Dark Hollow (16 page)

Merle looked up at the sky again. “Where are you going with this, Adam?”

“If you believe all that, then you’ve got to believe that there are supernatural answers to our supernatural questions. Answers we can only find in LeHorn’s Hollow. I don’t know what form those answers will take. But it’s sure as hell better than running off into the woods like we’re going squirrel hunting. I’d rather be armed with something more than a gun if we’re going after this thing.”

More rain fell, still sporadic, but hinting of the downpour to come.

“Like a spell or something?” Dale asked, wiping his glasses.

I shrugged. “Something like that. It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?”

They both nodded reluctantly.

“Okay.” Merle stood up. “I don’t feel like getting wet. What time do you want to head over there?”

I got up as well and grabbed one of the handles on the ice chest. Beer bottles clanked inside, and the ice sloshed around.

“Soon as we wake up. That okay with you guys?”

“Yeah,” Dale said, lifting his corner of the cooler. “I’ll make a pot of coffee.”

“Screw that.” Merle grinned, returning to his old, jovial self. “Your ass is making breakfast. I take my eggs over easy.”

Dale smiled. “Want me to bring it to you in bed?”

A blast of thunder ripped the sky open above us, and the rain began to fall in earnest. Within seconds we were soaked.

“Shit!” Merle trotted across the yard, waving over his shoulder. “See you in the morning.”

I helped Dale get the ice chest into the house. “Sleep well, man.”

“I don’t think so, Adam. In fact, I don’t intend to sleep at all tonight.”

I paused, ignoring the rain. “You think the satyr will come for Claudine again?”

He nodded, wiping off his glasses with his shirttail. “I think it might.”

I wondered if he was right, or if it was his own fears speaking, brought about by his impotence. He had to worry that Claudine would go elsewhere. Now he had reason to.

“Stay awake,” he said. “Alert. If either of us hears anything we’ll call each other immediately. Deal?”

“You got it. Be careful, man.”

I shook his wet hand and then ran back across my yard through the rain. I slammed the door behind me and stood there, dripping on the carpet. The house was quiet. I grabbed some paper towels from the rack in the kitchen and dried my hair and face. The rain beat against the windows and drummed over the roof. Lightning flashed outside, and for a second the kitchen turned blue. It was the first big thunderstorm of the season. It was possible we’d lose power before it was over. Tomorrow morning the streets would be full of downed tree limbs, and the gutters and storm drains would be choked with leaves.

I wondered what else the storm might bring.

Grabbing some candles from the kitchen junk drawer, I made my way upstairs. Tara was sound asleep, and Big Steve lay at the foot of the bed, facing the bedroom door. He looked up as I entered the room. His ears were plastered against the sides of his head, and he was shivering, his eyes wide and frightened.

I tiptoed over to him and kissed the top of his head.

“It’s okay, buddy,” I whispered softly, so as not to wake Tara. “It’s only thunder.”

He pressed his cold nose against my cheek and then licked my face.

I changed out of my wet clothes and put on some pajamas, and then I brushed my teeth. When I came back into the bedroom Big Steve had crawled underneath the covers. Only his nose was sticking out. He was still quivering, and the blankets moved over him.

I slid into bed, lifted the sheets, and patted him on the head just as another blast of thunder shook the house. Big Steve whimpered, trembling harder. Tara mumbled in her sleep and rolled over to face us. Her breathing was shallow. I tried reassuring the dog with one hand and stroking her hair with the other. I don’t know if it helped them, but it made me feel better.

Big Steve crawled out from under the covers and cautiously edged between Tara and me. She still didn’t wake up. I reached for a smoke, and then remembered that I was out of cigarettes. Instead I lay there in the darkness, petting my dog and listening to the rain tap-dance across our shingles.

Eventually the thunder and lightning died down, and then the storm was over as quickly as it had begun. Big Steve rose, turned in a circle, and lay back down, his head pointing back toward the bedroom door again. I noticed that he was still shaking.

And then it occurred to me that maybe it wasn’t the thunder he’d been afraid of after all. Maybe it was something else. Something in the darkness, standing beneath our bedroom window, with cloven hooves and horns and a king-sized dick.

I sat up and listened for the now-familiar shepherd’s pipe, but there was only the soft, throaty sound of Tara’s breathing. I lay back down and reminded myself not to fall asleep. I’d promised Dale. He was counting on me. So were Tara and Claudine, for that matter. I couldn’t fall asleep.

I decided to get up and make some coffee. Maybe do some writing. That was the last thing I remembered thinking.

