Still Life With Crows

“Cole!” He hauled him to his feet. Cole coughed, swayed. Larssen quickly leaned him over, head between his legs.

Cole vomited.

Brast said nothing, trembling, his eyes wide with fear, uselessly searching the darkness.

Larssen reached down, cupped some water, splashed it over Cole’s face. “Cole? Hey, Cole!”

The man sagged to one side, eyes rolling into the back of his head. He had passed out.

“Cole!” Larssen patted some more water into his face, gave him a few light slaps.

Cole coughed, retched again.

“Cole!”Larssen tried to keep the man on his feet, but his limp form felt like a sack of cement. “Brast, help me, goddammit.”

“How? I can’t see.”

“Feel your way along the rope. Do you know the fireman’s carry?”

“Yeah but—”

“Let’s do it.”

“I can’tsee, and besides, we don’t have time. Let’s leave him here and get help from—”

“I’ll leaveyou here,” said Larssen. “How would you like that?” He found Brast’s hands and locked them together with his in a basket grip. Larssen guiding, they stooped together, embraced Cole’s sagging form, tried to rise again.

“Christ, he weighs a ton,” Brast said, gasping.

At that same moment Larssen heard a distinct splash, then another: heavy footfalls in the shallow pools they had come through just moments before.

“I tell you, there’s something behind us,” Brast said as he strained desperately to lift Cole. “Did you hear it?”

“Justmove. ”

Cole slumped backward, threatening to slide out of their grip. They maneuvered him into place again and moved forward painfully.

The splashing continued from behind.

Larssen looked back but saw only indistinct washes of pinks and reds. He looked forward again, chose a narrow passage in the far wall that looked like it might be the right one, made doggedly toward it. If he could get to a defensible location, he could hold the thing off with his gun . . .

“God,” said Brast, his voice breaking. “Oh God, oh God . . .”

They ducked into the low passage, carrying Cole between them as quickly as they could. Larssen staggered as the rope caught his ankles; he straightened up, went forward again. After a short distance, the ceiling rose toward a weird formation of a thousand needlelike stalactites, some as thin as threads.

Oh God, I don’t remember that,thought Larssen.

Another splash from the darkness behind them.

Suddenly, Brast tripped against a rock. Cole slumped from their grasp and fell heavily onto his broken arm. He groaned loudly, rolled over, and lay still.

Larssen let him go, fumbling with his gun, aiming into the darkness.

“What is it?” Brast cried. “What’s there?”

At that moment a monstrous shape came hurtling out of the darkness. Larssen cried out, firing as he stumbled backward, while Brast stood in terror, feet rooted to the ground, his arms clawing at the darkness. “Jesus, don’t leave me—!”

Larssen grabbed his hand, yanked him away. As he did so, the shape fell upon the supine form of Cole. The two figures blurred together, a reddish tangle in the goggles. Larssen staggered backward again, tugging at Brast while at the same time struggling to get his gun back up. He heard a rending sound like a drumstick being wrenched off a turkey. Cole screamed abruptly: a terrible falsetto squeak.

“Help me!” cried Brast, clutching at Larssen like a drowning man, knocking him back and spoiling his aim. Larssen savagely shoved him away while trying to raise the shotgun, but Brast was all over him again, sobbing, clutching at him like a drowning man.

The gun went off but the shot was wide, sending long needles of limestone crashing to the ground, and then the shape was up and facing them. Larssen froze in horror: it was holding Cole’s severed arm in one fist, the fingers still pulsing spasmodically. Larssen fired again, but he had hesitated too long and the shape was rising toward them, and all he could do was turn and flee down the dank tunnel, Brast yelling incoherently and blindly at his back.

Farther behind, Cole was still screaming.

Larssen ran and ran.

Sixty-Eight

 

For a long time Corrie lay in the wet dark, confused and dreamy, wondering where she was, what had happened to her room, her bed, her window. And then she sat up, her head pounding, and with the return of the pain came the memory of the cave, the monster . . . and the pit.