by Matt Drabble
He quickly located his chainsaw and hurried as he had a long night’s work ahead to make the cabin safe by morning.
The noise was deafening, but he couldn’t find any of his ear protectors amongst his scattered belongings. As a result, as he used the chainsaw to cut the felled trees away from the cabin, he was oblivious to any approaching noises behind him.
He worked steadily for an hour or so before he stopped for a break. It was only then that he saw the gathering of lights surrounding the cabin.
He counted several flickering lights in all, and his first thought was that islanders had come to his aid, but why were they waiting?
Rex shut the chainsaw off and laid it down on the ground beside his feet. There was no sound from the encircling lights, but they did start to move in closer to him.
The lanterns were in front of him and he started to get a very bad feeling about this as they moved in.
On a whim, he slipped back further into the darkness to the rear of the property, but there were now lights out the back moving in too.
He counted nine lanterns in all but had no idea just who was holding them, right up until he caught a flickering glimpse of a white robe.
All of a sudden, the wild stories of the Niners didn’t seem quite so unbelievable.
The lights were all moving in closer now, and he couldn’t find a gap in the circle. He started to panic as his head jerked from side to side, desperately looking for an escape. He could hide in the cabin, but that would surely be the first place they’d look for him.
The men were almost upon him now, and at the last second, he had a thought. He ran to the old oak tree and prayed that he could still fit. It was tight, but through sheer fear and panic, he managed to force himself into his childhood hiding place. He had no idea how he would be able to get out again, but right now, that didn’t matter.
He kept his breathing as slow and low as possible as he heard the men start to move around the tree. The creepiest thing, however, was that no one spoke a word; he could only hear wet footsteps in the soggy ground around him.
His head was bent over at an uncomfortable angle and his back was soon aching. He had scraped a chunk of skin off his right arm without realising it on the way in, but there wasn’t room for him to turn inside the tree space and check the damage. All he could do was wait and pray that the men left, and soon.
After what seemed like an age, the world around him went quieter still, but he still didn’t dare try and move. His body was starting to cry out in pain at the cramped conditions, but he just kept himself motionless.
It now seemed like an age since he had squeezed inside, and he was sure that the men must have moved on. He decided to risk a small movement to ease his back, which was now screaming in pain, but he realised in horror that he was stuck. Such had been his adrenaline-fused entry, he had wedged himself solidly in a space meant for a child not a man.
He rocked back and forth with increasing terror, trying to force himself back out, but he was too far in and there was no way he could turn around. His chest began to tighten as claustrophobia hit him hard and only raised his panic levels higher. He was dimly aware that he was making too much noise, but he couldn’t stop himself; it was only when he heard the chainsaw kick into life that he ground to a halt.
Wedged firmly inside the hollow part of the large oak tree, he could do nothing but scream as the chainsaw’s teeth bit into the truck and started to slice horizontally towards him.
The whirring metal blade made short work of the solid oak trunk and quicker work of his fragile flesh as it ate through his skin and bone at waist level.
The only mercy was that he died quickly as a massive heart attack blew his life apart from the inside and he was dead before his body was separated by hungry metallic teeth.
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By the time that Torvan awoke from his nightmare, he was bathed in a heavy stale sweat.
He swung his legs off the bed and stumbled to the bathroom to splash cool water onto his face. The view back from the mirror showed him a scared child instead of the ruler he hoped to be, and he gripped the sink to keep himself upright.
There was a test for him here; he knew it in his heart. The only trouble was that he didn’t know where it was coming from.
The Nine Gods would surely test his mettle to see if he was worthy, but surely he had already proved his loyalty by slaying his father for them.
He had lain siege to the town and turned back the invading forces of darkness. Even as he stood here shivering, he had sent nine disciples to shed yet more sacrificial blood in their names. Was it not enough? Did they still demand yet more of him? Or was this test coming from below and not above? Were the forces of evil trying to worm their way into his mind and strike from within, to cause him to doubt the gods’ word? Yes… that made far more sense. But he was stronger, far stronger than they could ever know, and before the night was over, he would prove his power to them all.
There was a tankard by his bed and he took a long drink of mead, the sweet brew settling his nerves and infusing him with a warming confidence.
Gwendolyn slept soundly on the other side of the bed, yet another sign that he was on the right path. A good woman like that would have never agreed to sit at his side unless he was truly doing the gods’ work.
By the time that he laid his head back down on the pillow, he was relaxed again, knowing that his knights were out there tonight serving his will and proving his power to the gods. All was right and all would be served in their name and his.
CHAPTER 19
Divide and conquer
Haynes wanted no part of Dale Clayton’s demented plan. The town mayor seemed to have undergone a radical personality change and not for the better.
He had known weasels like Clayton his whole life: men who strutted around like they owned the world but were all trembling worms underneath. Dale had been such a man when he’d first met him - a man to use and manipulate for his own ends - but now there was a troubling gleam in the man’s eye, one that looked dangerous. It was also a look that seemed to spreading amongst several others in the shelter and Haynes wanted nothing to do with any of them.
