5: Nothing

Last Hour Story -- Julia Kent

There's peace in nothingness.

Nothing doesn't care about missed flight times. Nothing isn't worried about a lost calf or if you can live up to the creative competition in New York. Nothing doesn't care about who's dead, who isn't, and those skirting the border between.

Nothing is a promise of peace.

Nothing is all there is, for a while.

No pain, no fear, no ...nothing.

A lightning bolt of awareness surged through my body and I woke to reality, scrambled up into a world pouring snow.

"Lucas?" I croaked and, clutching my arms against my chest, remembered his screams. Screams of a dying animal, I thought, staggering into the long shadow of the ridge. "Lucas? Lucas!"

Nothing. Worse than nothing: silence.

Night had won the hour and buried it under a good six inches of snow. Dragging my feet, stumbling over hidden roots and stones, I scrambled back up the ridge, high as I could before steepness sent me sliding. My right arm burned; the left was a throbbing apartment fire. The coat had been singed straight through to blistered skin. I could feel the pull and crack of ruined flesh with every desperate lunge up- but even that sensation was fading under the strength of the storming cold.

"Lucas!" I yelled.

Silence.

Sapling after sapling, rock after rock, I grit my teeth and pulled myself higher. Halfway, I cut my hand on Luc's shattered lantern- and a short distance later my bloody fingertips discovered the rifle. Without losing hold, I managed to get a hand around the strap and sling it over my shoulder. I took a moment to catch my breath, then kept climbing. You only have so long before numbness eats away at your limbs and supple flexibility stiffens. The peak was just above, a sheer vertical. I needed my toes and fingers functional.

A low, fearful bray broke through dark.

Aching fingers digging into a dangerously bent sapling, I paused, squinting through sheets of snow.

The calf moved along the base, stopping to sniff my tracks.

With an abrupt snap, the sapling came out roots and all. I skidded then fell the rest of the way, landed in a great whoomph of snow that sent the calf dashing through the trees. After the stars finally blinked out of my vision, I stood in time to see the calf taking her first tentative steps back.

"Lucas?" I yelled again, keeping an ear toward the animal's careful approach.

No answer.

Lucas was my Schrodinger's cat, alive and dead and I didn't necessarily want to peer over that top and learn the cold hard truth.

The calf, meanwhile, was alive and frightened. The ridge slope lessened if you followed it west long enough. I could lead the calf around, climb the gradual incline and get back to Lucas. It was a longer walk, but I'd conserve energy. I might need that energy, depending on what awaited me.

"You're okay," I told the calf, dusting snow off her hide. Her body twitched and shivered; her legs folded underneath her skinny frame. Frost glittered on the soft whiskers of the snout she lifted toward me. We needed to get back quickly if she had any shot. Hell, we all needed to get back. Hypothermia was setting in; I wasn't feeling cold. Just numb.

Young and newborn though she was, the calf weighed about seventy pounds. Supporting her chest and rump, I lifted her into my arms and began the long walk around the ridge with nothing but memory as a guide.

*

I don't know how far or how long it'd taken. The snow-heavy in the air, dense around my calves-was like moving through wet cement. Realization was quietly coming to the forefront as we reached a small clearing that was most certainly not the turn up the ridge nor anything I recognized.

I'd led us astray.

I didn't have the supplies for a fire or strength to build a shelter, lacked adequate protection from the Smiling Dark should it return.

We were going to die.

Sure, freezing to death was supposed to be a more peaceful way to go, but you had to endure a lot of shit prior to attaining that beautiful state of nothing. Maybe it was easier to put one or the both of us out of our misery.

Setting the calf down, I checked the barrel for snow and counted five bullets in the chamber. My calf lay innocent and unaware, brown eyes blinking up at me. I stared into the falling snow, uncertain.

Darkness cleaved itself from the pine-studded nightscape. Steam curled through the snow, outlining a distinct shape and smile.

I aimed at the circling demon and fired.

In a wisp of embers the bullet passed clean through its neck and drilled a distant tree with a sharp crack.

The wolf shook out its shaggy mane. A crocodilian smile split its lips.

