Liar's Harvest (The Emergent Earth) (18 page)

H
enry was sitting in a lawn chair in his yard when we got back, notepad in one hand and shotgun across his lap.

I waved at him as we stepped out of the woods. “See any more lights?”

“Nope. Been quiet since you left.”

Chuck said, “How about a sunrise in the middle of the night? Did you see that?”

“Can’t say that I did.”

“Well, we saw it. That and a whole bunch of other stuff that didn’t make a goddamn bit of sense.”

I told Henry what happened. He took notes in his pad as I talked and let me finish before he spoke.

“Spider, fox, and coyote, eh? Was there fire?”

I thought about it for a moment. “Not unless you count the wisps as a kind of fire, why?”

“Just curious. Looks like whatever you encountered is claiming the identity of a Trickster god. Most cultures have a similar figure. The Africans have Anansi, who is a spider, the native Americans have Coyote, and the Japanese have Kitsune who is a fox spirit that often fills the same role. The Trickster does many things, but one of the common threads is that it helps mankind. For example, in the Greek legend of Prometheus, he steals fire from the gods and gives it to man against their wishes. Of course, it’s possible that this entity was simply taking on the role in order to gain our cooperation, so be careful.”

Chuck snorted. “Thanks for the advice, Professor. Because being lured out to the middle of the woods to meet a magic spirit didn’t trigger enough alarm bells. Hell, if you hadn’t said anything, I was going to invite the sonofabitch back for a beer. Christ.”

Henry continued as if Chuck hadn’t spoken, a skill that most people that hang around Chuck seem to pick up sooner rather than later. “So, the entity claims that these packages are a last ditch effort by older, more powerful creatures to eradicate as much of humanity as possible so that they can return. That means we’re going to have to assume that whatever Prime is trying to accomplish, it’s going to be fairly catastrophic.”

“We figured as much already,” I said. “But now we know that whatever Prime is up to, he’s not ready to finish it yet. He needs the Heart of the Forest, whatever that is, and he can’t start looking for it until dawn.”

Henry nodded. “That’s good, because we summoned Prime about twenty-four hours ago, and no one has gotten any sleep since.”

Dammit. I should have realized that. I looked around at everyone’s bleary eyes and drawn faces. They would have let me run them into the ground and never said a word.

“That’s a good point. Let’s get back to the house. I’ll keep an eye out until morning and you guys can get some rest.”

Nobody protested giving up the search for Prime, which said a lot about how tired they must have been. I carried Henry’s chair as we walked back to the house.

About fifty yards away, I held up my hand for everyone to stop. It was too dark for the others to see at this distance, but to me it was clear as day. There was something on the gravel drive in front of the steps.

I drew Hunger and crept forward. The gravel had been disturbed in a circle about ten feet across, and there was a round object in the center, like an upside-down bowl. When I got close enough to see what it was, fear knotted my stomach. I gestured for the others to approach.

Long wavy lines had been drawn in the gravel, layered over and under each other in an undulating pattern radiating out from the center. Like worms or tentacles.

Anne gasped when she saw it. “Oh my God. Georgia’s ceiling.”

Images of Georgia Eaton’s bedroom came to me unbidden. The urine soaked mattress. The single candle. And the worms etched from ceiling to floor in a vast undulating mass.

Up close I could see that the object in the center of the pattern was the top of a creature’s skull. The thing from the cemetery who’s head I had sheared in half with Hunger. All of the flesh had been carefully scraped off until the skull itself was picked clean, leaving only empty eye sockets and the upper fangs. The worms radiated out from the skull’s mouth.

“Abe.” Anne touched me on the arm, then pointed at the side of the house.

As I watched, an Eater of the Dead came slowly around the corner, head low to the ground as it moved forward. Its white skin gleamed in the moonlight, clearly showing the bunched muscles flexing underneath. It made no sound as it approached, the black talons at the end of every limb sinking silently into the lawn as it moved.

“Don’t shoot,” I whispered.

“Are you serious?” hissed Chuck. “Look at it!”

“I am. It’s moving slowly and carefully. I think it’s trying to be non-threatening.”

“You’ve got to be shitting me.”