When I woke up again all hell had quite literally broken loose.

TEN

Big Steve woke me with an alarmed series of barks. Startled, I propped myself up on one elbow and glanced around the bedroom in confusion. The dog stood on all fours at the edge of the mattress, facing the window. I reached for him, cursing myself for falling asleep. The fur on his neck stood up, and his white teeth glowed in the darkness.

I rubbed sleep from my eyes. “What…”

Outside lightning ripped the sky, and rain hammered against the windows. The storm had returned in all its fury while we slept. Immediately I felt for Tara, to reassure her that it was okay.

The bed was empty.

My heart fluttered. The fear was electric. My wife was missing. Before I could act thunder boomed, followed by another sound, almost lost beneath the noise of the storm and the dog’s barking—the faint melody of a shepherd’s pipe. Despite my panic I instantly had an erection. The arousal was a terrible feeling.

I ripped the covers off the bed.

“Tara? Where are you?”

The lightning flashed again, bathing the bedroom in an eerie blue half-light. Tara was not in the room. Outside, the music continued. Then I heard a floorboard creak in the hallway. I looked up in time to see my wife’s shadow disappearing down the stairs.

“Tara!”

Encouraged by my shout, Big Steve leaped off the bed and sprang for the door. Growls continued rumbling from deep inside his chest, and his nails scrabbled on the hardwood floor. He darted down the stairwell.

I ran after them both, pausing only to grab the baseball bat I kept underneath the bed. Tara didn’t approve of guns and wouldn’t let me keep one in the house. Before the miscarriages she’d asked me to get rid of the ones I owned, not wanting our child to stumble across them someday. I’d agreed at the time, and hadn’t brought the subject up since the miscarriages because it was just another reminder of what we’d lost. Now, running across the bedroom clad in only a pair of pajama bottoms and wielding the bat like a sword, I wished I had.

The floor was cold under my bare feet. I reached the top of the stairs and shouted again. Tara was at the bottom, standing at the door with one hand on the knob. Big Steve was behind her, the hem of Tara’s nightgown clenched firmly between his teeth. His legs were locked and spread apart, and he tugged with all of his might. Tara didn’t budge.

“Tara, stop!”

I took the stairs two at a time, almost losing my balance. I clung to the rail with one hand, struggling not to fall. Big Steve kept trying to pull Tara away from the door. She ignored us both. Without a word she wrenched the door open just as I reached the bottom.

Dropping the baseball bat, I spun her around. Big Steve released her nightgown, sniffed the air gusting through the screen door, and stepped back, whining. The rain hissed on the street outside.

“Tara, what are you doing?” I shook her.

She stared at me as if I weren’t even in the room. I guided her toward the couch and sat her down. Immediately Tara stood back up and walked toward the open door. Big Steve glanced nervously from the door to us.

I forced her back down on the couch just as the melody came again. My erection poked out of my pajamas, but I had no time to think about that. Quickly I ran to the door and peered outside. Main Street was rain-slicked and deserted. Nothing moved except for the water trickling down the storm drain. Leaves and a few scattered tree limbs littered the sidewalks. It was darker than normal, and the streetlights were out. The music continued playing, and I realized it was coming from our backyard.

When I turned around, Tara was standing behind me, trying to get through the door. I shoved her backward, harder this time, and slammed the door behind us. The dead bolt clicked into place, and I fastened the chain with one trembling hand.

“Tara, can you hear me?”

“Yes.” Her voice was sleepy and toneless.

“I need you to stay inside, honey. Can you do that?”

“No.” She shook her head slowly. “He needs me.”

My stomach leaped. “Who, Tara? Who needs you?”

“Hylinus.”

“Who’s Hylinus?”

“My love.”

“Why does he need you?”

She grabbed my hand and thrust it beneath her nightgown. The crotch of her panties was soaked, her clitoris swollen beneath the fabric. I yanked my fingers away, shocked.

Tara smiled. “See what he does to me? You can’t do that. I’ve got to go be with him.”

“Stay,” I told her, and Big Steve sat down instead, thinking the command was meant for him.

I forced Tara toward the chair again. She struggled—slapping, clawing, and pulling my hair. My cheeks stung, and one of her fingernails scratched a furrow across my chest. I wiped the blood off and stared at her, dismayed. My first urge was to strike back, but I repressed it, swallowing my anger.

The piping continued, and Big Steve howled.

“What the hell is wrong with you, Tara?”

She giggled. “I need it. I need it bad. Hylinus.”

