Aron scrambled up the shelves, slipping with every step. Klin was at the top, screaming at him and reaching his hand down through the balusters to him. Nero was nearly within reach of Aron’s feet now. Aron looked back and their eyes met. Then he lunged for the top though he had no solid footing. Nero leapt to seize a foot. Aron got his other foot on top of the biggest book on the shelf and shoved off of it, putting everything into one surge for the top. The big book tumbled out of the shelf as he pushed, but it had given him enough height to get his arms over the railing of the balcony. Klin grabbed him. Aron looked down, fighting to get his legs to the edge of the upper level.
Nero had turned his gaze abruptly from the boys and tried but failed to catch the book. It landed on its spine then parted, falling open. Nero grasped the fringes of his hair in tight fists as if about to rip it from his small round skull. He cried out, but no longer did his eyes seek out the intruders in his house. He looked down to the book, beside his swollen feet. On its yellow page stood a picture, jagged lines of the blackest ink.
It was a creature, gaping mouth draped with saliva, digging one bare claw into the almost empty carcass of a young boy on a rock.
Klin’s hands pulled Aron up over the top. He fell hard on the floor of the balcony, then scrambled to his feet. Tall Boy led them through a window and into the night, onto the branches of a tree, and Aron jumped too soon for the ground, twisting his ankle and bruising his legs on the roots below.
Klin swung down beside him and picked him up. They were running, running, running. They did not look back once. From the house they could hear Nero’s screams, screams of wrath and loss.
“Come back here you stupid boys!” they finally heard, then they could hear no more.
Aron’s body ached everywhere and his heart was pounding out of control. He fell over a dead log in the path and collapsed on the forest floor, struggling just to breathe.
Klin and Tall Boy were crouched over him. He couldn’t think of anything but trying to get his breath. There were hands on his chest and arms. He sucked one breath in, but could not remember how to exhale. Someone hit him and the air came out. He breathed again, then again. Now his breaths were coming fast and he started to hear their voices.
“Aron, Aron, it’s okay…. Stand up! You gotta keep walking….”
He stood but felt weak. His body was shaking. The other boys helped him for a few steps, then he pushed them away and fought his way alone. They kept anxiously by his side, and he pushed them angrily away. Slowly, he regained his breath and began to hear the wind and feel the chill of the forest. He had no idea where they were, but Tall Boy was leading them somewhere. Aron just kept following.
The moon was bright and cold and round.
Aron’s house looked small when they came to it, and he thought of all the comfort that was inside. He wondered for a moment if Nero would follow them here. He wondered if Nero were somewhere amongst these trees.
The three boys squatted for a while on the hill, considering the events of the night. Aron thought the other boys might be laughing now, except that he had collapsed like that. Finally Tall Boy told them that his paw was going to get him up before dawn to skin some animals, and how his paw would probably skin him instead if he weren’t around. His gaunt form wandered off into the forest, picking up rocks and nailing trees with them.
Klin smiled. “You doing all right?”
“Yeah.”
“How’d you like it?” Klin questioned. His tone was quiet and sincere, threatening nothing for an erroneous answer.
Aron laughed a little, nervously. “Not too bad.”
“You didn’t do so bad. I’ve gotta tell you, starting off, I wasn’t so sure you’d make it. When we were coming up on the house it looked like maybe you were about to bolt for the trees or something. But you did good. Got into a hell of a lot more trouble than me or Tall Boy.”
“Have you ever gone in there before?”
“No.”
“Were you scared?”
Klin smiled to himself, kicking at a root in the forest floor.
Aron said it was probably time that he went inside. Klin asked him if he was sure, and Aron told him yes, and Klin said okay. Aron started walking down the hill to his house. He walked a little nervously because he felt like Klin was watching him.
“Aron!” Klin called out, loudly enough so that Aron would worry if it had woken his parents.
He looked back and Klin was charging down the hill towards him. He came to Aron’s side and grabbed the top of his arm tight.
“You asked me a question back there, are you gonna let me get away without an answer?” He was breathless. “Scared?” He let Aron’s arm go. “Of course I was scared. But that isn’t what matters. What matters is…”
Aron watched him silently.
“Aw, hell. Good night, Aron. Sleep tight. And be quiet getting in there! Don’t want to wake the parents!”
He laughed and nudged Aron on his way. At the bottom of the hill Aron looked back once, and Klin was standing there where they had parted, and by his posture it was clear he was smiling.
When Aron got to the door of the house and looked back again, Klin was gone.
Quietly, he slipped inside.
His mind wandered and wandered in senseless circles. He heard sounds that were not sounds and saw strange things verging on dreams. He heard a knocking, a rapping at the door, then sat up, wondering if that one could have been real. But he heard nothing more. A scream from the forest.
The only sound was the cold fingers of the wind running through the earth’s bristly hair.
He awoke to the sound of his sister’s shrill scream. He rubbed his eyes and looked around the room, now bright with morning. His sister ran in the door bawling.
“What is it, baby?” he heard Father ask.
He got out of bed.
He saw his father slipping out the front door. His head poked back in.
“Son, stay with your sister,” he commanded sternly.
Cainy stared up at him, her eyes brimming with fear. Aron stood motionless, still waking up, wondering if the night before had been anything more than strange dreams. He said nothing.
Father came back in. His face was like stone. Mother, drawn by Cainy’s cries, came running in through the back door and went straight to her.
“What is it?” she asked Father.
“It’s Klin,” he spoke without moving his lips. “It looks like something’s chewed him up.”
Cainy screamed wildly but Aron did not hear her. He stared dumbly at his father.
Father was to go out to the field with a blanket to cover the body. Then he was to hike into town to tell the Vassal and his men what Cainy had found. Mother was to stay home and watch the children.
But Aron knew that with his sister throwing tantrums he’d be able to slip away soon. Cainy ran into the kitchen and Mother gave chase. Aron slipped out the back door into the open green field. He knew which way he had to run. At the top of the first hill, he heard his mother calling his name desperately. She must have thought she had lost him.
Klin was gone. In the mystery of the midnight forest winds, Aron might have believed it. In the strange light of the tavern, or with the shards of moonlit broken glass on Nero’s floorboards, he could have felt something, he could have cried and understood that Klin was gone.
But the morning light was a cruel anesthetic.
In it the white house looked fragile, and Aron ran straight up and pounded on the door. What was inside could be no worse than what lurked in the forest. He screamed and pounded harder and kicked the door violently until his toes were all smashed up. Then it opened. A powerful fist came down, opened, and wrenched him inside.