She tugged. Monks resisted, listening to the voices in the night's gentle wind. They seemed to be promising that this was what every instant of his life had been leading to.
She pulled again, harder. Whether she forced him or he yielded, he was not sure. The water was cool, a harsh shock to his skin, and it was deep. His feet did not touch bottom, and his motions to swim were awkward, his body not reacting with its usual coordination. It was alarming, a sudden forceful reminder of how out of control he was. He let the scarf go, struggled to the pool's rocky edge, and clung there. He spent a few seconds catching his breath, then started hauling his torso onto dry land.
Gwen breaststroked easily over to him. Her movements were graceful, and she shimmered with strength, her body all lissome toned muscle.
"Not yet," she said. "You haven't given it a chance." She gripped his ankle and tugged playfully, pulling him back in. He was not prepared for it, and he sank below the surface again, thrashing, gulping water. He came up hacking, groping for the rim.
"I can't" – he coughed – "do this."
"Oh, yes. It's what you've always wanted."
She disappeared in a smooth swift surface dive. He felt her hands at his right ankle again. This time, when she came back up, something was looped around it.
The something tugged, pulling him toward the pool's center.
She moved backward, treading water, holding the scarf's other end, towing him. She was smiling.
"Give in to the embryonic fluid that surrounds you," she whispered. "You're being reborn."
"I'm drowning," Monks gasped.
He tried to eggbeater kick, but the scarf held his right leg useless, and the left just flailed. He paddled furiously with his arms, but they barely kept him afloat, and were tiring fast. The voices cawed in triumph now, like ravenous prisoners finally about to tear into a meal.
He understood, with terrible clarity, that the scarf linking him to Alison Chapley had returned now like a vengeful snake to strike back at him.
He thrashed toward Gwen, but she eluded him easily. She dove again, becoming a silvery shape flitting in the water's blackness. The scarf yanked at his ankle, hard this time, pulling him under. Monks fought his way back up, sucking air in shrieking gulps – understanding that this was the last time.
"Now ask yourself, was Eden really worth it?" he heard her say behind him.
Monks inhaled one more lungful of air, then plunged his face down into the water, doubling over to grip his ankle. The scarf was wet, tightened into a knot his fingers could not undo.
She yanked again, pulling his ankle from his hands. He found it once more, hooked his thumbs inside the loop, and pushed down with everything he had. The loop caught for a second on his heel, but then slipped free.
He broke the surface, clawing for the pool's rim, kicking back to keep her away. He felt her hands on his leg again, felt the tightening loop of the scarf. He lashed out savagely, a hard thrust with his heel. It connected, with a shocking impact, with her flesh. Then he was free.
He scrabbled out of the water on his belly, suddenly aware of a raging presence around him that wanted furiously to hold him back. The rocks' sharp teeth tore at his flesh as he rolled to his feet. He crashed into the woods and ran headlong, branches and twigs underfoot stabbing and slashing him, voices howling in his head. He missed a step on the steep hillside, stumbled, missed another, and fell rolling downward, the hard earth beating the breath from his lungs and clawing more skin from his flesh. He kept himself rolling, over and over, tumbling down until he crashed against a rotted fallen log. He dragged himself over it, into its lee, and huddled there, fighting to get his breath back.
After a minute or so, he heard her.
"Carroll," she called. "What's the matter, darling? I was only playing!" Her voice was sweet, anxious, concerned.
Monks raised his face just enough to glimpse over the log. She was standing on the hilltop at the edge of the woods, a silvery magnificent vision. Her hair was loose now, a wild, wet stream down her back and shoulders, shimmering as her head turned slowly to overlook the moonlit landscape.
"Are you hurt? Tell me, I'll come help you." She took a few tentative steps forward, brush crackling under her feet. Monks tensed, ready to flee again. But she hissed in pain and bent suddenly to grip her foot, then backed away, limping a little. He closed his eyes in thanks. The same sharp branches and stones that had fought him were his protectors now.
But the sense of menace was still thick around him.
"You can't stay out till morning – you'll freeze! Come to me, love. I want you again."
Monks waited.
Suddenly, in screeching fury: "You kicked me, you bastard!"
He bowed his head again and hugged himself, shivering. He had never heard a voice like that – it was the furious presence he felt, speaking through her.
"Do I scare you because I'm not a cripple, is that it?"
He closed his eyes. She had found that in him too, not just Alison now, but Martine. Vengeance was descending for all that he had and had not done.
"I know you hear me," she called, voice low with wrath. "I can feel you. Go ahead and hide, but I've got you in me now. You're miner
He opened his eyes in time to see her stalking away, her white shape fading into darkness.
Monks lay there trembling in his cold rebirth. Around him, the night creatures moved with tiny rustlings, stealthy, timid with fear or fierce with readiness to pounce. In the distance, an owl hooted, whuh oo-ooo. The presence hovered around him, electric with menace: Hecate, queen of the night, mistress of spellcasters. They had powered their magic with effluvia from the victim's body, believed to contain the vital essence – hair, nail clippings, menstrual blood. Semen.
Monks forced himself to rise. Getting out of here was what mattered most in the world. He could see the lights of the house downhill and steered himself by them, crashing naked through the brush, barking in pain from his tormented bare feet. The invisible fury fought him like a headwind, while the voices chittered in his brain.
The parking area was deserted. He trotted in a crouch to the Bronco, pausing to peer in the windows, to make sure it was empty, then dropped to the ground and pulled himself under the rear end. His fingers found the set of spare keys he kept wired there, hidden by a carefully applied clump of mud. He got in and shuddered with relief when the big engine caught.
He found the narrow road and piloted the vehicle like a grandmother, hardly faster than a crawl, hands clenching the wheel at ten and three, staring wide-eyed through the windshield in the desperate effort to keep that winding line of pavement between the front tires. The overwhelming sense was that he and the Bronco were staying still. Everything else was moving, in a fluid shifting tapestry that obeyed no rules of physical order.
It got quickly unendurable. His panicked gaze searched for a place to hide, and spotted the moonlit tall tops of a eucalyptus grove across a field. He aimed for it, jarring his bones over ruts and hummocks, and finally pulled in behind the trees.
Little by little, the fury around him eased and the voices in his head receded. Awareness of cold seeped back in, and his body responded to meet its need, rummaging in the Bronco's rear for jeans and a sweatshirt. He went teary-eyed at their delicious warmth. He was feeling pain again now, too, from his cuts and bruises. Dark blood seeped from his flesh where the branches had slashed. But he knew that the healing had already begun – that invisible forces, like brownies in a fairy tale, were gathering to rebuild the torn tissue and replace the lost fluids. It was a marvel, this fleshly system that carried him around. As a physician, he was only a clumsy mechanic, able to guide the process a little. But the real work was taken care of on a molecular level, by some mysterious organic instinct that knew exactly what it was doing.