He had a point. Looking at the massive curved fangs protruding from its lipless mouth didn’t exactly fill me with confidence. It didn’t help that the thing was the size of a small pony. But so far it seemed peaceful enough.

We backed up a few feet as it approached the pattern in the gravel. It stopped at the edge of the design and then very carefully traced one of the lines with one wickedly sharp talon. Then it looked at me with its strange black eyes.

I gestured at the pattern. “You made this?”

It didn’t answer, but instead faced me and then slowly bent forward, curling its front legs inward and tucking its chin to its chest until its forehead touched the ground.

It was bowing to me. I approached until I was close enough to touch it, then carefully placed one hand on its shoulder. The flesh was cold and clammy, like that of a frog. It blew out air in a foul smelling chuff and then backed away from me. After one more long look, it turned around and trotted away, silent as a shadow.

30

I
sat on the porch steps for the rest of the night. It was cold and clear and quiet and in spite of the everything going on, I felt at peace. My eyes traced the carefully inscribed pattern around the Eater skull and wondered how long it had taken to sketch out.

I imagined the Eater hunched over, drawing and shuffling, drawing and shuffling, as it circled the pattern it was so painstakingly creating. I wondered if it had been worried about finishing before I returned or hopeful about my reaction when I saw it.

The memory of it prostrate at my feet made me uncomfortable, but also strangely pleased, as did the makeshift shrine itself. I realized that I didn’t want to see it disturbed. Then I wondered if the reason that I had been sitting next to it all night was because it comforted me somehow. I hoped not.

About an hour before sunrise I went into the house and started breakfast. We had missed supper the night before, and there was a good chance of missing lunch today as well, so I cooked pretty much all the breakfast food in the kitchen. A dozen eggs, pancakes, grits, bacon, and a pot of coffee. The smell brought everyone to the kitchen before I was done, shuffling and haggard after only a few hours of rest. I almost asked where Leon was before I remembered.

As we ate, I couldn’t help but notice that Chuck kept staring at me. I finally put down my fork and look at him. “What?”

“Am I the only person here who has never seen a man eat ten pancakes, two bowls of grits, five eggs and a pound of bacon before? It’s like a circus act or some kind of magic trick. It ain’t normal, dude.”

I froze. All of the effort I had made, keeping my meals in public normal while sneaking in extra food at night, may have just been wasted.

I tried to laugh it off. “You know I treat my body like a temple. In this case, it happens to be the temple of an ancient evil god who loves pancakes.”

I put a huge mouthful of pancakes in my face and made yummy noises.

“I guess. As long as we don’t need to tie you to the bed to keep you from eating until you explode.”

The pancakes stuck in my throat and I put the fork down with a shudder. I hadn’t really thought about my new appetite in terms of Greg’s wife, Valerie, but now that Chuck had pointed it out, the similarities were obvious.

But I wasn’t that far gone yet. Except for this one lapse, I was managing things pretty well. Valerie couldn’t keep it under control because she didn’t want to. That’s where we were different. She was willing to give up her humanity to get what she wanted and I wasn’t.

“No need for that. I’m about done, anyway.” I pushed the plate away. “I’ll meet you outside when you’re ready to go.”

Ten minutes later they came out of the kitchen as a group and together we headed across the lawn to the tree line. Nobody mentioned breakfast, for which I was grateful.

The woods had grown out to the point of being lush and the crowded canopy was much higher and thicker than I had ever seen it before. Strange sounds bounced between the trees, much more suitable to a primeval jungle than a small stand of pines and birch in North Carolina.

It was still a few minutes until dawn, so Henry set his chair down and got settled with a book and his shotgun.

I hoped that something would happen when the sun rose, otherwise I had no idea where to go from here.

Rosy pink light slowly leaked from the horizon, a slowly growing stain on the gray-blue sky. The horizon was hidden by the trees in front of us, but I would bet money that I could tell you the exact moment that the sun touched it.

The ground between two of the larger trees in front of us sagged and fell in, leaving a gaping hole between the trunks. The fox bounded out of the hole and darted away into the woods.

Henry gestured at the darkness with his shotgun. “Good luck.”

31