“You don’t have to.”
“You’ve left me no choice! If it’s true, if you’re friends with this…thing, you’re the only way we’ll get close enough. It’s time. He’s got to go. He’s terrorized us long enough, and I’ll die tonight before I let him live another day.” He pulled her along again. “Besides, if he won’t let any harm come to you, like Eustace says, then you ain’t got nothing to worry about, do you?”
Eustace wouldn’t meet her eyes. Just like Regina.
“As far as I’m concerned,” Brian interjected, speaking for the first time, “you’re just as much a devil as the beast.” His fingertips dug so hard she would surely be bruised afterward, and the light of Doc’s lantern caught the saliva spraying from Brian’s mouth. She wondered how long he’d been inebriated. “I should’ve seen it before. Protecting the monster like you’re some—”
“You’re more of a monster than he is,” she said, and his eyes whipped in her direction. If she didn’t have Taggart at her other side, surely he would have hit her.
They continued to drag her through the forest that reminded her of Henry and even of her father. She still felt her father here, even after all this, and she missed him then more than she had at every moment combined during the past month. How would he feel knowing she was in the midst of one of his fairy tales, that she was the single thing to make it crumble?
“Sheriff,” she pled. They walked the path she usually walked with Henry. “He didn’t kill Sheppy. I know this because he was with me. Please listen to me. You’re making a mistake. There’s something else here, and it won’t be merciful like the beast. Your lives are all in danger.”
“Sheriff,” Nicole said from behind, her voice tainted with fear. Honestly, Elizabeth was surprised she was here at all, even slightly impressed by the bravery it showed. “Maybe…we should listen to what she has to say. I don’t have a good feeling about this.”
“Course you don’t,” Taggart said. “What we’re doing here ain’t fun, Nicki. No reason to have a good feeling.”
“Sheriff.” Regina’s voice was stronger than Nicole’s. “C’mon now. You’ve taken it too far.”
“You didn’t think so earlier,” Brian said. Elizabeth had given up her struggle by now, but she threw her weight slightly to the right as they passed a cedar whose trunk intruded on the path, and Brian’s arm hit it with a thud. More saliva flicked from his mouth as he cussed.
“That’s because I didn’t know what we were gonna do,” Regina continued. “Handcuffing Beth and using her as bait?”
Taggart turned to her sharply and Regina recoiled, the beam of her light illuminating her face from beneath. “You got a problem with it, Regina, you’re welcome to go home.” His eyes shot to everyone else, at least thirty souls scrunched on the narrow path and even amidst the dense trees. Despairing faces, fearful eyes, all lit by their lights. They were at least fifty yards into the forest by now, and a small clearing waited just a few feet ahead around the bend. “That goes for everyone,” Taggart went on. “I get it if this is too much for you. I won’t blame you for leaving. But if you stay with us, you’re with us, and I don’t wanna hear any questions about the way I’m going about it.”
“You really think Mr. Clayton will approve of this?” Eustace said, and she could tell the idea didn’t sit right with him either. “I’d bet he’d kill you himself if he knew. He and Beth are friends.”
“You wanna go wake him up, be my guest.” Taggart and Eustace engaged in a brief stare-down, and when no one else spoke, Taggart yanked her arm and continued on his way.
“Tell him about the demon you mentioned,” Eustace said at Elizabeth.
As though on cue, an ear-piercing scream lifted in the air, not far from where they were—near the clearing just ahead—and her heart stopped with everyone else’s.
“Shit’s sake,” Eustace said under his breath, tightening his hold on Betsy. Taggart pulled his handgun from his holster and so did Deputy Holman, who’d been quiet the whole time. Elizabeth wanted to tell them guns would be useless, but she couldn’t speak. Every part of her froze with fear.
Henry.
Slapped by the blunt, breathtaking wind of reality, she turned to Taggart, pleading like she’d never pled before. “Sheriff, you have to let me go. He’s in danger.” Taggart’s brow furrowed and she went on, “It’s her, the demon, and if you want to get through this with no more deaths, I have to go to her. Leave me and get out of here.” She struggled in their arms. “You have to trust me.”
Taggart looked at Brian. “Let’s keep going.”
She fought with all her strength, dragging her feet. It wasn’t long before they reached the clearing and they paused, observing the stillness. Nothing was here; not even the smallest insect could be heard. The moon reigned high in the sky, the west still a grayish hue from the setting sun, and the stars were beautiful—far too beautiful for the doom she felt inside.
“Tie her to a tree,” Taggart said at Brian, and through the authority in his tone, she sensed his conflict.
“Sheriff!” she cried while Brian shoved her against the nearest trunk—a cedar, damp against her back. A rope looped through the small chain of her cuffs then around the tree, her hands pulled tightly against it. “Please, let me save him! Let me save you!”
She jumped when a shot cracked through the air; Taggart’s gun was angled upward behind them. “We have her!” he shouted. “You want her, come and get her!”
It came then, the air of Diableron—nearly seizing her chest. Elizabeth stared at the trees across the clearing, preparing herself. This was it, the time everything would change. The wind told her so, stirring the forest as doom stirred her heart.
Amidst a difficult breath, she announced, “This is your last chance, Sheriff. She’s here. Go home.”
“Who’s here?” he asked with a shaky voice, and she knew he felt it too.
She appeared from nowhere, only feet away, and startled gasps lifted everywhere, even from Elizabeth. Her face, black, void, and melting away, twisted as she looked at every vulnerable soul with eyes Elizabeth couldn’t see even if she tried. By the way Nicole screamed and Brian stumbled back—and how everyone whimpered—Elizabeth guessed Diableron was appearing as something different to each person, showing their deepest, most personal fears. And perhaps to some the very sight of her would be their deepest fear.
Elizabeth shouted at them, trying to get their attention while she struggled against the tree, but to no avail. Taggart’s gun had fallen to the earth, and Holman was on his knees, tears streaming down his face. “Look away! Look at me!” Taggart didn’t and in the most booming voice she could muster, she yelled again, “Dammit, Sheriff, look at me!”
He finally did.
“It’s not real, whatever you’re seeing. She’s only trying to scare—”
Something knocked the air from Elizabeth’s chest and Diableron was face to face with her at once, just like before. That cold, damp, heavy flavor; the invisible weight crushing her insides, sucking the oxygen from her chest too fast for Elizabeth to catch it. Her surroundings spun, her head whirled, and behind Diableron’s angry, bared teeth, the black hole that was her mouth tried sucking her in. Behind Diableron, people began standing again, looking around in disorientation, and she knew the images before them were gone.
“Where…is he?” Elizabeth managed stiffly.
“Sssuffering, like he deserves.”
Tears rose to Elizabeth’s eyes, though her breaths were diminishing. She tried not to sob, since she couldn’t afford the oxygen, and shook her head. “No.”
“It’sss no matter, Elizabeth. A soul like hisss isn’t worth sssaving. I’m doing the world a favor, doing you a favor. I’m sssaving you.”