Boneseeker

by Brynn Chapman

  He jabs again and I roll.

  I kick out and my boot connects with his thigh, sending him sprawling across the kitchen.

  I leap up, draw the pistol and point it at his head. “Don’t do it.”

  He lunges, launching the poker.

  I spin and it soars past. It misses and I hear it clatter and slide into the living area.

  He’s on me, gripping my shoulders.

  I swing the gun, and bash him in the side of his head.

  His eyes darken like a snuffed candle. He crumples to the kitchen floor with a ‘whoomp’.

  I must get her out. I feel the panic. He will move her soon, I know it.

  How do I bloody well get in?

  I fly across the room to retrieve an axe from beside the hearth. I swing down, delivering an almighty craack to the floorboards. I slam it down, again and again.

  It’s no use. They will flee before I can cut an entry large enough.

  A small hole reveals Arabella’s terrified face.

  I drop the axe and reach behind, into my waistband for the pistol.

  “He has a rifle!” Arabella screams, hysterical. “Watch out!”

  A white hot pain sears my shoulder. Then a crushing pain on my skull.

  And blackness.

  ###

  Henry

  My eyes fly open, tripping madly across the unfamiliar room. “Where are we? Where’s Arabella?”

  I can’t stop coughing, and it feels as if the inside of my chest is stuffed with cotton. Every breath a struggle.

  “Easy, Henry.”

  A pain in my shoulder sears as if the poker connected. But I know it didn’t. I clutch the spot, staring bewilderedly at father.

  “We’re at the closest Inn. You were shot. The house burned to rubble. We were lucky we found you, and that you didn’t die of exposure.”

  “How did you make it back in time?”

  “We happened on the law not five miles down the road. We found you outside, beside Abner, whom I’m assuming you tied to the tree. It was a miracle the fire continued. The storm abated, giving the flames a reprieve—which was all they needed.”

  “Who? Someone saved me? I collapsed in the kitchen. I should’ve died. The smoke…”

  My mind reels. I wheeze and cough and my chest screams.

  “You were surrounded by huge footprints.”

  I nod, and a wave of gratefulness spreads across my chest.

  I cringe as I struggle to sit. “What time is it? We have to get to the train station. We may be too late.”

  I flip my legs out of bed and stagger and lean against the chest of drawers.

  Father shakes his head. “The storm delayed much transportation. But yes, I’ve called a car, and we’ll head to the station. We’ll need a disguise.”

  He motions to clothes, wigs and even two false noses lying on the bed.

  I sit and begin shrugging into the shirt. “How will we find her? No doubt he’s completely changed her appearance.”

  “No doubt.” Father massages his face. Which means he doesn’t have an answer. Panic perforates a hole in my chest.

  He holds up a key and a journal. “The key was around your neck, the journal in your coat.”

  I blanch. “The giant. Arabella never removes that key. It’s to her journal.”

  Father nods. “He got them both somehow.”

  A light of revelation dawns and I laugh. It sounds mad.

  Father looks concerned. “Perhaps I should go alone. The smoke may have addled—”

  I hold my hand up, still laughing with relief. “No. No. I know. I know how to find her.”

  “Go on.”

  “Where’s Violet?”

  He checks his pocket watch. “She should be arriving. I cabled her while you were unconscious…” His face lights.

  “The dog!”

  I nod vigorously. “Yes. She’s bringing him, yes?”

  “Of course, they’re bloody inseparable. I’m told he sleeps in my bed.” He grimaces.

  I nod. It should work. It should work.

  I slide on the shirt, and the pain dries up the humor.

  I stare at the key. “Should I open it?”

  Father stares at it. “It’s covered in soot.”

  “She left it in the tunnel, for someone to find.” My mind whirls with worst-case scenarios.

  They’re already gone. I will never ever find her. He will bed her over and over, year after year, forcing children into her.

  My heart feels leaden in my chest.

  Father nods. “It’s a desperate move.”

  “The giant must’ve been lurking, and retrieved it, along with her journal.”

