The Best Science Fiction And Fantasy Of The Year Part 58

I excuse myself, claiming I need some alone time. This is, miraculously, not a lie. Then I head to the garage.

In my father's toolbox is a small hand axe. I'm doing this for the right reasons. The wrangler was correct all along. Maybe she was in the same situation I'm in. Tricked into caring for a unicorn that became increasingly dangerous, that created little monsters of its own. Maybe she was right to try to drown Venom's offspring, to let Venom die-or even kill the unicorn herself at last. Maybe the wrangler possessed the grace that I could not muster on my own.

I approach Flower's box. I can tell he's happy I've come, but something's wrong. There's a hole chewed in the side of the box. The box is empty.

"Flower?" I say, spinning. He's still in the garage, hiding. He thinks this is a game. Flower's joy is palpable. He's so proud of himself. Clever beast, escaping. Freedom. Showing off for me when I come home. Each emotion is clearer than the last, and I realize that every moment I spend with the unicorn is giving it more access to my mind, to my soul.

I tighten my grip on the handle of the axe. I must must cast it out. "Come here, Flower." cast it out. "Come here, Flower."

The unicorn usually obeys my every command, but he's hesitant now. Perhaps he's even smarter than I thought. Perhaps since I can read his thoughts, he can read mine and knows I mean him harm. I try to project my usual tenderness.

"Flower," I coax, following my senses through the garage, behind the saw table, under the disused weight bench, over to the old camping equipment. There are holes in the bag where we keep our cooking supplies, and utensils are strewn all over the floor. "Come here, baby."

I hear rustling from the darkness. Flower is unsure of my motives, confused by my tone.

"Flower," I try again, my voice wavering over more sobs. How do soldiers do it? How do the real unicorn hunters? The trained ones? "Don't you get it? I have to! I have have to..." to..."

The unicorn steps out of the shadows, his blue eyes trained on me. His mouth is open, panting slightly, so that he almost looks like he's smiling. I can see brand-new white teeth breaking through the gums. Teeth that helped him chew through the cardboard. Teeth he might use on my parents, or my friends.

I have to, I cry to the unicorn inside my head. Flower's matchstick legs wobble a few steps closer, and he watches me, eyes full of trust. This is the creature I've held and fed every night and every morning.

The flower in the center of his forehead is red now, glistening, enflamed and engorged like a ma.s.sive, starburst-shaped boil. The horn is coming. The horn, and the poison, and all of the danger that marks this monster's-this demon's-entire species. I can't let him survive. I can't.

This is the animal I caressed until he fell asleep, who I crooned to while he cried, who I dreamed of every night, who I've run through the yard by moonlight, who I rushed home to day after day. I watched him be born; I held him in my arms, still wet from his mother; and I crushed him to my chest so he wouldn't freeze. I've hidden him and protected him and given up everything to keep him safe.

Flower bends his forelegs and lowers his head to the floor. He bows before me, just like his mother, and stretches out his neck as if for sacrifice. I could do it now; it would be so easy.

I drop the axe and fall to my knees.

Under cover of twilight I take Flower out to the woods. The deadly woods. The forbidden woods. With an old rubber-coated bicycle chain for a collar and a leash made from steel cable that Dad uses to tie his boat to his truck, I secure the unicorn to a tree, then create a makeshift shelter in the brush right next to it. From a few feet away you can hardly tell there's anything unnatural there. And at least he's out of our yard. No one will go into the woods-not after this new attack.

Flower is quiet while I work, and still, as if he knows how close he came to death. He trots obediently into the shelter and settles down on a pile of leaves. I leave the unicorn a package of ground turkey for dinner. Now that his teeth are in, I don't even need to bother with the blender anymore, but I figure that the food should still be soft. Baby food, for a predator.

The woods are still now. No helicopters, no searchlights. No sounds of birds or insects, either, as if they also recognize the presence of my monster. Beyond Flower, I can sense no unicorn. I stretch out my awareness to its limit, searching for the other one I know must still be alive, and I find nothing. It feels incredible, but then I recoil from the magic.

After all, haven't I sinned enough for one day?

In Sunday school the next morning, we talk about the Book of Daniel. When we get to the part about the one-horned goat, everyone goes quiet. It's bad timing on the teacher's part.

