Maybe it was the adrenaline
in me, maybe it was something else but it was enough that my hands
made contact with the mane and I grabbed and pulled on it for dear
life. I used the momentum to hoist myself up onto the horse’s
back.
And then things got wild.
The horse started bucking and going crazy. I’ve always been pretty
good at staying on horses (and motorbikes) but this was no riding
lesson and I wasn’t ten years old. I was prepared for this. I was
as low to the horse as possible, with my legs gripping its sides
with ferocity.
I kept my upper body flat
against its withers and neck and held on for dear life. It did
whatever it could to get me off but, so far, I wasn’t budging,
though I wasn’t winning any points here for eight seconds. And I
could see, from time to time, amidst my rolling and bobbing vision,
Dex stirring on the ground beside us. If I could just keep this
horse preoccupied, that would be enough for the time
being.
This wild bronco ride
across the black plains of Red Fox continued for at least another
drawn-out minute until I heard Dex exclaim: “Holy shit!”
That was all I needed. At
this point I was done with the mane and had my arms around the neck
of the writhing animal, my fingers clasped so tightly that I
thought they might give way to gangrene. Seeing Dex on his feet, I
had to think fast. It was only a matter of seconds before it came
after him.
“
Your shirt!” I yelled at
him.
Thankfully, he didn’t
hesitate. He pulled his tee shirt over his head, ran towards me a
few steps, and flung it at me.
I reached low and grabbed
it by the hem. The horse reared but I managed to hold on with my
other arm. I knew it was going to do that. I was counting on
it.
With the horse’s head back,
I yanked hard against its windpipe in an effort to support my
motion and, gripping the shirt tightly, I swung it forward as if I
was fly fishing.
I only had one
chance.
The opposite hem of the
shirt caught the horse’s muzzle and slipped on like a feedbag until
its nose went straight through and the rest of its long face was
covered by the shirt. Time to go.
I bailed less than
gracefully. I tried to leap off but just ended up bailing on the
hard earth. Pain shot through me but luckily I knew enough to go
limp. I rolled over and got to my feet as quickly as possible. Dex
was scampering towards me, camera in hand. I looked blindly around
for my purse and scooped it up, eyeing the horse out of the corner
of my eye. It was rearing blindly, its vision was totally obscured
by the shirt that covered its face. I knew there wasn’t much time
before it fell off.
I felt Dex grab my arm and
we were running again, anywhere.
“
You really like me going
shirtless, don’t you?” he panted, keeping his grip steady on my
forearm, pulling me along with him.
“
Is that your way of saying
thank you?” I yelled.
I heard him snort. I took
that as a yes.
I didn’t want to look
behind us. I knew the time I bought us was brief and all too
willing to come to an end. We just had to keep moving, even though
we were now heading away from the lights of the Lancaster’s
house.
After a few yards though,
we came to a fence that abruptly came up at us in the charcoal haze
of night.
“
The perimeter fence,” Dex
said as he quickly scaled it.
I darted underneath the
planks, feeling the upper one take a good chunk out of my back.
Didn’t matter. We had officially made onto the property.
And just in time, too. I
heard a bone-chilling whiney from behind us and the galloping earth
being shredded.
We lumbered across the
land, it was flatter and more groomed here, making things a bit
easier. The house lights dipped behind something else, I guess it
was the barn. We must have been coming across near where the
worker’s cabin was. Even though it was Shan’s turf, it was still
closer than the main house.
I didn’t want to say
anything aloud to Dex but he seemed to pick up on it anyway. He
subtly changed direction and the outline of the low rancher came
into view against the sky. There was probably a phone in there, and
at least the door had locks. Yes, it was Shan’s place and he
probably knew it better than the back of his hand but it was still
the closest point of refuge.
We were about ten yards
away when a black figure moved in front of us, too fast for us to
comprehend. Dex ran straight into it and was knocked back, as was
I. I almost bit the dust but Dex’s crazy strong grip on my arm kept
me on my feet. Someone screamed. I’m not sure if it was
me.
“
Whoa now,” a deep voice
said.
Bird?
I shone the flashlight up
in the voice’s direction. Sure enough, the tall, stoic figure of
Bird came into view. He looked a bit worse for wear, but it was
him.
I’ve never felt more
relieved.
“
Bird!” I exclaimed and
threw my arms around him. He felt solid, real.
He chuckled softly. “I’m
sure glad to see you two.”
Dex slapped him on the
shoulder. “The feeling is mutual. Except I think a mutant horse is
coming after us right now so we should probably run for the
hills.”
Bird nodded curtly and
looked behind us into the dark.
“
I thought as much. Follow
me.”
And at that he was off and
running into the wilderness. Away from the Lancasters, away from
the ranch house and barns. There was a tiny, nagging feeling in the
back of my head that was telling me Bird could have been
compromised but I couldn’t do anything about it except just keep
running after him. But still, the thought of whether skinwalkers
could become other people, as well as animals, did cross my
mind.
We ran towards a rocky
outcrop and Bird started scaling it with ease. Dex followed him and
reached for my hand. Once again I ignored him and found my own way
up, climbing from rock to rock until I pulled myself onto a gravely
ledge that jutted out from a taller cliff face, maybe eight feet
wide and ten feet off the ground.
I got to my knees and Dex
hoisted me up the rest of the way. I strained to catch my breath.
My heart and lungs were working in overdrive and I was still
feeling the dizzy effects of the tea.
While I caught my breath
and warily watched the ground below us for any malevolent animals,
Dex let things fly into Bird.
“
It’s good to see you man,
but what the fuck happened out there? You just fucking
disappeared.”
