in the corner a prolonged gaze. “And look what happened.”
Jacob huffed and turned his back on the group.
Whistler slumped against the wall and rubbed his back, glaring at his brother.
“I find twins,” Jacob snarled.
“No,” said Max. “Alcazar can find the twins. We need to tell them, but not you. There are other things we need to do.”
He closed his eyes again and stroked the body of Edgar against his face.
25.
The last load of dirt fell from the spade in Jacob’s hands.
They all stood in the clearing of the small forest. Two mounds of freshly turned earth lay between them. Beside these, another patch of ground appeared recently disturbed, the first few green colonists taking root. Nat guessed that their mother, old Agnes, lay beneath.
On tree branches, various species of birds watched in silence. Pigeons, starlings, blackbirds, seagulls, sparrows; they stood side by side, taking up every available perch. Smaller birds balanced on Alcazar’s shoulders, and a large thrush sat atop his head. One of the smaller species constantly chirped its song into his ear.
Nat thought it might have been amusing under different circumstances.
She glanced at each face that surrounded the fresh graves. Alcazar and Max stood on either side of Jacob, heads bowed, hands clutched together. The twins, finally found, looked a little more human in the daylight. They stayed close to each other, almost touching. Their eyes, small and completely black, squinted in the sun. Their snouts emitted long, wet sniffs. One of them wiped the tip with the back of a long claw.
Whistler had maintained a safe distance from Jacob through the tunnels and up through the grate. He stood the furthest away, barely in the circle.
Nat stared at him in bewilderment.
What can be going through his mind? He could have stopped one death. Where was he when Johan and the rest of them called?
Johan. It always came back to Johan.
Whistler looked up at her and, meeting her eyes, immediately glanced away.
Coward, she thought, returning her attention to the two graves. Edgar’s burial place was no more than a foot long. Her hands tightened on each other.
Jenkins trotted around the undergrowth, sniffing the base of the trees.
“Someone should say a few words,” said Max, his voice quivering. “I’m… I’m not up to it.”
Jacob thrust the spade deep into the earth and leaned against its handle like a cane. “She not be here,” he grumbled.
“What?” said Max.
“Not want her here,” Jacob replied and shot Nat a look. She saw the cold hate in his eyes.
“She has every right,” said Alcazar and wiped tears from his face. “Max has told me all about you, Nat. You might not be part of this family…” He gave a weak smile. “Something I imagine you’re grateful for, but you are one of us. If you hadn’t helped for so long, who knows? This might have happened sooner.” He dropped his gaze from her to the graves between them.
“But she not family!”
“Hush, Jacob,” said Alcazar. “This is not the time or the place.” He walked forwards and the roosting birds took flight to join their comrades in the trees. Stopping between the freshly turned mounds, he outstretched his arms.
“We are here to celebrate the lives and mourn the deaths of our beloved brothers, Herman and Edgar. They were taken away too soon, through hands that did not realise their sin.”
The twins erupted into muffled sniffles and hugged each other.
“We pray that God Almighty will welcome them into his Kingdom. Our brothers have suffered on earth and deserve the reward of eternal paradise. Despite our appearance, we are all God’s creatures. Amen.”
“Amen,” the others repeated.
“Now,” said Alcazar, a single tear meandering down his cheek, “let us pray, remember the good times that we shared.”
Jacob snorted and received a sharp glance from Alcazar.
With her head down and eyes closed, Nat took the few minutes of silence and gathered her thoughts. Her mind seemed distorted, like her thoughts had been refracted through a prism and lay scattered in her head. She guessed it was due to the lack of sleep and the journey she’d made since entering the derelict area of the city. She realised this was the first time she had actually stopped since her time in the sewers. Her life, in a single night, had become a rollercoaster. No, she thought, that’s not right. It’s more like a ghost train—full of creatures and horror and shock.
She opened her eyes and again studied the brothers. She shivered at the twins. The wound down her back had begun to itch terribly.
They’re not monsters, she thought, just fighters. Alcazar’s right. I do feel like one of them now. How can you go through so much and not feel like one of them?
She closed her eyes again.
