The Hole (14 page)

“Return,” the people of Nahom called in unison.

“Pray!” Jeffry went on. “For centuries we have fought their menace, battled against the evil they would do. God has given us this mission through his prophet, Joseph Smith. He has pledged us in the battle against this evil. So I call upon all of you, men, women, and precious children, to pray until we have overcome the horrors that pound at our gates.”

The light had consumed him now, covering his features in a thick blanket of illumination. Elliot pulled Evajean into himself, pressed her cheek against his shirt, and he could hear her calling out without words, overcome by the light and the mad oration of Uncle Jeffry.

“The scriptures speak on the coming of the one mighty and strong,” Jeffry continued. “They tell us that he will lead us to salvation, forging forward on the path the prophet began. We do not know who the mighty and strong is, but I say to all of you that he has returned in this, the worst of times, and he will give us the power needed to overcome the evil that has overcome this wretched world. We need only hold out long enough to recognize him. We need only have faith in the words of the prophet, Joseph Smith, and we shall defeat the plague the devil has brought down upon us.” He raised his arms up, his hands flat, holding the two stones, and the light spiked. Elliot had to turn his face away. “These are the end times, my children. And we shall prevail!”

The people were shouting now, some in the strange language of the crazies, others just calling out phrases in repetition of Jeffry, and several stood up and began dancing, writhing and twisting in place. Elliot pulled Evajean into him as the crowd pressed forward, into the center of the circle. Soon his view was obscured entirely by denim pants and cotton skirts. Neither of them tried to stand, however, because doing so would draw attention and disappearing was the best way to avoid being hurt.

Then it stopped. The dancing, the chanting, and Uncle Jeffry’s oratory all simply ceased and the cavern became still but for the patterns of light and shadow created by the now steady torches. Elliot looked at Evajean and she turned her head up to his, but they both only had blank looks. Neither dared even whisper.

Uncle Jeffry spoke up again, quiet and calm. “Blessed be the prophets of this church,” he said, his voice soft. “Blessed be those who have followed their teachings. We have known this time would come, our scriptures tell us with absolute certainty. Sacrifice is required but we carry the legacy of Joseph Smith and the lost tribe and now we will live up to that legacy. Lindsay, my dear,” he said to a woman Elliot couldn’t see, “will you bring the materials? You know where they are.”

“Yes, Uncle Jeffry,” Lindsay said, a young girl, maybe even still a child.

“Thank you, Miss Tanner,” Jeffry said. “And now, Travers, I want you to help her carry it and set up the materials. Can you do that?”

“Yes, Uncle Jeffry,” Travers said. Still Elliot couldn’t see these people, for the people of Nahom had pressed backwards and together while Jeffry spoke and Elliot’s view was even more obstructed. Evajean sat, leaning into him, unmoving. They could now hear shifting in the crowd as it made way for Lindsay and Travers.

Presently, those two returned, Uncle Jeffry saying, “Ah, now. Now we can begin,” and then there was the thump of something heavy being set in the center of the circle. The people breathed deeply.

“Lindsay, please,” Jeffry said, like he was directing her to sit down. Then Elliot heard a box open on tight hinges and Evajean jumped in his arms. Willing to risk notice, she said under her breath, “This is bad. We need to get out of here. I don’t like it.”

He pushed his mouth close until it was nearly touching her ear. “First chance we get,” he said.

And then a shocked gasp rattled through the crowd and from the center of the circle, where Jeffry, Lindsay, Travers and unknown others were, came the sound of scuffling, feet sliding rapidly on dirt. “Extinguish that,” Uncle Jeffry said and one of torches near Elliot went out.

“Lindsay’s sacrifice,” Jeffry continued, “paves the way for all of us. I say unto you that this shall be our finest day, for we are close to the return of the one mighty and strong. With her blood, Lindsay draws him to us and his coming is prefaced by the power we need to disable the current threat. Quickly now, while the wound is fresh.”

“Oh god,” Evajean was saying, her face firmly against his chest. “Oh god, oh god.”

Elliot wasn’t sure what was happening, didn’t want to be sure what was happening, but he knew they needed to move because things had taken a terrible turn and no matter what happened now, he needed to at least try to get Evajean to safety.

