Harry nodded and got moving, the others shadowing him tightly. The snow enveloped each of them past their knees, which led to them almost wading rather than walking. It wouldn’t be long before the snow was deep enough to swallow them all whole. The effort of every step left them panting. They moved in silence, too laboured to speak.
Several minutes passed.
The snow went on forever.
Then: “Do you have any idea of where we’re going?” Kath shouted from the back of their human chain, struggling to be heard over the howling wind. “We should have been there by now.”
She’s right. Harry had been thinking the same thing just before Kath voiced it out loud. He’d gotten them lost in conditions cold enough to freeze a penguin solid.
“We’re lost aren’t we?” said Kath, accurately reading in on the meaning of Harry’s silence. It had been more an accusation than a question.
Instead of Harry answering, Jerry did so for him. “Yes, we’re lost,” he said, “but Harry’s not to blame.”
Harry raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean I’m not to blame?”
“I mean that the snow made us lost.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Kath. “You sound just like that silly girl back at the pub.”
“Come now,” said Lucas, stopping and halting everybody in the line. “Let’s hear the boy out.”
Jerry prepared to give his explanation and the others gathered around close, all of them shivering except for Lucas who was coping slightly better. “It’s not normal snow,” Jerry explained. “It’s a magic snow.”
Despite the brevity of the situation, everyone started laughing.
“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up,” said Jerry, deadly serious despite their mockery, “but I’m telling you that this snow is unnatural. It’s a force being wielded by a force even greater.”
Harry decided to humour him. “Wielded by whom?”
“Who you think? The guy in the hood. The snow is just his tool to trap us or get us lost and confused. Then he comes to take us like he did Ben.”
“Okay,” said Harry, trying his best to remain open-minded. “But, if you believe that, what the hell are you doing out here?”
Jerry smashed a fist against his open palm. “Because me and the guy in the hood have unfinished business. If he turns up, I’ll be the one to face him while the rest of you make a run for it.”
“Why would you want to do that?” Harry asked, seriously considering that Jerry may have lost his mind. He was a teenaged boy, not Rambo.
But Jerry seemed more than sane as he continued. “I need to take some responsibility instead of letting other people do it for me. If this is the end of the world then the least I can do is make it hard for the bastard that started it. I’m going to give him the ass-kicking of his life.”
“Erm….fellas?” The group turned to face Lucas, who was looking unsettled. “That bastard in question,” Lucas pointed over Harry’s shoulder, “is right over there.”
Harry spun around to see a shape in the distance. The dark silhouette of a man taller than a man had right to be. It was coming towards them, slowly and methodically, as if it had all of eternity to get there. In the last year there had been numerous nights where Harry had drifted out of a nightmare and woken up with a stinking hangover, but this was the very first time he had ever felt as though he were drifting in to a nightmare.
And the nightmare was getting closer.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“I better go check on Old Graham,” said Steph, leaving Jess and Nigel to look after Damien and Peter. Jess had started to feel desperately lonely since their numbers had halved. She just hoped the situation was temporary and that the others would return soon. Everyone except for Kath, that is. Jess wouldn’t care if she ever saw that woman again. She turned to Nigel. “Best settle in. It’s already been a long night.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” Nigel replied.
The two of them slid down either side of the fire, leaving the middle clear so that its warmth could reach Peter on the sofa. Damien was still tied to a chair nearby, not as close to the fire as the rest of them. They’d dumped an assortment of blankets on him to keep him warm and he now looked how Jess imagined a geriatric, old woman would look knitting in front of the fire. She pulled a nearby duvet up over herself and let out a shiver.
“Not getting any warmer is it?” Nigel commented. “Don’t they say you should all huddle together to share warmth?”
“Yeah,” Jess agreed. “They do say that.”
Nigel patted the floor beside him. “Well? You want to come over?”
Jess tried to work the offer out. What was he suggesting? Nigel seemed like a nice guy – shy, if anything – so she assumed he was just being practical rather than intending anything else. Still, the suggestion made her uncomfortable.
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m warm enough for now, but thanks for offering.”
For a half-second, Jess thought she saw anger flush Nigel’s face, but when he spoke, she realised it must have been her imagination. He was harmless.
“Don’t mention it,” he told her. “I just don’t like to see a young girl suffer.”
Jess giggled. “What a gentleman.”
“Unlike some.” Nigel nodded towards Damien.
Jess thought about that for a moment. Something still didn’t sit right about what had happened earlier. “I still can’t believe that he tried to hurt Steph.”
“Well, believe it! The guy’s a fucking animal and he’s lucky I didn’t kill him.”
Jess was taken aback. “Wow! Calm down. I was just saying it was a shock, that’s all.”
Nigel rubbed at his eyes and shook his head. His gold pinkie ring glinted in the fire light, the image of a dolphin shining for a split-second. “Yeah, course…I’m sorry. I’m just so angry that I wasn’t there to stop him sooner.”
