The Mountain King (17 page)

At the far end of the chamber, in front of a narrow shelf of rock, was a crudely made corral of thick timbers lashed together with dried-out vines. Through the slats, Mark saw a large mounded stack. As he passed his flashlight beam over it, he realized that it was a pile of animal carcasses. The smell of rotting flesh was nauseating, but he was too amazed even to retch. 

“Jesus!”
Mark shouted when something moved behind the stack of carcasses. A hand—a human hand rose up and beckoned to him. 

Stunned and amazed, Mark started moving closer, walking like an automaton, unable to believe that his flashlight was shining straight into the face of his friend Phil Sawyer. Sitting beside him, their backs against the cave wall, were two other people, a man and a woman. All three of them were tied up with thick, knotted vines wrapped around their knees. 

Phil squinted as he tried to look up at Mark, but the light was too bright. His face was smeared with grime, and his clothes were torn and dirty. His hair was an oily mat plastered against his forehead. His lips were pale and cracked, and his eyes reflected a frightened glaze as he forced a wide, crazy-looking smile. 

“Jesus Christ, man!” Phil said. “What the fuck took you so long?” 

Chapter Twenty-six  

Escape Plans 

“I just—I can’t believe you’re still alive!” Mark said as he screwed the top off his canteen and handed it to Phil, who slurped a mouthful of water and then licked his lips greedily. 

“How long has it been?” Phil asked, his voice a low rasp. 

“A little less than a week. It’s—uh, Thursday,” Mark said, having to think a moment. “Watch it with that water. It’s all I’ve got until I can get you out of here.” 

“Christ, Thursday?” 

Phil closed his eyes a moment and rocked his head from side to side. 

“I’ve only been here five days? Jesus, it feels like it’s been more than that . . . a couple of weeks, at least.” 

“I just can’t believe you’re still alive!” Mark repeated. He glanced at the other people, then offered each of them a sip of water, which they swallowed. Both of them looked much worse off than Phil. 

Turning back to his friend, Mark examined the vines binding his legs. They were dried, and had been twisted together so tightly that even with his hands free, Phil would never have been able to loosen the knots. It would take a knife to cut through them. Other than that, though, Phil seemed to be in fairly good health, considering the circumstances. Mark took out his Swiss Army knife and began sawing through the crude rope. 

“They’re clever, I’ll grant them that,” Phil said. He suddenly winced and shifted to one side. 

“Did I cut you?” 

Phil gritted his teeth and shook his head. 

“No, it’s my . . . legs—I’m afraid they’re both broken. From the fall off that cliff. But these bastards would have done it to me, anyway. I’m all right, though. Check out those other two first.” 

Mark went back to the man and woman who sat on the floor, their backs slumped against the stone wall. Their faces were gaunt with hunger and dehydration. Their skin had a pale, almost translucent quality to it, and they both smelled as if they had been sitting in their own filth for weeks. Lice and other bugs crawled in their hair and over their ragged clothes. The man’s beard hung halfway down to his chest. The woman regarded Mark with eyes completely devoid of human expression, as if she didn’t even recognize him as another human being. 

Mark shined the light on her to inspect her injuries. There was a serious gash on the left side of her face that had started to heal but was festering. The skin around the wound was an angry red. The woman kept licking her lips and trying to speak, but the only sound she could make was a low croaking in the back of her throat. It sounded almost like laughter. It took Mark a moment to realize that, like Phil, both the man and woman’s legs had been broken. 

“It’s all right . . . it’s all right,” Mark whispered as he tilted the woman’s head back and let a bit more water trickle down into her mouth. “I’m going to get all of us out of here.” 

The woman swallowed, then made a noise that sounded almost like the words
thank you.
 

Mark then gave the man another drink. 

“She’s not doing very well,” the man said in a voice that cracked on every other word. 

“Who are you?” Mark asked. “How long have you been here?” 

