Silas: A Supernatural Thriller (24 page)

Something rustled in the trees behind us. We whirled around to see Will emerge, his expression as stern as it had been the night before. Silas panted, seemingly the only one glad to see him.

“Where are
you
going?” Kaiser’s humorless doppelganger asked, his voice a mask of ridicule.

“Mr. Ken is headed for the Wasteland,” replied Kaiser.

“Oh.” For the first time a tinge of worry crossed Will’s stoic expression. “Why is he going there?”

Kaiser glanced at me. “I don’t know,” he said. “Why
are
you going, Mr. Ken.”

I chuckled, shrugged, and felt the backpack’s weight tug on my shoulder blades. Without another word, I walked away from them on a pair of heavy feet. Paul’s words echoed in my head.
You must free Kaiser and Will from their bonds.
I wanted to do that for him, to give the spirit of my mystery friend whatever relief might result from completing this task. No matter how much my sense of self-preservation fought against it, I dismissed the urge to accept Kaiser’s offer of help and made a beeline for the forest. A snap of my fingers was all it took for Silas to follow. Terror clenched my chest, threatening to crush my ribcage with the weight of its burden. I wrestled with the impulse to spin around, run into the shelter, and hide in the dark, cramped space beneath Paul’s bed.

“I’m off to kill myself a monster,” I whispered, and kept on walking.

34

Heat assaulted me as I marched. It was much hotter than the day before, with stifling mugginess the likes of which I hadn’t felt since we visited Wendy’s aunt in
Louisiana
a few years back. Moisture constricted my esophagus, making it difficult to breathe. This made our progression laborious and monotonous, like being stuck in rush-hour traffic on the highway.

The heat mired Silas, as well. His usual prancing was reduced to an arduous strut. Gone was his customary, watchful loop – instead he stayed alongside me almost step for step. It actually seemed like
he
struggled to keep up with
me
at times. I didn’t take that as a positive sign.

The dense cover of trees thinned the further inland we tread, gradually revealing the
Crystal
Mountain
and its ominous splendor. The black, rocky surface twinkled in the sun, casting funnels of light in all directions. It was equally a pyramid blessed by the gods as a beacon to the lost and a prison watchtower whose spotlights incinerated any wayward inmate. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it.

We walked for hours in that oppressive heat and spotted nary a sign of life. Only the soft tread of our feet on the ground reached my ears. This lack of living sound – the cawing of birds, scurrying of insects, or the padding of a squirrel – gave the journey an impression of dreamlike extrication. It was as if the earth was telling us that when nothing subsists then nothing is real.
Who do you think you are, Jean-Paul
Satre
or something?
I thought. I snickered between strenuous rasps, a welcome feeling despite the pain.

Before long the land became a steady procession of rolling hills. Rough brown grass covered the terrain, the blades swaying even though there was no breeze. The large evergreens dwindled, replaced by meager patches of much smaller perennials that looked like sickly elm or maple trees. Their branches sagged beneath the weight of their crinkled leaves, the decayed remnants of a defeated army forgotten by all but the effects of time.

I kept getting the impression I was being followed, but every time I turned around there was nothing there. I passed it off as nerves. The setting sun, now low on the horizon and hiding its huge red body behind the mountain of black rock, cast portentous shadows from the trees’ moldering carcasses. It made everything dead seem to come back to life, to this day one of the creepier sights I’ve ever experienced.
It’s no wonder I’m getting paranoid
, I thought.

Silas whimpered while we crossed this wide plain. His gait became a stagger, as if every movement caused him pain. We’d been in constant motion for at least four hours, and it obviously wore on him. My own back ached from carrying the heavy bundle over my shoulders. A familiar lack of darkness spread its cloak over the land as the cobalt hue of the full moon, emerging from a bank of clouds on the other side of the horizon, replaced sunlight. I stared up at it like a child, captivated by the dark gorges and craters that were plainly visible to the naked eye. I knelt and rubbed Silas’s back, feeling his lungs expand and contract.

“There it is, bud,” I said. “Our nightlight.”

My feet throbbed inside my crude boots, so I set up camp underneath the limbs of one of the dying trees. Dropping the bag on the ground, I removed the blanket Kaiser had packed and spread it out. I took off my boots and tramped over the blanket to flatten the grass beneath. When it gained the proper impression of evenness I sat down. The compacted grass acted as a mattress of sorts. It was more comfortable than I expected it to be.

“C’mon, Silas,” I whispered. He waddled up to me, creaking like an old man, and collapsed in a heap by my side. I put down my head, using a second blanket as a pillow, and slithered my arm beneath Silas’s neck. He moaned while I scratched his soft underbelly.

“It’s gonna be okay,” I said, staring up at that brilliant moon and the stars as they revealed themselves. At least for the moment, I felt no fear, which was nice.

35

A shrill wail pierced my ears. I awoke with a start, not knowing where I was. My lungs seized.
I’m drowning
, was my initial thought as my sensitive heart pounded away. I started hyperventilating, each failed gasp discharging a million tiny spikes through my chest and arms.

So this is what it’s like to die.

I curled into a ball and grasped the nearest object I could find, pulling a bundle of musty smelling fabric in tight and holding it like a lifeline. The fear I felt, with the lack of awareness that came with an abrupt end to a deep sleep, was very real.

Get yourself together, Ken
, my mind ordered.
Calm down.

