Thor. Part 17

The rock smashed into the werewolf's pointed ear, crushing the thin flesh and tearing open a painful-looking gash. The werewolf shrieked and started up the hill when another, smaller rock whistled down and struck its right cheekbone. Another rock flew past, and the beast took cover.

As soon as he saw the werewolf duck behind a tree, Tom turned and scrambled over the top of the hill, emerging onto a level area of the woods. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the werewolf coming up. He threw two more rocks at it and missed both times.

He only had two rocks left. Better save them. He turned and ran toward the thinnest-looking underbrush on the plateau - he'd long since forgotten about finding paths.

He wanted desperately to believe it was all a dream, that any moment he would wake up, frightened but safe in his bedroom. But the pain in his lungs, the ground hitting his feet, the branches that whipped his face and cut his hands were all undeniably real, regardless of the grotesque impossibility that was chasing him.

He wished he could stop and hide for a second, just to catch his breath and see if it was still behind him, but the insanity of the idea only deepened his terror.

Don't look back, it might be gaining on you.

He ran as only a man in fear for his life can run; ceaselessly, mindless of the fire in his lungs and legs. His hands burned from the scratches they took pushing the branches out of the way. His legs felt warm, then hot, then almost weightless, creating the eerie sensation that he was floating through the forest without touching the ground. It occurred to him that the shadows no longer stretched out in front of him. Had he somehow turned around?

But no - the moon was almost directly overhead.

How long had he been running?

He slowed down just a little, trying to hear if there was anything behind him. What if the monster had given up and gone back to the house instead?

It was impossible to listen while he ran - all he could hear was his own breathing. He chanced a quick look over his shoulder and saw nothing. He couldn't keep running forever. He had to find out if the werewolf was still back there.

He picked out a large tree up ahead, just next to the path, and decided to duck behind it. By the time he made his decision he was almost there.

The tree came up the path at him and he scooted behind it and pressed his body against the trunk. He tried to hold his breath, but it was impossible. His chest refused to stop heaving - his blood was screaming for oxygen. He took five deep breaths and clamped his hand over his nose and mouth.

In the stillness that followed, a series of rapid footsteps suddenly came to a halt twenty or thirty yards back. The werewolf had been behind him all along, gradually closing the distance between them without revealing its presence. And Tom had stopped and let it catch up even more. He was lost.

His only chance was to keep perfectly still and hope the thing didn't find him. His lungs heaved and his body rocked as he held his nose against the urgent demand for air. If he let go and gasped, the werewolf would be on him in seconds. But he couldn't hold his breath forever.

He unb.u.t.toned his shirt with his free hand and pulled it over his mouth and nose. He pressed the fabric into his mouth and willed himself to take a shallow breath, but his will was no match for his lungs.

He sucked in air like a drowning man, wheezing and gasping so loud that he couldn't hear anything else. Then he regained control and heard the footsteps dashing in his direction.

Desperate, he looked up the tree. There was a single branch, about eight feet off the ground. He leaped for it and, to his astonishment, snagged it on the first try. He heard the werewolf's footsteps racing toward him as he gripped the limb with both hands and hauled himself up. In the midst of his panic, he heard a perfectly calm voice in his head say, It's amazing what you can do when your life depends on it.

The werewolf rushed the tree just in time to see Tom's feet swing up and out of its reach.

The werewolf regarded him with hungry eyes that showed no trace of recognition. Moonlight gleamed on its sharp canine fangs and saliva ran down its chin.

The werewolf leaped and grabbed the limb. As its short, stubby fingers closed around the branch, Tom swung the flashlight down hard on the creature's knuckles. The werewolf howled and jerked its hand back, then grabbed the tree with both hands, bit it, and shook it with tremendous force. Tom held on for his life.

"Please G.o.d please G.o.d Jesus please don't let it get me please G.o.d Jesus please please please," he chanted, only dimly aware that he was speaking out loud. The werewolf let go of the tree, leaped suddenly, and caught hold of the branch with both misshapen hands. Tom swung the flashlight in panic, but the werewolf was ready for him. It reached up and grabbed the flashlight and threw it into bushes about twenty feet from the tree.

The werewolf began to haul itself up and Tom kicked its fingers and ground his heel into its knuckles. Again the werewolf howled and tried to pull away, but its hand was pinned to the branch by Tom's boot. Tom dug a rock out of his pocket and hurled it straight down into the werewolf's face. It struck the monster across the bridge of its nose, and Tom was sure he heard the sharp click of breaking bone.

The creature yanked its hand out from under Tom's foot and he almost fell out of the tree.

The werewolf shrieked and licked its damaged fingers and touched its puffing face tenderly. It stared up at Tom with boundless hatred, hissing and showing its fangs.

Tom unconsciously pulled himself up another inch or two, transfixed by the living nightmare below.

One of the werewolf's eyes had swollen shut and a thin line of blood trickled from it to the creature's mouth. The werewolf glared at Tom with its good eye, as if wondering how to get him out of the tree.

Then its face brightened suddenly. As if remembering something important, it took one last look at Tom, grinned hideously, and ran off.

