Still, there was no sign of the palace.
It amused Seth how easy the transition to this lifestyle had become. No one had brought a toothbrush or a single bar of soap, and the lack of baths made their skin ripen. The way they were—what was happening to them, the smoke from the fires, the fish on their hands, no matter how often they tried to wash themselves in rivers and streams—had caked itself into every pore. Like nomads, they got used to it quickly, and it was simply another aspect of the journey they had to endure.
But as the third week arrived, though, their confidence began to wane, and negative remarks were voiced with more frequency. How did they know they weren’t on some futile quest, producing nothing but more colder air and rugged mountains at every turn? Even the black sword seemed useless.
After a while, the palace seemed nothing more than a dream. The adventure began to weigh heavily upon them all. Seth didn’t enjoy the comments he heard, but he was starting to feel the same way. The Dragon had steered them in the wrong direction, manipulating the land. For all they knew, they were moving farther from Ellishome and the palace.
Seth tried to predict when it would emerge: around the next bend, over the next rise, but it was only more forest, hills, and endless trees. Ellishome seemed a distant memory.
Albert, as well, had noticeably begun to thin. His pants and winter coat hung loosely about him. His face was not as round, but sculpted, defined, and angular.
“I’ve been meaning to go on a diet anyway,” he told the others, making them laugh.
The land was becoming a part of them, and they were becoming a part of the land.
v
Four weeks into their quest, they stopped in the late afternoon near a small basin, and tried to fish again. Yellow flowers spotting huge green, leafy bushes, and mountain bluebells lay in clusters between large, tan-colored boulders. Eddie mentioned the water was just runoff, and probably absent of fish, but Albert tried anyway, to no avail.
Onto firmer, drier ground to the west, they set up their tents, and were fortunate to find dry wood for a fire. The heat and crackling flames felt good on Seth’s hands and face. The sky was laden with a gray so deep, it was almost black, and it was noticeably colder.
“I’m beginning to think we’re never gonna find the palace,” Gavin said.
“I know what you mean,” Malcolm said. “But we have to keep moving. We’ve come too far to give up.”
“What are we supposed to do, though?” Albert said. “I mean, if we’re supposed to find this palace or whatever it is, how are we gonna make it back? Does Ben expect us to just keep going? Do we have to put that much faith in this? I’m not sure I have that much faith. I don’t know if all of us combined have that much faith. I feel like we’re going in circles. The food we have isn’t gonna last forever. And it’s only getting colder.”
“Maybe it’s a test,” Seth said. He hadn’t said much during the journey, but the attitude began to weigh on him. “Like anything. Maybe Ben’s trying to see how strong we are. Maybe it’s not just about the palace, finding whatever we have to find there, and then getting back home. Are we good enough? Do we really have what it takes? I don’t know.”
“Jeez!” Gavin said. “I don’t know if I’m up for all that. It’s like murder. We’re killing ourselves.”
“But isn’t that what it’s about anyway?” Kinsey said.
All of them shivered in the cold, scooting closer to the fire.
“We’re just the pawns who have been chosen,” Kinsey finished.
“Vessels,” Malcolm said.
She looked at him. “Yeah. Vessels. Jesus never did anything for himself. Why should this be any different? Maybe, if we’re being tested at all, it’s in our faith in God. What we have inside we’re willing to give up. Are we willing to give it up? Are we willing to sacrifice ourselves, all of us, for Ellishome? For everyone who lives there?” Kinsey paused. “Besides. We’ve talked about this already. This is why we’re here. We made the commitment at Samuel’s Creek. It’s not even an issue. It’s not worth discussing.”
“But why are we expected to act like Jesus, or to have faith, when we don’t really believe in that…at least not all of us?” Gavin said. “That doesn’t make any sense. We’re going on blind hope. It doesn’t have anything to do with believing in God. So what? Because of our belief, we’re either going to live or die? Just because I was brought up or taught a particular something or have this thing ingrained into me, whatever it is, I’m already screwed? That hardly seems fair. What kind of God would allow that?”
