tonight, he might just as well fall into the hole of the bottle once more, because the power of reasoning had been stolen away from him. He
Tonight, his composure was falling apart.
He opened the cabinet, brought out one of the bottles, but quickly replaced it in its niche. He closed the cabinet door and ran out of the pantry.
He dashed across to his recliner and fell upon it. With his face buried in his hands, he let out a deep growl of frustration.
From a room, Robert Smallwood was shouting something in an urgent and sonorous voice.
Chapter 16
When they drove to the very end of Sebastian Road, Brian poked his head out the window, checking to see if the map had started to fail them, searching for the landmark-a dirt road.
There was none.
Brian heaved a deep sigh.
In his writing, Robert had described the dirt road as a wide boulevard lined with apple trees on both sides and running for more than a million miles. Such a description possessed a sharp contrast to the typical feature of a dirt road. And it was this sort of disjointed piece of information that had detracted from the value of the direction they had had at their disposal when they had set out-at least, in Allan’s view.
But Brian knew enough to separate the wheat from the chaff, to disregard the discrepancies, and just use the rational parts of the boy’s message-or try to demystify the undertone of whatever message Robert was trying to deliver, rather than taking things at face value.
He got out from behind the wheel. Without casting caution to the winds, he pulled his gun out and scanned the whole area as quickly and effectively as he could.
Craig and Dwayne joined him, their weapons drawn as well.
Allan brought up the rear, playing the perfect grumpy old cop.
Brian thought they had reached the end of their quest, until he took a closer look and saw tire threads in a number of places.
At first, they all missed it. But for some reason, Brian paced back the same way they had come, and it caught his attention-an overgrown footpath. Not an obvious landmark by any standards. The path was hardly visible even when they moved closer. They also noticed huge footprints in places.
Ahead of the weed-grown trail was a cluster of trees blocking the view that lay beyond, which they later discovered to be a long stretch of dirt road.
“Is that the road the kid wrote about?” Allan’s voice carried loud over the calm layers of air.
“I suppose,” Brian said, walking back through the trail towards their cruisers.
“Thought the dirt road comes before the trail, and not the other way around,” Allan said as they all followed Brian.
“Yeah, that’s the way it should be.” Brian walked swiftly past the cruisers. He was in search of another hint. “But I’m more concerned about something else.”
“The access route to the dirt road?” Craig observed.
“That’s right.”
There was no path in sight at all for a vehicle to go through in order to connect to the dirt road on the other side. Of course, along the trail, in the light of the moon, they had noticed very huge footmarks, which, in all likelihood, belonged to a proportionately huge individual crossing from the end of Sebastian Road to the dirt road. But there was no means of driving a vehicle across without being impeded by the multitude of trees hugging one another.
Cognizant of the amount of time that had elapsed, Brian began to grow a bit agitated. “There has to be a way to drive our goddam cars across to the other side.”
“This ain’t looking good,” Craig said, his pop-eyes darting in every direction. “God, we’re kinda trapped here. And the temp’s dropping, too.”
“Reminds me of the Israelites getting stuck at the Red Sea,” Dwayne said.
“Yeah,” Allan agreed. “Except water was their own curse, trees are ours. Perhaps we should pray the gods of the woods to grant us an access road.”
“Goodness, we’re trapped,” Craig repeated. “I hope nothing’s happened to the boy yet.”
“We’re not,” Brian said. “Knock that silly thought out of your head before it poisons you. If we can’t forge ahead, then we’ll turn back, and make a fresh plan. So, what’s the whole fuss about?” Brian turned around. “But I see no reason why we would be unable to create a passage to the other side.”
“So, what’s the plan, Sheriff?” asked Dwayne.
“We’re not giving up, that’s what it is,” Allan said.
“That’s right. We’ll get back in the car now and drive the length of this road. There’s gotta be a way around this somehow. So, move it.”
They all started towards their cars.
“Hey,” Craig said all of a sudden. “You see that?”
“What?”
“Over there.” He pointed in the same direction they had been advancing before Brian suggested they get back into their cars. “Looks like an opening.”
Chapter 17
His single-handed uproar through the house must have awakened the boy. Robert had been in a comatose kind of sleep when The Outcast had brought him into his haven. That was the way it had always been between them. Whenever he was in the presence of The Outcast, he vacillated from a state of profound hypnotism, in which he was almost unconscious, to a state in which he could only put up a mild remonstration like he had done when Donnie had got killed.
But now, he was screaming as loud as he had never done while in the vicinity of The Outcast.
Suddenly, in the middle of the boy’s unprecedented din, the revelation flashed across The Outcast’s mind like a bolt of lightning.
The problem was his True Blood. At last, he had found the answer.
But he should have known all along that his enemies had intended to get to him through the weakling. They knew the boy wasn’t fully formed yet, which was tantamount to The Outcast’s Achilles heel, the very weakness they would be working very hard to attack, because trying to save his True Blood from their scourge would be multiple times harder than trying to save himself alone. But he had to fight for both of them at the same time. It was his divine responsibility.
He bolted towards the boy’s room, wondering what he could do to expedite the growth process.
The answer lay on the lap of the final ritual, which entailed Robert’s full participation. In fact, it was all about Robert’s involvement. When properly executed, it would be the watershed that would catapult the boy into the fullness of maturity. But that wasn’t possible yet. There was still a handful of killings the boy had been predestined to witness.
But when The Outcast got to Robert’s room, his sentiment about the revelation changed altogether.
Chapter 18
They found a passage through a clearing-thanks to Craig’s powers of observation.