“You stopped him soon enough,” Jess told him. “He never got to hurt Steph. Well, not in that way, you know?”
He nodded and smiled, yet something about the gesture made Jess feel uncomfortable. It felt as though she were being looked at through a mask. That perhaps Nigel’s smile was just a way of hiding something else.
But what?
“Do you mind holding down the fort for a couple minutes?” Jess asked. “I just want to see if Steph needs anything.”
Nigel’s smile never faltered. “No problem,” he said, looking her in the eye.
Jess shivered again; she was certain it wasn’t because of the cold. She stood up and hurried away, glancing back over her shoulder to check that she wasn’t being followed. Past the bar, she approached the darkness of the staff corridor. Jess felt even more then that something wasn’t right about Nigel, but her final glance back showed that the man was still seated in front of the fire. He wasn’t following. Jess felt stupid and paranoid. Nigel didn’t seem like he could hurt a fly.
Neither do frogs until they shoot out their slimy tongues and pull you in and swallow you whole.
When Jess stepped into the cellar doorway at the top of the stairs, she immediately felt the warmth from the fire below, flowing up and over her face. She shuddered at the pleasant feeling and started to take the steps downwards.
At the bottom, Steph sat near the barrel-fire with Old Graham. The two of them were chatting away like they didn’t have a care in the world. Steph looked up at Jess as she approached and asked, “Everything good up there?”
Jess shrugged. “I wouldn’t describe anything as good at the moment, but things are…stable.”
“How’s Peter?”
“Bad. I don’t know what to do for him. I’m hoping that the others come back soon with medicine or something to help.”
Steph bit her lip. Her face was swollen on one side where she’d been attacked and her right eye was half-closed. Jess wondered quite how much Steph had been affected by tonight’s earlier incident. It was obvious she was trying not to show her emotions, but the feisty barmaid didn’t seem quite as tough as usual. “
Are you okay?” Jess asked her.
Steph seemed to snap out of a trance. “I’m fine. Just a bit worried, I guess, but that’s to be expected, right?”
“Hell yeah. You’d have to be made of stone not to be worried tonight. Speaking of which, how well do you know Nigel?”
Steph looked confused. “Nigel? Pretty well, I guess. Why?”
“He just makes me feel a bit uncomfortable.”
Steph shook her head. “He’s never caused any problems in the eight or nine months I’ve known him. Keeps to himself, more or less.”
“A nice guy…f-from…what I seen…tonight.” Old Graham had fallen into a drunken haze, but still managed to fade in and out of the conversation. “A nice…guy.”
“Maybe, I’m just being silly,” said Jess.
“I’d say so. The guy saved me from being raped tonight!”
Jess nodded. There was a good chance she was just paranoid as she’d suspected earlier. Having Steph confirm it made her feel much better. She would go back upstairs now and look after Peter, thinking no more about it. But first she wanted to check on Steph’s injuries. Someone needed to look after her too, especially after what had happened. “Let me have a quick look at your face, before I go back upstairs. You look pretty beat up.”
Steph waved a hand. “Don’t worry. Just a bruise.”
“I’d feel better all the same.” Jess slid down onto the floor besides her.
Half-asleep, Old Graham murmured something from the floor. “Let the girl…have a…look.”
Steph sighed and leaned forward. “Fine, just keep your hands away. It hurts bad enough as it is.”
Jess leaned forward slowly and cringed at the sight of Steph’s bulging cheek. Her misty blue eye above the injury was bloodshot and teary. A second injury on her forehead seemed just as painful. A throbbing, aggressive bump that was already turning purple. “Jesus, you really took a whacking.”
“Think I fell against the toilet bowl. Don’t really remember much more than that. Someone came out of the dark and hit me.”
“You don’t remember anything at all?”
Steph sighed. “No.”
She went to move her head away, but Jess stopped her. “Hold on a sec.” She looked closer at the wound on Steph’s cheek, suddenly noticing something as her eyes adjusted to the dim light of the cellar. It was something at the centre of the bruise, lighter in colour than the surrounding tissue. It formed a shape, maybe matching the surface of whatever had hit her. The outline seemed to resemble a…
…
Jess’ eyes went wide.
A dolphin.
The image was familiar and Jess scratched at her head while she tried to understand why. What could have hit Steph in the face that featured a small dolphin shape?
A ring with an engraving on it, maybe?
Jess’s breath caught in her throat at the realisation. “Holy shit! Nigel!”
“Did I hear someone say my name?” Nigel was walking down the stairs into the cellar.
Jess’s stomach cramped as she tried to think of something to say. All she could come up with was: “Hi, Nigel. Yeah, we were just talking about you. Steph just told me what nice guy you are.”
Nigel smiled at her. Jess finally understood what the expression was designed to disguise. It was indeed a mask.