  I shove the key inside as my hands shake. Her words.

  If she dies…these pages will be the only remaining whispers of her voice.

  I shake my head and grit my teeth. I flip the pages, secretly pleased as I see my name many, many times.

  I leaf to the front, to find a subheading. Finally, the words: DOG COMMANDS, leap from the page.

  I smile and shake the journal at him. She left it to give us a clue. “She was telling us to use her dog, too.”

  Father snatches the book, leafing through it as he simultaneously jams on the false nose. “Look at what she taught them. I’ve never seen the likes of it.”

  I grab the overcoat, taking a final look in the mirror. The false nose, bowler hat and wig make me almost unrecognizable. Except for my eyes. I grab a pair of dark glasses, and a white cane. I shall be blind.

  “We have to go. Where are you meeting Violet?”

  ###

  Bella

  I whimper quietly as my head bounces off Stygian’s back. I see the pain like a pick and anvil, tap-tap-tapping against every suture in my skull. I keep losing and regaining consciousness. The images in my head stop and start like a faulty reel at the moving picture show.

  Stygian slides me off his back to stand and I feel his hands steadying my shoulders. “Stand up Bella.”

  “Don’t call me that,” I spit. I cringe, waiting for the slap.

  He tugs at my hat. My hat?

  My hands fly to my head, feeling. A hat, a wig.

  I reach underneath to my hair. He’s cut it, to above my shoulders—undoubtedly to fit it under the wig.

  I stare down at a dress I do not recognize. He…undressed me. I analyze my body. I don’t feel any different. I am mercifully intact, undoubtedly from a lack of time and fear of discovery than any moment of remorse.

  My perception clears and I register dripping sounds and close, tight air. It seems to barely seep in and out of my lungs.

  We are still in a tunnel. A very tight tunnel.

  My breath halts. And restarts. I’m instantly panting.

  Only Henry’s reassuring presence was able to fight the phobia. It’s crippling. I collapse to the stone floor, sickened by my own vulnerability.

  Stygian halts, his eyes narrowing. “What is this?”

  I stare up at him, his face blurring in and out of focus. His eyebrows rise and his face bursts into a sickening smile.

  “Claustrophobia.” He rubs his hands together, like it’s the most delightful joke. “Ah, you see, the mighty Holmes’s do have Achilles’ heels. Yours…is claustrophobia. And I shall wager that I now may discern Sherlock Holmes’ weakness as well. You.”

  I’m ill. I might as well tilt my head and present him with my jugular as well. I picture my head on a chopping block, with Stygian holding the guillotine’s rope.

  He hauls me to stand. “Walk. We will be late for our honeymoon darling.”

  I half stumble for what feels like miles. And then I hear it. Voices. Loads of voices.

  The tunnel splits, becoming more shabby and tighter and we are at the crossroads, perhaps in a drainage tunnel.

  Far off, I see the tiniest speck of light in each direction. “To the right.” He releases my arm, arranging our luggage. A bag
I don’t recognize will undoubtedly hold unfamiliar clothes, ready to alight me to a life of rape and torture.

  Faces of whom I shall lose flip through my mind.

  Violet, John, Father, my dogs…Henry.

  I whisper, “Henry.” Willing him to me.

  Stygian bends over.

  Anger surges as my heart rockets to life and I leap forward. With all my power, I kick out, clocking the side of his head.

  He swears, buckling to one knee.

  I run, swerving with my vertigo the left.

  My chest is hitching as if an invisible hand clutches my lungs and my head wails with indescribable jags of pain as fits of light spark behind my eyes.

  I whimper with every boot-strike.

  Forty feet, thirty feet, ten feet.

  I hear laughter. Rescue is just feet away.

  With the force of a steam locomotive Stygian slams into my back, driving me to the cave floor...

  My face bashes against the stone as Stygian tackles me. I scream, and hear the voices overhead halt, listening.

  Stygian’s hand covers my mouth, and I bite down.

