The Pines (43 page)

Where’s the moon?
When she opened her eyes, she could no longer see the stars. Her hands traveled over herself, feeling for blood, for gaping wounds. Her sides ached, and she trembled with a shock reaction from the pain in her scalp.

Something swirled in her vision, off in the trees, dim movement.

Mist shrouded the glow of the flashlight.
But I threw it farther than that, and I ran. How could…?
The splaying beam swung through the trees.
Steve?
She stayed crouched, and her chest heaved.

In refracted brightness, she could almost see what held the flashlight, could almost make out the misshapen arm.
It’s coming
this way!

The beam struck her eyes, and her night vision blanked out. An unvoiced scream rattling in her brain, she turned her head until the beam passed on. She blinked. Dark and squat in the diffuse moonlight, something loomed behind her in the reeds.

A shack!
Lurching to her feet, she almost pitched forward, and her leg exploded in pain. Gritting her teeth to keep herself silent, she hobbled toward the hut, looking back with every step.

The patch of brightness had stopped moving, still a good distance away, and she staggered on, gaining speed as the leg responded to her panicked demands.
It’s back there. Way back there.
Peering over her shoulder, she noticed the light still had not moved…that it seemed curiously low to the ground.

The thing had thrown it away.
It could be anywhere now.
Pain loosened its grip on her side, and she limped rapidly toward the hut.
Could be right behind me!

Off its hinges, the door leaned against a tree.
No shelter here.
Nowhere to run.
Drying mud flats stretched all around in the faint moonlight.

A weapon
—
there could be something inside.
She had to press against the wall and step across a bent sapling, and even as she entered, she realized this movement reminded her of something.
Matty at the shed that rainy morning, that pantomime he did.
She tried not to breathe through her nose, but a stench coated the roof of her mouth, gagging her. Mouth open, she peered back through the doorway.
Is it following?

She stepped on something soft.

No.
Moonlight leaked through the doorway, and the reeking shack swam about her.
Run!
Slowly, her eyes adjusted.
Get away from here!
She looked down at something like a black pudding stuffed into a dress and became aware that other things sprawled around her, vague shapes, some in advanced states of liquefaction. Something rustled.

Her eyes tracked across the moonlit floor.

From a dark corner inside the shack came a blubbering mockery of words. She backed away, slipped on a mound, fell, and a lump of something slimy as wet clay came away in her hand. She rolled. There was movement in the bulk she tumbled over, and she recoiled with a silent shriek.

“’Th-thena…” It spoke and reached for her.

“Steve!” She knelt by him, felt the wetness of his shirtfront. “You’re hurt? Did you crawl in here? No, don’t try to talk.” She watched the doorway. “It’s out there.” She searched his pockets for matches, struck one, and the sulfurous stink found her throat. In the glow, his shirt glistened.

She looked around at hell, at madness.

The occupants of the shack lay in positions of abandon. Most had clothing peeled back to expose rotting carcasses. Pocked faces grinned pus yellow and mold green in the light of the tiny flame. Nearby, what appeared to be a male hunched on its face, coarsening gray buttocks exposed, and against the wall, a skeleton grin that fell away in maggots was no less obscene than the legs spread wide beneath a tattered skirt. Puddling flesh left the leg bones bare in spots.

The match went out, and she inhaled the horrible intimacy of the dark, the air so corrupt even it could probably kill. She pressed Steve’s handkerchief to his throat, tried to stop the blood that gurgled there. “You’ll be all right, Steve. I’ll get you out of here.” She lit another match but couldn’t bring herself to look at his slashed belly. Tightening her jaw against the rising flow of nausea, she closed her eyes against the force of her mind’s rejection. She couldn’t move.

A distant flash of pain forced her eyes open. The match had gone out. With burned fingertips, she fumbled for another.

“Something under me…hurts…” Squirming, he shivered convulsively, and his arms jerked toward her.

“Don’t try to move.”

But he pulled her toward him. “…get out…”

“I’m not leaving you.”

“’Thena, run.” His grip tightened. “Don’t you know…where we…?”