“Maybe Ben’s asking us to believe,” Kinsey said. “Maybe that’s what this is all about. After all, how can you not, after everything we’ve been through?”
Gavin didn’t reply.
Seth looked at them. They were nodding, but they looked troubled.
“This trip is strange, no doubt about it,” Malcolm said. “But it makes sense. We don’t have to like every minute of it. We just have to keep going.”
“But that’s okay,” Eddie said.
Albert nodded. “Yeah. It is okay. And Malcolm’s right. We can’t afford to get down on ourselves. This is how it is, whether we like it or not. If we all felt good about it, we’d know something was wrong. Or something bad was gonna happen any minute.”
“We have to stay focused,” Malcolm explained. “We have to stay confident. Promise. Let’s promise right now.”
Around them, they made a silent pact. They held their hands in a circle, bowing their heads, and prayed. It seemed funny to Seth, but what could it hurt? Gavin made a good point, but so had Kinsey, and he supposed if faith were anything at all, it was in the hope that things would turn out for the best. Allowing it to unfold the way it should was all you could put your trust into. Maybe this trip was exactly that, in believing in something outside oneself…in Ben, for example, something stronger, more powerful, loving and guiding than the human mind could comprehend.
Regardless, their talk gave them hope.
They said a quiet, “Amen,” and put their hands toward the fire.
“Be nice if we had some cocoa,” Eddie said.
Heads nodded, but no one replied.
In the clouds above, it began to snow.
CHAPTER VII
Hell walked into the life of Jeanie Masterson. Hell was about to do things she never thought possible. That was okay, though, Jeanie thought. That’s what Hell was all about.
Jeanie Masterson knew enough about Hell, though she didn’t want to. Now (with Hell staring her in the face), she didn’t have a choice.
Hell was the limpid, lustful eyes of her father, a strong and overpowering man who always got his way. Jeanie didn’t dare scream, let alone make a sound. It was best to keep quiet. If she screamed, he’d kill her.
Tune it out, she told herself. Just tune it out, Jeanie. You’ve done it a thousand times before. Maybe millions. Just tune it out, and you’ll be free. Tune it out, and you’ll be fine.
But Hell kept coming back, looking at her with demon eyes, the face of her father (a skull?).
She could smell him, and the smell had volition, telling her she’d never escape: the rotten onions, bad bacon, and whiskey breath. His hands—demons themselves—were part of that. She hated hands. She didn’t touch anybody’s hands. When she dated, even alone with boys, she told them never to touch her…never to hold her hand.
Jeanie Masterson was a ruthless high school tease, and everybody at Centaurus High School knew it. When the jocks and preppies got her alone, they found out who she really was. She didn’t give of herself easily, of course.
She received puzzled looks throughout the year, but that was nothing new, a different life, her other life, not the one she owned now. What she suffered now wasn’t life. Once she walked through the front door, it was something akin to sacrifice. She gave herself to him (not willingly, of course), felt her body go cold, clammy, and unresponsive. Her life now was not her own, because it was Daddy’s. He could do anything h
e wanted. That was the bargain. “Let me have you now,” he once said, “to do whatever I want, and you can have a life outside of here…to do whatever you want.”
She didn’t have a choice, so she’d agreed. If she didn’t, he’d kill her.
Her father was close enough now she could smell his sweat, a ripe, pungent odor, forcing her to hold her breath. At times, she took showers until the hot water ran out, trying to get the smell of him off of her. That smell congealed before her now, an entity itself like the swirling darkness in his eyes. It was strange, she thought, as she looked, she saw something—someone else besides her father—a villain inhabiting his skin. She wondered if all criminals had that same dead look in their eyes.
Jeanie couldn’t believe she was used to this, to him already.
No. You’re not used to it, she thought. How could you get used to it?