Tom breathed a sigh of relief as he watched the creature disappear into the forest.

Toward the moon. East.

Toward the house.

Oh my G.o.d! Tom thought. Janet! The kids!

Chapter 16.

Thor lay in the cramped cage, listening to his heartbeat in the darkness. The Angel of Death had left for the day, and with no humans to hear them, only a few die-hard animals still howled and cried. Perhaps Thor's turn would come tomorrow. He hoped he wouldn't have to wait long.

A sc.r.a.ping noise at the front door startled him out of his gloom. Maybe the Angel of Death had come back for him.

A piercing screech of metal against metal shocked the animals into silence, followed by a series of loud bangs, the high-pitched scream of gla.s.s shattering, and the squeaky crunch of feet grinding gla.s.s into concrete. Someone had broken into the outer lobby.

m.u.f.fled voices in the lobby sounded strangely familiar. A crowbar sc.r.a.ped against the metal frame of the inner door for a moment, then stopped. The voices argued for a second, then the gla.s.s pane of the inner door exploded with a terrific crash, scattering bits of broken gla.s.s across the floor. A crowbar swung around the opening, knocking a few of the larger pieces of gla.s.s out of the door frame. Then Teddy and Brett stepped into the House of Death.

"Jeez," Teddy said. "If we let him out now, he'll cut his feet. You look for his cage while I find a broom." He handed the crowbar to Brett and tried the doorway to Death. It was unlocked. Thor panicked as he watched Teddy step into the Death room. But seconds later, he emerged, still alive, with a broom in his hands. Brett found Thor's cage and attacked it with the crowbar while Teddy swept the broken gla.s.s away from the cages.

Teddy looked up from sweeping and saw Brett struggling with the crowbar and getting nowhere.

"Here, gimme that," he said.

Brett had wedged the curved end of the crowbar into the door, but he wasn't strong enough to pry it open. Teddy grabbed the long end with both hands and put one foot against the cage, and together they wrenched the door out of its frame, with its tiny padlock still locked. Teddy peered into the cage.

"C'mon, Thor! You're free!"

Thor looked back at Teddy with oddly mixed feelings. There was something undeniably pleasant about seeing him, but what was he doing here? Thor was no longer part of the Pack. And even if his crime was forgivable, which it wasn't, only Dad could forgive him - not the Pack's pups. Not those he outranked.

"Come on!" Teddy ordered, pulling on the muzzle Thor still wore. He tried to sound authoritative, as he had so often recently, but he possessed no authority.

But Thor heard something else in Teddy's voice - desperation.

Thor could ignore Teddy's bl.u.s.ter forever, but he could not ignore his needs - that would only compound Thor's guilt, and he couldn't bear that.

Just when the pain had begun to fade and he'd started to feel nothing, these two had to come along.

"Thor, come on," Brett added, and there was a hitch in his voice - he would start crying any moment. Brett crawled into the mouth of the cage and unfastened the muzzle.

What was this all about? Thor looked closely at the boys for the first time, and for a moment forgot his Badness and saw only their terror.

They needed him. Desperately. And it was his fault.

The Bad Thing wasn't dead. On top of all Thor's Badness, all his mistakes, he had failed to do his Duty, failed to kill the Bad Thing.

The kids were scared, more scared than he'd ever seen them before.

Pack member or not, he still loved them. He couldn't turn his back on them.

He shakily got to his feet and crawled out of the tiny cage. Brett took his collar to guide him through the gla.s.s to the front door.

"I got an idea!" Teddy said. "You take him out and wait for me in the woods. I'm gonna let the other animals out. That way, they won't know who did it." Brett wasn't sure about Teddy's plan, but there was no time to argue. The pound was a good block away from the nearest house, almost completely surrounded by forest, but breaking through the doors had been unbelievably loud. Brett was sure a sheriff's deputy would arrive at any second.

He led Thor to the back of the building and into the woods, where they waited for Teddy. They hid in a thicket behind the building, where Brett could see the gravel road that led through the trees to town.

Dogs and cats suddenly darted out of the front door. Some limped from cuts on their feet, and some limped from being locked in tiny cages with no room to stand or walk, but all were glad to be free. Brett counted seven dogs and ten cats before the flashing red and blue lights appeared at the far end of the road.

"Teddyyyyyyy!"

One last dog came out and ran directly toward the patrol car, which skidded to a halt. Teddy shot through the door holding the crowbar and circled to the back of the building, and the three of them took off into the woods as fast as their feet would carry them.

The patrol car pulled up to the building with its searchlight focused on the shattered front door, and the officer radioed headquarters before getting out. He'd seen the kid run around the building, but made no attempt to chase him. There was no point in trying to find a kid in the woods at night, even with a full moon. He got out and walked around the building to see if there were any more kids around, then went inside to a.s.sess the damage and look for clues to the punk's ident.i.ty.

Teddy and Brett knew this part of the woods better than any adult. They were on a path that would eventually take them straight to their house.