The man’s eyes fluttered a moment as though he were lost in thought, searching his memory for something that was far, far away ... almost irretrievable. 

“Phil said it was September when he came here. Is that true?” 

Mark nodded. “Yeah, today’s September—um, eleventh, I think.” 

The man nodded again and took a deep breath that sounded as if it were tearing his throat apart. 

“My name’s Jack—Jack Russell, and this is my girlfriend, Mary Fecteau. We’re from New Jersey. We— we were hiking on Agiochook last summer—the Fourth of July weekend.” 

“Jesus! You’re the two hikers who disappeared last summer,” Mark said, sitting back on his heels in amazement. “Half the county turned out to look for you. Do you mean to tell me you’ve been here all this time, just sitting here in the dark?” 

“Oh, no,” the man said. “These—these creatures— I don’t know what the hell they are, but they’re intelligent. They know how to make fire, so sometimes there’s been a campfire with enough light to see by.” 

The woman started moaning as she rolled her head from side to side. A thick yellow foam dripped from the corners of her mouth. Mark couldn’t tell if she was just trying to relieve the itching of the lice on her scalp or having some kind of seizure. 

Jack nodded stiffly. “Two of them ... these creatures, they attacked us on the slope just before we got to the summit. They—they—” He tried to finish but couldn’t stop himself from crying out loud. Agonized sobs racked his body, making him shudder. 

“Hey, take it easy, now, Jack,” Mark said, placing a hand gently on his shoulder. “Don’t worry. Everything’s gonna be fine.” 

“They—the bastards broke our legs and have kept us tied up like this ever since. Neither one of us can feel our legs anymore. We’ve been here so long, I know damned well the bones have healed all wrong. They feed us from time to time. That!” 

He sneered as he indicated the pile of rotting animal carcasses with an angry hand gesture. 

“Every now and then—there’s no way of knowing how long—one of them will bring in a fresh kill. Usually it’s a deer or something. They eat what they want, then throw us the scraps. About all we’ve had to drink is animal blood. A couple of times they’ve carried us out to the ledge where rainwater collects in a shallow depression in the rock, but I—I never imagined I could bring myself to eat raw flesh or gnaw marrow out of bones just to stay alive, and for what?” 

His eyes went wide, and his body began to tremble. 

“Stay alive for what? So they can torment us like this? I have no idea why they’re keeping us alive!” 

Mark didn’t know what to say, although, judging by the elaborate fence the creatures had constructed, his first impression was that they were treating these people like cattle. Maybe they were their stock of winter food, or if these creatures were intelligent enough, maybe the humans were being saved for some kind of primitive ritual or something. 

“I’m sorry,” Jack said, once he had calmed down a bit. “It’s just that—Christ, you can see we’re not doing very well. Tell me, how’s Mary doing? Do you think she ... you know?” 

“Who can say?” Mark replied, shrugging sympathetically. He directed his flashlight beam back at the entrance leading to the cave mouth. “I’m no doctor, but I do know we have to get the hell out of here.” 

“How are you going to manage that?” Phil asked. He slapped his useless legs. “I’m sorry, but I’m not gonna be much help.” 

“First tell me what I’m up against,” Mark said. “How many are there? Have you noticed any pattern to their activities?” 

Phil shrugged. “I’m not precisely sure of their numbers. It’s hard to distinguish them, but I’m pretty sure there are only six of them.” 

“Yeah,” Jack said. “There’s six by my reckoning, too.” 

“Three females, I know that,” Phil said, “and at least three males—two older and one young one.” 

“What the hell are they?” Mark asked. 

“I have no idea what they are,” Phil said, “but I agree with Jack. They’re intelligent as hell, no doubt about it. I don’t know. My guess is they might be some kind of human throwback or something, you know? Like maybe a tribe of Neanderthals or something that—somehow—have survived into the twentieth century without being discovered.” 

“How can that be?” Mark asked, shaking his head in amazement. 

“You got a better idea?” Phil snapped. 