He’d found her coming out of the bathroom just minutes before. She knew she was doomed already because he had that look in his eyes. His white shirt was untucked. Even the belt swung, undone at his waist. His face was red and glossy with sweat. He was a big man with brown eyes and a mop of stylish hair women actually found attractive.
He put a hand on her chest, firm and solid, and pushed her into her bedroom.
The curtains were closed, giving a murky light to the room. Keep the curtains closed, he always told her. Just in case…
Jeanie, for now, was telling herself to go away, trying to ignore the warning sirens in her head.
Numb, to a place far away, a place he can never be, where it’s just you, Jeanie. A dream. Someplace pretty. Someplace new. Away from the horror of his hands and breath…
The Dragon licked her ear and groaned. His hands moved along her ribcage, cupping her breasts.
Funny, she thought, how they felt like claws, but then, hadn’t they always?
He lifted the fabric of her shirt, slipping his finger under her bra.
The smell and the feel of him were too real. She couldn’t go away as easily as before.
His other hand rested under her jaw-line and ear. She could smell the hands now, too, his sweat making him worse than rotten bacon. His hand, quite literally, smelled like shit.
Okay, Jeanie told herself. He’s doing this. I have to let him do this. If he doesn’t get to do this, he will kill me. He will kill me fast. I’ve tried to hurt him before, but it never works. He always gets me. He always hurts me worse.
He buried his whiskered, sweaty face under her ear, mauling her neck with his teeth and tongue. He was forceful, and it hurt. Jeanie clenched her eyes shut. He ground his hips violently into her. Her calves bumped into the bed.
Someday. Someday very soon I will kill you. You will die. I will cut your hands off. I will cut your eyes out. I will do the worst things I can imagine. And you will not stop me. You will not have me ever again.
Jeanie smiled at the thought. She could not feel him suddenly. Sometimes, the promise of murder made it endurable.
Do anything you want. Anything. Because one day I will kill you. And it will be okay that I kill you because everyone will know.
She prayed for survival, that her mind would remain stable because she was letting him violate her now. She was not insane. She was not out of control!
It scared her, though, madness. She wasn’t sure what to believe anymore. Wouldn’t she put herself in worse danger if she slipped over reality’s edge?
This is a terrible moment. I know it’s a terrible moment, but I don’t think he knows it’s a terrible moment. If he does, he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care, which means, if he wants to, he can kill me. He can kill me quick. He can kill me fast.
Jeanie knew this. She wouldn’t let him have her, not her way. She would get him in the end.
His hands moved down her thighs, cupping her crotch, his firm, solid grip squeezing her buttocks. She moaned. He told her if she didn’t moan, he’d kill her. She hated that more than anything. For that reason alone (that he told her to moan), she would kill him.
Jeanie closed her eyes, and forced herself not to cry.
She was sleeping on the floor most of the time now because she could not lie on the same mattress. Hands, she hated. Floors she loved. Anything but a bed…
He knelt in front of her and smiled. His hands moved over her: rotten, oily bacon, and shit. Her body went away, far away. Over and over, she repeated the words of her redemption, her salvation:
I’m going to kill you. One day I’m going to kill you. I will cut your heart out, cut your hands off, tear your eyes out…
He was careful now, but before long, he wouldn’t be careful. In minutes, there’d be pain and blood. In minutes…it would get brutal.
His tongue went everywhere, his hands, too, and then the thing she dreaded most, the thing she hated most, slipping between her, making her cry out in pain, in revulsion, in unequivocal, searing hatred! Sickness came afterward—the thought—the promise that, one day, she would kill him!
Jeanie tried to disguise it, tried to make it seem as if she were enjoying it. She must be doing a good job because he was ignoring her, doing what he liked.
Thoughts of fire danced through her head, a towering conflagration with her father in the middle of it. She would know satisfaction soon enough. She would know what being free was like, and it would come soon.
But not now. This wasn’t her moment. This moment was his.
And don’t you forget, she heard him say. Don’t you ever forget.
