Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy (19 page)

Ten days after the avalanche, in the first week of March, Alex staggered
from the wreckage of a tumbledown cabin just off a nondescript fire
road somewhere west of the mine and southwest of Rule. At least,
she thought it was west-southwest. After days on the trail, she had a
lot on her mind. Like finding food before she became it.

There was new blood in her mouth and a huge knot on the back
of her head. She didn’t need a mirror to see the swelling under her
left cheek where Acne had clobbered her not so long ago. God, the
kid’s fist had felt like the business end of a pile driver.

She was headed toward the shed—and that weird mound she’d
seen earlier—but halfway there, she either fell or tripped, she wasn’t
sure. Blundering through snow, her boots probably tangled. When
she hit, she let herself sink, really dig in so the cold could start its
work of burning her skin, scorching its way through her brain. Maybe
reduce the monster to a cinder.

God, please. Please, help me.
She had to fight.
Can’t break. Can’t give
in. Got to stay me, no matter what Wolf wants or thinks.
She began to swim, dragging herself on hands and knees, carving
a snail’s path through snow, heading for a dilapidated shed next to a
curtain of corroded chicken wire, sucking air through a windpipe that
felt as if it had been slashed by razor wire. Another few seconds with
his hands around her neck and Acne would’ve crushed her throat.
On her knees now before that mound. Patchy with snow, the hill
was about three feet high and reared on the shed’s south side, where
there was the most light and warmth. She stared at the mound a good
ten seconds, maybe as long as thirty. A loamy aroma steamed from
the rich, dark earth. The smell was a little like flat beer.
Then her eyes snagged on something small and black scuttling
over a white patch.
Don’t think, Alex.
She eyed another tiny black scuttle.
Fight, you’ve
got to fight. Just do it.
Because things were bad. Really, really bad.

Her memories of what happened after the avalanche were vague,
a jumpy, chaotic collage about as comprehensible as a badly edited
YouTube video. What came to her first was a rhythmic swaying like
the pitch of a small boat in a high swell. Her chest was very hot, the
tortured lining of her lungs on fire, even as her body shuddered with
cold. Mostly, everything was a swirly blur as she swayed back and
forth and back and forth—and then she went away again, sinking into
the dark waters of unconsciousness. She probably did that a couple
times, like a periscope coming up for a peek.

Finally, fading back, she was first aware of a hand cupping the
back of her head. She was falling, too, and she landed on . . . a bed?
A boat? Her head was swimmy but also ballooning, expanding, the
monster swelling and stretching as if it had sprouted arms and hands
and fingers and was searching for something—someone—to grab.
She was very relaxed, almost peaceful, which was strange if you considered the cold and the steady pressure on her chest, like the heel of
a sturdy boot.

Then something skimmed her right cheek. The back of a hand—
and were those fingers? Her head lolled toward a coil of scent that
was black mist and something sweet, crisp . . .
Chris?
Or wait, no—the
aroma was deep and rich and smoky.
Tom.
It felt like a thought and
then a sigh because she tasted his name in a dreamy whisper. “Tom.
Tom?”

In the next moment, she was falling even further, sinking away
from herself but pulling
him
down with her, tasting him, warm, so
warm, Tom’s urgent mouth on hers, the sigh of his breath over her
tongue, the desire a hot rose that unfurled in her chest. A strange liquid heat raced up her thighs, and she felt her back arching, her heart
beginning to thump harder and harder, and then his weight on her
body, her arms twining around his neck, his hands slipping into her
hair, over her face, and she moaned into his mouth—
yes yes yes yes
—as
Tom’s fingers trailed over the sensitive skin of her throat, the ridge of
her collarbone, before slipping just a little further—