I need to speak to Max. He’ll know what to do. It's time to tell him everything I know. Johan, Agnes, the whole damn story. Fuck. Will he get mad that I didn’t tell him sooner? No, he’ll understand. I couldn’t prove anything.
She heard a small cry from her left, a low, sharp whistle.
Nat tensed her fists.
And what about him? Should I tell Max that he was there the night their mother was murdered? That he turned and ran instead of helping her?
“Look after him, Herman,” said Alcazar, “you cantankerous old bastard.”
He raised his arms and all the birds took flight. They rose high into the sky in a tornado of beating wings. The dark cloud of movement dispersed; the sky between the treetops returned to a gentle blue with thin wisps of drifting cloud.
“We have to return underground,” ordered Alcazar. “It’s been risky enough. Come on.”
Jacob strode on ahead and lifted up the thick metal grate that covered a raised concrete platform. Nat jumped as the twins shot across the clearing, bare feet scampering across the earth. They disappeared into the dark hole in seconds.
Alcazar’s little feathered friend had returned to his shoulder, chirping in earnest. The older brother’s brow creased in concentration.
“Whistler,” he said. “A moment inside, if you’ll entertain my questions. A little birdy tells me we need to talk.”
Whistler studied the grass between his feet.
“Now, brother,” said Alcazar, threat creeping into his voice.
Nat watched Whistler plod towards the birdman like a child caught drawing on the walls. Had Alacazar’s network finally called Whistler out?
Did the older brother know Whistler was there when Agnes was chased?
Max called for Jenkins and the dog trotted over, blades of grass poking out from its mouth.
“Stupid dog,” he said and scooped Jenkins up. “You know that makes you sick. Why do you still do it, eh?”
“Max?” Nat asked and put a hand on his arm. “Can you hang back for a second? I… I need to talk.”
He nodded. “It’s overdue, I suppose. Alcazar? Can you get everyone back and keep them there?”
Alcazar waved the request away and ushered Whistler into the hole. From beneath his black fringe, plastered down on his forehead, Max gave Nat another worried glance over his shoulder.
“Go on,” said Max and placed Jenkins on the ground. “Off with your uncles.”
The dog barked and shook its short fur. Tail wagging, it ran off after Alcazar. He picked up the dog.
“Don’t be too long,” he said.
Jacob growled and lowered his body in after Alcazar. He dropped the heavy grate into place and was gone.
“Can we get back?” asked Nat.
“There are many ways back,” said Max. “Now, what�
�s on your mind?”
They sat down on the grass.
Nat looked around the vacant clearing. Not all the birds had gone. Some lingered in the treetops in warbled song.
“It was nice,” she said, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her face and the fresh, earthy aroma of the wood. “I’m sure Herman would have approved.”
“Funny how he was a devout Christian,” said Max with a small smile. “You wouldn’t think it.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Apparently he had read The Bible from cover to cover at a young age. Changed his outlook.”
Nat frowned. “Doesn’t the Bible say thou shalt not kill?”
Max plucked at a patch of weeds by his sides.
“Herman didn’t kill anyone. He always left it up to Jacob or the twins.”
“Um,” said Nat and looked at the ground.
“I’m sure you didn’t keep me behind just to discuss how nice the service was. You look drained, distracted. I know what this is about.”
Nat raised her head to meet his eyes. “You do?”
“I expected it. You want to leave, anyone would.”
The rays of sun highlighted the few ginger strands in Max’s thick beard. They glistened like copper wire. Nat wondered what he looked like underneath all the hair and dirt.
“We’ve been keeping you prisoner,” he continued. “Okay, you’re out of the cell, but we still haven’t let you go.” He placed his hand on her shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “We’re only in the park, you can hear the traffic if you listen carefully. Go. I’ll tell them I lost you in the trees. Jacob will be pissed, but he’s got other things on his mind. He’ll forget quickly and—”
Nat swallowed. “It’s those other things I want to talk to you about,” she said slowly.
“What do you mean?”
Nat climbed to her feet and held out her hand.
“Let’s walk for a bit. I promise I won’t run off. Like Alcazar said, I’m part of the family now.”
After a few seconds, Max took her hand and allowed himself to be pulled up. Nat snaked her arm around his, linking them.
“See. You can grab me if I make a break for freedom.”
Mother's Boys Page 20