After a few hundred yards, Thor recognized the path, too. He'd taken it once, coming the other way, but had never followed it to the end. He'd heard the animals crying faintly in the distance and turned back, disturbed and frightened and not sure why.

Now he wished he could go back to the place where the animals cried, but he couldn't, not yet. He still had work to do.

Janet couldn't believe her eyes. The local TV station was signing off for the night. After Letterman, she'd watched Craig Ferguson with the sound low and the lights out and no idea what she was watching. And now it was over, and she was still awake. She decided to get up and make herself a cup of decaf and see how Tom was doing. h.e.l.l, she wasn't going to get any sleep tonight, either. She was beyond kidding herself that she might.

Fact was, she loved that d.a.m.n dog almost as much as Tom did, and that was all she could think about. Watching TV had been nothing but a lame attempt to shut out the trauma of the day's events, and it hadn't worked.

She dragged herself out of bed, put on a robe and slippers, and turned off the set. Tom would no doubt be glad to see her after all these hours by himself. She'd expected him to come to bed a long time ago.

On the way to the stairs, she stopped to check on the kids.

She gently opened Debbie's door and crept in. Debbie was sound asleep, clutching a tiny stuffed elephant.

She checked the boys' room. The door was open a crack and she could see them asleep in bed, but she went inside for a closer look. They always looked so angelic when they were sleeping. But Brett's head was completely under the covers, and it was an awfully warm night for all those blankets. She gently pulled them away and found a pillow underneath. Startled, she s.n.a.t.c.hed the blanket off. There was a pile of clothes and blankets and nothing else.

She checked Teddy's bed and found the same: wadded covers and clothes, but no son.

They must be downstairs with Tom.

She hurried to the hall and started down the stairs. No light filtered up from the kitchen, and no sound, either. She wasn't even halfway down when she realized there was no one else in the house. She could feel it.

The whole first floor was dark. Where was Tom? She turned on the kitchen light, expecting to see a note on the kitchen table, explaining everything. Nothing.

She felt the cold touch of fear run from the base of her neck down to her toes.

Then she noticed the lights in Ted's apartment - that must be where they are!

She marched across the driveway, mentally composing the tongue-lashing she was about to give her husband. She climbed the stairs, trying to ignore her growing awareness that the apartment was as silent as the house.

She paused on the landing to listen before knocking. There was nothing, not a sound. Anger gave way to fear as she lightly tapped the gla.s.s pane with her knuckles.

"Ted?" she said. "Are you in there?" She knocked again, not expecting an answer, then banged the door loud enough to wake the neighbors.

Still nothing.

She saw an image in her mind of her family lying dead on the apartment floor, asphyxiated by a gas leak. Then she remembered there was no gas in the apartment.

She twisted the doork.n.o.b and rattled the door, but it refused to open. She thought for a second and gathered up a handful of robe and wrapped it around her fist. She turned her face away and squinted, punched a hole in the window, reached in and opened the door.

A single lamp burned on the nightstand. There was no other sign that anyone had been in the apartment all night. The bed was made with the covers pulled back, untouched, ready to be used. Everything else was in its place, as tidy as could be.

What the h.e.l.l is going on here?

She checked the driveway from the landing. All the cars were there, parked and waiting, like Ted's bed.

"Teddy! Brett! Tom!" she shouted into the night. No answer.

She hurried back to the house to call the sheriff, but once in the kitchen she wasn't sure.

There was no sign of foul play. The kids obviously left of their own free will if they stopped to stuff their beds first. And no one could have sneaked into the house and taken them all with her in the bedroom. She told herself to be rational, get a grip. No doubt the boys couldn't sleep, so they went downstairs to talk to Tom. Then Ted came in, and they all decided to go for a walk.

Sure. A walk in the middle of the night. Just the four of them.

Why didn't Tom leave a note? It wasn't like him. It didn't add up.

She turned on the lights in the kitchen and looked for a clue to their whereabouts. Nothing. She went back upstairs and examined the boys' room more carefully, but still found nothing. Finally she went back down and stood on the front porch, calling their names at the top of her lungs, then did the same at the back door.

She was standing on the back steps, just about ready to get her car keys and start looking for them, when she heard something coming from the woods and breathed a sigh of relief.

"What are you doing out there, dammit?" she shouted, unable to see who it was in the dark. Then the creature stepped out of the woods and into the moonlight.

It was tall, as tall as a man, but covered with hair and grotesquely hunched over and twisted-looking. Its face seemed to be all teeth. Janet gasped and took a single step backward into the kitchen, slamming and locking the door behind her.

The thing in the gully wasted no time. It dashed across the backyard and onto the back steps, slamming its fist through the gla.s.s pane and b.l.o.o.d.ying its clawed hand in the process. But it didn't seem to know enough to reach in and unlock the door. Instead it pounded and kicked, trying to make the window opening big enough to pa.s.s through. Janet jerked a flatware drawer open, sending spoons and forks clattering to the floor. She grabbed the biggest knife and ran for the stairs. She had to protect Debbie.

The werewolf gave the door a final vicious kick and it split down the middle.