And that was when she felt a very strange tug.
Tom was . . . working a zipper? Yes, that’s what it was, and that
was fine, it was
good
; she wanted this and him; she was so hot, burning up. And yet, she was also strangely cold, and why was that?
Suddenly, all these things—the sensations, her thoughts—slid and
shifted like a slow dissolve in a movie. Now, there were other hands
and a different body on hers. The aroma of wood smoke and musk
gave way to shadows and sweet apples as—
Chris, that’s Chris
—his
mouth found hers. The moment was electric, exactly like the morning, months back in Rule, when she and Chris had kissed in the sleigh:
mist and darkness and a blaze of desire as their hands twined, and
their bodies, too.
Yet there was still something off. She felt the hitch, the way her
mind tripped over a detail that did not belong, and then she had it.
It was the smell, no longer mist and apples but something fetid and
spoiled. Oozy green pus flooded into her mouth.
Wait.
Choking, she
recoiled, her throat working, the muck slithering down her throat,
and now she couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t breathe, she
couldn’t
. . .
“Ugh!” Gasping, she slammed back into herself, her consciousness
collapsing to a point as she pulled away from the dream, and woke.
Wolf was there, haloed against a stunning, bright blue sky. He
wasn’t draped over her body. His hands weren’t tracing her cheeks or
the angle of her jaw, and his mouth was most certainly
not
on hers.
But she
was
flat on her back, not in the snow but on a sleeping bag,
and his fingers
were
working at a snarl of parka trapped in the teeth
of a zipper, and he
was
trying to undress her.
“No!”
She gave a spastic little jerk. She tried punching, but her
arms were lead pipes, her muscles balky and uncooperative. This was
like Leopard, coming for her in the mine and . . .
Wait. Knife. I have
Leopard’s knife . . . Get up, get up!
She bolted to a sit. Caught off-guard,
Wolf flinched back to sprawl in the snow, dangerously close to a small,
crackling fire. Heart sputtering, she slapped awkward fingers along
her right leg, clumsy fingers searching for the sheath.
Someone jammed a hand into her right shoulder and slammed
her back. Thrashing, she got both hands up before Acne—the boy
who had been Ben Stiemke—grabbed her wrists. Pinning her, he let
his weight drop with a hard
thump
that drove the air from her lungs
in a grunt. If she’d been thinking, she’d have twisted around for a bite
or tucked her knees, but she was so panicked that she reared instead,
craning her neck, teeth clashing. He jerked his face out of the way,
a little too far, and that was just as good. She felt the pressure on her
chest let up, read the bow of his back. Acne was off-balance and she
wouldn’t have another chance. Howling, she rammed the point of
her knee into his groin.
Acne let out an abortive
guh!
It was like she’d hit the emergency
override. Acne’s eyes went round as headlamps; all the blood fled
his face. She didn’t think he was even breathing. Then he crumpled,
slumping to one side, hands cupping his crotch, mouth hanging open
to let out this weird, choked
aaawww
.
As soon as his weight left her legs, she bucked him the rest of
the way. Awkward as a crab, she scurried off the sleeping bag. Her
body was electric, as if all the circuit breakers had been reset, the
connections sizzling back to life. Dimly, she heard the clatter of bolts
being thrown, the rasp of metal, and knew the others—wherever
they were; she was so wild with fear she’d lost track even of Wolf—
had drawn their weapons. She didn’t care. Screeching, she scrambled
to her feet, Leopard’s knife now in hand, and shouted through terrified tears, “Get away, get away, get
away
!”
Discounting Acne, now moaning and slobbering on the snow, and
Wolf, there were three others: Marley, that lanky kid with the dreads
she remembered, and two younger boys, maybe sophomores and
obviously brothers. Same pug nose, same piggy little eyes. Both had
hair that was either very dark brown or black, and toted Bushmaster
ACRs, the business ends pointed her way. The taller brother was the
nervous, twitchy type; the minty fizz of his anxiety leaked through
his pores. By contrast, his brother was rounder, shorter, calmer, and
she thought,
Bert and Ernie.
Wolf had made his feet. His expression, which was Chris’s in
another life, was taut and intent but not drawn in the predatory snarl
he wore right before zeroing in on his next Happy Meal. A second
later, she also sussed out that telltale resin pop, the sparking of pine
sap from a fire burning too hot, very bright. The air grew weighty as
a heavy coat as the Changed did their weird, unknowable Changedspeak mumbo jumbo. Seated in her brain, the monster shifted, nosing
