Dead of Winter

Chapter 16

As we rounded the turn, the truck's headlights caught flashes of color in the nearby snowbanks. Shades of muted green and unmistakable crimson that drew screams from both of us and caused Rory to bring the truck to a juddering halt.

Dashed against the snowbank, discarded like a ruined rag doll, Ferrilyn's upper body lay facing outward. A horrific gash marred the top of her head, as if someone had cleaved it with an axe. One arm, outstretched and mangled, intruded into the pool of blood that had spilled forth and frozen about her torso. Still clad in ragged shreds of thermal, fuchsia-patterned leggings, one of her legs jutted from the top of the snowbank behind her.

"Taryn!" I gasped. "I was afraid she'd come back!"

"It knew the chick was nuts, but I never dreamed she'd—Oh, Christ!" Half-hopping, half-falling from the truck, Rory started to his sister, one hand already reaching for the phone in his back pocket.

Leaving the truck idling, I followed. Unable to bear the sight of Ferrilyn's ravaged body—the butchery she'd sustained reminded me of Nisha's crime scene photo—I slogged past Rory, wading over my boot tops in knee-deep snow. I hadn't gone more than a few yards when I stumbled over something buried in the driveway. Too odd-shaped for a tree limb, it was also much too large to be Ferrilyn's missing leg.

Kneeling down, I began scooping out handfuls of snow. I didn't have to dig far before one of my fingertips snagged on two small holes. Pushing more snow aside with my free hand revealed what had been hiding inside that mound. My stomach roiled. Bile, hot and sour, rose in the back of my throat as I gazed down at Taryn's features. Her eyes, wide and black as olive pits; her mouth frozen in a forever-scream.

She was still wearing the tattered and bloodied remnants of her hospital gown.

Pulling my hand away from her nose, I hollered for Rory.

"Oh, s**t! s**t! s**t!" He stomped, turning himself about in circles. "Who could've—? What the f**k do we do?"

From the trees, a howl answered. An unbroken feral ululation, ending in a spine-chilling hiss. Saplings bent and snapped, flinging showers of snow and shards of ice from their limbs. The ground shook, reverberating beneath the weight of ponderous steps. At last, a shape emerged from the grove and stepped into the headlights.

Neither bear nor catamount, the creature reared itself like a man on two spindly legs, but was like no animal I had ever seen before. Arms, overlong, dangled from its sides, the hand-like appendages attached to these ending in curved extrusions of sharpened bone. Ashen hide, shriveled and scarred, covered its emaciated form, except for the ragged strips that hung from its exposed rib cage.

When it turned its head, I found myself face to face with every night terror I'd ever had.

The bloodstained fangs, ragged gash where a nose should have been, and eyes sunken so deep that they resembled little more than dark slits. When it raised that wreckage of a face and sniffed the air, my father's long-ago warning screamed inside my head.

It comes in the night. It comes with the cold—

"Over here, motherfucker!" Rory screamed. "I'm ready for you!"

Hearing his challenge, the thing turned to him and hissed.

"No, Rory, don't!" I whispered, still kneeling in the snow, too terrified to move. "Don't let it—"

Before I could finish, the creature sprang over the snowbank. Tackling Rory, it buried its claws deep into his shoulder and pinned him to the ground with one arm, as if he were weightless as a scrap of discarded cloth and not a man of flesh and blood.

As he writhed and twisted, trying to escape, the creature sank its teeth into his midsection. Agonizing wails pierced the air as it stripped Rory’s flesh away in  great b****y chunks, which it then devoured, smacking and slurping.

Luckily, Rory didn't have to scream for very long.

Unable to watch anymore, I heaved myself up and ran, losing both my boots as I stumbled toward the house. If I can just get inside, lock the door, I can call for help, I told myself. Once inside, I'll be safe, I'll be—

Claws sank into the back of my down coat, shredding it with a sickening tearing sound and a soft "pop" that released a feathery cloud. Shrieking, I redoubled my escape efforts, struggling for purchase against the slippery drive until my feet were raw and my fingers bled from clawing so much at unforgiving snow.

Caught in a living nightmare, an unnamable beast at my back, I pressed on, frantic. The house seemed to recede the closer I came to it. Its darkened threshold, gaping like a maw, retreating in increments with each of my forward steps.

I will not die here! Not like Rory! Not like the others! I will not—

Another screech from the creature spurred me on. Lungs burning, head pounding, I skirted Ferrilyn's Honda, hoping to put an obstacle between us. The door was less than ten feet away. If I didn't slip, I could make it!

Behind me, metal squealed. Glass, erupting, peppered my legs with painful shards. Damn! The monster hadn't followed me around the car, it'd gone over it!

With one last scream, I launched myself in midair and soared over the threshold. But as I crash-landed against the stairs, sharp-edged steps that should've left me screaming in agony dissolved at my touch.

The air about me shimmered, trembling like the atmosphere of a dream. Once solid and stalwart, the walls of home—my last sanctuary—melted away. Coiling upward like candle smoke, they whirled away on the wind. Panting, driven to near breathlessness, I prayed for this to end with the anguished cries of one awakening from a nightmare.

Instead, destroying this tenuous vision revealed another, more harrowing winter scene. An image from another place, another time. A home ripped from me long ago, but from which part of me refused to leave.

Loon Lake Lodge loomed before me. A single light, burning within its attic window, beckoned me like an impossible beacon. Hair unbound, clothes in ribbons, bloodied, frost burned, and stippled with gooseflesh, I stood before it. Around me, the wind rose, bearing upon its back the triumphant screams of my inhuman pursuer.

Was this Nisha's end? Were these her last sights: the silent house, the attic lamp, and the unforgiving wilderness? Was her killer the same infernal being who now stalked my every move?

Rage rose like a fiery wave within my breast. Her end would not be my end! Wheeling about, I faced my shadow hunter, my nameless, near-faceless denizen of the devil's lair.

No, not nameless. Ferrilyn gave it a name, and so had Taryn, for all good it had done them.

Manitou. Wendigo. Flesh-eating demon!

Dropping on all fours, the creature circled about me, snapping its teeth and clicking its claws. Not yet, its movements indicated. No doubt, it meant to savor every drop of my blood, sweat, and fear. Season me before the major event where my fate would entwine with those of my family, friends, and the man I could have loved.

Nothing tastes as good as fear...

I heard those words. Each as clear as if the creature had whispered them in my ear. Each as real to me as the hot gusts of breath on my neck and the noxious stench of its body, a funereal bouquet of death, decay, and utter depravity.

Stopping before me, the beast reared itself on two legs once more. One appendage, extended, raked its claws along the soft flesh of my lower jaw, then tightened about me. Then, pulling me close, the creature opened its filthy maw, as if it desired to speak.

I refused to scream or run or shy away. Though my legs quaked like jelly, I willed myself to look the murderous devil in the eye.

The creature's face shifted, soft flesh tones flooding its featureless grey. For just an instant, another face, its features fragile, insubstantial as a ghost's, transposed itself upon the monstrous, corpse-like visage. No longer the creature of my undoing, this face, familiar as my own, regarded me with eyes as wide as Loon Lake. Dark eyes, instilled with equal parts sorrow and welcoming. Eyes soon whisked away on the howling wind. 

The grey thing licked its sunken lips and drew a ragged breath. Opening its desiccated mouth, it then spoke a single word to me.

The last word I would ever hear.

Sister.