  He yells and straddles my chest, pinning me.

  I knee him in the back. He moves an inch. It’s all I need.

  I punch his groin and he flies off.

  I crawl. Toward the light in the ceiling. A drain in a public house?

  And then I feel it, something slipping over my head. I’m drowning, without water. The phobia reduces me to a child, begging for release.

  Paralyzing, crushing fear erupts, “No, no please.”

  A maniacal cackle is his reply.

  Blackness.

  The phobia crushes me, immobilizing.

  He has shoved me inside a sack. I feel my body hoist over his shoulders once again.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Man’s Best Friend

  Henry

  “Stay close,” Father says, loud enough to be heard over the crowd in the train station.

  Father turns sideways, his profile altered by the bulbous false nose. I resist the urge to adjust my wig. I tap my white cane, playing my part of the blind man.

  Father gestures to a bench. “Sit, Henry. Keep looking.”

  We deposit ourselves on a raised platform which provides a bird’s eye view of the station. Father flicks open a newspaper, glancing over top.

  Beside me, Newton growls and shifts uneasily. “Easy boy.”

  I speak low, so only father may hear. “This is maddening. I don’t even know what I’m looking for. What color hair, what clothes.”

  “That’s why we have Newton. Sheer genius, my boy. Keep him still.”

  “Sit, Newton.” He sits, but reluctantly.

  I stroke the dog from his neck to his tail, but his coarse black and white hackles refuse to lie down; his hair’s as vigilant as his mind in his quest to find his missing master.

  After a quarter hour, Newton stands, quivering all over. A whine of longing rips from his throat.

  Father folds his paper, anticipating.

  My heart hammers as my eyes tear through the crowd and frustration heats my cheeks.

  The station seems in order; I see nothing abnormal. People hugging, departing, coming and going. Children screaming, porter’s lugging suitcases.

  My eyes tick from person to person, checking facial features and expressions. Finally, a movement catches my eye.

  A woman rips her arm out of a man’s grasp. His fingers close around her forearm and her lips quiver in an unmistakable grimace of pain.

  “I see them.”

  Arabella’s red locks are poorly stuffed beneath a black wig while Stygian sports a false moustache and an unconvincing limp.

  Newton wriggles and whines, straining against his lead.

  Father’s hand shoots under his overcoat and I know he’s drawing his weapon.

  I extract Arabella’s handkerchief from my pocket, shoving it beneath Newton’s snout.

  He whines pitifully, and then his ears perk as he sniffs in earnest, nostrils flaring as he inhales his master’s scent. He dances skittishly, nails clicking against the floor.

  I stare straight ahead, eyes never leaving the pair. Afraid I will lose them in the masses.

  “Ready?”

  Father nods.

  “Find Arabella, Newton.” I release his collar.

  The dog leaps from the platform, growling and snapping, barreling into the crowd.

  “A dog is loosed!”

  “Somebody catch him!”

  Women and children scream and a path appears through the thick crowd as patrons leap out of his way.

  Father and I hurry behind, bolting to keep pace with him.

  Stygian has caught on, his limp discarded. I see the top of his hat swerve and head for an exit.

  “Blast! He’s making a run for it!”

  “Keep moving, Henry.”

  I cannot see him. His hat’s disappeared.

  “Hey, you! Catch your wretched dog! You aren’t blind!” An irritated fop gives me a rough shoulder.

  I ignore him and weave quickly. I see the tail end of Newton’s leash disappear again and bolt forward.

  But he’s too fast. His barks echo through the station, but I cannot see him. The path he cut has filled back in.

  Somewhere I hear a bobby’s whistle. The crowd will slow him.

  “Excuse me. Excuse me.” I push my way to a statue, and scramble up onto its feet, searching.

  Father’s face peers up, along with twenty other perplexed faces.

  “I see them. Head for two o’clock!”

  Father is gone, instantaneously swallowed by the multitude.

  The bobby spy’s me, his whistle bleating in earnest.