up for a sniff as if about to butt into the conversation. Or only land
her inside Wolf ’s head again, as had happened in the tunnel during
the mine’s collapse.
Oh no, you don’t.
Her mouth felt crawly, as if there was a busy little
spider in there, bustling over her tongue. Had Wolf
kissed
her?
No,
no, that was a dream.
Or, maybe, that was what Wolf
wanted
: her and
him, together. She could feel a new flare of hysteria as her self-control
tried to unravel.
It didn’t happen. You didn’t want him, you
don’t.
It was
the monster, it was all the monster.
Reaching out to its own kind, the
way it had when she was slipping away, slowly suffocating under the
snow? She remembered that bizarre moment when her mind had
shimmied, stepped away, and how then she’d seen a field of snow
and broken trees and rocks . . .
And a ski pole. My God, that wasn’t the bright light at the end of the tunnel. I was in Wolf ’s head again. He was looking for me after the avalanche,
trying to figure out where I was under the snow.
That was the only explanation for why she was alive. When she’d
passed out for that final time, only minutes from death, the monster
had slipped its noose, oiling out in black tendrils. Because like seeks
like.
“What do you want from me?” Her voice quaked. Leopard’s
knife wobbled, and she clutched with both hands to steady it. She
was hunched over, very cold now, trembling uncontrollably. Her hair
hung in icy clots, although her parka was . . . dry? How could that be?
Her clothes were still wet.
Wait, wait a minute.
Her breath hung in her
throat.
My parka was sopping wet. How can it—
Her gaze drifted to her right arm, and she saw, immediately, why
this
parka was dry. The color, gunmetal gray, was wrong. It was also
too large, the cuff loose around her wrist. The coat puffed out from
her chest, and was clearly intended for someone much bigger and
more muscular. The parka actually reminded her of Tom’s turtleneck, the one he’d given her in the Waucamaw after he’d carried her,
bleeding, unconscious, and soaked through, back to his camp and
then gotten her out of her wet clothes to keep her warm
.
Her eyes shot to Wolf, who reeked of sweat and boiled raccoon
guts and damp iron. Blood crusted half his face. That rock; she
remembered he’d been hit. Now that she was shocked enough to
notice, she saw that he wore only a bulky wool sweater over which
was knotted a wolf ’s skin. From the streaks of amber in the fur, she
knew this cowl was new, a replacement for the one Leopard had stolen when Spider took over the pack.
She understood then: Wolf had given up his parka for her. Her
grimy white coat, still wet, was spread over rocks, close to the fire.
Only later would she appreciate the huge risk Wolf was taking.
The day into which she’d awakened was clear. Judging from the
stabs of strong light through trees, it was well into mid-morning,
maybe close to noon, and yet the Changed were still awake, still
moving. That fact alone—Wolf ’s crew pulling their version of an
all-nighter—should’ve clued her in on just how desperate they must
be, and how dangerous the current situation was. The mine was
gone. A lot of Changed
and
prisoners were dead. Any Changed
who’d gotten away or been somewhere in the vicinity would be
hungry—and she was fresh meat. Catch her scent, might as well
ring the dinner bell. Once Wolf and his crew had pulled her from
that icy tomb, they
had
to make tracks or risk being overwhelmed.
But then Wolf had made them stop and build a fire. He’d stripped
her sodden parka and given up his to save her from freezing to death.
It was exactly what Tom had done, what Chris would do in the same
situation. Wolf was doing his best to keep her alive, and warm.
“Why?” she said to him. “What do you want from me, Wolf ?
What do you
want
?”

She’d seen one before. Her dad once stowed something just like it
in the trunk of his cruiser because, by definition, all cops were firstresponders. His wasn’t all that stuffed: just the barest essentials to
keep a smashed-up person from tanking before the EMTs arrived.

This
pack was much different, with a gazillion pockets and flaps,
and loaded for bear: bandages, gauze, glucose tablets, syringes, scissors, a few dozen packets of antibiotics—even that special QuikClot
gauze combat medics used to staunch bleeding PDQ. Kincaid
would’ve given his eyeteeth for something like this.

She also knew what the pack meant and now had an inkling about
why Wolf had gone to such trouble to rescue her. Wolf knew she
had the basics down. After all, he’d eaten part of her shoulder and
then seen her dress the wound. True, Wolf might have grown very
attached to her, might
want
her . . . but for him, she was also a very
valuable prisoner: a camp nurse with a skill-set that just might come
in handy.