Well shit.

The calf, suddenly aware of danger, chose that moment to kick my kneecap. I fell, scrambled to my feet, holding the gun out, pointing it to darkness as if the useless weapon might hold it at bay.

Darkness. Darkness. Darkness. I spun. Snow. Snow. Snow.

From the left its hellish smile opened wide. It sprang.

I fired every round. Bullets ghosted straight through its body in bursts of demonic flame.

The wolf's skull slammed my chest. I went down without enough air in my lungs to scream.

Its tongue brushed acid across my cheek. I punched it square in the jaw. My fist didn't go through like the bullet; it nailed the sucker on its furry chin. The phantom sprang away snarling but didn't attack again as I rolled into the snow, rubbing like an animal in search of relief. The Smiling Dark watched me pat the burns along my face, then threw back its head and howled.

A horn bellowed in reply. I dropped beside the calf, covering my ears.

Moonlight burst through the clouds. Shadows fell from the sky in a flurry of hooves and snorts. Gigantic coal-black horses, the epitome of all things wild and unkempt, thundered down from the stars. I threw myself over the calf as primal whoops and yells from their riders closed in.

*

The men were dressed in armor, some iron and steel, others in fur and leather and bone. Regardless of cloth and cut, all donned skeletal helms. In the haunted parade I glimpsed the broken tusks of a walrus, the yellowed gleam of an eagle's beak, a stag's handsome rack, and other species I couldn't recognize from skull alone. Every rider wore a mask and every rider's face beyond the bone was a bleak void except for their eyes.

Green light flickered in their hollowed eye sockets. Ghosts, spirits, demons, specters, fae: words raced through my mind as the riders circled. I wasn't sure what I was looking at, and while the shock of it all froze my body in place it didn't stop my brain from stupidly trying to make sense of things.

The horses snorted and bit one another with sharp fangs. The riders jostled and bickered as the space between me and them narrowed. The wolf reclined on its haunches in a puddle of melting snow, growling here and there at a stallion tramping too near.

The calf shivered. I whispered assurances into her ear and rose to meet the riders. More than one of them carried weaponry, the blades and sharpened edges glinting prominently in the moonlight as their motion slowed and their mounts were steered toward me.

The wolf yelped- snapped wildly at the man that'd kicked it in the head, and slunk around behind the largest horse. It leered out at me from there, fur bristled in a stiff ridge along its neck and burly shoulders. I leered back at, and then the horse had trotted forward and the point of a sword came near to my heart.

Its rider was silent, a man no other vied against. His helm was a sabertooth's dredged from the tar-pits, coated with an oily gleam in the silvered light. Furs were heaped upon his shoulders, and his eyes held all the sphinxlike mystery of the darkness between stars.

"Run," he commanded, though no part of his shadowed face moved. His was a voice inside my head.

My muscles responded to his tone, heating, flushing, tempting me to flee. But I felt the calf at my heel. With a frayed coat sleeve I pushed the blade gently aside.

In that moment, as snow fell everywhere but around us, the riders went quiet.

"Run."

The horse stomped a dinner plate-sized hoof as if to emphasize its master's urging.

"No," I said. If I hadn't said 'no' the last glitter of hope would vanish and I'd dissolve into a screaming mess. "I know your game. I saw what you did to Dakota. Find another way to kill me. You aren't gonna run me down and stab me in the back like a coward."

The rider inclined his head.

The Smiling Dark crept forward, baleful eyes locked on the calf.

"Save the calf," I said suddenly, walking out to intercept the wolf. "Save her and the man on the ridge if there's something left to save. Save them and I'll run. I swear."

Tiny white fire flashed in the ancient fossil's eye sockets. "Run now."

I shook my head. "I need to know they're safe."

A spear sank into the snow inches from my feet. I tumbled backwards. The men laughed. The rider with the stag's rack hopped from his mount and retrieved the weapon. The demon, easily twice the size of a regular man like Lucas, pointed the razor edge toward me, stabbing at my feet as I slipped and scrambled away.

