Hemlock Grove (7 page)

You see! Who would have had any suspicion a girl who couldn’t say the word
menses
went around calling people cunts and fat retarded cows in her head? Saucy little bitch! She caught sight of her small smile in the ceiling mirror. She paid her money but it still felt like stealing.

She returned along the same path twisting the plastic bag on her wrist clockwise and counter and saw in a furrow of earth a small rabbit hole. She stopped. It reminded her of the dream. She considered this another less welcome occult indicator of the turn inside her, the return of a recurring dream she had not had in years. It is a simple dream. She is inside the mill, as she had been once before, in that dark you can feel on both sides of your skin, and something is in here with her. The thing is the same color and smell as the dark. But she knows it’s in here all the same; there’s a difference between a place where you are the only living thing and where you are not, and something in here is alive. And there is only one place to hide: in the dark she can just make out the outline of that great black cauldron keeled to its side. Of course if she doesn’t know what the thing in here is she can’t know what it wants, if there’s even any reason to hide. But it’s a chance she can’t take so she makes her way to the cauldron and puts her hands to the lip and peers in. But what if hiding means there is no place to run? What if there is something worse inside the cauldron? Or if there is nothing in it at all? Real bottomless nothing? But there is a dark thing in this mill with her and she can feel its nonshadow fall on her, it is right behind her now and she doesn’t know what it will want if she faces it. She is paralyzed. She doesn’t know whether to turn and face it or Go Down the Hole.

And then she woke up.

“You can be such a weirdo sometimes you should just tie a ribbon around your skull and walk into the Brain Barn,” Alyssa said. (The Brain Barn was the common nickname for the Neuropathology Lab at Hemlock Acres, which housed three thousand human brain specimens and was an object of great fascination among local youths.)

Well, what of it? Some people had funny dreams. And moments where they felt that every cell in their body was made of cancer, or that when they breathed they breathed out pure oxygen and breathed in cigarette ash. And broke down into hysterical tears at that video on the Internet of the elephant that paints its own portrait, as Christina had recently in the computer lab, for no more articulable a reason than it seemed to her that all nameless sadness she had ever experienced or for that matter existed in the great ethereal matrix of which all life is part was somehow encapsulated in that video transmitted for light amusement. She was a late and mysterious bloomer with a date on Friday with an eleventh grader and a plan to show certain somebodies just how much it was possible for a person to change, so peripeteia and what of it!

As she passed the rabbit hole something else came to view beyond the furrow—an incongruous patch of color—fabric, a shirt. At first she thought it might be a vagrant and she tensed, but … did vagrants wear pink? She crept a few steps to peek. It was a girl. Lying on the dried leaves, near Christina’s age, a little older. Face pretty but smeared clownishly with mascara and body glitter as though she hadn’t washed off last night’s makeup, and whoever she was Christina did not know her from school, though she had some inkling of recognition. The girl’s eyes were open and staring at the sky with a glazed, insensate look, what Christina would imagine a person hopped up on PCP would look like if Christina knew exactly what PCP was, except the twins’ dad occasionally had a cautionary story of people hopped-up on it.

Christina stepped forward and started to ask if the girl was all right but didn’t finish. She dropped the bag containing one spiral notebook, one Pilot Precise pen, one diet iced tea, and one box of condoms.

The girl was on the ground, twigs and leaf bits caught up in her splayed hair, arms twisted at all the wrong angles; her pink shirt had an image of a lewdly frosted cupcake on the chest and her skin and lips similar in hue to rubber cement, and, as had been obscured from Christina’s vantage: the girl’s lower half was missing.

Christina sagged against a tree trunk. No sir. Obviously this was a gag, some kind of cheap prop. It didn’t even look real after a second look. Halloween on its way and some guys got this from the mall and left it here for some stupid little girl just like her to stumble on and completely freak out. And she had probably seen the horrible thing on a wall display somewhere and that was where she “recognized” her from but still fell for it. Probably a camera on her as we speak. Okay, if that’s your game. She was making a few changes, here was a golden opportunity.