“Come on,” he said, pulling her backward, keeping low to the ground. “Come on.” They both slid on the dirt, away from the circle, and none of the townspeople seemed to notice. Elliot pushed his way past legs and the people moved out of the way easily.

They were near the rock wall when Jeffry spoke again. “The torches,” he said. “Bring them here.” The light in the cavern moved and it became darker where Elliot and Evajean were. Taking this as a blessing, he pushed backwards faster. If they could make it to the cave wall, they could inch around and perhaps find a way out. Going back up the ladder was clearly impossible, but this cave might open out or join another chamber in which they could hide.

He was looking over his shoulder, pushing himself along with his feet, and Evajean did the same, her back pressing into his shoulder. At last Elliot felt hard stone and made the quick decision to go right. “This way,” he said to Evajean, and lifted himself to a crouch, scrambling as best he could along the cave’s wall. Evajean followed, the two barely able to make enough out now that the crowd of people was completely between them and the remaining torches.

They’d gone perhaps ten feet, without finding an opening, when Evajean called out. Her cry was dangerously loud and Elliot immediately hushed her, but then he saw had caused her to forget caution.

The crowd had pushed even closer to Jeffry and the middle of the circle (what was in that circle Elliot didn’t want to think about) but their numbers had swelled. Every adult and every child Elliot could see now had a companion, a figure standing just behind and off to the side, hulking and-he blinked-only barely human. The shapes were indistinct, blurry and transparent, and the darkness of the cave made seeing difficult, but Elliot could make out large heads and shoulders that sloped upwards and out too far before plunging down into arms fat and knobby. Color was entirely washed out of the figures, but Elliot knew this wasn’t a matter of shadows from the torches or even hysteria a hour’s events. No, their modest company had been joined by things impossible to imagine.

“We have to go,” he said to Evajean, forcing himself to give up trying to comprehend what he was seeing. “Now.”

And they rushed along the cave wall, eating the distance, but still no escape presented itself. Is this it? Elliot ask himself, very near panic. Is there only this one room? There can’t be. But of course there could be, as he remained aware.

“There,” Evajean called, her voice still low but only barely.

“Where?”

“There.” She pointed and he could see it now, a recess dark in shadow. On his hands and knees, Elliot dashed towards it, Evajean close behind.

Just as they reached the passageway-for it was an opening that ran deep into the rock-Uncle Jeffry’s voice carried over to them, booming and harsh.

“We are one!” he shouted. “After these long years, we are one!”

And, suddenly, they were. The new shapes, those shadows of monsters, folded into the people of Nahom, shrinking in from the edges and disappearing inside. Many of the townsfolk were overcome by this, shaking or falling to the ground. Elliot didn’t want to stay to learn what happened next, so he pulled Evajean with him into the small passage and, when he was sure she was safely behind, stood as high as he could manage and ran.

As they turned left along a bend in the tunnel, a crash and screams came from back in the chamber, and Uncle Jeffry called out, “They are here! Defeat them, my prophets! Defeat them!” Then Elliot heard the babbling of the crazies and the sounds of combat before he and Evajean turned another corner and the rocks fully muffled the clamber. They were alone in the now complete darkness.

The passageway was narrow, the walls jagged. Elliot and Evajean moved slowly, Elliot in front, feeling with hands pressed out on opposite walls, head low. The pace was terrible on Elliot’s legs, his muscles not used to this kind of work, and he knew they’d have to stop frequently or the burning in his legs would force them to quit.

For a while, he’d anxiously strained his ears for some sound from behind, an indication that either Jeffy’s people or the crazies had found the entrance to this side shaft and were after them. But he could only hear Evajean’s breathing and his own. They’d managed to escape, though where to was an open question.

The two had gone for some distance further when, behind him and faint, Evajean said, “Something’s wrong.”

“What?” Elliot said, stopping. The tunnel here was four feet from side to side and close to five high. They’d just gone through a narrower stretch, however, and his chest felt tight from claustrophobic nervousness. “Are you hurt?”

“I don’t think so.” He couldn’t see her but she was close enough that he could feel the electric fuzz of proximity. “I’m just…” she said, pausing to swallow. “I’m dizzy.”

“Do you want to stop? We can rest here. I don’t think anyone’s coming after us.”

“Yes,” she said. “Thank you.”

