Monstrum (22 page)

I am rapt, oblivious to the commotion around me as I stare into those disturbing eyes and wonder if we've seen even half of the evil that this creature is capable of.

I wonder if it knows what I'm thinking.

As if in answer, one side of its mouth edges back, revealing row after row of teeth that are perfectly triangular, blindingly white and, no doubt, hideously sharp.

After a long beat, I realize, with a sickening jolt in my belly, what's happening.

The chimera is smiling at me.

Any hope of subduing him is false; the mere sight of him is overpowering. . .

The folds of his flesh are tightly joined; they are firm and immovable.

His chest is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone.

When he rises up, the mighty are terrified; they retreat before his thrashing.

The sword that reaches him has no effect, nor does the spear or the dart or the javelin.

Iron he treats like straw and bronze like rotten wood.

Arrows do not make him flee, sling stones are like chaff to him.

A club seems to him but a piece of straw, he laughs at the rattling of the lance.

Job 41: 9, 23-29,
Biblia Hebraica

“E
spi, you shower first,” I say, wrapping that stupid blanket tighter around my shoulders and trying not to shiver from the chill that has now encased every cell in my body. “We're in no hurry, are we?”

“Nope,” says Maggie.

“Take your time,” An agrees quickly.

“One of you go first.” Espi is dead on her feet, swaying more than walking, and her lids are so droopy that they're more closed than open. We're all exhausted, of course, but there's something disturbing about the dreamy quality to her voice, and the rest of us exchange concerned sidelong glances. “I need to rest for a minute.”

With that, she selects one of the twin beds in our assigned cabin and sprawls on it, fully clothed and facedown.

The three of us watch her uncertainly for a minute.

“What should we do?” An whispers. “I almost want to leave her like that. I think letting her sleep in her damp clothes is better than forcing her to take a shower and maybe risking her getting hysterical again. I mean, at least she's calmed down.”

An has a point. It took the concerted efforts of all us kids to get her away from that tank and settled into a chair long enough for the ship's doctor to inject her with a mild sedative. Then we had to walk her down to the cabin, which was no mean feat given her growing drowsiness and the ship's tendency to impersonate a roller coaster now that the storm is kicking up.

“I vote we let her sleep,” Maggie says. “Bria?”

“I guess,” I say, but then my simmering anxiety gets the best of me for no real reason that I can detect. “I don't know. I'm going to try again.

“Espi?” I approach her bed quietly and study her still face. The nightstand lamp is just bright enough for me to appreciate how pale she is, and I'm reminded of Snow White, with her raven's wing hair and white skin. Only Espi's skin has always been a smooth olive. “Espi? You awake?”

“Hmm?”

I shoot the others a relieved smile and thumbs-up.

“How're you doing?” I ask.

“Tired,” she murmurs without opening her eyes. “I'm so . . . so tired.”

“I know,” I say. “You've had a rough day.”

“Bria?” Her lids flutter open, revealing long-lashed brown eyes that seem unnaturally bright, and she holds her hand out to me. “I know . . . you don't like me, but will you . . . sit with me?”

I don't move.

“Ah,” I say weakly, struggling not to drown in my discomfort.

First of all, why is she bringing up our past animosities now? Hasn't the slate been washed clean by everything we've been through together since we got on that plane in the Bahamas? Second, why can't I deflect her comment with a snappy comeback—
I don't think about you enough to dislike you, honey
—or a quick lie—
Espi! Of course I don't hate you—why would you think that?
—the way I normally would?

Why does she look so pale? And should the sedative make her slur her words and speak so slowly like that?

“I don't not like you. . .” I try.

She smiles, letting her lids drift closed. “You were . . . jealous of me because I'm prettier than you are. More . . . popular. Right?”

I feel my lips twist up, and this galling truth tastes bitter on the back of my tongue.

Her eyes open again. She nails me with a gaze that's direct and honest. “And I was jealous of you because . . . you're . . . you.”

I wait with reluctant and unwilling interest, but she doesn't offer anything else.

“What does that mean?” I ask, cheeks burning and uncomfortably aware of Maggie and An hovering in the background.

“Sit . . . with me and I'll . . . tell . . . you.”

Frowning, I sit on the edge of the bed, at her hip, hoping that will put an end to her demands for closeness, but no such luck. She reaches for me, encasing my hand in hers.

