Stoneskin's Revenge

by Tom Deitz

  The woman patted a smooth place on the stone to her right. “Come, sit, lay your head in my lap.”

  Allison hesitated, but just as fear came sneaking back, so did the song, and without really wanting to, she slipped around to the old woman’s side and sat down there, so close she could hear the rasp of the shawl’s coarse fibers against each other.

  “You heard my song, didn’t you, my little one?” And Allison felt an arm slide around her shoulders and draw her down into the woman’s lap. She flinched a little, because the crone was so old and wrinkled and bound to smell bad, but the only odors she caught were of hot stone and a sort of musty smell like dusty rags. Not her favorites, but they weren’t really unpleasant.

  What was unpleasant was the feel of the old woman’s skin against her bare arm. Though thin and wrinkled, it felt—there was no other word for it—hard. But not hard the way leather can be made hard: no, this was more like how sand can be firm and yet yielding.

  Uwelanatsiku. Su sa sai!

  Uwelanatsiku. Su sa sai!

  The song was crooningly soft now, almost a lullaby, and Allison found herself relaxing. Before she knew it, her eyes drifted closed. She felt the woman’s hand on her head, gently probing, then slowly dragging something stiff and pointy through her hair, sorting through the snags and tangles the woods had given her, tugging now and then to remove a twig or leaf. And all the while the song kept on, sent her drifting further and further down toward sleep.

  At some point the woman shifted, and Allison started awake, but then the song returned, and Allison was only vaguely aware that there were two hands at play amid her curls. No, wait, one was slipping down across her shoulders until it rested on her side. She could feel it there, like a bag full of warm sand. A movement, and she realized the woman had slid her shirt up and was resting the hand on the bare skin just below Allison’s ribs. Her flesh was hotter: too warm—like rocks that have lain in the sun all day.

  Allison stirred, but just as she did, she felt something poke her right beneath her bottom rib. She gasped, but by then the pain was gone.

  Uwelanatsiku. Su sa sai!

  And Allison’s eyes slid closed. She dreamed of sliding down sand dunes. And then she dreamed of nothing.

  Chapter IX: Runaways

  (east of Whidden, Georgia—late afternoon)

  The first thing that Calvin noticed when he began to return to himself was pain: a pervasive soreness that bounced all across his body when he tried to zero in on it, that moved as he moved, sending long, dull tugs of agony along his muscles.

  Gradually, however, his senses began to clear and he became sufficiently aware to focus on the more persistent spots. The worst was along his thigh—a kind of thin-edged burning; another was along his jaw, which was duller but still sensitive to the touch of his tongue. There were a couple of others along his ribs and around his right arm—those felt more or less like bruises. He opened his eyes then—and almost cried out, for the world had gone strange and blurry and he couldn’t see colors right, could not perceive distance the way he thought he should.

  No! he cried. And got another shock, for the word had come out as a sort of snort. That hurt his jaw, and he slapped his tongue across it automatically—and found that he had licked the tip of his nose! And that nose was altogether wrong, was long and brown and…

  Christ! I’m still a deer!

  And with that realization, Calvin began to reassess his situation, though he had to fight hard to remember how he had come here to this sheltered place by the riverbank. He could recall the fear easily enough, and running for what seemed like hours through the woods, running until he could run no more. But he didn’t remember choosing this particular spot or collapsing, or why he should be so sore. And he could only with difficulty conjure back the lawmen and their dreadful words: “They found your daddy dead this mornin’…and there was evidence you’d been there too.” Every time he started to think about that, his memory promptly clouded up and a new set of instincts made him want to leap to his feet and flee, and eat the thick foliage around him, and never be human again.

  He had to get a grip on himself, had to let his rational side regain command.