Intended to hide a monster.
###
When Jess suddenly excused herself, Nigel had been concerned. Maybe his fumbled attempt at getting the girl to sit beside him had eroded the harmless veneer he worked so hard to maintain. It was possible that Jess had seen his true intentions.
Now, as Nigel entered the cellar, he wasn’t entirely sure. Jess certainly seemed jumpy at his presence but, considering the events of the last few hours, that was perhaps understandable. Steph seemed glad to see him, however, that much was clear; she’d smiled and waved a hand at him when he’d approached. It wasn’t surprising she trusted him. After all, he’d been working on gaining her confidence for the last eight months. As far as Steph was concerned, he was as harmless as a three-legged kitten with pneumonia.
Dumb fucking whore.
It didn’t matter if Jess suspected anything. They were both just his prey now; more victims to add to his mental highlight-reel of rape and torture. He figured he had at least an hour to have fun with them before he’d have to slit their throats, stash the bodies, and take a finger for his collection (and that was only if Harry and the others managed to make it back from the supermarket without freezing to death). Even if they did come back he’d have a story ready for them (and his trusty flick knife ready in his pocket just in case they didn’t believe it).
“Everything okay?” Jess asked him, still not giving away whether or not she suspected anything. “Shouldn’t someone be watching Damien and Peter?”
Nigel nodded, trying his best to look solemn. An emotion he couldn’t actually feel at all, but one he felt he was adept at emulating. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, sweetheart. I think Peter’s waking up. I heard him say your name.”
Jess didn’t react for a moment and Nigel wondered how well his lie had gone down. Finally, she replied, but made no attempts to get up and join him. “That’s wonderful,” she said. “Great news.”
“Well,” said Nigel, offering out his hand, “you going to come see the poor lad or not? I’m sure you’re the first thing he’d like to wake up to.”
Jess shifted uncomfortably as if determined not to get up. Eventually she had no choice but to concede.
“You’re right,” she said. “Be right there. I just need to talk to Steph about something first. Girl problems, you know? So, did you want to meet me up there in five minutes or so?”
She’s trying to warn Steph, the little bitch!
Nigel closed his eyes and fought away the urge to rip the girl apart right there and then, tasting her wet insides as she gulped her dying breaths. He had to work real hard to control himself and keep his cool. He would be nowhere without his control. Far better to have fun once everyone was tied up and under his power. That way there could be no surprises and the party could really get started.
“I think you should probably come now,” Nigel suggested, keeping his voice soft so as not to alarm an unsuspecting Steph. “What if he doesn’t make it and this was his last chance to speak to you, Jess?”
Steph placed an arm around the girl, before frowning directly at him. “That’s a little bit harsh, Nigel. Let’s not condemn the poor boy just yet.”
“Thanks,” Jess replied.
“I do agree with him though, honey. You should go right away. Peter hasn’t been conscious much tonight and you wouldn’t want to miss out on anything he could tell us about what happened outside.”
Nigel grinned. That’s a good girl. Always so eager to help daddy, aren’t you? Just like when you knocked yourself out for me in the toilets.
Nigel reached his hand out further to Jess. “That’s what I was trying to say. I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m sure Peter’s going to be just fine, but right now he needs you.”
Jess looked like one of the cats Nigel used to strangle as a child (before he moved onto women and children). Trapped and terrifyingly aware that death was quickly approaching, yet powerless to do anything about it. The girl was afraid; the sight of it made Nigel’s cock throb. He liked it so much better when they knew it was coming. Love that look in their eyes.
Jess started getting up, ignoring Nigel’s outstretched hand and rising tentatively, as though she expected a strong wind to blow her over at any moment. Nigel moved back and waited patiently by the stairs for her. To his irritation, Jess instead turned to Steph and held out a hand. “Will you come with me?”
Don’t even try it! Just take what’s coming to you and stop making things hard.
Nigel was relieved when Steph shook her head. Jess seemed to deflate like a leaking balloon.
“I can’t,” Steph told her. “I need to stay here and look after Old Graham.”
/> “But he’s asleep,” said Jess, the pleading and desperation in her voice was clear to Nigel. But is it clear to Steph? Much to his dismay, Steph did indeed seem to pick up on the girl’s veiled pleas and was now staring at Jess as if trying to work her out. Nigel held his breath, waiting for the outcome.
“Okay,” said Steph. “I’ll come with you, but we’ll have to be quick.”
Damn it!
Nigel stood, irritated, as the two women huddled up and waited for him to lead on. It was obvious Steph had picked up on something in Jess’s tone, but he doubted she suspected anything specific, anything close to the truth. She knew something was up, but, as long as he didn’t leave the two of them alone, she wouldn’t figure out what until it was far far too late.
The Final Winter: An Apocalyptic Horror Novel Page 17