What Blood Leaves Behind (The Poison Rose) (37 page)

It takes only an instant and the air clears. Everything is suddenly quiet. There’s the smell of burning wood, the sound of a crackling fire and that is all.

I spin around and see no other shapes but the Elders at the far end of the square and they look like they’re hurrying off. The Riders have melted into the blackness of the surrounding streets.

Except for Jendra. She remains huddled at the base of Gideon’s column, clutching her wounded arm, looking lost, even frightened.

A showdown—Moira and me.

Not Aisa’s tribe against Moira’s tribe. Moira and me.

One clear shot—
a single bullet boring into the soft milky-white of Moira’s forehead, right between those corkscrew curls.

Maybe I can use Jendra, use her as a bargaining chip. I fumble out another cartridge and slip it into the rifle.

“I’m here, Gillian,” a voice whispers from right behind my back.

Her voice.

Again I spin around but see nothing. Not one of the Riders. The Elders have all slipped away.

“Over here, little one.”

Her voice from the edge of the square, disembodied, dancing through the shadows.

I’m torn between going back for Jendra and trailing after Moira. Jendra looks so dopey and dazed, I don’t think I could move her, force her to do anything. And to pursue Moira—she could lead me anywhere but she’s promised me one clear shot.

Her voice.

“That’s right. Come on and follow me. Stalk me, chase me, ambush me if you can. Lay a trap, use your skills.”

Her voice drifts farther back into the dark streets. I leave the dying glow of the fire and follow.

I’m not hunting
Moira. She’s leading me.

She makes no sound, moves nimbly through the night like a cat. The crackling of my boots on the hard-packed snow and a sharp wind that’s started to howl, cutting through eaves and awnings, is all I hear, until—

A whisper. Her voice.

Moira makes no sound—unless she intends to. If I stop, for even a moment, I hear her call to me, so close it makes me leap from my skin, whirl in every direction with the rifle clutched to my chest, trying to see clearly under the spooky sheen of moonlight, trying to penetrate the tangled shadows.

But after threading my way through one city block after another, I begin to hear the icy crunch of multiple feet ahead of me—it’s more than just Moira leading me on. The Riders are all in attendance, accompanying us, filling the streets, watching to see what happens. There are brief sparks of illumination from flashlights they flick on and off as they move.

They’re showing you the way. You are doing exactly what they want you to do.

I know this but I have to see this through to the end. There’s that chance I’ve been promised—a chance so small that maybe it barely exists but a possibility nonetheless that I might get that split-second, that bat-of-an-eye opportunity to take one clear shot at Moira…

She calls to me, “Gillian…”

It’s like she’s whispering from just over my shoulder. I turn and of course she’s not there. Looking back at the street ahead, there’s a quick flash of light and I stumble toward it. I’m not paying attention to what’s below my feet and trip over a tattered backpack half-buried in a drift. I sprawl out face-first on the frozen street, lie motionless.

There’s no strength in me. I’ve had enough adrenalin surging through me to keep me on my feet so far but I’m drained. My legs feel shaky, my stomach still in knots from the food I ate, my head pounding.

There’s an ambulance that blocks the sidewalk in front of me. I think maybe Moira’s on the other side of it but then hear her cooing, calling tenderly as if speaking to her own child. Her voice is buffeted by the wind—coming from the right, then the left, then from behind me again.

“I want to make you another promise,” she says. “Once you’re dead, Gillian, I am going to mingle my own blood with that of your precious little family. I’ll take them one at a time—the redheaded girl, those two small boys and Emily—and see who survives. It will be a chance to experiment with the younger ones. Maybe their youth will make them stronger, better able to survive the change.”

She giggles delightedly, like she’s playing the best game anyone’s ever devised. There’s scattered laughter from farther ahead.

“Up on your feet now,” she says from right beside me. “You’re not much of a hunter.”

I push myself to my feet, grip the rifle tight. The sound of boots stepping lightly, heading up the street impossibly fast past all the junk and wreckage teases me, eggs me on.

Another block and then another. Always the same—taunts, laughter, pinpoints of light that flare and vanish, the crunch of frozen snow. The noise they make comes close to me for a moment and then fades away until there is no sound but my own feet and the wind.

