Escana (12 page)

A
hand jerked Solomon back by his scalp and the knife plunged deep into
his throat. A strange look of shock passed across his face and a
gurgling noise crawled out of his mouth. A roar emanated from the
newcomer behind him as he toppled back into the ground with the body.

The
knife was torn out and great gouts of blood filled the air as its
blade flew back and forth. It haphazardly punctured his chest and
abdomen and continued into his eyes and face. It tore great rents in
his
body
and subsided to the
sounds of strangled howling
behind it.

She
watched from afar as she
felt
what was left of
Solomon
being
torn
away
from
her,
noting
that none of it was from the inside
.
Had
he
really refused to touch her
?

Solomon was dead. Something
had killed Solomon.

Doubling
up
in
pain,
she
tried
to
force
herself
further
into
the
mud,
making
one
last
futile
attempt
at
escape.
The black mottling diffused from her sight as she came to,
tilting her head forward and fighting back the retching in the pit of
her stomach.

She
f
e
ll
back
in
agony
and
exhaustion,
blinking
up at the sky as it doused her with cold rain
.

Solomon was dead.

She
was
still
alive
but
felt
no
relief.
He
had been minutes away from ending her and now he was gone.

Casting
her
bleary
gaze
around
the
forest,
she
spotted
a
figure
cloaked
in
shadow
on
the
edges
of
her
sight.

Recoiling
in
fear,
she
grabbed
Solomon's
knife,
ignoring
the
wetness
of
his
blood
congealing
on
the
hilt.
She
somehow
raised
herself
to
her
knees
and
warily
clawed
toward
the
back
of
this
murderer.
Realising
what
they
had
done,
she
grabbed
at
the
figure
in
rage
and
it
spun
around
to
meet
her.
She
lurched
forward
with
the
knife,
thrusting
it
toward
the
man,
finding
all
her
anger
unleashed
upon
him.

It
had
all
gone
horribly
wrong,
again.

He
leapt
back
at
the
first
few
swipes,
calling
to
her
in
a
voice
she
ignored,
then
his
hand
gripped
her
wrist
like
a
vice
and
twisted
the
knife
out
of
her
grasp.
Her
knees
went
from
under
her
and
she
slumped
back
onto
the
ground
in
shock.
She
knew
now
who
stood
over
the
wreckage
of
what
was
once
Solomon.

The
stillness gripped both of them for an untold amount of time as the
recollection eventually hit.

She
couldn't tell what had ceased her trembling, yet this small change
had enough momentum to break the silence. She stared up into his
haunted eyes and could only think of one thing to say.

'Jakob?'

He
wrenched his gaze from the huge body at his feet to meet hers before
quickly fixing his stare into the distance. He mouthed a few words
that she couldn't pick up. She clutched at herself, hiding her shame,
she had to think fast now.

'Jakob...
he... he was going to kill me.'

His
gaze returned to Solomon. The bleeding was beginning to subside.

'Jakob?'

He
glared at her, rage penetrating his blank features. 'Why do we keep
meeting?' he asked before turning away and facing into the forest.

She
fell back into the mud. Exhaustion grasping for her, its cold fingers
wrapping around her consciousness, threatening her.

'Please,'
she breathed, 'help me.'

Jakob's
turned back to her, his eyes widening, as if taking in the enormity
of what he'd just done. 'I need to leave. This.. it's too much.' He
turned away to leave her alone in the muck.

She
grabbed for him, causing him to flinch at the touch. 'Please. Don't
leave,' she said, her voice a piteous whine in her own ears. 'Don't
leave me here.'

He
let out a long sigh then. 'If I stay, they'll catch me. Even if you
back me up nobody is going to believe my story, not if he told anyone
about finding us in Harvester's barn. They'll hang you too.' He fell
to his knees, staring Solomon's remains. 'It wasn't supposed to be
you,' he said. 'You weren't the one.'

He
continued muttering inaudibly at the body for a time as he stared at
it in regret. She watched him uncertainly, her tension rising.

Eventually
she raised herself with care, feeling the pain in her joints flaring
up from the beating. Beginning to back away, she was struck still by
the purpose that came his voice.

'I'm going to look after you,' he
said. 'Then we deal with him.'

She nodded at him dumbly. Could
this be it? Could this be the escape she was hoping for?