“Oh,” she said experimentally to the torso, “you gave me a real scare there.” She talked in the suggestive, wide-eyed tones of pornography. Which she wasn’t personally familiar with, but sometimes the twins imitated. “Ooh, you look a little pale. Do you need … mouth to mouth?”

She was greatly pleased with her own performance. The unseen conspirators somewhere in the trees getting a real bang for their buck. Well, hold on to your hats, fellas. She got on her knees, flushed at her own daring—what a little slut!

“Gosh,” she said, “you sure have pretty lips.”

She lowered her mouth to the dummy’s. The dummy’s mouth was moist and feculent like if you have ever had the unfortunate but irresistible impulse to smell a compost jar. Christina fell back, gagging. It was then that she caught movement in the gray-white gore of the lower abdomen, a pulsing that at first she thought was something trying to push its way out. But then it hit her it was actually lots and lots of little pulsing feeding things that were not trying to emerge; this was the last thing they wanted.

*   *   *

Who am I? What’s my dog in this fight?

I’m the killer.

Boo.

PART II

NUMINOSUM

The Order of the Dragon

From the archives of Dr. Norman Godfrey:

NG: No one’s used that word, Mr. Pullman.

FP: This is a fucking crazy house, it’s between the
lines
. Check my record. My luck is shit, not my head.

NG: I have. There’s no history of psychosis, and your MRI is clean, but that was quite a night you had on Saturday, would you agree?

FP: …

NG: Do you have any memory of it?

FP: Check my record. Nothing wrong with my head.

NG: Would you care to discuss it?

FP: You got a name?

NG: My name is Norman. Dr. Norman Godfrey.

FP: …

NG: Would you like to discuss Saturday night, Mr. Pullman?

FP: Why are you talking to me?

NG: Why do you ask?

FP: You think I don’t know who you are?

NG: Does it matter what my name is?

FP: Why are
you
talking to
me
?

NG: Fair enough. Because my daughter asked me to. You met her on Saturday, do you remember?

FP: …

NG: Let’s talk about that night, Mr. Pullman.

FP: We talk about it you’re gonna lock my ass up here.

NG: Frankly, you already said more than enough the night in question to make a case for that. I’d just like to give you a chance to explain. Now, you repeatedly told the paramedics that “they” had done this to you. Who did you mean?

FP: …

NG: You said “they” had killed you.

FP: …

NG: Is “they” the government?

FP: Do I got a dick in my mouth? I ain’t fucking crazy.

NG: Is it voices?

FP: …

NG: Do they talk to you?

FP: … I see things.

NG: Such as?

FP: (
inaudible
)

NG: What do you see, Mr. Pullman?

FP: Who else is gonna die.

NG: … Can we take a moment for you to elaborate on what you meant when you said you had been killed?

FP: The fuck it usually mean?

NG: But you’re sitting here right now.

FP: They brought me back.

NG: How did they pull that off?

FP: Cardiocerebral resuscitation.

NG: I see … Can you tell me about Ouroboros, Mr. Pullman?

FP: Where’d you hear that?

NG: It was something else that you mentioned repeatedly. Can you tell me its significance?

FP: Where does the soul go? It’s why they killed us. The plan, it’s all in their plan. It’s not right. It’s not right that now we have to see those things. I don’t want to see.

NG: “Us”?

FP: Today I have seen the Dragon …

NG: I’m having difficulty following, Mr. Pullman.

FP: I seen it. I seen the thing inside her.

NG: What do you mean? The thing inside who?

FP: The thing inside your little girl.

*   *   *

If Brooke Bluebell shook the hive, Lisa Willoughby was a fist straight through it. Like Brooke, Lisa was a Penrose native, but the animal responsible was still local. Because the body had been exposed several days, a species still could not be determined, but more baffling was the continuing lack of tracks. Tracks tell a story. They tell the story of who this animal is and what it wants and how this is interwoven with the fabric of its ecosystem. An animal of this size leaves tracks, it tells its story, it has no choice. But nature abhors a vacuum, and loose tongues were once more ready to fill it. Fear is a communicable disease; it comes out in the sweat and passes from host to host. Fear is an incendiary agent; it combusts with stupidity. An escaped circus animal, an escaped lunatic, Sasquatch, a secret alien experiment, a secret White Tower experiment, werewolves. Shelley Godfrey.

