XIII. Witch
“Randy please!"
Scott awoke with a scream in his head--shouted, according to the dream he'd been having, over turbulent waters from the stern of a distressed ship. He sat bolt upright. He reached for Ingrid and found an empty pillow. The ship--it had been sinking. On it there'd been a girl.
"Ingrid?" he called.
There were no concrete reasons for disquiet. The windows, the open room, professed their innocence with tranquility. Ingrid was probably right outside the door, brewing coffee with Varion and Dixon.
Yet the dream lingered. And Scott’s heart, as he looked from one corner of the room to the other, could not get free of the hot fist closed around it. He reached for his pants.
"Wait! Wait!" a girl’s voice, this one very real, shrieked from far off.
Tranquility broken. Running towards the door, Scott grabbed the first shirt he could find and threw it over his shoulders. Another scream came from Ingrid:
"Oh God!"
He plowed straight into Varion on the front walk. "Where's Ingrid!" he shouted.
Varion's eyes were frantic. "I don't know Scott! I heard her scream--"
At that moment Dixon rushed onto the scene. "Down the trail!" he yelled. "Hurry! Hurry!"
They followed his lead--but not for long. Legs pumping, Scott was soon ahead of the other two, ignoring the sharp stones under his feet, ignoring the sudden bolt of lightning that forked over the lake, ignoring everything except the girl on the ship. He broke from a cleft to confront the bay. Water lapped at its shore. Trees, their boughs hushed, towered over glittering water.
"Ingrid!"
The surface rippled. And from over the center came a flurry of bubbles. Scott plunged into the water, diving forward just as Varion and Dixon appeared, shouting words--orders, curses, who knew?—he barely heard.
It was a good distance to the center of the bay. Scott swam harder, but no matter how fast his body moved, he knew it wasn't fast enough. The time had come to dive under. Two minutes, maybe more, were gone now since Ingrid's last scream. If she'd actually been underwater for that long...
At that instant, a goliath emerged from the depths of the bay, throwing water from the ragged black hair of its massive head. Over one meaty shoulder was the naked body of its victim. That body belonged to Ingrid; Scott knew it instantly. He hadn't needed to see her face--her glazed, unseeing eyes, her lolling mouth, her blue neck--to understand. He hadn't needed to see her face. But it was there anyway.
The first thing he felt was desire--a desire to take the beast by the head and twist until its neck broke. Scott's hands trembled; his eyes swelled with tears of rage. What is it? he wondered. What is it and how can I make it feel the most agonizing pain there is before I kill it?
"YOU!" he shrieked.
The beast had been swimming towards shore. Now it stopped. It twisted around, wearing an impish smile. Look, the smile said, I caught this butterfly and tore off its wings. It was fun.
Roaring, Scott dove forward. This was by no means a tactful reaction: The beast, even with half its body underwater, held the advantage in regard to size and strength. But Scott's hatred blinded him from rational thought. All he wanted was to get Ingrid out of its arms--and then kill it. Kill it dead.
The beast seemed to realize his intentions, for rather than swim to meet him in the middle of the bay, it carried Ingrid back to the bank, where it laid her down with a reverential grace that outraged Scott even further. Then it turned to face him.
And for the first time, Scott faltered.
The beast was huge. Standing over six feet tall and appearing to weigh hundreds of pounds, it was far beyond anything Scott's imagination could have conjured. Its round face, pale white from its recent bath, stared at Scott without the slightest trace of fear.
Also, the beast was completely naked.
More than anything, this last almost made Scott stop. The beast's body, flabby and covered with short, wiry hairs, looked positively obscene: a grotesquerie from a pulp horror comic book. Its pink-nippled breasts drooped like melted orbs of spoiled cheese. Its penis pointed from a straggled, greasy nest of pubic hair. Its toenails, jagged and filthy, desecrated the water.
"Give her to me!" Scott thundered.
As he walked forward, a third individual appeared on the scene and kneeled next to Ingrid. Scott stepped to the left. The beast's eyes followed him--good. Now the newcomer—it was either Varion or Dixon--had an even less chance of being seen. He had already tilted Ingrid's torso backward to drain water from her lungs and at present appeared to be administering CPR.
Scott left the water. He crouched into a fighting stance, looking the beast up and down. There was only one visible weak spot. Balling his fist, Scott charged. The beast stood its ground, smiling all the while. Scott planted his left leg. His arm reared back--
And then, with his right leg, he kicked at the beast's groin as hard as he could.
Under better circumstances, the maneuver might have worked. Were Scott's clothes not so wet from a cold bath; were the beast not so confident of its place on the shore. As it was, when the kick came, the beast side-stepped with alarming speed, then bent to hoist its attacker off the ground. Scott punched it in the head, but not enough leverage existed to do damage with the blow. The beast raised him higher. Now he looked like a belt captured at a title bout. Another bolt of lightning flashed over Coldfrock Lake, followed by a rumble of thunder.