"Ms. Guzman?" A boy raises his hand. "Do you think that's a unicorn? That one they put on the news the other day-it kind of looked like a goat."

"It's possible," Ms. Guzman says. "In fact, there are older translations of the Bible that call it a unicorn. When this translation was made, however, we didn't know there were unicorns, so they called it a goat instead. If Daniel did see a unicorn in his prophetic vision, what do you think it meant?"

"That whatever was coming would be much more vicious and dangerous than if it was a goat," says one of the girls. "If it really was a unicorn in his vision, that makes it a much scarier one."

"And it makes more sense if it is a unicorn," says another girl, "because it goes on to say that neither the ram nor anyone else was strong enough to withstand the goat's power. And that's what they say about unicorns, that no one can cure the poison, that no one can catch or kill them."

"Someone can catch them," I find myself saying. "And maybe the goat kind of unicorn-Well, maybe they aren't vicious. So maybe the vision meant that Daniel should-"

"What?" asks the boy. "Hang out with the man-eating monster?"

"He hung out with man-eating lions," I snap.

"I think we're getting a little off topic," says Ms. Guzman. "The point is, no matter how powerful this unicorn might be-and the angel Gabriel explains to Daniel that the unicorn in the vision represents the pagan king Alexander the Great-all these kingdoms, the ram, the unicorn, all of it, are destined to fall because they are man's kingdoms, human kingdoms, and not the kingdom of G.o.d."

Ms. Guzman talks about G.o.d a little more, but I can't pay attention. I've been praying to G.o.d about Flower for weeks, hoping He'll forgive me for lying to my parents, hoping He'll forgive me for betraying Rebecca's and John's memories by taking care of a unicorn. I've been waiting for a single sign of violence from Flower, a clear sign that he is as dangerous as all the others so I can kill him with a clear conscience-but I've not seen anything. Is it because Flower isn't a killer? Or is it because I'm like Daniel in the lion's den? Is G.o.d protecting me?

And if so, why didn't He protect Rebecca and John?

Weeks pa.s.s, and Flower remains my secret. The unicorn is eating real food now-chicken thighs and kidneys and pork shoulders and anything else I can find on sale at the supermarket. I'm burning through my savings at an alarming rate, but I know my mom would notice if I started stealing meat from our fridge. Flower must be deadly bored, hanging out in the makeshift shelter all day, but he's out of sight of my parents and out of reach of any danger, so that's all that matters. With the woods off-limits to everyone in the neighborhood, the only thing that could hurt him is one of his elders, and I haven't sensed any during our nightly runs through the forest. The unicorn likes when I run alongside him, I've learned, and I admit, I love how fast we can go together. Branches and roots are never in my way when I'm flying through the forest with the unicorn at my side. If only he weren't illegal, I'd keep Flower around and stay on the track team.

But if I tried that, the unicorn might try to eat the spectators. Plus, Aidan would totally call me out on being a jock. Not that it matters. Even if Aidan did decide he liked me, I could never go out with him. Every time I see his cast, I'm reminded that it's only through G.o.d's grace that I avoided being the cause of his death. I could have killed them all, and yet I persist in this defiant path through my own weakness.

School is torture now. Since finding out about my cousins, Summer writes my odd behavior off as post-traumatic stress when it comes to unicorns. Yves doesn't correct her, and I don't enlighten any of them. They know unicorns are deadly, my parents tell me that they are evil, and I know everyone is right.

But I still love mine.

Flower is already half as tall as his mother, and his silver-white coat turns long and wavy. I draw the line at brushing it, but I'm pretty sure that if I bothered to, Flower would look as pretty as any unicorn in a fairy story. Even his dangerous horn is pretty-a smooth, creamy gray that twists like a corkscrew and seems to grow longer by the day. You can hardly see the remnants of the flower-shaped marking that gave my Flower his name.

One night, as I sneak into the woods for our usual evening romp, I catch a strange scent in the air. The reek of unicorn is as strong as ever, but there's something else carried aloft on the summer breeze. Something horrible. Flower rustles in the shelter as I approach, and the unicorn's elation stings like a cramp. What kind of life have I consigned this animal to? Alone all day, chained to a tree, never allowed to run except for a short half-hour each night when I should be in bed?