On November 5 Roman caught two boys tormenting his sister in the ninth-grade locker section. She was sitting on the ground with her head between her knees moaning and drooling miserably as a crowd watched the boys leaning over her.
Who tasted better—Did you do it fast or slow—Who’s next—Who’s next—

Roman elbowed his way through the Sworn twins and there was a hush as he stood, his green Godfrey eyes were hard candy. The boys backed into the lockers, vainly and stupidly protesting their innocence. Roman looked at his sister on the ground. Her head was still bowed forward and her massive humped shoulders were shaking. He looked into the eyes of the second boy and in a tone striking for its reason said, “Kiss him. Kiss his pretty little mouth.”

The second boy took his friend and drew their lips together. The first boy sent an indignant fist to his suitor’s ear. Roman braced one foot against the lockers and helped Shelley up as the two boys wrestled on the ground, the first a flurry of knees and nails against the other’s unyielding advances. Shelley and the lights above her flickered asynchronously.

As recess closed, Roman approached Peter, who stood at the side of the building humming a current R & B chart hit and carving a lewd glyph into the brick face with a razor appropriated from bio. The news of the second girl had come as no surprise to him, only the length of time it had taken to come out. He knew now what was happening, or at least enough to know how much he’d rather think about just about anything else, but of course that would now require shaking the
upir
from his tail.

“Powwow,” said Roman.

The bell rang and they went to the basketball court and sat against the chain-link fence, sending several pigeons in flight.

“Are you … sure it wasn’t you?” said Roman.

“I never go out on an empty stomach,” said Peter.

“You got any grass?” said Roman.

Peter dug a joint from his pocket.

“It wasn’t me either,” said Roman.

“I know,” said Peter.

Roman masked his dejection at not remaining a suspect. He pointed to the pavement, indicating the ground, underneath the ground. “Do you think it’s—”

“No,” said Peter. “That’s something … weirder.”

“Weirder how?”

Peter shrugged and lit the joint. Roman knew he knew more than what he was saying and Peter took some pleasure in allowing the moment to stretch.

“
Vargulf
,” he said.

“What?” said Roman.

“
Vargulf
,” said Peter. “A wolf will only attack if it’s hungry, or provoked. If it’s normal. A
vargulf
is a wolf that’s gone insane.”

“Insane how?” said Roman.

“Doesn’t eat what it kills,” said Peter. “It isn’t the way. It’s a disease.”

“You’re sure that’s what this is?” said Roman.

Peter passed the joint to Roman, nodding. He had sensed it the first moon and the latest came across its scent station but could not make hide nor hair of the discovery; it was unlike anything he had ever encountered; it communicated nothing of the other wolf’s sex or intentions, it just smelled … angry.

“Is it someone you know?” said Roman.

“I never knew any others except Nicolae. But this is a strange town. You can feel it in your balls.”

Roman nodded. He tilted his head back and exhaled smoke.

“So I guess now we find him,” said Roman.

Peter didn’t follow. “Who?”

“The
vargulf
,” said Roman.

Peter didn’t follow. “Why?”

“To make him stop,” said Roman.

Peter laughed.

“Do not laugh at me,” said Roman, meaning it more than any other thing he could say.

“Sorry,” said Peter.

“He ripped a girl in half,” said Roman.

Peter was quiet.
And?

Roman was reluctant now, how best to explain. “Have you ever heard of the Order of the Dragon?” he said.

Peter looked at him. This better be good.

“It was a group of knights from the Crusades. My mom used to tell us stories.”

Peter looked at him, but more so.

“I … I’ve always wanted to be a warrior,” said Roman.

Peter came to the silent conclusion that this conference was about to jump several echelons of his Hierarchy.

Roman flicked a pebble and it skittered just short of the foul line. He silently counted the parallelograms formed by the overlaying diamonds of the opposite basketball net. It was difficult for him, admitting it. He’d never talked about it, even with Letha.