Dale’s plan had been disturbing in its aim and simplicity. Apparently, Clayton Snr had many things stashed away in an old hunting cabin for God only knew what purpose. Amongst his dubious collection were apparently several boxes of dynamite.
The town mayor wanted to take a small band of volunteers up to the monastery and set explosives under the main building using the old tunnels beneath - simple but potentially deadly for everyone involved.
Haynes had spent a summer as a young man working with a family friend who owned a copper mine. The experience had been set by his father who wanted to teach his son a lesson about life and hard work.
He’d taken two things away from that summer: one - hard manual work sucked, and the second was that you did not screw around with aged dynamite. The sticks would sweat over time, making them extremely volatile, and they could explode simply by too much friction.
According to Dale, his father’s store had been sitting around in a basement for the past 20 years or so. As such, Haynes wanted to be as far away as possible when anyone tried to move them.
He knew that Dale wanted his town back and saw this as a way to truly assert some authority over his people. He had been a paper king for a long time, but something had definitely changed in him now. The townsfolk needed a leader and Dale Clayton wanted the job.
As far as Haynes was concerned, these people were all nuts, Niners and islanders alike, and he wanted no part of either.
On the mainland, you simply called the police when a band of insane monks went on a bloody rampage, but apparently, islanders looked to solve their own problems.
“Psst,” he hissed at the man he sidled up to in the basement and then jerked his head to one side to indicate that the man should follow him away from the main group.
“It’s Anderson, right?” he whispered.
Anderson Jennings nodded nervously in reply.
“You going along with this craziness, or do you want to get out of here and make a lot of money along the way?”
Anderson shook his head vigorously.
“Which one is it?” Haynes hissed after rolling his eyes.
“I want out of here,” Anderson clarified quickly and enthusiastically. “There’s... a woman. I could help her.”
“Can you drive a boat?”
Again, Anderson nodded.
“Good, then let’s just hope there’s still one floating at the harbour and that no one sees us leave.”
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Quinn came around slowly and only then because she was being dragged out of the car. It took her a few groggy moments to catch her bearings, mainly because the whole world seemed to be upside down.
In reality, it was just the car that was sitting on its roof. She saw this as someone was dragging her clear.
She looked down at her feet being pulled from the wreckage. The car wasn’t just upside down, it had been totalled.
Groggily, she tried to turn and look up at the man pulling her free, assuming that it was Caleb, but it wasn’t.
She attempted to speak but her brain refused to work quickly enough.
The man pulling her was large, dressed in black combat fatigues and a complete stranger to her.
“Miss Quinn?” a man asked her as the one pulling her let go of her arms and she slumped back down to the ground.
“Huh?” she slurred with a tongue that felt fat and dry in her mouth.
“My name is Calvin Morrison, Miss Quinn, and I’m in need of your help.”
“My... friend,” she managed drunkenly, pointing back to the car with a heavy hand.
“Oh, don’t worry about them, Miss Quinn. They’ll be taken care of, I can promise you that.”
Even in her groggy state, she didn’t like the sound of that.
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Caleb watched the scene unfold from his vantage point which, unfortunately, was upside down in the SUV.
He fought and strained to free himself of the seatbelt as the voices continued outside.
It took an enormous amount of self-control for him to take a breath and relax before reaching for the centre button and popping the seatbelt clasp open. His body fell from its harness and he had to manoeuvre his bulk until he was lined up with the car door and able to crawl away.
His first instinct was to run towards Quinn’s voice, but he had heard enough from the man talking to her that this was no rescue party.
He crawled into the thick woodland and kept low as he headed up and then around so that he was now overlooking the crash site.
There were several men standing around, and all of them were strangers to him. The only slight comfort he gained was that the group were clearly not Niners.
The men all carried powerful flashlights that lit up the area. They were all wearing some kind of black combat fatigues and most seemed to have sidearms strapped to their waists in shiny holsters. Part of him wanted to believe that they were some kind of rescue party, that someone on the island had gotten through to the mainland and summoned help. But that notion was dispelled by the rough way that Quinn was yanked to her feet by the group’s leader.
One of the group headed back to the upturned car with his weapon out before poking his head in.
“No one there,” the man called out to what was obviously his boss.
“You and you,” he ordered to two of the men, “fan out and find them. No witnesses, understood?”
The two men nodded in compliance and Caleb hunkered down lower into the wet undergrowth to keep himself hidden.
He could only look on as the boss man took a firm grip on Quinn’s arm and led her away from the car crash scene. As scared for her as he was, there was little he could do right now with that many guns between her and him.
Caleb waited until the main group headed out through the woodland trail. Whatever they wanted from Quinn, it clearly involved keeping her alive, so he had time - hopefully, enough.
He had spent his entire life on the island, and as such, he knew every inch of her. Like most men, he had been inducted into hunting at an early age, and now he worked hard to push aside the rising tide of panic and anger and to concentrate instead on the task at hand.
