by Sara Clancy
But perhaps I’m reading too much into things. Maybe she’s just distracted by the forest and being her antisocial self.
Still, Mina couldn’t shake the suspicion and waited fretfully until Cadwyn was busy checking Ozzie’s blistered feet to move over to the smaller woman.
“Is something wrong?” she asked quietly, almost dreading the answer.
Basheba glanced up at her, her face scrunched up and brows knitted.
“I mean, you seem tenser.”
“Do I?”
“Is there anything you want to tell me?” Mina tried again, wanting to get the confrontation over with but dreading it at the same time.
A tiny smile tipped the edges of her mouth. “Like what?”
The conversation was broken as the boys came over. There wasn’t much left to eat, and they quickly went through the few berries Basheba pointed out. With that done, it was wordlessly agreed that they wanted to get moving again, to get the horror over with. For once, it was Basheba holding them back. She finished tying the poles to the side of the bag. Then, she worked to loop the ends around the spikes on Buck’s armor.
“Shake.”
The dog flopped around, successfully knocking the poles aside.
“Good boy,” she cooed, completely ignoring everyone else so she could focus on her dog.
“What are you doing?” Ozzie asked when no one else did.
“I’m not going to let him get stuck with your pack if things go wrong,” Basheba said.
“He’s taking my bag?”
“It won’t bother him.” She finally paused in her gushing affections to throw a glance over her shoulder. “You can barely walk.”
The small act of kindness caught Ozzie off guard. “Thanks, Basheba.”
The tiny woman scoffed. “Buck’s the one doing the work. Aren’t you, pretty boy? Such a good boy.”
The group used Basheba’s distraction to check in with each other and drink a little more. Eventually, the blonde remembered what she was doing and set off. Once again, it seemed she didn’t care if anyone noticed or followed. Buck trotted happily alongside his master’s side, unconcerned with his armor, or the heavy pack now attached to it.
“Were you planning on switching our bags later on?” Ozzie asked, hurrying to clarify. “Cadwyn and Mina could probably use a break as well. And you, of course.”
“I think Mina will want to keep hold of her bag,” Basheba said with a light giggle.
The guys threw her some questioning looks, but she shrugged, attempting a confused nonchalance. Mina suddenly felt queasy.
She found the belladonna. She had to have. I can’t believe my mother actually put it there. She honestly wanted me to poison these people.
Mina wasn’t sure what made her feel worse; her parents pushing her to murder, or Basheba believing she was capable of going through with it. Oh god, the knowledge was a punch to the gut. A burst of pain that left her breathless. Basheba thinks I planned to kill her. Images of the graveyard flashed across her mind. The blonde had almost poisoned the town population because she thought they might be turning a blind eye. What would she do to someone whom she thinks is a clear and present threat? Gulping down the blossoming fear, she followed the others in silence.
The tiny woman always knew where she was going. She wove their way amongst the trees, working over the rolling hills and across moss-drenched creeks as if she was following a map only she could see.
A deep, bone-aching exhaustion had taken hold of Mina by the time Basheba let them rest again. Keeping to the base of a hill kept them somewhat protected from the snow and growing winds. Without discussion, Mina, Ozzie, and Cadwyn clustered closer for warmth. To absolutely no-one’s surprise, Basheba favored her dog, instead.
Hunger bit at her insides like a wild animal. Mina spent the vast majority of her break trying to find the perfect way to ask Basheba to send Buck on a hunt. She didn’t know how much time had passed but they seemed to have plenty of daylight left. Even if she was wrong, she would be deliriously happy to simply spend a few moments beside a fire.
Before she could decide how best to ask, Basheba let go of Buck and started fussing with the bags again. This time, she retrieved a thin cord from the tent and proceeded to slash her mud-stained shirt into strips.
“Okay, we’re going to kindergarten the hell out of this,” Basheba said abruptly. “Everyone holds onto the cord. You do not let go of the cord. You do not stop walking.”