"There's a rock behind you," the beast said.
Scott quit squirming. "So you can talk," he managed through the tight grip around his throat. "Funny. You don't look smart enough to wipe your own ass."
"That must make you even more stupid. Since I'm about to kill you." Then, again: "There's a rock behind you."
Scott turned his head. There was indeed a rather large rock about fifty feet back from the water. And why not? Horseshoe Bay was nothing but rocks--rocks and water. By the latter, Ingrid had been killed. By the former--
"I'm going to splat your head as hard as I can all over it," the beast disclosed. "Maybe it'll hurt. Maybe it won't." Its shoulders gave a minute shrug. "Maybe you'll notice when one of your eyeballs pops out. Maybe you'll see your own teeth in the sand. I don't know."
"Fuck you!" Scott hissed.
But he was scared. The beast meant every word that came from its blubbering mouth. Unlike the dambuhala, this ogre possessed an awareness of its actions: The look on its face--an almost serene dedication to purpose—said all that needed to be said.
"Ready?" it asked.
Scott began squirming afresh. It granted him no ground. The beast took a step forward, and then another, and then another. As the rock came closer, the steps gained speed. The beast's hand tightened more. The steps became a jog. The jog, a run. Bloody death was moments away. Wanting to see Ingrid one last time, Scott cast his eyes across the sand. Varion and Dixon were there. And Ingrid, thank whatever maker who sat on his throne in the heavens, was sitting upright between them, blinking at the sky.
"I love you," Scott breathed through his tortured windpipe.
The beast didn't hear. Or if it did, it found the words amusing, for as the rock bore down it began to laugh a merry, lunatic laugh. It was an ogre after all.
"Here it comes!" it shrieked. "Pumpkin pie for everyone!"
"TAHIMIK!"
The beast stopped, grabbed the top of Scott's head, yanked it forward.
"TAHIMIK!"
Eyes closed, Scott waited to die. Yet it wasn't happening. The hand holding his head was poised, but remained immobile. His eyes came open a crack. The shouter of the strange word--tahimik--stood off to the right: a tall, middle-aged woman with close-cut dark hair and a truculent glower.
"Mom!" the beast yowled, disappointed by this interruption from its sport.
"Let him go now," the woman came back with. "You've had your fun."
Her eye went to Scott. In that moment Scott knew that, despite her intervention upon his slaughter, this woman was no savior. Rescue did not interest the proprietor of that brief, black glance; there were other plans in the mix.
"And I've no wish to observe your brutalities," she added.
"Look the other way then."
"Randy!"
"Fine!" The beast dropped Scott to the ground. "Happy now? Mother?"
The woman stepped forward. Her boots trudged, like the footsteps of a drunkard. Indeed, she was drunk. Scott arrived at this conclusion through the drawling, drifting manner of her next words.
"I'll be happy...when you at last decide to have a stroke or a heart attack and let me forget you were ever born."
"Touching. I'll be extra careful with the signatures for this year's Christmas card."
"Get dressed you pig."
"Oink oink, mother dear."
On that sentiment, the beast turned and disappeared behind the rock.
"Are you hurt?" the woman asked with mock tenderness.
It was hard to hear. Scott’s attention had focused on Ingrid. Varion and Dixon were still tending to her. Neck throbbing, legs shaking, Scott rose to his feet. Fifty steps--that was all it would take to get her back into his arms. So easy. If only the ache around his windpipe would recede just a little; if only his spine, which felt twisted by vice grips, could support his weight for just a few more seconds.
He staggered forward while trying to call Ingrid's name. No joy. His voice didn’t want to bother. It came out in a whisper that stung like broken glass. To make matters worse, a hand fell on his shoulder, impeding his already delicate progress. Scott turned—and there was the dark woman who had postponed his demise. She stood as tall as he. Her eyes were black marbles; her breath stank of cheap whiskey.
"Hi," she chirped. "I'm Nancy. You must be Scott."
"No..."
She put on a crooked smile and cocked her eye. "Yes you are. Who else would dive into that water for Ingrid?"
"No," Scott whispered again, "I mean...leave me alone."
"Ha! You're welcome!" Suddenly she had hold of his other shoulder. "You," she said, pulling him closer, "need to sleep. Okay?"
Scott, for the third time: "No..."
The black marbles gleamed. "Yes, Scott. Look at me. That's it. Now listen."
"I can't."
"Makatulog," she breathed. "Makatulog."