"Run into my arms, sweet girl," this one jeered in a tone of sharp lightning as he came to stand over me. "I'll carry you home without delay."

Motion raced past the corner of my eye. In instant the Smiling Dark set its jaws upon the calf's throat and dragged her into the night.

The stag man hooted at the sight, hefting his spear in one hand to the cheers of his fellows. With his arm upraised and his attention momentarily off me, I lunged. I didn't know why. I just knew I didn't want to die like a rabbit worn down by wolves.

My arms wrapped around his thigh, but I couldn't knock him down. He stumbled, lifted me by my throat and flung me into the snow. I landed in a coughing heap. There was venom in his eyes as he approached, raising the spear high. Spirited by moonlight, the tip shone like a shooting star on its descent.

The spear cut through my thigh. I screamed, writhing against the ground. The stag man released his end of the weapon, walking in a circle, gesturing to his wild companions like a fighter in the ring after a knockout blow.

The rider with the broken tusks of a walrus leaned forward on his horse. A shield dangled against the animal's flank. The demon's eyes blazed with white-hot intensity.

I knew I couldn't stand, felt an odd sensation of blood pooling where it didn't belong. If I wrenched the spear free my life would flood out faster than it already was. The stag man continued his parade with his back to me. Gritting my teeth, I gripped the shaft in both hands and snapped it in two.

The walrus started to laugh.

"Hey, asshole!" I hissed.

The stag man turned.

Hard as I could I chucked the broken spear end at the sabertooth rider's horse. It slapped across the stallion's broad chest. The horse reared, launching its unsuspecting rider into the snow. The rider, their leader, I'd presumed, dusted snow from his furs and rounded on me. Not a single man laughed. The stag cut forward ahead but found himself met with darkness.

Tainted by the sour smell of blood, the Smiling Dark had returned. It stood between me and the stag, snapping at him when he dared inch forward, until the rider retreated. After it seemed assured the stag wouldn't attack, it nudged my arm with the top of its snout as if asking me to rise.

"Little late to grow a conscience" I said to the wolf, pressing my fingers against my pulsing thigh.

The wolf whined and stepped away.

Its master stopped twenty feet short of us. One fur-lined glove extended with an impatient snap.

I didn't know if it was magic or possession or something more sinister, but the whispering in my head brought me to a screaming stand. I panted, collected myself, felt the blood rush from my head, saw my fingertips whiten.

Chin high, I lurched forward under his command, the wounded leg dragging a crimson trail. Pain exploded through my body, but I stopped crying out loud, leaving tears to do the talking. I was terrified, terrified of what power drove this compulsion to walk, terrified of what he'd do when I arrived. What if he forced my bones to run? That would be a worse hell than anything I could have imagined.

But death, and the sorry peace of it, wouldn't be long now.

The stag man shoved me hard as I passed, grabbed me by my hair and dragged me back to the start. I had to tear myself off the snowy ground, reliving the sharp pain of standing.

It was a long twenty feet to their primordial leader, but I made it. I didn't have a choice. I couldn't ignore his call. As my fingertips touched the worn leather covering his hand, a sudden force thrust through my gut.

I looked down.

On instinct and with dawning amazement I grabbed the hilt, but he wrenched it free. Blood and moonlight slid off the sword. Like a puppet cut from string I fell backward, stunned and paralyzed. Pain bubbled through my lungs, emerged between my lips in a stream of red. Blood poured into my hands until every thought I had dissolved into raw feeling.

But it wasn't the stillness of nothing that greeted me. It wasn't even darkness.

It was the bitter chill of ice. The pain was fading, losing ground to the cold just as I was losing hold of life.

The man wearing the sabertooth skull bent over me then, lifted me almost reverently into his arms. He carried me to another man's horse, then secured me along the back like a dead deer. My consciousness flicked in and out. In my confusion I experienced the most curious sensation of detachment, as if I were in the heavens watching my lifeless body freeze a thousand feet below.

I could see everything. The tracks around my body whirling away on a strong gust. In between the tops of trees I even made out Lucas stumbling through the snow with my lantern swinging from his hand.