From my pocket I retrieve the bits of ham I secreted away from dinner and hurry toward the clearing. The smell grows stronger, and as I round the last tree, I put my foot down in something slick and sprawl onto the forest floor.

At eye level is a rabbit. Or what used to be a rabbit. The remains-mostly skin-are almost unrecognizable, except for a pair of floppy ears.

A few feet farther on is the half-digested skin of a chipmunk. Then a squirrel, and a scattering of sparrows.

I raise myself on my elbows and try not to gag.

In the center of the carnage sits Flower, with what looks like leftover racc.o.o.n all over his snout, and his chain lying in crumpled chewed-up chunks at his hooves. Flower looks at me, proud as punch, and thumps his tail against the earth.

Flower? Try Flayer Flayer.

My killer unicorn is finally living up to the name.

I fix the restraints, but the unicorn gnaws through them again. I spend the last of my savings on the heaviest chain the local hardware store supplies. Flayer, as I've taken to calling him, takes four days to chew up this one and then, in retaliation, procures a feast. I find the unicorn on his back in the shelter, four hooves in the air, drunk with the blood of small woodland creatures.

Oddly enough, this new evidence of the unicorn's deadly abilities only confuses me further. I wonder if killer unicorns are really the work of the Devil. I've seen Flayer in his natural element, covered in gore, tearing apart flesh and bone, and loving every minute-and though he's not exactly a candidate for a petting farm, neither does he seem like an evil demon. Dogs and cats and great white sharks do that too. Biscuit likes leaving mice and frogs and crickets as gifts on old Mrs. Schaffer's porch. I eat cows and chickens and pigs and fish. Flayer is a predator. That's not against G.o.d's plan.

But then I remember what that other unicorn did to my cousins, and I'm not so sure. Perhaps my ability to accept these acts of violence in my unicorn is nothing more than a sign of my own corrupted soul. I defied my parents, indulged the magic, raised a killer unicorn by hand. Maybe I'm past all redemption.

As if to prove the point, on our run this evening Flayer decides to s.n.a.t.c.h bats out of thin air for an evening snack. I hear him crunch their little bones, listen to them squeak their last, and shut my eyes to the sight of him tearing through their leathery wings. An animal that eats bats must be a creature of darkness, right?

We return to the shelter and I get Flayer settled down for the night, encouraging him to lie quietly and remain here, and above all, not to destroy the final length of chain. Thankfully, even when he has escaped his bonds, the unicorn hasn't wandered too far on his own yet. With the woods being off-limits, I can only hope that whatever slim precautions I can take will be enough to protect him from people, and enough to protect people from him him. I've read stuff online about how baby fawns will wait in the brush for their mother to forage, but Flayer's obviously not going to be a baby much longer. He'll graduate from bats to people. Then what will I do?

I think about this on my much slower walk back to my yard and as I edge around the moonlight on my lawn, sticking to shadows in case my parents are randomly looking out the window.

They aren't. But someone else is. As I am rounding the back porch, I catch movement out of the corner of my eye. Yves is standing at his bedroom window, and he's staring down at me.

I successfully avoid him the entire next day at school, and volunteer to accompany Mom on a shopping trip on Sat.u.r.day, so I miss both of his phone calls and the time he drops by the house for a chat. My parents raised me to return calls, but I find that disobeying them concerning the unicorn is indeed a slippery slope, and I avoid calling him all evening. He's waiting for me on the porch after church on Sunday, though, and since my parents are there, I can hardly run past him and into the house-or worse, up to the woods.

"Hey there, Wen," he says. "Long time, no see."

If I were any good at lying, I'd have explained to my folks that I was mad at Yves. If I were any good at lying, I'd tell Yves he was imagining things in his bedroom that night.

But I'm not, and Yves knows it. And as soon as the screen door closes after my parents, the smile fades from his face.

"What's going on with you?" The spring sun suddenly feels more like the glow of an interrogation lamp. I can feel my church skirt sticking to the back of my knees.

"Nothing."

"Don't give me that. You're hiding from everyone in school, and you're sneaking into the woods."

I look away. Old Mrs. Schaffer is shuffling down the street, pausing at telephone poles and mailboxes and peering into open garage doors.

