“Oh me! Oh, poor beloved me.”
As Candy stumbled out of Boa’s hold she turned and the subtle signs of deceit upon Boa’s face caught Candy’s attention. Boa didn’t wait to let Candy speak. She quickly was gone, out of the chamber and off up the wooded slope. Candy did her best to recover her equilibrium, but it was difficult. Boa’s thefts had left her body weak, and her thoughts ragged. She was only certain of one thing.
“She would have killed me . . .”
“Oh, I don’t doubt it,” Mrs. Munn replied. “But this is my rock, girl, and she has no—”
The cry came from Covenantis. And as heart wrenching as his wails were, the terrible howl of anguish that followed was infinitely worse.
Laguna was clearly torn between her responsibilities to her injured guest, and those she had to her son. Candy simplified things:
“Go to the boy! I’ll be fine. I just need to recover my breath.” She looked up at Mrs. Munn. “Please,” she said, “don’t worry about me!”
Her plea was lent force by another sobbing cry from her son.
Laguna Munn looked at Candy one more time.
Laguna Munn didn’t put up any further argument. Instead, she addressed the walls of the chamber.
“This girl is here as my guest. She’s hurt.
“Be careful . . .”
“I know, girl, I know. Boa’s dangerous. But believe me, so am I. I’ve got a few tricks she wouldn’t want to see. Now heal. The dark Hours that are coming won’t wait for you to put yourself back together. Hurry up. The beginning’s been a long time over. And the end always comes sooner than you expect.”
And so saying, she left the girl who was truly Candy Quackenbush, nothing added or taken away, to the healing hush of the chamber.
Chapter 14
Empty
NEVER IN HER SIXTEEN years had Candy felt as alone as she felt now. Though she’d tried many times to imagine what it would be like without Boa in her head, her attempts had failed miserably. Only now, alone in the vastness of her thoughts did she sense the horror of such solitude. There would never again be a presence to silently share the state of being as Boa had. She was utterly, unconditionally alone.
How did people, ordinary people like those on Followell Street—even her own mother, even her
Candy suddenly recalled the big billboard outside the Presbyterian Church on Munrow Street in Chickentown that had carried the same message for as long as Candy could remember:
THE LORD IS WITH YOU ALWAYS. YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
A shriek interrupted her thoughts. Laguna Munn was shouting one word, its force fueled by horror and rage.
“NO!”
She stopped only when she ran out of breath. She inhaled and began again.
“NO!”
Finally, she let the word fall off into silence. Several seconds passed and then Candy heard her say, “My son. What have you done to my son?”
Candy didn’t wait for any more clues as to what had taken place. She got up headed for the door, realizing as she did so that while she’d been contemplating her loneliness, the sentient chamber had obeyed Laguna Munn’s instructions and begun the process of healing her. She was no longer shaking as she had been just a few minutes earlier. And her weakened legs had recovered some of their strength. Even her thoughts, which had been left muddied by Boa’s attacks, were clearer now.
Exiting the chamber, she didn’t need any further cries from the incantrix in order to discover her whereabouts. The powers she feared she’d lost to Boa’s devouring were unharmed. Once the chamber had washed from her thoughts the grime of Boa’s appetite, she remembered without effort how to locate Mrs. Munn in the darkness. All she had to do was follow the vibration that moved ahead of her, trusting it to choose a safe path up the slope.
The temperature quickly warmed up as she ascended; the air carried with it a smell like rotted meat that had been burned on a barbecue.
Then she heard Mrs. Munn again, speaking softly somewhere ahead of her.
“What’s she done to you, child? Now you hush your weepin’. I’m right here. Where does it hurt?”
“Everywhere, Mama.”
Candy saw a light now, no brighter than two candle flames, hovering in the air a few feet above the ground. The scene illuminated was a grim one.
Mrs. Munn was kneeling on the ground, tending to her favorite son, Jollo B’gog. He was in a terrible state. All the dark beauty he’d possessed when Candy and Malingo had first met him had gone. He was emaciated now, his bones jutting through his withered skin. His teeth were chattering, his eyes rolled up behind his lids.
“Listen to me, Jollo dear,” Mrs. Munn was telling him. “You’re not going to die. You hear me? I’m here.”
She stopped talking, and looked up in rage, her gaze instantly locating Candy. There was a flicker of lightning in her eyes.
“It’s only me,” Candy said. “Don’t—”
The lightning receded, and Laguna Munn looked back down at her son. “I want you to stay here with him. Keep him from any further harm while I find her.”
“Boa . . .” Candy growled.
Laguna Munn nodded. “She took from the child what I stopped her taking from you.” She tenderly stroked her son’s cheek. “You just stay here, sweet one,” she said to him. “Mama will be back in just a few moments.”
“Where are you going?”
“To find her. And take back what she took from him.”
She got to her feet, rising with surprising ease for so large boned a woman, looking down at Jollo all the while. It was only with the greatest difficulty that she finally separated her gaze from him.
“I’m so sorry,” Candy said. “If I’d known what she was capable of doing—”
“Don’t,” Mrs. Munn said, waving Candy’s apology away. “We have more urgent business than talk. Will you please stay with him, maybe talk to him a little so his spirit stays near?”
“Of course.”
“She’s not a