They lead me into a wide central boulevard that’s been cleared almost entirely of vehicles and debris. The boulevard’s end isn’t far and I can see how it opens out to the riverfront. We’re approaching an area of open sky, passing the last of the office towers, the riverfront hotels.

Where do they hide?
I keep thinking.
Why wasn’t I able to find one, just one of them during the day?

They’ve given me back the power to kill but it only reinforces how helpless I am—waiting for Moira, waiting for her to decide when the time is right.

The farther I trudge down this uncluttered street, the fewer flashlights I see winking on and off and I no longer hear Moira or any of the Riders. It’s obvious to me that they will be waiting by the river. I’m certain that that’s where she wants us to face off. But will they lure me onto a bridge? Take me deep into the weedy jungle that envelopes Waterfront Park?

The remains of the old carnival. That’s the spot Moira would choose.

At the boulevard’s end, I scan left and right down Front Avenue. I see the bridge where they left me dangling in the cage and where I crossed over from the Orphanage. Just past it to my left is a sloped walkway and a green space that leads down into the park. And not far from that, high above, are the swaying gondolas of the Ferris wheel.

I cross Front Avenue, make my way to the edge of the park. Close up, the undergrowth of vines and ivy looks as impenetrable as a brick wall.

But a single flash of light from what must be a Rider deep inside this jungle shows me that there’s a path, a way in. Moonlight floods this area near the river and I can see a spot where the vines have been whacked aside. A small, dark tunnel—and I’m only a few feet away from it.

Think about what you’re doing—going from an open space into a narrow corridor. Anything could be waiting for you there.

But I have no choice. The Riders will come out and get me, drag me into the weeds if I don’t do what they want.

I examine this slender cleft leading into the snarl of vegetation, hesitate for a moment, grip the rifle tight and take a step inside.

My boots sink through the crust of snow as I squeeze sideways down the path that’s been cleared. Thorns prick at me, ripping at the sleeves of my parka as I jerk loose from them. It’s a maze, the path barely wide enough for one. The shadows are thick and I keep stumbling into the brambles, pulling myself clear and trying to find another way forward.

All at once I’m at a chain link fence held in place by cinderblocks, half collapsed, the vines and creepers pulling the rest gradually down. There’s a gap in the fence I slip through, two rickety plywood ticket stands to either side. One has a tree sprouting within it, bare branches reaching across its counter.

And past this is the long carnival midway. It’s been cleared of trash, tangled undergrowth hacked back. The moon throws shadows from the rows of old gaming attractions off to the sides, two lines of booths and tents. Most of the booths are still standing but it’s too murky to make out the crazy-colored lettering that highlights the front of each.

The shadowy interiors of any of these booths could hide the Riders. I wonder if they’ll spring out at me from behind the wheel of fortune or the dime pitch, from the milk bottle toss, the Whac-A-Mole or from inside the empty dunk tank. I stop for a moment in front of the shooting gallery, peer into the darkness inside, expecting Moira to pop up for a second like the painted target of a rabbit or a deer.

But nothing happens. Just the wind twisting through tent flaps and the sound of my boots on the frozen snow. I pass the area where the little kid rides are, the tea cups, the carousel. Then I’m by the flat, two-story facades of the tunnel of love and the funhouse. There’s also a haunted house shaped like a castle with a skeleton, its foot caught in a noose, dangling head-first from an upper story turret. I wonder if the bones are plastic or from someone once real but now rotted.

The haunted house, the fun house—perfect backdrops for Moira to use. I put the rifle to my shoulder, scan every door, every window but there’s nothing to indicate she’s there. Nothing moving, no unusual sound, no sudden flash of light.

I’m left with only one part of the carnival to search—among the stomach-churning, spinning, twisting, plummeting rides at the far end of the midway. The big ones that rise up like the barren bones of long-dead dinosaurs. I see them ahead of me—the Matterhorn, the Tilt-A-Whirl, the Zipper, the Yo-Yo, a collection of metal monsters.

They have to be here.

I walk a few feet and stop, wait, listen. Take a few more steps, study the shadows, watch how the moon blinks silver-blue off any shiny surface.