  I meet his fiery gaze and bellow, “Call Inspector Giamatti. Hurry!”

  He hesitates, but seems to choose to believe me and scurries toward the exit.

  Stygian jerks Bella and her head snaps with the force, pushing her toward the door.

  Bella slides to a stop, Stygian colliding into her back.

  A man blocks the exit.

  A huge man. A giant.

  He places his hands on his hips, and spreads his legs wide, blocking their escape. I see him mouth the words, ‘Miss Holmes’.

  Arabella’s face breaks in relief, but Stygian wheels her away as the man lurches for her.

  I see father’s bowler hat still headed for two o’clock, and Stygian’s now barreling in the opposite direction.

  I leap off the statue, keeping my eye on the other exit.

  How? The Brethren of Large?

  It must be. The giant sent for help. Saving our carcasses a second time.

  I break out of the crowd. Another colossal man blocks the exit.

  Stygian whirls away; his head whips desperately back and forth, searching for escape.

  I grit my teeth and run as fast as the crowd will allow. Father falls in beside me.

  “Giants,” He breathes.

  “Aye.”

  Newton’s barks pierce the air as he leaps out of the fray, charging Stygian.

  Bella sees him first. Ripping her arm from Stygian’s grasp, she flings herself to the ground, out of his reach.

  Stygian raises his pistol.

  “Newton, desist!” Arabella shrieks. “No. No!”

  Newton leaps, snarling, his eyes fixed on Stygian.

  Arabella scrambles up, flinging herself at him. Her boot flashes up, striking Stygian’s wrist.

  Stygian’s shot discharges with a ‘Bang’.

  Newton’s yelp cuts to the bone and my heart hammers. His black and white body contorts mid-air as the shot connects, as if hitting an invisible barrier. He strikes the floor and slides into the gape-mouthed crowd.

  He whines, flopping like a fish out of water on the floor.

  His nails tick wildly off the floor as he tries to stand, his body writhing.

  Newton’s back le
g scrapes uselessly, unable to find purchase. He stands, teeth bared, ready to leap again.

  Stygian’s gaze shoots to the dog, gun swinging wildly.

  “No!” Bella flies, tackling the dog, rolling with him in her arms. “Desist, desist. Oh, please, boy, please.”

  The second giant slips behind Stygian. I meet his eye and jerk my head.

  He steps out of the way, arms extending, moving back the onlookers who are apparently devoid of common sense.

  “Drop your weapon, Stygian!” father yells.

  Stygian’s pistol arm swings in our direction.

  I see father’s arm raise beside mine. I squeeze the trigger and hear his pistol fire in tandem.

  Stygian’s shoulders rock, one-two, as our rapid fire shots graze his biceps.

  “Ah!” He collapses in pain, still clutching the pistol.

  I know without any consultation, that father aimed to maim, not kill.

  No matter how odious, we are trying to stop him. Others will decide his fate.

  The crowd presses in, murmurs rising.

  I hear someone call, “The police have arrived! Make way! Make room!”

  Arabella is sobbing as she rips off her wig and I hear the inspector’s familiar voice behind me, “Dr. Watson, Mr. Watson, what’s going on?”

  Montgomery is hot behind him.

  Three uniformed guards stand above Stygian’s prostrate form, pistols drawn. His eyes finally admit defeat.

  His weapon clatters to the floor, and his eyes jam closed.

  I drop to my knees beside Bella. She’s sobbing, tears flowing and sluicing down her cheeks.

  The dog is whining. “Shh. Easy boy, easy boy.”

  She pulls his leg up, examining it. It’s a red mess of flesh. She drops the paw and swoons, her eyes rolling back in her head.

  I catch her, and wrench her to me, inhaling her scent.

  Words of gratitude fill my head.

  Home. You are home, at last, Bella.

  They echo, ringing over and over like the pealing of bells. It’s like I’ve been on a long, long journey, and I’m finally home.

  She, is my home.

  “Bella. You’re alright. It’s alright. We’ll mend him.”