“What is it?” he whispered. “A bear?”
Nell kept backing toward him. She shook her head.
He could hear the others behind him as they reached the opening. Susan started to say something, and he held up a hand.
“Shh!”
He wasn’t sure she saw him. She, Jean, and Kate stood blinking in the entrance.
Nell had almost backed up all the way.
“Get out,” she whispered as she passed close to him. “Get out now!”
He saw it then. A foot from where she’d been standing, four filthy, matted bodies curled against the wall. Blue cloth littered the ground near them, torn to bits.
Slashers.
Max tensed and started to ease himself backward, too.
“Their hands!” Nell whispered to him. “Look at their hands!”
He squinted in the dim light. One of the figures lay sleeping with an arm flung out, and he saw the palm of its rough hand. It was covered in blood.
A slasher moaned and stirred in its sleep. Max tried to force himself to move slowly, to tread without a sound.
“What is it?” Susan whispered behind him. Her eyes would adjust in a second. If the others saw . . .
A slasher groaned and lifted its head.
Kate gasped.
The thing’s head swiveled, and it took them in. It growled, then threw the others aside and jumped to its feet. Suddenly, they were all awake.
Before Max could even shout, it leaped for Nell. She screamed and held up an arm, but it slammed her against the stone wall. Max grabbed its hair and yanked, but the others were up now, and he could feel their sharp nails on his back, their sharper teeth.
He flailed and kicked as they threw him to the ground and turned back to Nell. Overhead, the things shrieked and the girls yelled. Max struggled to his feet as the scuffling slashers kicked and clawed him. Susan charged in, swinging Jean’s stick, and caught them with the end of it. He heard it smack sharply again and again.
He’d nearly reached Nell when a slasher threw him to the ground and rolled him over, tearing with rough nails at his shirt, his arm, his collar. He kneed it and it reared backward, yelping, when he caught a glimpse of its face in the shadows. Glazed eyes stared out of the mat of hair. For a moment, they sharpened, and the slasher opened its mouth.
“Hey!” Max yelled. “Listen! Can you understand me?”
But at the sound of his voice, it jerked its head as if slapped and the spark dimmed. Max looked again and saw only terror and desperation. The slasher growled.
Susan caught the thing from behind with the stick, and it howled and raised its hands, moaning with a nearly human voice. Max tried to shove it off him. The thing was so heavy! A second later, it growled again, then swiveled back to Nell, who rolled on the floor as the other slashers buffeted her, snatching at her shirt and hair, tugging at her hands as she clutched the ends of her makeshift sack.
“Nell!” Max yelled. “The food! They want the food! Throw the blanket!”
Three of the things were on her, and now he could see clearly that they were yanking at the blanket sack. She’d fallen on it, and they ripped and mauled her, trying to grab it.
He rolled over to get to her, but the fourth slasher seized him and tossed him down. He reached up to snatch at the hair on its chest, but this time his hand caught the remains of fabric.
Nell was yelling. One of the slashers had turned on Susan, and she kept at it with her stick. Jean darted to where Nell lay struggling beneath the other two and tugged at the blanket, cringing as the things swiveled her way. After a second, Kate joined her.
Reeking, mountainous beasts too big for the space of the cave, the slashers blocked the light and loomed above the girls, but Jean and Kate jumped out of reach, and Susan, who’d been caught for a second by a gnarled hand, wrenched free and smacked the attackers with her stick. Nell kicked and struggled, and Max reached for the slasher on his chest and grabbed its face, hand closing on a mass of hair, slick with spittle. He pulled as hard as he could, careful to keep out of reach of its teeth. It yowled sharply, like a cat.
“Here!” Kate screamed. Max saw her holding the blanket sack that she and Jean had extracted from beneath Nell. “Here! Take it!”
The slashers raised their heads. Their eyes locked on Kate.
She ran to the opening of the cave and turned again. “This way!”
The slashers leaped up, and Max, suddenly free, jumped to his feet. Behind Kate, he could see the stone ledge. She backed toward it.
“Kate! Watch it!”
Jean had flattened herself against the wall, and now she tugged Nell, who lay gasping in the dirt, out of the way. The slashers eyed Nell, then Kate.
Kate lifted the blanket. “You want this!” she said. “Come on!”
Then she flung the sack over the edge.
The four figures leaped, and Max yelled, but they were past Kate in an instant and bounding down the ridges after the food.
Gasping, Kate watched them go.
Max ran toward her, shaking. They were all shaking. He stepped out to the ledge and looked down. Below the series of stone outcroppings, the slashers scrambled over the blanket, ripping at it and fighting over the peaches.
“There’s not enough for them,” Nell said from behind him. “They’ll be back up for us.”
Jean stood hugging herself by the cave opening. Nearby, Susan leaned heavily on the walking stick.
“Why didn’t you make the wind blow like you did before?” Jean asked her.
Susan only shook her head, trying to catch her breath.
“I didn’t have time,” she panted. “Couldn’t.”
The yelps and growls from below increased.
“They’re almost done,” Nell said. “We’ve got to go!”
Without another word,