  A movement startled him; triggered cervine reflexes before the human could override. Something was stalking him, watching him. Maybe if he were still it wouldn’t notice. (That was the deer again, a part of him noted.) He froze, but cast his gaze about, seeing only the gnarled trunk of an oak, the riverbank, the shrubs that grew close around—and, crouching almost as still as he was beside a decaying cypress stump, what appeared to be a boy about eleven or twelve. He was short and thin, fair and towheaded, and sported the remnants of a hi-tech haircut. He was also rather dirty, and looked to be rather trendily dressed, to judge by the number of zippers and pockets and tags and loops and studs that adorned the jeans and vest he wore with his B-52s T-shirt. Finally, he sported a dangling earring, but Calvin couldn’t make out what form it took.

  The boy was watching him, peering intently with wide, dark-lashed eyes, and it came to Calvin then that he was probably behaving damned peculiarly for a deer.

  The boy shifted subtly, extended a hand in one slow, smooth gesture as he hunched forward a half step. Probably trying very hard not to alarm this poor hurt animal he had discovered. Slowly, slowly, and Calvin could feel his heart rate increasing, as one set of instincts fought another.

  Slowly…slowly, and then a dragonfly lit on the boy’s hand and he yipped and flinched and utterly lost his cool.

  And with that abrupt motion, the wariness that ever haunted the deer-mind asserted itself, and Calvin rose to his feet, staggered for a moment, then commenced running, the deer taking more and more control as it coordinated four legs instead of two.

  But…but…he hurt, was dizzy… A twig poked his injured jaw and he bleated in pain, and then the dizziness claimed him and he slumped to the ground, barely conscious.

  The boy was there in a moment, his thin face crammed full of the rounded eyes and lips of astonishment, his body a-fidget with headlong energy that he suddenly checked as he began to creep closer and closer to his quarry. “Don’t worry, deer,” he pleaded desperately. “I’m not gonna hurt you; I’m gonna help you if I can. Oh, don’t worry. I’m not a hunter, I like deer, but you’re gonna have to relax and trust me if I’m gonna help you.”

  Calvin jerked his head around but did not rise. The pain returned with the movement—and brought sickening flashes of darkness which neither consciousness desired and which incited real fear in both parts of his awareness.

  “Shit,” the boy yelped. “Oh shit!” And with that he turned and crashed away through the bushes.

  Calvin tried to rise, to follow, but his body wouldn’t let him, it was too full of pain. He thrashed, trying to get to his feet, but could not. As he moved, though, something gouged his throat, which brought more pain. If only he could escape it, if only he could win free for just a moment.

  And then he did feel pain, as spasm after spasm wracked his body.

  And then, without warning, it was over, and he lay gasping and panting on the ground.

  It was a moment before Calvin dared open his eyes, but when he did, it was to glimpse bare, smooth skin. “I’m back,” he croaked in his own voice, and fainted once more.

  *

  This time he woke to a blessed coolness across his forehead, trickling down his cheeks and into his eyes, sliding down the angle of his jaw and onto his neck and chest. Somebody was holding him, he realized dimly, cradling his head against bony shins. And he didn’t hurt nearly so much now, though he was still getting occasional twinges from his jaw and hip.

  Water found its way into his mouth and he choked on it before he could swallow. That made him open his eyes, which showed him a splatter of blue sky above a lacework of branches—and, closer in, filling half his field of vision, the wild blond hair and dark brows of the boy he had seen before.

  Another spasm, and he sat up, though he could feel the boy’s
hand on his shoulders trying to ease him down again.

  “You okay, mister?” The boy’s voice was softer now, and it took Calvin a moment to figure out that he was hearing it with human ears, not the deer’s more finely tuned senses. He couldn’t place the accent beyond generic South.

  Another round of coughs, and Calvin finally gasped, “I’m fine. I…” And then the peculiarity of his situation dawned on him. The boy had gone off looking for help for a deer, had come back to find a naked man in roughly the same location. If he was a sharp-eyed lad, he’d probably noted the uktena scale on its thong around both sets of throats. (And it was a wonder he still had it; a miracle it had neither been torn off during his headlong flight nor garroted him when he’d transformed.) Suddenly Calvin would have given a lot to know what was going on in that boy’s head right now.

  A final series of coughs cleared his lungs, and Calvin scooted around in place to face his benefactor. “Thanks,” he whispered hoarsely. “Thanks a bunch.”