“Fuck this.”

Grabbing the baseball bat, I stalked to the back door. My palms were slick with sweat, and the bat slipped in my grasp. I clung tighter. Big Steve slunk along behind me, but when I ripped the back door open he shrank away. I stepped outside. The rain pelted my bare skin. Blood dribbled down my chest. I rounded the corner of the house and skidded to a halt.

The satyr stood between my yard and Dale’s, playing his shepherd’s pipe. His eyes were closed, and he swayed slightly, in time with the music. Claudine walked toward him, her arms outstretched as if to embrace a lover. Her dreamy face was ecstatic. She licked her lips. Her thin T-shirt and panties, soaked from the rain, clung to her body like a second skin. Her breasts sagged, but her nipples were hard beneath the wet material.

“Hylinus,” Claudine shrieked with joy. “I’m here!”

There was a blur of movement at the corner of my eye. I turned just as Tara dashed past me. I grabbed for her, but my wet fingers slipped off her arm. She and Claudine reached the satyr and knelt at his feet. His massive erection was only inches from their faces, and despite the overall weirdness of it all, I was filled with sudden, overpowering jealousy when I saw the look in Tara’s eyes as she admired the creature’s engorged member.

“Tara?” My voice cracked.

The satyr opened his eyes and beamed down at them both. Seconds later my jealousy turned to rage as Tara reached out and began to stroke its cock. Claudine joined her, rubbing vigorously. Rainwater streamed down their exposed flesh and dripped from the tip of the creature’s penis. Something else dripped from it as well: a clear, dime-sized droplet of taecum.

“Leave my wife alone, you fuck!”

Hefting the bat, I stepped forward. The satyr’s eyes flicked toward me.

“Come no closer,” the beast warned. Its voice was like gravel.

“Tara,” I shouted, ignoring the monster. “Get away from him!”

Her lips closed over the head of its penis, while Claudine’s tongue laved the shaft. Both of them cradled his plum-sized testicles with one hand and caressed the thick, wet fur on his thighs with the other.

Dale’s screen door banged open, and he rushed outside, his bathrobe flapping behind him, a Marlin .30-30 rifle clutched in his shaking hands. He wasn’t wearing his glasses, and he blinked twice at the scene unfolding in the yard. When he realized what our wives were doing, his jaw dropped.

“Son of a bitch.” He gasped. “Claudine…”

Dale slammed the rifle butt into the hollow of his shoulder and squinted, trying to sight through the falling rain without the aid of his glasses.

“Get the fuck away from my wife!” I inched closer, holding the baseball bat over my head, ready to swing.

Tara turned back to me, the tip of the creature’s shaft still in her mouth. Her left cheek bulged like a chipmunk’s. She pulled her mouth off of it and smiled. More of the satyr’s precum dribbled from her lips.

“I want to have his babies, Adam. The ones you give me are no good. You’re tainted. Weak. That’s why our babies died. Hylinus can give me strong ones.”

She turned her attentions back to the satyr. Her head bobbed up and down.

I made a strangled, choking sound. Tears spilled from my eyes and ran down my already wet face. “You bitch…”

Claudine stripped off her panties, turned around, and crouched on all fours, presenting her ass and swollen sex to the monster. Her fingers clutched the wet grass.

“Me too,” she groaned. “I want to feel you inside me, Hylinus. My man can’t get it up.”

Dale clicked off the safety. “Adam, step away from them.”

The satyr’s ears twitched, and it jumped backward. Its huge penis plopped out of Tara’s mouth with a wet, smacking sound. Regret shone in her eyes as she pouted.

“This is the second time you have interrupted my pleasure,” Hylinus said, fixing me with a baleful stare. “I remember your scent from the forest. I must procreate, and your wife wishes to do the same. It is the season. Time for my kind to live again and walk the woods of the earth.”

He turned to Dale, his laughter swallowed by a blast of thunder.

“And you,” Hylinus continued. “You are old and weak. You cannot give her what she so obviously desires. Neither of you can. Why not let me share the fruit of my loins?”

My fingers tightened around the bat. Claudine waited patiently for the thing to mount her, while Tara resumed her ministrations. Dale just stood there, mumbling the Lord’s Prayer under his breath. His bathrobe rippled in the breeze. Rain lashed at his face and dripped off the barrel of the Marlin.

“Dale,” I shouted, “what are you waiting for? Just shoot the fucker.”

“I can’t! The girls are in the way.”

Lightning flashed overhead as Hylinus thrust his hips forward.

