“I don’t know, maybe it jumped up there, those prints outside were deep.”
I held grandpa’s saber up with my arm fully extended, just as I’d learned in a fencing class back in a junior college course I’d taken. Vance thought I was a romantic fool, but I really did prefer the sword at close range and against this type of enemy. It always worked and you never had to reload.
I glanced at Monika, she had produced and unfolded a pocketknife, probably from her pack. I was glad to see she was prepared to do what she could. I’d see plenty of people taken down who might have been able to save themselves, but who seemed too horrified and surprised to fight for their lives. In these new days, our deeper, more animal instincts served us well.
The ceiling gave way and Vance’s Mauser boomed at the same moment. The thing that came down was one of the types we called trolls. It was as big as a large dog, but shaped more like a humanoid with overlong arms and curved claws instead of hands. It had bristly reddish-brown hairs that stood out in a stiff spray from its body. One leathery foot was splashed red, showing that not all of Vance’s shots had missed. The troll-thing landed on the sofa and perched on the back of it for an instant, between me and the cheerily burning fire. Before Vance could blow it away, it sprang impossibly fast, shrieking. Huge curved claws still full of splinters reached for me.
It was when the troll sprang at me that I saw the face. It had the face of a famished idiot, which I had expected, but the eyes were bright blue and very human. They looked like they belonged on a little boy’s pale face. They were Billy’s eyes, of course. I realized too, that the troll was looking past me with those strange, haunted eyes. It was trying to get to Monika, not me. It wanted to finish the job it had started out on the highway, and I was in the way.
The thing once called Billy opened its fanged mouth shockingly wide. It stank pungently of wet scat.
The Mauser boomed again, but this time it was a clean miss. Crockery popped somewhere in the kitchen as the round smashed into the cupboards. I heard dry clicks from the rifle after that. Vance cursed.
I forget what French number the move is called in the fencing manuals, but I slashed the crap out of it. I sheared away a huge hunk of meat, starting at the furry left shoulder, which came away from the body in an explosion of dark, sappy blood and flesh.
Monika was screaming in my ear as the thing that had once held her hand in the park thrashed about on the floorboards. I gave it a few hard thrusts, and it stilled. I might have been screaming too. I’m not sure.
Four
A young man’s mind never strays far from love. I’d heard that quote somewhere, and just to prove it, I found myself thinking that probably the last way to get a girl’s affection was to cut down a kid right in front of her.
As it turned out, in this case I was wrong. She knew it wasn’t a kid anymore. She knew it was a monster now. I looked at Monika. We were both breathing hard. She was clearly in shock. She trembled and stared at the thing on the hardwood floor.
“Billy. You said he wasn’t there. Wasn’t in the car,” she managed between the sobs and shivering. Her fingernails dug into her face making deep impressions and one tiny crescent of blood. I was shook up too, but tried to hide it. I laid the saber on a bench. There was a nasty stain on the blade, but now wasn’t the time to clean it.
“We’ve never seen him before now. He must have-changed in the car and caused the crash.”
“Right in front of us, so fast?” she asked. Then she stopped, thinking of something. “No, he had a blanket. He was cold. He had a blanket. He must have been changing under it… Shifting…”
I nodded. That word sounded very right to me. Wasn’t that what they called werewolves, Shape-shifters?
“Shifting, yes,” I agreed.
She fell against me then. She buried her face against my chest. I felt her body heat and smelled her hair. It was intoxicating. Using my clean hand, I touched the back of her head and shoulders. Her hair was silky to the touch. Vance watched us with twisted lips and I found his displeasure gratifying. I gave him a look and indicated the dark heap that was the troll’s body on the floor. He nodded and rolled it up in the entryway mud-rug. He quickly dragged it out back and dumped it.
“Will there be a service?” asked Monika, still hugging my chest.
“Tomorrow,” I said.
In the morning, the sky was gray and the sun was only a weak shadowy disk overhead. We buried the monster that had once been called Billy out back behind the tool shed under the watchful, looming pines. He was still wrapped in the entryway rug. We had nothing better. I mumbled a few words, bowed my head, and wished the Preacher were here. He always knew what to say.
Vance pulled me aside after our pathetic little service and made sure Monika couldn’t hear us. “You said it had hooves.”
I stared at him for a moment, and then realized what he was talking about. “Yes, the prints. I hadn’t thought about it, but you’re right.”
“That thing had nothing like hooves. That wasn’t what made those prints.”
“But that was Billy,” I said, thinking it over. “There must have been something else back there at the wreck. Something else was outside our cabin yesterday.”
“Right,” said Vance. “Something that beat us here, because it knew where we were headed.”
I took that in and chewed on it. I didn’t like the taste at all. “Keep an eye out, this isn’t finished,” I told him.
“No shit.”
For breakfast, we toasted up the rest of the moldy bread. It tasted better as toast. Afterwards, Vance took Monika to Doctor Wilton in the Durango while I struck out toward the Preacher’s cabin. Her wrist had swollen up pretty badly. Doc Wilton wasn’t a proper doctor, but she was the best we had left. Pharmacists at least had gone through basic medicine and anatomy, everyone figured, so Wilton was it: our town physician.
Looking everywhere for something with hooves, I set out for the Preacher’s cabin. It was really best to walk to the Preacher’s place, as the only access was an old logging road strewn with potholes and deadfalls. The Durango had four-wheel drive, but I didn’t want to risk it without need. If I broke an axel now it would never move again. The last mechanic in the area had died weeks ago.
So, I hiked it up to the ridge. It was about a mile and half straight through, three if you stuck to the road. I stuck to the road most of the way.
It took me until mid-morning to arrive. There were some scuffling sounds in the bushes as I hiked up the hill. I stopped and looked around, trying to breathe quietly.
I listened for a full minute, but heard nothing more. Deciding it was probably nothing, I continued up the road.
The Preacher’s cabin was one of those A-frame type ski cabins. They were rare around here, as we really didn’t get enough snow to warrant building a place that is mostly roof. I supposed it was stylish when it was built. When I walked into the Preacher’s yard, I heard it again. More pattering, sounds, like small feet.
I pulled out my saber and threw one last glance over my shoulder at the tree line. Nothing stirred.
While I listened, I had time to admire the view. One thing this hilltop spot did allow was a wonderful sight of Redmoor and the lake beyond. I paused to gaze at down at the town I had grown up in. It was strange not to see any stoplights or moving cars. There were no fishermen gliding their boats over the lake, either. The only noticeable details were the burned out buildings, here and there, around the town. The church steeple had survived and the steel roof still shone brightly in the sun like a silvery white arrow.
The screen door slammed as the Preacher came out to meet me. He had his wood axe in his hand, as he always did, and his heavy black book tucked under his other arm-as he always did. About fifty paces apart, we eyed one another for an obligatory moment of suspicion. I thought to myself that centuries ago frontiersmen and scattered mountain people must have eyed each other upon meeting and performed just the same careful appraisals.