  The boy regarded him levelly, and with more than a trace of suspicion. “You’re just lucky,” he replied, with the tone of someone trying to act cool and not quite certain he was succeeding. “I…I was lookin’ for a sick deer and found you instead.”

  “That why you’ve got water?”

  The boy nodded sheepishly when Calvin indicated a plastic juice jug still half full by his side. There was a wadded pile of blue fabric nearby too, which looked disturbingly like the jeans he’d abandoned earlier.

  “You’re countin’ on a lot if you think a deer’ll let you near enough to give it water.”

  “It was hurt, and I was gonna clean its wounds.”

  “Hurt?”

  “Had a bad scrape along its thigh, looked like it couldn’t walk easy.”

  The boy’s eyes shifted lower, and Calvin dared a glimpse at his bare thigh—and was both relieved and shocked to note that there was no wound there, only a thin, pale line almost invisible amid the long shadows that dappled him.

  “Maybe not,” Calvin countered quickly, “but it’d be a powerful stupid deer—or a powerful trustin’ one—that’d let you get that close.”

  “I wasn’t gonna hurt it!” the boy protested. “I think it kinda knew that. It sure let me get close, though.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Real close,” the boy emphasized.

  “Uh, yeah,” Calvin muttered noncommittally. “But, uh, look, you said something about wantin’ to bandage that deer, and…well, I can’t help but notice you’ve got some clothes with you…and I imagine you’ve noticed that I don’t have a whole lot on, so…well, do you think I could maybe give ’em a try?”

  “Yeah, sure.” More grunt than answer.

  “Thanks,” Calvin sighed, rising. Most of his previous soreness was gone—except a twinge in his jaw. That was curious, too; he’d have to think about that when he had time. Still moving a little stiffly, he wandered over to the pile of clothing, which indeed proved to be his jeans. He made a point of checking the waist size, though, in case the kid was even sharper than Calvin feared.

  “These yours? They look a little big.” (Was that a lie? He hoped not.)

  The boy shook his head. “Found ’em.”

  “Found ’em? You just found a pile of clothes in the woods?”

  “I just found a naked guy in the woods too. That’s a little more unusual, I’d say.”

  “Touché!” Calvin laughed, as he began tugging on the britches, hoping by his light tone to draw the conversation away from the obvious question.

  “Look like they fit you, too,” the boy noted wryly.

  “Lucky for me.”

  “Cops was hanging’ around,” the boy added.

  “They see you? You might get in trouble.”

  “I’m careful and quick,” the boy replied. Then, so suddenly it caught Calvin by surprise, “They after you?”

  “Yes.”

  “What for?”

  “For killing my father.”

  The boy tensed, and Calvin was afraid he was going to bolt, but he stood his ground.

  “You do it?”

  “No.”

  The boy relaxed a tad, though Calvin thought he still looked wary. In fact, he had the appearance of someone who was used to being wary.

  “Those your clothes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why’d you take ’em off?”

  “To throw the cops off my trail.”

  “Yeah, but—” And then the boy grimaced. “Never mind. I won’t ask nothin’ else. If the cops find me I don’t want to have to lie to ’em.”

  “Any reason they should be lookin’ for you?”

  “Might be.”

  “I was straight with you, man; you owe me a secret or two. At the very least, you owe me your name.”

  “You ain’t told me yours!”

  Calvin took a deep breath, and debated the wisdom of replying, then: “It’s Calvin. Calvin Fargo McIntosh.”

  “Fargo? That’s a funny middle name.”

  “It’s a version of my Cherokee name.”

  “Which is…?”

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “You’d tell me that you’re wanted for murder, but not your name?”

  Calvin grimaced in turn. “It’s a matter of principle. Names have Power, and if you give somebody your true name, you’re givin’ him power over you. You have to really trust somebody a lot to do that. You get me now?”

  “Yeah,” the boy replied. “It’s like magic, I guess.”

  “Right,” Calvin affirmed. “More or less.”

  Silence, while the boy pondered this.