Oddly enough, it was their silence that finally made her look at them. The large hunting knife in her hand added an extra unsettling element to her glare.
“Am I talking to myself?” Basheba asked.
The three of them hurried to retroactively agree with the requirements. Cadwyn was the only one who ventured to ask questions.
“What’s going on with your shirt?”
“Well, I can’t trust any of you not to look. So, I’m making blindfolds.”
His brow furrowed. A silent sign of confusion that somehow earned him Basheba’s full attention.
“I already know what’s on the other side of the hill. You don’t have to. So, just hold onto the cord and trust me to lead you through.”
“I don’t like the idea of making you face whatever this is alone,” Cadwyn said. “That’s the only good thing about this whole setup. We’ll all come out with shared trauma.”
Basheba straightened and passed him the far end of the cord. “Oh, now you’re all about sharing? Once the pretzels are gone?”
“Are you still not over that?” he asked, taking the cord more out of reflex than conscious thought.
“Cadwyn, years from now, when you’re old and grey, and on your deathbed, I will still be berating you over those pretzels. Your poor grieving wife is going to be so confused.”
“Huh,” Cadwyn said. “You’d think she’d be used to you by then.”
“You’d think. But she’s very slow. Pretty, but slow.”
Cadwyn shrugged. “Can’t wait to meet her.”
With that, he began to get everyone into position. Basheba, Ozzie, Mina, with him at the rear. Mina wondered if he had noticed Basheba’s increased dislike of her and wanted to keep them separated. She was a little surprised when Basheba trusted everyone to tie their own blindfolds.
“Can we at least get up the hill before we put them on?” Ozzie asked. “I’m not that great walking in snow. And if I fall now, I’m taking you all with me.”
“We’ll go slow,” Basheba promised. “Don’t worry. It’s not for long. The ranch house is right on the other side of the orchard.”
Since that was the closest Basheba seemed to come to offering actual reassurance, no one was quick to brush it aside. It was Cadwyn who checked their blindfolds were set in place before Basheba started to walk.
True to her word, she went slow, inching their way up the hill at half the pace she had been forcing them to adopt all day. That changed once they were down the other side. Unable to see heightened Mina’s other senses. The wind bit her harder. The crunch of frost and snow was louder. She finally noticed the increasing lingering stench.
The ground had been flat under her feet for a while before the sound of rustling leaves once again surrounded them. Here, however, the sound was riddled with the creak and groan of swaying branches. Her nose wrinkled as the air grew sweet and musky at the same time. The combination brought to mind rotting meat and mothballs.
Even though they all walked in a singular line, it was easiest to keep track of Buck. His makeshift sled created a tell-tale scrape. Everyone else faded into nothing more than footsteps.
Lingering between sensory deprivation and overload, Mina could almost feel her curiosity welling up inside of her, filling her skin and drenching her mind.
They kept walking. A single, slow line trailing through a self-imposed night. The smell grew stronger while the sound of struggling branches became numerous and loud. Mina twisted her hand around the slender cord. Resentment seeped into her curiosity to
create a thick sludge in her lungs. It made it hard for her to breathe. Paranoia pricked at her thoughts, whispering that there was nothing around them, that all of this was just Basheba’s way to punish them for whatever unknown crime she was blaming them for.
What can she stand to see that I can’t handle? Her hand twitched with the desire to take a quick peek of her surroundings.
No one would know. Just one little glance. She pushed it aside only to have a voice whisper, how do we know she’s not leading us to the Witch? She was the only survivor of her last group. Maybe this was how she did it. Offered everyone else up, and killed them herself. It’s what my parents wanted me to do after all. She might not be any different.
The gathering thoughts got the best of her, and she hooked one thumb under her blindfold and peeled it back.
Sunlight, as weak as it was, blinded her for a moment. She squinted around, trying to make sense of what she saw. Everywhere she looked, tall apple trees stretched out to the horizon in perfect rows. One after the other, each loaded heavily with bleeding lumps. A heartbeat later, she understood what she was seeing.
