Flames sprang in the air, heat and a crackling shock that sent her staggering backward, stunned and reeling.
Don’t look!
Lightning slithered on the ground, and a lump of ore fused in blinding brilliance.
Its eyes! As a red afterimage, she saw it standing erect now, scant yards away. Oh my God looking into mine its eyes. Returning to black, the ground seemed to shake, and her weaker leg gave out. The mouth God I can’t run the snarl with its lips drawn back. She fell to one knee. Teeth in the red mouth.
Rain already beat down the flames that crept across the cloven earth between them.
Now, she ran with no knowledge of how she’d risen. Tripping, she slid on her face, the gun discharging on the ground beneath her. She was slow to get up, sure some part of her had been ripped away. Again, the full force of rainfall hammered from the sky.
Crashing sounds surged toward her.
No. She lunged through the woods, shotgun left behind. You won’t get me! The tearing pain in her side jolted. Not this easy! Branches clawed. I won’t let you! Then the ground was gone in sliding mud, and rushing black water knocked the breath from her, filling her mouth. Cold and powerful now, the creek boiled, tumbling her like a leaf.
Narrow here. Lightning glowed off the water, freezing her as she crawled up the sand.
Doubled over, she hobbled on, shivering and limping. I won’t look back. I won’t. Then she staggered into the clearing.
“Pamela!” She launched herself at the trailer. “Pamela, it’s Athena!” She pounded and yelled, her voice lost in the shriek of wind that buffeted and pulled at her. “Open the door! Let me in! Hurry!” Bubbling up through the downpour, the screams emptied out of her. “I think I hear it coming! God damn you! Open up!”
“Go away!” There came faint, frightened squeals. “I can’t unlock the door. They’re out there. I can’t now!”
“Let me in, Pamela!” Her words swept away before the growing howl and the roaring pound of terror in her ears. “Please, oh God.” The baying of dogs surrounded her.
The door popped open, and Pam collapsed out of it. Falling, she struck Athena, knocked her off the trailer steps. They rolled on top of one another, both struggling in the mud. “The lights went out!” Pam sobbed. “Oh, ’Thena, the lights went out and I didn’t know what to do. I hear it! Oh, what is it? I hear it!”
Athena jerked her head toward the thrashing in the trees, caught a glimpse of rapid motion. She heaved herself up, dragged Pam back inside.
Small lights glinted, and something slipped, smashing under her feet as she latched the door. Thin white candles stuck to the collapsible table, and their box lay open, contents scattered about the floor. Thunder rattled the window. The storm drummed on metal walls.
With a tinny sound, the door moved. Pam pulled Athena closer. The latch clattered.
The whole trailer shuddered. The door leaped. It banged and shook with impact after battering impact. Pamela cowered, sobbing in Athena’s arms.
The pounding stopped abruptly. Something tore at the walls.
“Pamela!” Athena took her by the shoulders. “Is there a gun here? Pamela?” She shook her. “Is there a gun?”
A terrible screaming roar ripped through them.
“What is it? Oh Lord!! There ain’t no gun. Oh Lord oh ’Thena.”
Metal wrenched loudly. The whole trailer jolted, tilting, and Athena threw out her arms to block her fall. Some of the candles toppled, went out.
In the gloom, the wall began to bow inward, groaning. “It’s gonna get in! Sweet Jesus, ’Thena, what is it? It’s gonna bend down the wall.”
The window vent shattered. Spinning around, Pamela screeched as a particle of glass struck her cheek. The remaining candles went out with a rainy gust.
Lightning—something like a hand at the window—then blackness.
Pam fell on her face and screamed in static terror with every breath.
Athena groped her way around the other woman, found the small cabinet and clawed through the drawers. Paper, rags, flatware. From the broken vent came scrabbling and a rasping breath. There’s a face pressed at the window. She clutched a paring knife. Please, don’t let there be lightning. Please, don’t make me see it.
But when brightness flared again, only rain showed at the window.
“Where’s…?” From the floor, Pam made a noise like gagging. “Where is…it?”
A tremor ran through the walls.
Something rattled overhead. The trailer rocked wildly on its foundation. Athena hit the wall, slid sideways, the knife clattering away from her. Her knee struck the floor. Pamela grabbed at her and hung on as they rolled.
The pounding on the roof merged with the sound of the storm—giant hailstones, beating one after another. Rapid light flashed at the ruined window, and they watched the low ceiling bend, sagging toward them. Athena knelt beside Pam and held her hand. There came a small tearing sound and a splashing, sudden trickle of wetness.
“Oh no, oh no my baby, oh no, no.” Pam wept.
Athena stroked her hair, so long and soft. Pam clutched her, her breath very hot on Athena’s face.
“Maybe if we don’t say nothing, maybe it’ll go away if it don’t think we’re in here. ’Thena?”
Athena raised her head. It had all changed, the one roaring replaced by many growls and snarls. Was the forest alive with them?
Rain muddled the sounds from outside. Something scrabbled overhead, and scufflings blended with ferocious baying in the wind. Barking became shrill yelping, then reverted to snarls.
Moving with numbed calm, she worked herself painfully to her feet and limped to the broken vent.
“’Thena, what?”
She stood quietly at the window while the storm and something else raged outside.
“’Thena?” Pamela peered from between her fingers. A double flicker of lightning showed her an impassive face beneath the dark mass of hair.
“It’s gone.”
“What?” Pam whispered in a voice like a child’s. “What’s the matter, ’Thena?” She crept to the window.
They peered through the twisted metal slats. Intermittent glare afforded them glimpses of the dogs in the clearing, starved and diseased looking beneath wet fur, insane from fresh blood. The chicken coop lay in twisted fragments, and all the mongrels had drenched hens in their jaws, shaking them, crushing them with gushes of black fluid.
“No!” A white hen tried to flee, and Pam made a small wretched sound as she watched.
In silence, the two women stood, now in darkness, now in sudden radiance. They stared. Small rent bodies were tugged apart, and white feathers w ere flung about in the downpour. Small legs kicked amid the mangled flappings. In burning glimpses, through hanging shards of glass, they watched the miserable gray slaughter of the hens.
Thursday, August 6
They watched night fade to shades of dawn, watched the fragmented glass slowly brighten. Outside, it still drizzled.
Athena shifted about, uncomfortable in damp clothes. A blue glimmer came through ruffled chintz, a drowned sort of daylight that made the flowers on the curtains seem to crawl. Knowing she approached nervous collapse, she blinked at the acid-gray horror of the morning. Without comprehension, she watched Pam cheat at solitaire, then glanced at the broken window again. Her eyes felt tight.