Night had fallen across their small corner of the world, and the cold air brought with it only a light dew. As a result, the ground was still dry enough to hear the movement around him.
Caleb took a long deep breath and tuned himself into his surroundings. Two men were moving, and as light as they were trying to be, these were mainlanders and may as well have been elephants for the amount of noise they were making.
He picked up the first man off to one side and the second moving not far behind him. In a strange environment, the men were nervous and were sticking close together. Caleb could hear their heavy boots snapping twigs as they moved clumsily - to his ears, at least - but now he also picked up a third figure.
This one was moving quieter but still not quiet enough to escape his attention. The third sound was another man, judging by the weight of footsteps, but this one was heading away from the group.
Caleb decided to concentrate on the two men immediately looking for him and started to move stealthily around them.
He picked them up quickly and closed in quicker. The two men were shining their powerful lights around in a wide arc. They both had their weapons drawn, but even from this distance, Caleb could tell that the men were inexperienced in this kind of setting and that gave him confidence.
He slipped in behind them and started to match their footsteps to cover his own sound. Even though he was a large man, he moved with stealth and grace, stepping over rocks and downed branches while always keeping at least one eye on the men in front of him.
“This is hopeless,” one of them whined. “How the hell are we supposed to find anyone in here?”
“You want to tell the boss we failed?” the other responded. “Be my guest. I’ve got a phone right here.”
“No, I’m not saying that,” the first man replied quickly. “Besides, there’s no bloody signal on this pissing rock!”
Caleb kept his distance and let the men talk, to see if they’d spill anything of use.
“I don’t even know what we’re doing here,” man one continued. “I mean, I get kicking the shit out of some scumbag who won’t pay up, or torching some dickhead’s shop who doesn’t want to pay for protection, but this bullshit? Invading an island wearing some kind of army clothes? The whole thing is crazy.”
“Don’t sweat the small stuff. We just follow orders.”
“Like Rollins?”
“Hey, man, no one knows what happened to Rollins.”
“He seem like the sort of guy who just disappears one day?”
“No.”
“He ever strike you as the sort of guy who gets disappeared?”
“What are you saying?”
The two men had stopped now and their attention was fully focussed on each other.
“I’m saying that this is some bad shit here, bruv. I’m saying that we shouldn’t even be here, for Christ’s sake! Rollins came out here on his own and no one’s heard from him since.”
“So what? You want to just leave, is that it? You want to get back on that boat and piss off home? You got any idea what Morrison will do to us?”
“Hey, he can’t hurt us if he can’t find us. Besides, man, I’ve got a real bad feeling about this shit.”
“You always have a bad feeling.”
“Yeah, but this time I mean it. There’s some bad juju here, man - real bad. I mean, heading out to that creepy-ass monastery, taking a hostage. What are they going to do? Shoot a bunch of monks up there?”
Caleb had bent down to snatch up a sturdy-looking branch on his way over to the men. He had moved up close now while they were distracted talking to each other. Their hands still held glistening blac
k automatic pistols, but they were now held down by their sides.
He used the thick cover to hide his approach and was now directly behind them. He stooped down and picked up a rock. He threw it high over the men’s heads, landing it with a loud crash against a tree trunk.
The two men spun around, panicked by the sudden sound and turning in that direction.
Caleb sprung from his hiding place and swung the hefty branch hard against one of the men’s heads. The thick lump of wood hit its target with a sickening thud, hard enough to snap it in two, and the man slumped to the ground in an unconscious heap.
The second man turned with a wide expression of shock and surprise on his face. The hand holding the gun started to rise, and so Caleb stepped in close, grabbing the man’s arm in the process.
While he was bigger and stronger than the other man, there was fresh panic in the air, and the man was squirming like a wet eel in his grasp.
Caleb held the man’s arm up in the air and the gun fired off several shots loud enough to deafen them both.
They stumbled together in a clumsy waltz, spinning around as they fought for control of the gun. Stumbling, the other man’s foot caught on a tree root and he fell backwards, sending both of them tumbling to the ground.
As they fell awkwardly, the gun went off one last time, only this time the weapon was pressed up against the man’s chest and pointing upwards. Caleb felt a sudden wet splatter on his face as the bullet fired up through the other man’s chin and exploded out the top of his head.
Caleb pushed the dead man aside as he fought to get out from under a now-dead body, shoving it with disgusted and panicking hands.
He climbed back to his feet and resisted the urge to vomit as he clawed at his face to try and wipe the blood away. Turning back to the first man, he stumbled over to the prone figure on the ground.
He hoped to gain some kind of intelligence from the man, but as he drew close, he didn’t like the look of the thin blood trail emanating from the man’s ear.
Stooping down to check for a pulse and finding none, he just managed to stagger away in time before he did vomit into the grass. One second he had been creeping around the woods, stalking his prey like he was in some kind of movie, the next two men were dead and the blood was on his hands. He didn’t feel heroic; he just felt sick to his stomach.