Bodies.
They dangled by their feet, plump and discolored, soft and malleable, like rotten fruit. Snow clung to the blood that dripped from them to create small pools of red around the trunks. A soft groan drew her horrified gaze. One of the nearest bodies twisted in the breeze to bring its rotten, distorted face into view.
Shock hit her like lightning. Death hadn’t distorted the face enough that she couldn’t recognize her own cousin. Once she had seen one, there was no way to stop seeing the others. One after another, then all at once, she saw the faces of her missing relatives. The ones she had heard whispers about. Those who had come to the Witch’s Woods and had never been seen again. And the others. Those whom she had never met before but could feel the Crane blood lingering in their veins. And still others who weren’t of her blood. Somehow, she could instinctively pick them out. Winthrop, Seawall, Bell. They all crowded the branches. Hundreds of people. Thousands. Twisting and swaying in the snow-speckled breeze.
Mina’s jaw dropped but she didn’t scream until her cousin’s eyes snapped open and focused upon her.
Chaos broke free.
Cadwyn and Ozzie tugged off their eye masks. The added attention woke the corpses. Death rattles filled the air as, one after the other, the bodies turned toward them. Rotten hands clawed at the air in a desperate attempt to reach them. Buck went wild, his thrashing dislodged the pack from his spikes. Basheba tugged harshly on the cord only to have it slip through their hands.
“Run!” she roared.
Hard shoves sent them into motion, but the damage was done. The writhing bodies around them were already tearing themselves free from the trees. Most couldn’t stand. Crippled and riddled with decay, the corpses dragged themselves along the ground, moving to cut the living off as they sprinted down the narrow path between the rows. Blood bubbled up from the ground, staining the snow and shining through the mist. Ozzie’s panicked cries gave way to panted breaths and whimpers. Mina grabbed his hand and urged him on as the orchard disintegrated into a bloody mush. His hands squeezed hers to the point of snapping bones. When he fell, he took her with him.
Chapter 19
The drop was short and came to a sharp end with a sickening snap and an explosion of pain. Ozzie clutched his arm, instinctively drawing it closer to his body. He could feel his right collar bone shift, the broken edges scraping together, and almost blacked out with the spike of agony. Mina landed on top of him. She rolled away quickly, and he got his first good look at the world around him.
The orchard was gone, replaced by a dark tunnel gouged into the earth. Holes riddled the roof, allowing snow and blood to drift down into the abyss. The screams of the others came down with the debris. He couldn’t see them, but he was sure Basheba and Cadwyn hadn’t followed them into the pit.
Buck’s head emerged over the rim above his head, barked a few times, and then disappeared. He was about to call him back when he noticed Mina’s whimpering. It had been lost under the carnage of other sounds above him. Peering into the murky light, he caught sight of her huddled in the shadows. Curled into a tight ball, she pressed her forehead against her knees, clenching her muscles tight to try to stop herself from shivering.
“Hey, Mina, are you hurt?”
“I shouldn’t have looked,” she whimpered.
Ozzie had barely gotten a glimpse of the hanging bodies before everything had gone to hell. He forced himself not to think about it now, sure that whatever was lurking on the edges of his conscious awareness would cripple him. What would Cadwyn do?
“Mina, can you walk? We need to keep moving.”
Almost instantly, evidence of this toppled down from the sky. The living corpses had found the openings in the earth and, compelled by their desire to reach them, had hurled themselves into the open air. Their sun-bleached bones shattered as they landed and destroyed their decomposing flesh. It only slowed them down.
Ozzie gripped Mina’s shoulders, remembering a moment too late the amount of pain the motion would cost him. “We have to move. We have to get back to the others.”
Mina lifted her head, her eyes widening when she saw what surrounded them.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” he asked.
“It’s too small.”
The space was narrow, but not crushingly so. It was almost the same as walking under the low, hanging trees in the forest. But the walls changed everything. They pressed in on them, deepening the shadows and making everything seem smaller.