At church today I prayed that G.o.d would show me a way out of this mess. I can't let Flayer go, but I can't keep him either. I can't tell my parents what I've been up to. I can't figure out what to do. I know now why the lady at the carnival was so upset. Like me, she was trapped.

And Venom ended up dead. My throat closes up if I try to picture a future like that for my unicorn.

"Do you have a death wish?" Yves's voice cuts through my reverie.

"What?" I turn back to him.

"Are you out there looking for-for unicorns? You think you can kill them or something, because of what those people said to you?"

I laugh. "Trust me, Yves. If there's one thing I'm positive I can't do, it's kill a unicorn." Spoil it rotten with hamburger meat? Teach it to come when called? Treat it like a jogging partner? Sure. But kill one? Forget it.

Yves's collar is open, and there's a dab of moisture in the hollow at his throat. I wonder how long he's been waiting out here for me. And if it's this hot for him, Flayer must really be sweltering in his shelter-if the unicorn is even there, and not out on a rampage.

I shut my eyes for a moment. If I don't stop dwelling on Flayer, Yves will be able to read the truth on my face. If I don't stop staring at him, things will get even weirder.

"Wen, I saw saw you." He takes two steps, and suddenly he's on top of me, speaking in a voice that's so low I almost need my unicorn senses to hear him. He puts his hand over mine on the porch railing, and it practically sears my skin. "Tell me. You know you can tell me anything." you." He takes two steps, and suddenly he's on top of me, speaking in a voice that's so low I almost need my unicorn senses to hear him. He puts his hand over mine on the porch railing, and it practically sears my skin. "Tell me. You know you can tell me anything."

"h.e.l.lo, children." Mrs. Schaffer's standing on the walk. "You haven't seen my Biscuit around anywhere, have you?"

"No, ma'am," Yves mumbles. Beside him, I stiffen. He glances at our joined hands, and when I try to pull away, he clamps down. He knows me so well.

"I haven't seen the poor thing since Friday morning."

I can't swallow. I certainly can't speak. Yves squeezes my hand in his, and it's not hard enough to bring tears, but somehow they're welling up in my eyes.

"I'm just so worried about him," Mrs. Schaffer goes on.

I hate that mangy old cat. It pees on our newspaper. It rips up our flower beds. It tears down the wind catchers Mom hangs on our porch.

And it's totally toast.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Schaffer," I choke out. "I-"

"-hope you find him soon," Yves finishes, and tugs my hand. "We have to go."

I stumble, blind with tears, into the backyard. I've hated Biscuit for years, but that doesn't make him food. Random, nameless rabbits and racc.o.o.ns are one thing. But Biscuit? Mrs. Schaffer loved him like I love Flayer. What have I done?

Yves pulls me into the shade behind the kitchen door and makes me look at him. We used to make mud pies back here. We used to make dandelion crowns and willow swords.

"It's a unicorn, isn't it?" he asks. "A unicorn ate Biscuit."

I nod, miserably.

"Oh, no. Wen, I'm so sorry." He pulls me into a hug. "I know it was just a stupid cat, but it must remind you of-"

"No." I shove the word out as I push him away. "You don't understand. It's my fault."

"Stop saying that," he cries. "This is exactly what I'm talking about. You have to stop blaming yourself for this. Stop punishing yourself. Stop going into the woods and endangering yourself. I don't care if you think you're irresistible to unicorns or whatever stupid stuff those people told you."

"Invincible," I say with a sniff. "And irresistible, I guess." irresistible, I guess."

"Listen to me," he says, and tilts his head close to mine. "Look at me." I do. I see a hundred Sunday afternoons and a thousand after-school playdates and one very black night last fall. Yves's eyes are dark and clear. "Rebecca and John weren't your fault, and Biscuit isn't either."

"It is. This one is." I take a deep breath, but I don't look away. "Yves."

"Wen." It's a whisper.

"I have to show you something. You're the only one who'll understand."

He doesn't hesitate, not even for a moment. I'm the girl who beats him at Skee-Ball; he's the first boy I ever kissed. Yves takes my hand, and I lead him into the forbidden woods.

I can feel the unicorn, sleeping through the afternoon heat. We'll just have to keep our distance, like with Venom at the sideshow. Flayer is chained, so Yves will be safe.