“No.” Mark shifted uncomfortably and glanced back at the cave opening, “but it just doesn’t seem possible. I mean, they can’t have been up here all this time and never be discovered.” 

“Maybe they
have.
Maybe that’s why there’s all those rumors and legends about this mountain being haunted. Remember? You were telling me about that Indian monster. What was it called?
Pomoola?
Christ, since I’ve been here, I’ve had plenty of time to think about how there could be all sorts of superstitions about these things.” 

“Yeah ... maybe,” Mark said, scratching his chin. “It just doesn’t seem possible that they could have remained undiscovered for all these years. Is it possible they’ve been here even as far back as prehistoric times?” 

Phil shrugged. “Beats the shit out of me.” 

“But you say they can make fire,” Mark went on. “And it’s obvious, from the way they’ve constructed this fence and tied all of you up, that they know what they’re doing. Obviously they can make plans and execute those plans. That would take some level of intelligence and communication between them. They had to drag all this timber quite a ways up the mountain, and I saw a stack of what must be firewood out in the front chamber. Do they have any kind of language?” 

“Nothing I can understand,” Phil said. 

“Me neither,” Jack added. He was leaning back against the stone with his eyes closed, as if the glow of the flashlight was too painful. “They howl and grunt all the time. I don’t know if it’s actually language, but they sure as hell seem to communicate, at least amongst themselves.” 

“So where are they now?” Mark asked, glancing over at Jack. “Do they leave you alone like this often?” 

Phil shook his head. “This is the first time since I’ve been here that they’ve all left at the same time.” 

Mark glanced at Jack, who was nodding with his eyes still closed as though he was now used to darkness and wanted to keep it that way. “First time since we’ve been here, too,” he said wearily. “They’ve never all been gone at the same time before.” 

“So what do you think they’re doing?” 

Phil regarded Mark for a moment, then said softly, “I think they’re looking for you.” 

“What—?” 

Phil shrugged. “Ever since I’ve been here, especially after last night, they’ve been taking a real keen interest in me. Jack’s even commented on how they spend a lot more time with me, knocking me around and grunting at me, obviously trying to communicate
something
to me. And they’re always sniffing me, too, like—I don’t know, like bloodhounds, trying to pick up a scent or something.” 

“And last night—when that one male that was wounded came back to the cave,” Jack said softly. “I think he died during the night. I heard some pretty awful sounds coming from the outer chamber. Who knows? Maybe they’re all out giving him a funeral or something.” 

“That must have been the one I wounded yesterday when it attacked me down at the trail head,” Mark said. “I hit him in the shoulder with my rifle, and he was bleeding pretty bad.” 

Jack shook his head. “He got that wound a couple of days ago. Looks to me like he got shot.” 

Mark hooked his thumb over his shoulder toward the cave opening. “Well, then, that means there’s two of ‘em dead, because I shot another one down at the base of this cliff.” 

“We heard the shots,” Phil said. “That’s when we started calling to you. That was the one who had stayed behind to guard us. He must have heard you coming and went to get you. We heard three rifle shots. When you didn’t answer me, I figured you either didn’t hear me or else the bastard had gotten you.” 

“Well,” Mark said, glancing quickly at his watch, “it’s getting late. If I don’t get you out of here soon, it’s going to be dark before I can get you off the mountain.” 

“I don’t mean to be a bummer, Mark, but how the hell are you gonna get three people who can’t even walk out of here?” 

As if proof were needed, Phil struggled for a moment to stand, then sagged back down, exhausted. 

“We can tie some of these vines together, and I can lower you down, one by one.” 

“With four or five of these things still out there?” Jack said. 

“Shit, you’re right,” Mark said. “I only have three bullets left.” 

The three men were silent for a lengthening moment. Mark kept glancing over at Mary, who looked as though, now that rescue was so imminent, she had lost what little grip she had on reality. Her head was thrown back, hanging to one side. Her eyes were staring unblinkingly up at the rocky ceiling.