Bird took it in stride. “I
know. So did you. I went inside to use the washroom. I know I
shouldn’t have but I was only going to be gone a minute. I was
standing over the toilet, heard the door open, turned around and
was hit on the head. I woke up later, I don’t know how much later
but it was already starting to get dark. I was locked in the
bathroom and couldn’t get out.”
It made sense. Yet
everything had me extra suspicious.
“
How did you get out?” I
asked.
“
I had to break Rudy’s
window. Wrapped the towel around my hand and out it went. Barely
squeezed through but I made it. You were gone, Rudy was gone, the
tent was destroyed…”
“
And Boy Boy was going
nuts?” Dex interjected.
“
Boy Boy was nowhere to be
found. I saw my truck was gone, I had hoped you took it. I had to
take Rudy’s all the way back here.”
“
How long have you been
here for?” Dex questioned.
“
Not long, five minutes. I
parked Rudy’s car far, far away and came the rest of the way on
foot.”
“
Why?” I asked.
“
I’m not stupid. From the
moment I woke up on that bathroom floor I knew exactly what
happened.”
“
Well, if you don’t mind,
can you please fill us in?” I asked.
“
I don’t know how much time
we have,” Dex said to me.
Bird walked forward and put
his hands on both of our shoulders. “Don’t worry. We have enough
time. It will take Shan some time to get used to his new
body.”
“
What?” I replied,
dumbfounded.
“
When a skinwalker changes
into an animal, there is an adjustment period. He has to learn what
it’s like to be that animal. He was a horse to cover quick
distances. He’ll probably be a bird next to get up here after us.
Or perhaps he’ll go find Sarah first for support. But it’ll take
him a little bit to learn how to operate in this new
form.”
“
So you know its Sarah and
Shan…,” Dex mused, bitterly.
Bird sighed, “Yes. I know.
Now. And I should have known then. I just didn’t see it. I didn’t
want to believe that Sarah could do something like that. But I have
a feeling it goes much deeper than what we will ever understand. I
knew as soon as I woke up, that Sarah and Shan were behind it all
and that Rudy was dead.”
My heart froze. I found
myself reaching out for Dex and holding on to his hand. Was Shan
right then, that Rudy was dead? How could anyone…die? That was
stuff that happened to other people, people I didn’t know…other
people’s grandparents or dogs or goldfish. Not someone I had just
seen, just trusted, that morning.
I was speechless but Dex
was not.
“
How did Rudy die?” he asked
carefully. I could feel the heaviness in his voice. I gripped his
hand tighter.
“
I don’t know, but he’s not
coming back. He was the only one who could have possibly put an end
to this, the only one with the means. So of course, they got rid of
him.”
Bird’s voice was wavering
and ripe with emotion. I felt so bad, for everyone and everything.
Even though this had been going on before we got here, I couldn’t
help but feel like it was all my fault.
“
Why are they doing this?” I
mumbled, feeling too much at once. Dex pulled me into him and put
his arm around me. I wasn’t sure if it was to make me feel
comfortable or to warm himself up, considering he was bare-chested
and the air had a heavy, solemn chill.
“
I don’t think we can
really understand. Some people get angry,” Bird said simply. It was
true. That was pretty much the motive of every murder out there.
Some people got real angry.
“
What’s our plan, then?” Dex
asked.
“
I think you guys had the
right idea. Get out of here.”
“
It’s kind of hard when
you’ve dragged us onto a cliff,” Dex said.
“
This is the only way I
could buy us time. You think that hiding in the house would do you
any good? You think it’s tough for them to be human and beat down
doors? It’s not. He’d be at you in a second. After what happened
with Rudy, he’s more powerful now than ever.”
Dex didn’t say anything but
he did pull me in even closer. Maybe he was scared after all. I
looked up at him. With the dark clouds obscuring all starlight, his
face was just a shadow but I knew his eyes were meeting with mine.
I could almost hear him thinking
we’ll be
OK, kiddo
. Only, he didn’t believe it
enough to say it.
“
Here you guys are,” we
heard a voice drawl from above us. We all jumped a bit and turned
around to face the cliff. Five feet above us stood a tall,
commanding figure. He had a branch in hand, its tip lit with fire.
The glow illuminated the tell-tale face of Maximus.
“
Maximus!” I
yelled.
He jumped off the cliff and
landed beside us with a thump. It was him all right. Tall, burly,
broad-chested, flannel-shirted, ginger-haired,
yellow-eyed…
No, wait. Maximus had green
eyes...
I tried to process that as
I stared at him. He looked at Bird and slapped him hard on the
back.
“
Here you are, old man,” he
drawled. The firelight showed Bird was just as perplexed as I was,
though maybe a few steps closer to figuring it out. I looked up at
Dex. He knew something was up. He stared intently at
him.
“
Maximus,” Dex said with a
big fake smile. “You got here awfully quickly. How did you find
us?”
‘
Maximus’ didn’t miss a
beat. “Well, you guys make it pretty easy when you’re standing on a
cliff edge and jabbering loudly about skinwalkers.”
He took a step towards Dex.
I noticed the grip around the branch became tighter. In the flame’s
light, there was no mistaking that Maximus’s eyes now glowed
vibrant amber. It wasn’t him at all.
The truth was in the
fire
.
I felt sick but before I
could even let the feeling take over my body and reduce me to mud,
Bird leaped for Maximus as if to tackle him.
But Maximus was faster than
that. He veered out of the way and Bird went flying onto the
ground. Maximus raised his flame in the air and brought his foot
back, meaning to boot Bird off the cliff.
I looked at Bird. He stared
up at Dex in horror and then pointed at me, and yelled, “Don’t
trust her! She’ll be lying!”