Her hand is shockingly cold. It's like plunging my fingers into an ice bucket.

My concern turns to alarm. “Espi,” I say, “we really need to get you warmed up in the shower.”

“It was because you're . . . smarter. And . . . and . . . funnier. And . . . stronger.” Her eyes drift closed again and she sighs, long and deep. I'm torn between wanting her to rest and wondering if she's going into shock or something, because I really don't think she should be this cold. “But maybe . . . we can be . . . friends . . . now.”

“Yeah, sure, of course we're friends,” I say automatically, rubbing her hand between both of mine and trying to warm her up a little. “But the main thing right now is warming you up.”

She exhales softly, not answering.

“Espi?”

No answer.

“Hey, guys?” I twist at the waist to look at Maggie and An over my shoulder. “Doesn't she look way too pale to you? Look at her. Her skin's the same color as the pillow. That's not normal, is it?”

They hurry over to look just as Espi rouses herself. “Bree,” she breathes.

Her voice is now so faint that I have to lean down close to her lips to hear what she's saying. “Yeah? Do you need something?”

“We'll get to . . . Eleuthera . . . in the . . . morning . . . right?”

“Yep.” I smooth her hair back from her face, and it's as sleek and shiny black as a wet seal's pelt. I'd kill for hair this beautiful. “We'll be there when you wake up.”

Opening her eyes, she looks to me, and then to something in the distance that only she can see. “Papi . . . will . . . be there. To . . .meet . . . us-sss.”

There's something about the long exhale and lingering hiss at the end of that last word that weighs me down with dread, and that's before I notice that her eyes seem vacant now when they were so bright just a heartbeat ago.

“Espi?” I ask, my voice quavery.

No answer.

“Espi?”
I try to pull my hand free so I can touch her face, but her grip has locked tight, and it takes a fair chunk of my strength to pull it free. A terrible thought moves out of the shadows and into the spotlight, where I can no longer pretend not to see it.

What if she's . . . dead?

“Espi!”

I shake her shoulder. Her eyes don't blink or otherwise move, but her head lolls to one side and her hair slides away from her neck.

That's when I see it: an inflamed pink circular mark on her neck, about the size of a quarter—or an octopus sucker—with a bright red drop of blood in the center.

And that's when I hear it: the squelchy sound—soft, but distinct—of something fleshy hitting the floor.

“Bria?” someone asks. Footsteps come closer. “What's going on?”

I don't answer. I can't answer.

Still uncomprehending, I blink, slowly bend my head to look at the floor, and discover the wet trail that begins at the head of Espi's bed, snakes across the linoleum floor, and disappears beneath the closed cabin door.

I blink again, and it all comes together.

“Espi!”

I flip her limp body onto her back and lace my fingers together so I can begin chest compressions even though I know it's useless, because you can't resuscitate a person who's lost all their blood. But I have to do something to reverse what I think just happened.

There's no way I sat here and had no idea that that evil creature was drinking Espi's blood.

No way.

“Espi-iii!”
I scream.

I
f anyone on the ship was asleep, my grief-stricken shrieks, which are quickly joined by wails from An and Maggie, wake them within seconds.

“Bria!” The first person to bang through our door is Cortés, who takes in the whole scene with one sweeping glance and strides over to me before I can fully register his presence. “Are you okay?”

“It's not me.” I give up on the futile chest compressions and just sit there, leaned over Espi in a protective stance. “Espi's dead,” I tell him. “That thing killed her.”

Nodding sharply, he raises something long and thin that he brought with him—a baseball bat, I realize—and turns in a slow circle. “Where is it?”

“It's gone now—” I begin.

“What the bloody hell's happened?”

A bleary-eyed Murphy, whose hair now surrounds his head in an electrified cotton fluff, bursts into the room with the boys hot on his heels. When they get a good look at me and Espi, though, they all stop dead. All except Gray, who steps around them, reaches out a hand to me, and tries to pull me up.

“No.” Ducking my head to hide a new wave of sobs, I smooth her thick hair away from her empty face. “I don't want to leave her.”

“It's okay,” Gray says gently. “She's with God and her mom now. She doesn't need us.”

He's right, of course. But I can't let her go without pressing a kiss to her forehead, which is as icy as her hand was, I realize, choking off another sob.