S
omething was
changing inside him, he was starting to remember more of who he was.
It was as if knowing this gave him the power to dictate how the world
should see him. He still felt fear and revulsion upon killing Solomon
with his own knife, yet it had felt undoubtedly the right thing to
do. This was especially true after seeing the nature of his
relationship with Ella, something he felt he should have noticed
before. The feelings he held for her weren't a simple childish crush.
There was a complex tapestry of events unfolding before him that he
had to be wary of, it was clear to him now that she was a part of
them. She had simply been involved in too many things not to be, this
final act of uncovering Solomon's abuse felt almost as if the world
was thrusting her into his care.

He
hauled the body through the trees, he had underestimated just how
much dead-weight it would be. He fought down the urge to scream and
run, trying to keep his mind on how Ella's crumpled form had felt
pressed against him. He had somehow carried her to the water's edge,
again driven more by instinct than anything else. He had looked after
her as best as he could with the meagre resources at his disposal but
he couldn't leave Solomon's body unattended for long.

That
man's death had changed everything, he didn't think of himself as a
murderer and would never have thought he could bring it upon himself
to take another life. It seemed that now, after the fact, he had he
only felt stronger for it. The circumstances surrounding the killing
seemed to mitigate the barbarity of the act. It was as if it had to
happen as soon as he had first laid eyes on the man, even though he
knew that the feeling was entirely different than the one Gooseman
had elicited.

He
saw the trees had started to gradually thin, with less branches
threatening to snag his weighty burden. It wasn't a person at this
point, just a fleshy load that he had to drag onward, he was just
thankful he wasn't far from the river bank now.

He
finally tossed the body down in exhaustion, a few meters short of the
river. He took out the knife and contemplated how best to do this.

He
had considered just hauling the body into the water and hoping that
the current would take it far away. Unfortunately he knew that the
river ran too close to the hamlet's centre and he couldn't risk it
getting washed up on any of the shallows. The corpse was too
desiccated to ever be mistaken for a drowning, the implication would
be clear for all to see.

He
cut into the soil of the riverbank, probing it for a place with
enough give to start making a hole. It was hard work, the roots of
the trees were deep and tangled and impeded him constantly.
Eventually he hurled the knife aside in frustration and sat next to
the stinking mess, trying to fight down his rising panic. There had
to be somewhere he could rid himself of this, he just couldn't seem
to think clearly.

He
spotted a small hole as he stared back into the forest, presumably
the lair of a badger or some other large mammal. There was no way
that Solomon's dank corpse was going to fit in there in one piece,
the knife afforded him another opportunity.

It
was messy work and the stench was almost overpowering but Jakob
managed to decapitate the body by sawing through the neck with the
blade. He tossed it into the hole where it landed with a vague
thudding noise. He was under no illusions that the lack of head on
the body wouldn't stand up to scrutiny after an inevitable search was
called. The body had distinctive broad shoulders that were easily
identifiable even in death, Jakob had to rid himself of it all and
hope that the rain washed away the trail of blood.

He
lost track of how long it took him to sever the various limbs into
sizes that would fit into the hole. He worked relentlessly, fearing
that if he stopped the roiling in his stomach would prevent him for
completing the task.

He
was applying the final cuts to the sternum when his concentration was
interrupted by a splashing sound. Something was coming out of the
river.

He
abandoned his work and crept toward the trees, hoping this newcomer
wouldn't stumble across the corpse.

It
turned out that the person wasn't coming out of the river at all,
merely kicking his feet through the water in the shallows. It was a
tall-looking rake of a man with a fishing pole slung across his back
who was whistling tunelessly as he gradually drew closer to the
burial site.

Jakob
closed his eyes, unable to look at the inevitability of it all. This
man was going to find the corpse, then he was going to report back to
Thom. The Warden was going to ask around and discover that Jakob had
been working with Solomon. It wouldn't take him long to come to the
right conclusions from there.

Jakob
opened his eyes and lifted his left hand, he was still clutching the
blood-soaked knife. Could it really be that easy?

He
crept quietly around the edge of the forest as the man drew closer,
trying to get to his blind side. The stranger was entirely oblivious,
happily whistling away as he reached for his pole and prepared to
cast out into the river. Perhaps he wasn't going to notice the body
several feet away, perhaps he didn't have to kill him.

The
rain continued to hammer down and the stranger paid it no heed. What
kind of idiot went fishing in the middle of stormy weather?

The
whistling slowed, the stranger seemed to be sniffing the damp air.
Jakob had forgotten entirely about the smell.