“We’re in its…lair.” Striking another match, she spoke softly. “My leg hurts. I can’t run anymore.”

A howl shook the walls.

She clutched him in terror. The sounds that emerged from his throat ceased to be words.

A weapon.
Pulse throbbing in her head, she turned from him.
Find a weapon.
She forced herself to look beyond the ravaged bodies, the inflated faces.

Strange objects littered the shack. Damp sticks that might once have been furniture were heaped in the corners, and things twisted and partially devoured sprawled upon them, coated with a scum that seemed faintly to glow, a clinging putrescence. Oddly shaped devices hung from the rafters, bent stiff-wire cages and rotten leathern contraptions with tufts of fur adhering.
Must’ve been a trapper’s hut. There have to be guns, guns and skinning knives and things.
But they’d be old, the guns, she knew—museum pieces. Useless.

Dust laden and cobwebbed, the largest object hung just above her head, and she struggled to pull it down with one hand, thick grime coating her fingers. It weighed more than she expected, and she almost dropped it. Rust ground into her palm.
What in the…?

As she hefted the object, examining it, match light gleamed off something on the floor, something bright.

Stooping, she brought the match low. A glistening caul of decay covered the face…but silver jewelry glittered on a bloated wrist. She recognized the design of interlocking leaves.
It’s the
bracelet Steve gave me, the one that belonged to his wife.

Everything went black.

Oh, Pamela.

Choking, she held one hand across her nose and mouth and felt what remained of her sanity begin to splinter. A moment later, in the darkness, she realized what the heavy object in her hand must be.

“Steve?” Another match sparked. “I’ve found a bear trap.”

In the flickering shadows, his mouth seemed to move.

“It’s pretty rusted,” she whispered. “Oh God, I think I hear it.”

The thing howled again, louder, and dust rained down on her from the ceiling.

Oh God, let this be over.
She pawed frantically across the corpses, finding canteens and camping gear, but no guns or knives.
I can’t fight anymore. I can’t.
Then she saw it. In the corner leaned an ax. She brushed away the silken tent that cocooned it, and black spiders dropped off. She hefted the ax. The handle was rotten, the head dull and loose, but it was something.

From outside, from just the other side of the wall, came the whispery scraping of heavy feet against the sand.

Almost.
The match dropped, because she needed both hands now. Working in the dark, she struggled with the trap, trying to figure out how it opened.
I’m almost ready for you.

Tugging and grunting, she managed to pull the ridged jaws a few inches apart, but they closed with a grind. She felt blood on her fingers. Taking hold of the ax handle, she pried the jaws open again, exerting all her strength, then worked the handle between the teeth. Holding the trap down with one foot, she levered it, slowly, all the way open. Then she put her lame foot on it and heard a click as the trap flattened.

“’Thena, run.”

“Ssh, Steve.” Stepping back, she felt for the matches.
One left.
She set fire to the pack and examined the spring plate in the center of the trap.
This better work.
Holding the flame gingerly, she positioned the trap by the doorway.

She dropped the curling matchbook and watched the red fade. Then she stood out of the strike of moonlight and waited with the ax raised above her head.

The footsteps ceased.

It’s just standing there, on the other side of the doorway.
She could hear it breathing and realized with a sinking terror that it could hear her. Its breath became a slavering growl, a guttural snarl that ground thickly on and on.

“Thh thth ththtenahthena”

Soft as spider’s silk.

Then silence.

The damp wood of the ax handle began to crumble in her grip.
It…said…my…name.

She heard a wet slithering.

Then Matthew’s voice echoed clearly in her mind:
Behind…behind inna dark…turn around…right behind…

From where Steve lay came a giggle that choked into a sob, and she spun, swinging with all her strength.

She heard a harsh animal shriek as the ax connected.

She swung again, shouting with a ferocity of her own. The handle snapped. She leaped for the doorway as fingers clawed at her. Her foot struck something hard and she went down, dragging the heavy object across the floor, feeling its metal teeth dig into her leg.