Scott tried to look away. But his eyes refused the order. The dark woman kept bringing her face closer and closer, holding his gaze in a grip that seemed--crazy as it was--even more powerful than the beast's.
"Makatulog," she kept whispering. "Sleep. Sleep, Scott. Makatulog."
He tried to fight it. But his legs buckled. Looking into her eyes had a vertiginous effect. Like outer space, they were abysmal, and it seemed that to fall into them was to fall forever.
"Makatulog..."
A quote from somewhere rose to the surface of Scott's thoughts: When you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you. Eyes fluttering, he collapsed on his knees, yet he still could not break free of the dark woman's stare.
"Sleep."
When you gaze long into an abyss...
"Sleep, Scott."
the abyss also gazes (unconscious, Scott fell to the sand)--
"Sleep."
into you.
Nancy smiled. "Good boy. Rest for awhile."
***
"Good girl. Wake up now."
Nancy's voice. That was the first thing Ingrid heard--the first thing she heard and comprehended--after her sojourn in the blue ice. Blue ice was all she could remember seeing after Randy's attack. It had risen around her in paralyzing thickness, just as her lungs gave way to the tide. What happened afterward was hard to pin down. Time, at that point, had come to a stop: the scream on her lips, the terror in her eyes, the flood in her chest. She hadn't been able to move. There'd been too much cold, blue weight. The pedestrian belief of death being a tunnel that led to fields of gold was a myth. Death, instead, seemed more like a glacier.
"Innngriiiid," the voice sang. "Hell-oooo!"
She was still groggy. It was hard to respond to the voice, or even lift her head. Yet somehow she managed both. "Nancy?" was the croak that came from her throat.
"Oh do you look awful."
Ingrid felt awful. Her hair hung over her face in dry, dead strings. The clothing she'd been dressed in appeared to be little more than rags. And her wrists, she now became aware of as her cognizance returned, were shackled over her head by thick, rusty chains.
"Where am I?" she wanted to know.
"You're in the hull of my brother's ship. The Barony. Can't you feel it?"
"Feel what?" Ingrid whispered.
"Oh come on. There's a storm outside. The ship's pitching merry hell."
"Is that why your legs are wobbling? I thought you were drunk again."
Nancy's eyes narrowed, but her voice remained cheerful. "Clever. Almost as clever as going skinny-dipping alone in Horseshoe Bay."
"Where's Scott?"
"On board. Somewhere. With the other two...what are their names? Dixon and Varion, right? We're all on our way across the lake to Woodward's castle."
The hull gave a creak as it rose on the swell of a wave and then fell hard. Lanterns swayed on their beams.
"Are you going to kill them?" Ingrid asked, when her stomach relaxed.
Nancy seemed to find the question ridiculous. "Of course," she said. "I just haven't decided how yet." Her features twisted in disgust. "Randy wanted to...make a mess. He doesn't enjoy men."
"And you do?"
"More than women at least. I'm going to make the Bremman boy suffer."
This last was spoken in a tone a woman might use to describe how she's going to cook the eggs for breakfast. Ingrid gave her head a shake in effort to clear it. Instead, the pain came on worse. Her biceps were throbbing as well; she wished she could lower her arms.
"Don't hurt Scott," she pleaded. "Please. It's my fault he's here in the first place."
The other woman recoiled. "I beg your pardon. It is not your fault. He loves you, Ingrid. Whoa!"
The Barony was pitching again. Nancy's boots stamped the floor for balance. Ingrid felt like throwing up.
"If anything it's his fault that you're here. But what does it matter? The daughter of the man who tried to kill my brother belongs to me again." Grinning, Nancy fetched a deep sigh. "This time through," she went on, leaning closer, "I'm not interested in captivity. At least not for long."
"You're interested in death."
"I am," Nancy agreed. "So was your father. So is Lisa." The grin dropped. "And so are you, Ingrid."
Ingrid looked at her. What was she saying?
"You're here to kill my brother," Nancy told her, as if she had asked the question aloud. "Right?"
With care that was almost like love, the older woman placed her hands on either side of Ingrid's face, splaying her fingers wide. Then, she began to pull the lids of Ingrid's eyes open.
"Am I right?"
The fingers were strong--far too strong. Even at her most powerful--and this was not one of those moments--Ingrid knew she would be no match for Nancy.
"I came to stop him from killing others," she explained, twisting in the other's grasp. "What are you doing?"
Instead of answering, Nancy repeated her. "You came to stop him from killing others. How noble. Oh Ingrid." Her long fingers continued to widen, stretching the skin around Ingrid's eyeballs to the limit while her neck was forced backward.
She couldn't blink. Hot, dry air from the lanterns began to feed on the moisture around her corneas. "Stop it!" she screamed.
"You really are a very stupid girl," Nancy said. "You w