  Calvin broke it. “Two questions, then, and I promise I won’t ask any more. You act like a boy with secrets, and I’ve got a few of my own, so I won’t ask anything personal.”

  “Go ahead—but I’m not sayin’ I’ll answer.”

  “Okay. Well, first, I’d really like a name, just a first name, so I won’t have to call you boy, or hey you, or whatever all the time.”

  “Brock.”

  “Brock?”

  “It’s an old name for badgers, and badgers like to dig and hide and fight.”

  “That your real name?”

  “No.”

  “Is that what you like to do, then? Dig holes and hide and fight?”

  “When I have to.”

  “Okay, fine,” Calvin said. “One more, now: what’re you doin’ sneakin’ ’round in the woods? You don’t look local and you don’t sound local, either.”

  “Neither do you!”

  “I’m not, but answer my question.”

  “I’m…I’m a runaway, I guess. Me and my sister ran off from Jacksonville. My stepdad beat me and…and did things to her, and we just couldn’t stand it. We’re goin’ to Savannah and try to get on a ship. Robyn’s got a friend over in England.”

  “Think they’ll take you?”

  “Her friend will!”

  “On the ship, stooge!”

  “We’ll stow away.”

  “Yeah,” Calvin chuckled after a moment’s consideration, “I’ll bet you would.”

  “You gotta place to crash?” the boy asked suddenly.

  “If the cops haven’t found it.”

  “They’re workin’ the other side of the highway, I think. I watched ’em for a while. ’Course, if it’s over there, you’re in trouble.”

  “It’s not. I—”

  Calvin’s stomach growled loudly.

  Brock started, then giggled and checked his watch. “Christ, it’s almost five—and I’ve gotta get goin’—Robyn’ll kill me.” He paused, then, “You can have dinner with us if you want to. That way you can meet my sister. She’d probably like you.”

  “Would I like her, though?” Calvin teased, flexing his muscles experimentally as the boy rose.

  “Probably. Most guys do.”

  With that, Brock turned and started down the ghost of a trail. And Calvin found, to his surprise, that he was following.

  He
shouldn’t do that; he had enough problems of his own without getting tangled up in the affairs of a couple of runaways. But there were so many of them all of a sudden that he had no real notion of where to begin, and the cops were after him, and his…his father was dead—which seemed so remote from him he almost thought he had dreamed it. A part of him suggested he was blanking, running on automatic until he could get time to think it through. Also, if this kid and his sister helped him and the cops found out about it, it could get them in trouble, not to mention landing them right back where they came from—where they obviously had no desire to be.

  He sympathized, he’d run away a time or two himself, and while he didn’t approve of it in principle and knew far too much about its dangers, he also suspected that the kids probably had good reasons for what they did, it what Brock had hinted at was true. At the very least he ought to meet the sister, get a feel for their situation. There came the Vision Quest again: you had to do the right thing as your heart perceived it. And right now his heart told him to go with Brock-the-Badger No-name.

  *

  It took a fair while to get Brock’s camp—long enough for Calvin to figure out that he’d evidently run far south during his madness—but a good ways before they reached it, Calvin had a strong suspicion of where it was, for the simple reason that he’d tromped that territory himself the day before while searching for the place Don Scott had told him about. Shoot, he’d even rested there. Hopefully he’d left no trace of his passing—that was one of the things he was trying to achieve as a matter of principle, but it was real hard to disguise everything.

  He’d guessed correctly, too, for when he followed Brock past a stand of oaks and through a thick fringe of palmettos, he found himself gazing at the short grass, ferns, and mosses of an almost circular depression a little lower than the surrounding land—a sinkhole, he was nearly certain; possibly dangerous, if not for the recent rains that had surely raised the water table under it. Though the promised sister was not present, there were plenty of signs of habitation: a small fire in the center of the ring; two backpacks in mighty disarray; a pair of expensive sleeping bags; assorted bits of clothing and food wrappers; the rest of his clothes, including, thank God, his sneakers—and a couple of sooty-shiny masses among the coals that Calvin suspected were potatoes baking. Smaller lumps might have been onions or apples.