She scrambled outside and shoved at the leaning door, sent it toppling. For an instant, she glimpsed the blue-gray face above her in the moonlight, the wide, luminous eyes, the chin wet with drool. Then the door thudded, the thing disappearing beneath it.

Moonlight struck like a wave of energy. She plunged into it, stumbling, and fought her way against that current, still clutching the steel-jaw trap.
Too rusted.
It hadn’t worked, hadn’t snapped shut when she’d fallen on it.
Thank God.
She had to reach the pines—lose herself in them.
Steve, forgive me.

At the edge of the woods stood the boy. His eyes shone white.

“Run! Matty, get away!” The wind blew strong against her as, limping heavily, she raced toward him.

The boy stood very still, and his gaze traveled past her.

“Run!” Yelling as she turned, she saw the thing burst from the hut and streak forward, blurring.

The gaping maw. The clutching hands.

“No!” She hurled the trap, falling to her knees, arms outstretched to shield the boy.

She heard a muffled clang, and the moonlight faded steadily, sinking the world in darkness.

Mired in the stench of the hut, Steve heard the awful screech and knew he had to help her. He tried to rise but felt the blood pool in his bowels and then leak out around the burning coil of pain. Again, his strength ebbed, receding into darkness. Something was sticking into him, sharp and hard at his back. He tried to squirm off it.

He couldn’t die here, not now, couldn’t abandon her when she needed him. He twisted over on his side, the pain searing him in half, his breath burning through his throat. Then his hand struck the thing he’d been lying on and fastened instantly on the familiar hardness.

The sky seemed to boil, the clouds strange and fleet.

She approached. It lay on the ground. A naked thing, it convulsed, shrieking and gibbering. She waited for it to die. In the dark, the feet looked horny and malformed. Cautiously, she bent closer. It breathed still but no longer growled, the worst of its death spasms over. Only as Matty drew forward did she recognize the long whitish hair that trailed about its shoulders.

The trap had stuck the abdomen, clamping shut on its stomach.

He’s still alive.
Heavy shadow lay across the face, but she could see the twitching of the lips, like the struggles of a dying bird.
I
don’t want to hear.

Stench rose from the earth.

“…kill anybody’d try ta chase you ’way…you ’bout the only friend I ever…”

The words grew even fainter, and she tried to hold Matty back from him.

“…no don’ tie me up! Wanna help ya. Ernie, they comin’…come to get Lonny’s things she said you know what’s out there, boy. My own son. You and yer ma out there inna woods…”

She watched his bowels looping out, listened to the pathetic ravings.
He’s spilling his guts.
She wanted to scream or laugh. It seemed incredible he still could speak, incredible he could breathe, and in the weak light the entrails seemed to unclench and writhe on the ground like serpents.

His face.
Moonlight raced, dappling over him.
I have to see.
Nothing of his features remained visible for more than a fleeting second, and the sibilant gasp of his voice ebbed, growing even more chaotic.
I have to know.

“…what’d you do to my father loony you ain’t like them others what are we sort of like cousins where’s my old man I know you know where…”

Something buzzed in her skull. In confusion, she seemed to hear his voice duplicated by an echoing whisper.

“…come with me please just once lef’ me wi’ a kid come with me to the woods Marl please…”

Speaking almost simultaneously, Matthew parroted every word, and when the other no longer had the strength, Matthew spoke alone.

“…think you could take this alla this fer yer ole man shoulda blowed yer head off like I blowed hers off inna woods…”

She put her arms around her son’s shoulders, tried to jerk him out of this communion. As though she’d touched a power line, awareness jolted through her; she drowned in unending misery as all the frightening filth of Marl’s life poured through her. Sometimes it seemed more than words, more than just a sordid, horrible ramble. It entwined her, and she caught a sense of something that churned, deep and turbulent and hot, fuming over and obscured, a molten sadness that foamed upon the cold rawness of death. She smelled things, tasted things—jumbled memories—saw gigantic Spencer edge closer, leering, too close, the pores like craters in his bristling face, his clothes open. She saw the Devil loom transparent, and the pines breathed to her, moaning of the hunt and of wetness and of love. She broke away from the boy, and it ended.