“Aim high,” I hollered. “Shoot it!”

The satyr pointed at me with one taloned finger. “I’ll be back for you, son of Adam.”

I wondered how it knew my name, and then I realized it meant another, much older Adam—the original version.

Scooping up his shepherd’s pipe, Hylinus dropped to all fours and fled toward the alley. His speed startled me. Dale squeezed the trigger and the rifle bucked against his shoulder. Smoke curled from the barrel. My ears rang. The shot missed, slamming into my shed instead. The creature disappeared into the darkness.

“Did I hit it?” Dale peered through the rain.

“No.” My shoulders slumped in defeat. “It’s gone.”

Tara and Caludine stumbled to their feet and started to chase after Hylinus. I rushed forward and gabbed Tara from behind, wrapping my arms around her waist and lifting her off the ground. She struggled with me. Her breath was sharp and musky.

Dick breath,
I realized, shuddering.
She smells like that thing.…

Her lips were glazed with the satyr’s fluids. I turned away.

“They’re still under its spell,” Dale said. “What do we do?”

“Hylinus,” Claudine cried. “Come back!”

Dale dropped the Marlin and restrained her. Then both women suddenly went limp in our arms.

“Adam?” Tara blinked as if awakening from a dream. “W-what’s going on?”

“It’s okay, honey.” I hugged her to me, crushing her against my chest.

“Why am I outside?” she whispered. “What happened?”

I could still smell the stink of the creature on her with each gasping breath. I closed my eyes and held her tight. Claudine clung to Dale, sobbing in confusion.

The gunshot had woken our neighbors. Lights clicked on in the houses around us. Within minutes Merle, Cliff, and Cory were in the backyard. Merle, dressed in ratty sweatpants and a too-small T-shirt, clutched a Colt .45 pistol and a flashlight. Cliff, shirtless, but still wearing his jeans, had a golf club. Cory carried nothing and wore nothing, except for his boxer shorts. His eyes were bloodshot, and he still appeared drunk. All three of them looked confused. They stared at our half-dressed wives, and then quickly looked away in embarrassment.

“Who’s shooting?” Merle asked. “What the hell’s going on?”

“It was here,” I told them. “That thing. The satyr. It came for Tara and Claudine.”

Tara mumbled, “What thing?”

“They okay?” Merle’s voice was shocked. I shrugged. “I hope.”

Cliff glanced around. “So, where is it now?”

“It got away,” Dale said, one arm wrapped around Claudine, supporting her weight. “I shot at it but missed. Couldn’t see. It ran off toward the park.”

Cliff fished his cigarettes out of his jeans pocket, tried lighting one in the rain, and then gave up.

“Come on, guys,” he grumbled. “Stop with the bullshit. Enough is enough.”

I resisted the urge to drop Tara, rush across the yard, and hit him.

Merle shone the flashlight beam across the yard, revealing dozens of muddy hoof prints heading in the direction of the alley.

“They’re telling the truth,” he said. “How else do you explain those?”

Cliff’s eyes widened. The unlit cigarette tumbled from his mouth.

“Still think it’s a fucking deer?” Merle asked him.

Tara slumped in my arms. I looked down and saw that she’d fallen asleep. I shook her gently, trying to wake her up.

“Tara?”

There was no response. I glanced over at Claudine and noticed that she’d done the same.

“Let’s get them inside,” Dale said. “Merle, you guys check around. Make sure it’s not out there somewhere, hiding. Take my Marlin.”

Grinning, Cory picked up the rifle. A second later Cliff snatched it from his grasp.

“Hey,” Cory protested. “What do I get to use?”

“This.” Cliff handed him the golf club.

“Gee, thanks.”

“Try not to hurt yourself with it,” Merle said.

While they searched the yards, Dale and I took our wives back inside. I stripped Tara out of her wet clothes and put on dry ones. She didn’t wake up, remaining limp as a rag doll. Her breathing was shallow. Big Steve pranced around, concerned, then jumped onto the bed and lay down beside her.

“Stay,” I told him. “Guard Mommy.”

He wagged his tail in confirmation. This was a job he could handle.

I bent over to kiss her, but in my mind I saw Tara’s mouth on the satyr’s cock. I caught another whiff of her breath and noticed the crusted glaze on her lips. I kissed her forehead instead. I hated myself for feeling that way toward my wife. I loved her. It hadn’t been her fault. And yet I felt disgusted and angry. My stomach was in knots. I took a deep breath and tried to clear my head.