This must be the place she’s chosen for our showdown. It’s perfect—a ghost-world, wrapped in magic half-light. A ruined playground. The snow is unbroken here, only my footsteps leaving a trail through the icy crust. It could be a dream except for the wind scratching at my face—the wind rattling tin signs and iron chains, ripping at loose canvas flaps, snapping at steel wires.

And then I’m at the foot of the biggest ride of all, the Ferris wheel—the only ride clearly visible above the jungle that surrounds me. I back toward the base of it, trying to find a little shelter but not work myself into a corner. I stare at the bicycle spoke shadows the wheel casts, an enormous web of inky strands.

Where are they? Where is Moira?

As if in answer, there’s a creaking from right above me. I look up just as I hear a cable snap with a whiplash twang and see the black bottom end of something circular plunging down. I have less than a second—no time to move, to get out of the way—before there’s an earth-shaking thud as a gondola dropped from the wheel smashes to the snow.

I keep still for a moment, stunned. My mind churns slowly, grasping for an explanation until I begin to think, like a petulant child,
Kill me like this?
What about my one clear shot at you, Moira? You are not going to cheat me.

But almost immediately the explanation comes to me—they did this just to scare me, to keep me on edge, disoriented. Not to deliberately hurt me. Moira still has to prove herself, reassert her control. Use me to prove she’s invulnerable. She can’t just squash me into the ground.

Push on. Keep going.

I have to take deep, wearying steps to work my way through layers of snow to the opposite side of the Midway. There I find a little shelter under the wide reach of the Octopus ride. There are eight serpentine arms, twisting out from an angry-faced octopus head at the ride’s center platform. There are pairs of gourd-shaped purple cars dangling at odd angles from the end of each arm.

“Gillian…”

A car held aloft by an octopus arm ten-feet above the ground swings toward me with a hair-raising screech. Moira pokes her head out. I see the glint of moonlight bouncing off her shades, the wind snatching back her corkscrew curls. The bleached-white skin, the wine-dark smear of a smile across her lips—gloating, taunting, tempting.

She holds still, so close, willing me to take a shot at her. She has her arms folded on the edge of the car as if she doesn’t have a care in the world, is waiting for the ride to resume spinning.
This is the moment—she’s decided to give me my one clear shot after all. But where is her audience? She should have an audience, the other Riders…

I fire.

The rifle smacks against my shoulder. The echo of the report is whipped away in seconds by the wind. The car twists again, turning away from me. I wait but again hear nothing, see nothing—no scream, no body tumbling to the ground. I shuffle around so I can look at the other side of the car—but she’s gone.

While I slam another cartridge into the rifle, I hear a stilted, throat-clearing cough from behind me. I swing around, squinting hard to penetrate the half-light but can detect no movement within the inky snake-shadows of the octopus arms reaching past me. The Riders could be anywhere, invisible in these conditions—black upon black in the shadows except for their faces. Faces the color of snow.

I look for another place to hurry to, wanting to find another place to shelter, to put something solid behind me. But her voice, the smooth-cream voice a cruel cat would have if it could talk—

“I’m here, right here. Do I have to make it any easier for you?”

I spin back to the open midway—stare as hard as I can, trying to uncover anything definite in the gloom. Was she by the Ferris wheel gondola this time, the one that almost crushed me? It sounded like she was there but—

“Where are your skills, little girl? I thought you’d at least make this challenging.”

Then I catch a glimpse of a shape sweeping through the dark like a bird of prey between the steep oblong frame of the Zipper and the miniature mountain range of the Matterhorn.

“One chance, Gillian. That’s all I’m going to give you.”

Now it sounds like she’s whispering in my ear, like she’s a perched right on my shoulder even though, simultaneously, I’m watching her black phantom form darting through the frigid night air.

“Here, Gillian Rose. Damn it, I’m here.”

This time I’m positive I know where her voice is coming from. From across the midway, in front of the rotating top of the Yo-Yo which lays on the ground, collapsed from its tower, its dozens of swinging chairs spread out around it tangled in chains. I
see
her. She’s waiting for me, exposed by a clear pool of moonlight just beyond the looming shadow of the Yo-Yo’s top.