“Mina, it’s a trick.” Hearing his own voice made him cringe. Even he wouldn’t believe that lie.
She looked at him, though, so he pushed on.
“It’s the Witch, Mina. She’s just messing with your head. This place is huge.”
“Huge?”
The bodies were piling up, creating writhing, festering mountains that inched ever closer to them.
“Godzilla could stroll through without having to duck.”
Dead fingers gouged at the soil by his foot.
“Mina, we have to go. I need you to move.” He shook her slightly, forcing her to finally look him in the eyes. “Please, Mina.”
Her wide eyes locked onto his. While the panic remained, her body stilled. Sucking in a deep breath, she clenched her jaw, nodded once, and got to her feet. A hand latched onto Ozzie’s ankle, gripping tight enough that its fingertips popped like rancid grapes. Frantic screams ripped out of him as he kicked his leg back, desperately trying to dislodge the hand, but only succeeding in dragging the corpse along with him. Mina darted forward. She stooped down, driving the heel of her boot into the brittle bone and snapping it in two.
Ozzie snatched the limb up, narrowly avoiding the other hands that burst free from the squirming pile of flesh. The crude weapon felt light and feeble in his hand; nearly worthless, but better than nothing. Tucking his injured arm protectively against his stomach, he lashed out, swinging the limb like a club. He couldn’t put the strength he wanted behind the attacks; his body wasn’t capable of it. Still, the severed arm collided against the others with a resounding, reassuring crack. It didn’t stop the encroaching tide of bodies. Knocking back one only left room for more to follow.
“Can you see a way out?” Ozzie asked Mina, stomping and kicking and swinging.
Mina’s back bumped against his as he retreated. She had collected a leg bone from the mush and, together, they carved out a few feet of clear space.
“Maybe if we can get to the top,” she said. “Can you climb?”
The thought alone brought a spark of agony.
“I don’t think so.” Bones shattered under his feet as he kicked a corpse back. “Maybe I can try.”
A swift kick from Mina’s boot severed a head and sent it soaring into the distant shadows. Watching the motion brought their attention to the clumps of dirt that toppled down from the opening. The horde of corpses fell into such sudden, in
tense silence that Ozzie heard each clump squish as they landed. He glanced to Mina, barely catching her eyes before the light began to die. They both snapped their heads up to see what had blocked the light.
Spider legs slipped around the edges of the hole, the tips sinking into the raw earth as its colossal body rose up and blotted out the sun. The opening was nearly ten feet in diameter, large enough for an elephant to fall through. Yet the earth ripped away in clumps as the spider surged down, its bulbous abdomen sealing the hole like a cork. Ozzie knew he was screaming. His legs gave out, and he fell upon the still corpses. Tears scorched his eyes. But it all felt beyond him—a distant notion that he could never really be a part of.
Only the monstrous spider was real.
Its exoskeleton clicked as it scraped and struggled. Eyes like glistening black orbs filled his vision. The air became saturated with a choking chemical smell as venom seeped from the spider’s sword-like fangs to splash over the corpses. They bubbled and melted upon contact. Weak sunlight blinded him as the creature reared back. The earth fell like rain as it threw itself back down, its large abdomen striking the rim again.
“Ozzie!” Mina cupped his head with both hands. He couldn’t see her. “Ozzie!”
She jerked him sharply, nearly tearing the tendons of his neck but forcing him to meet her gaze.
“Stay with me,” she begged him. “I can’t do this without you.”
A shower of dirt rained down on them; the spider was a few feet closer. They threw themselves away from the flailing limbs that shredded through the clustered bodies. Bone, flesh, and rotten organs joined the airborne mud, becoming shrapnel that slammed into their backs and tripped their feet, bringing them back down. Ozzie screamed as he landed hard on his shoulder. Mina’s gloved hands caught his face again.
“It’s okay. It’s okay,” she repeated.
He tried to look at the charging spider, but she held his head in place, forcing him to see only her.
“I can’t,” he whimpered.