An aroma moved over her, something reminding her of the grave, the cries and wails of dead children. She was too confused, too much under his influence to think about Seth and his friends. She spared a thought for him, but she saw monsters in her mind instead. Jeanie Masterson saw dead children reaching up from under cold clods of dirt. A lone black rider made of shadows sat upon a black horse.
Despite the horror, she willed the images away. She didn’t understand. Instead, Jeanie closed her eyes, thought about stars, being free, and a wall of all consuming flame.
ii
Mattie McCall smiled into the spiraling vortex, and welcomed the end.
She was a skeleton, refusing to eat. What was food in the Land of the Dead? She was wasting away, focused only on the swirling matter above. Nothing else existed. Nothing else was important.
And so, the world moved on. Sometimes, someone she didn’t recognize came into the room, fluffed the pillows, smiled, said things she didn’t understand, trying to get her to eat. Mattie wasn’t sure who this person was, some stranger, saying things she didn’t want to hear.
Staring into the darkness was better, and she slipped comfortably into it. This swirling matter was all she cared about, all she lived for. It was pretty. And at times, colors appeared, all kinds of colors…every color imaginable.
Other people came in to talk to her, but Mattie didn’t reply. She didn’t trust them. They wanted her to get up and move around; it would make her feel better, they’d said, but Mattie refused. They tried getting her up and out of bed, but she refused!
Something terrible was happening. Mattie could slip away. Everything would be okay if she did. If the darkness moved down and covered her body with its shadowy tendrils, she would be happy. She welcomed it.
She heard her angel crying, her little boy/girl, her precious angel she wanted back so desperately. Sadie would grow up eventually, and be a beautiful, sensitive child. Women dreamed of men like Sadie. He would be bashful, charming, and elegant. He would light up every room he walked into!
Sadie called to her, trying to get her attention. He was standing at the end of a long corridor, beckoning from the dark.
Something about the dark…
A figure stood next to him. Mattie couldn’t see who it was, because the black obscured her vision.
Just take my hand, the figure said. Just take my hand. You don’t have to go down the beaten path any longer…
But Mattie couldn’t do it. Not yet. Her boy was here now, and she wouldn’t let them
take her…
On cue—several men came into the room—the one man who looked familiar with the receding hairline. She laughed at his balding head. She couldn’t place him, though. Couldn’t they see she was only trying to reach Sadie?
One man grabbed her arm. Another tried to move her head.
Mattie shrieked and hollered, but they were stronger.
“Mom!” Sadie wailed.
The darkness was right in front of her. Her little boy was trying to reach her. He was frantic, calling to her, “Mom! Don’t go! You have to help me down the beaten path…”
Go to the man, Mattie wanted to say. Go to the man in the long black cape.
He was there somewhere. Were he and Sadie the same, she wondered? Did they both call her Momma?
What was the beaten path anyway? Did she even know? What did Sadie mean when he talked about the beaten path?
The men held her forcefully. They carried her through the door, out of the room, and down the stairs.
She turned to the man on her right, opened her mouth, and bit into his shoulder. She tasted the fabric of his shirt, but her teeth sank deeper. The fabric and the flesh punctured at the same time, blood filling her mouth. The man let out a howl, throwing back his head. Someone slapped her in the face. Mattie wailed in rage. She had blood on her lips.
Was the whole town here? Is that what this was all about? Did they need help? Where were they taking her? Couldn’t they see she was safer in bed? Why would they drag her from the only place that had ever meant anything to her?
In hellish defiance, Mattie McCall let out another painful shriek.
The darkness was maddening. Sadie wasn’t here. She couldn’t hear him now.
They dragged her out the front door and down the sidewalk. It was cold and cloudy outside. The chill dug into her bones.
Bones?
More people surrounded her. No wonder it was easy for them, making certain they had her secure, unable to struggle, to put up a fight.
Snapdragon Book II: In the Land of the Dragon Page 13