Elliot sat down and leaned against the tunnel wall. What time was it? he wondered. How long had they been crawling through the passage away from that terrible chamber? Twenty minutes or a half an hour was the best he could figure, but panic had driven him early on, so it was impossible to know. And then there was the nagging idea that this passage might go nowhere, that he and Evajean would die lost under the Appalachians.

He said to Evajean, “You might just need water.”

“I know,” she said.

“It’s been, I don’t know, a couple hours since either of us drank anything and our bodies have been pretty stressed.”

“I know.”

“Are you okay?”

“No.” She breathed heavily. “I feel sick. My head feels huge.”

“You’re just thirsty.”

“No,” she said.

“That’s what it is,” Elliot said, because he was thirsty, too. “Once we get out of here, we’ll find water.”

Evajean groaned and said, “Okay, yeah. Sure.” She wasn’t paying attention to him.

“You could stay here,” Elliot offered, “and I can go on ahead, see if there’s a way out.”

“Okay,” she said. Then, “No.”

“No?”

“You’ll get lost. You won’t be able to come back and find me.”

“I can-”

“No,” she said, “I’ll come with you. I’m okay, I’m just sick. It’s stress, like you said.” Elliot heard her push away from the wall and crawl in his direction. “Let’s go.”

They progressed a while more-slower, though, because Evajean was having an increasingly hard time. She kept saying “ow” under her breath, like a meditative chant, and the sound of it in repetition made Elliot feel deeply strange-stiff and tired, with the sound of blood rushing in his ears, a kind of forced meditative state. He wanted out and could only tell himself that continuing along the passageway was the best way to do that. They sure as hell couldn’t go back the way they’d come.

He was very near to losing it entirely when the tunnel finally opened out into another large room, apparent only by a sudden freshness of the air and a loss of the feeling of pressure from the close stone.

“Hey,” Elliot called back to Evajean. “I think we’re okay. Can you smell that?”

“It smells like outside,” she said, her voice less wilted than before. “I wish we could see.”

“I’m going to try to stay along the wall. See if there’s another passage that’ll take us back to the surface.”

“Good. I’ll rest, for just a minute.”

Elliot stood up and put his palm against the wall. If only they had a flashlight or a lighter, anything to cast even the slightest illumination, the effort wouldn’t feel so dangerously futile. He’d seen movies about people lost in caves and they always ended badly. He made his way out and along the wall, careful to move slow and feel in front of his face with his free hand. Walking into an overhang or protrusion would be a terrible cap to the day.

“You still there?” he said.

“Yeah,” Evajean said, “I’m here. But, Elliot? I
really
feel sick. Do you want to-”

“I’ll go just once around this, see what I can find. If there’s a way out like I said, we can get you up to the surface and get some water or some food. You’ll feel better.”

“Right,” Evajean said. “Okay.”

Elliot had gone a ways, he didn’t know how far, when two things happened. First, Evajean began moaning, very near screaming, and he came away from the wall, running to her without thinking. Second, from behind him and to the right, low, yellow light blinked faintly, on and then quickly off. Knowing he shouldn’t, he ignored it and stumbled his way to Evajean, his outstretched hand finding her leg. “What’s wrong?” he said, but she was kicking and he had to back away. “Evajean!”

She moaned and then coughed. He wanted to grab her, to pull her close and make this all stop, but she was trashing too hard and he couldn’t risk getting knocked into something hard and sharp. If that happened, they’d very likely both die in this cave.

“Evajean!” he said again, “What’s happening? What’s-” And then he heard it. He didn’t want to, hating that he did, but there it was, sliding into her voice as she called out in pain. The gibbering. The mumbling, babbling talk of the crazies. Of course that’s what it was, because he’d heard it so many times in the past, and there was no way now to rejected what he was experiencing.

Evajean was sick.

He threw himself down on her, pinning her twisting arms and legs. She was so small and she gave up quickly, her calls dropping to whispers, her body limp under his. And Elliot stayed there, unable to get up and address what had just occurred. Evajean was it. The only thing left for him in this goddamn world. She wasn’t sick. Neither of them was sick. That sort of shit doesn’t happen, he wasn’t going to let it happen. Because Uncle Jeffry and those
real
crazy people, those fanatics who’d done this to him and to Evajean, those fundamentalists were all healthy and fine and the world just wasn’t an evil enough place to let them live on while Evajean went mad.