I took my own advice, grabbing my knees and counting each breath with a metronome’s steady pace. Before too long the pain dissolved and I felt somewhat normal again.

When I opened my eyes the reality of my situation came back. I was lying on my blanket beneath the dying tree, surrounded by a bright azure haze. I sighed. A part of me expected to wake up in my bed with Wendy beside me and Silas at my feet. Finding out the truth was a little disappointing.

Thinking of Silas brought my wits full circle. I glanced down the length of my body, anticipating the sight of his shiny black coat, but he was nowhere to be found. I picked up my head and looked around. He wasn’t on the blanket, or behind me, or rummaging through the grass in search of lost treasure.

“Shit,” I muttered.

The wailing that had awoken me sounded again. It shook the atmosphere with its histrionics and then seemed to break down into a series of hitching sobs. I remembered Kaiser’s warning about the Dreadnaught, how it would make itself known even when sleeping, and wondered if that’s what I heard.
There’s no way
, I thought. I hadn’t even crossed the
Crystal
Mountain
yet – which, by the way, became a glowing sapphire temple under the light of the moon. These were still the Outskirts’
boundarylands
, a “safe zone.” So unless Kaiser had either lied to me or screwed up his facts, which seemed unlikely, I still had a ways to go.

I stood up and a yowling echoed across the valley. I thought of the
Tao-Kin
as Paul had described them to me in his letter, these living vestiges that prowled the Outskirts, and swiftly yanked the knife Kaiser packed for me from the rucksack. Its blade, dull when I first laid eyes on it, glimmered. My body shook and I found it difficult to grip the handle.

Putting my thumb and forefinger in my mouth I blew a soft whistle, trying to get Silas to come back. He didn’t. That strange voice cried out again. Worry consumed me. I gathered all the inner strength I could and shouted, “Silas!” No reply. “C’mon, boy!” Still nothing.

Then I heard a pleading moan. Not Silas. I felt of the same impression I’d had a few hours ago, that someone was watching me. Could that be it? Was it my unwanted, unseen follower? Had whomever it was snatched up my boy and stolen away with him, only to come back and torment me? “Shit,” I muttered, and then the moan came again, once more sounding distressed. Fighting back every instinct that said to go the other way, I moved toward it.

The grass beneath my feet was dry, and the coarse blades chafed my soles like sandpaper. Radiant moonlight crystallized the smattering of trees around me, giving them the appearance of ancient Greek soldiers victimized by Medusa’s icy glare. Their limbs were motionless, just like everything else. Even the dry grass, which during the day swayed in unison, was frozen in time.

Still I marched in the direction of the sound, approaching a short wall of jagged rocks. The wailing, silent for a few brief moments, sprung forth again, pointing me in the right direction. It seemed to come from behind one of those serrated boulders. I took a deep breath and counted my steps.
One, two, three, four.
The side of my right foot struck something hard and sharp. Blood trickled from the wound. It hurt like hell, but I felt certain that when the sun came out I’d find nothing but a scratch. With a wince I kept on going.

I was only a few short feet away from the rocks now. A new sound then emerged – quiet, infantile sobs, full of anguish and fright, seeming to ascend from the stone itself. There was no menace in its tone, no aggression, which caused me to breathe easier. I wondered if it had always sounded like that, if in my confusion and uneasiness I’d given it attributes that weren’t there. I swallowed hard and jogged the last few steps, ignoring the pain in my sore foot and squeezing the knife’s handle, preparing to lash out with the blade just in case.

The boulders were only waist-high. The side of my heel brushed against one of them and the rock crumbled like dried clay. I leaned over and pressed my fingers into the stone, discovering that what had seemed hard and jagged in the distance was actually soft, almost spongy. The tip of a spire broke off in my hand and I worked it around in my palm, disintegrating it, the powdery residue falling through my fingers. For a moment I forgot where I was and mentally retreated back to Wendy’s studio as she showed me the basics of how to spin the pottery wheel.

The voice wouldn’t let me retreat for long. It suddenly screamed, so close now that dagger-like vibrations stabbed into my eardrums. I backed up a step, convinced that my original thought had been true and it
was
coming from inside the soft stone.

Just then, movement caught my eye. It came from my left, disappearing as quickly as it came. In that brief glimpse, even in the eerie blue light, I saw nothing frightening – there were no teeth, horns, or bulging eyes, only a flurry of shaggy black hair.

“Hello?” I said.

I moved around the malleable boulders with caution. It seemed to take forever, as if I’d been trapped in a bubble of stagnant time. Gradually, I came upon the hiding place and saw its occupant fully. Two skinny legs were held tight to a thick, barrel chest by a pair of just-as-skinny arms. Eyes stared up at me, shimmering with tears. It was a boy – a frightened, shivering, naked boy. A sense of relief passed over me, along with a sudden urge to take the child in my arms and protect him. I thought of Paul and understood how he must have felt when he first happened upon Kaiser and Will, abandoned in some wrecked and burning village.

As if sensing I meant no harm, the young boy of around eight uncoiled his body and crawled in my direction. I knelt down, put down the knife, and held out my hand. He lowered his head into my palm, pressed his black hair into my fingertips, and then pulled back and licked my wrist. I yanked my arm away. The boy stared up at me, still on all fours, and cocked his head. I knew where I’d seen that motion before, even though my brain told me that what was unfolding could never in a million years be real.