FSE

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35

"Daddy, am I too heavy?"

"No, sweetie. You're light as a feather."

"Are you sure? I can walk for a while. I don't mind."

Don't let them see. Godsdammit, James, don't you dare let them see...

"Daddy?"

James smiled and kept going, stepping over rocks and fallen logs, each one a potentially deadly obstacle. "We'll go just a little bit further, okay? Just until it gets dark."

She hesitated, clearly sensing that something was wrong, but in the end, she was just an exhausted little girl. She rested her head against his shoulder, squeezed him tight, and said, "Okay, Daddy."

"And how are you doing back there, Luke?" James said, suppressing a sigh of relief. "You'd better pick 'em up and lay 'em down if you don't want to get left behind."

"I'm right here, Dad."

"And Timmy-boy? How's that bump on your noggin?"

"It's fine."

"All right. This time tomorrow, we'll be at your uncle Jon's, eating his awful cooking. I don't know how poor Jonah does it. You remember your cousin, right? The one who used to fold all those silly little paper hats?"

Keep it light. Keep them going. Don't give them time to think. One step at a time. One step at a -

James breathed too deeply and another searing bolt of pain shot through his chest, impossibly deep, and he had to bite down on his tongue to keep from screaming. That would only upset Valery. So he kept going, putting one foot in front of the other, listening to the hypnotic rhythm of his shoes sinking into the snow.

The trees were thick here, growing so close together it felt more like a maze than a forest. Their bare branches were laden with white powder, making them creak and groan above their heads. Twigs stuck out in random profusion, black lines against the white, playing tricks on his exhausted mind. Sometimes they looked like the legs of a giant spider, entombed in frost. Sometimes they looked like hideous black claws, reaching out for them, grabbing hold of their ragged clothes, ripping and tearing, trying to pull them back.

She will be a part of me... forever...

James gave his head a quick shake.

Just keep going. Don't give up. We're almost there. All we need to do is keep north east. Where is the sun?

The shadows were more numerous than the light, separated from each other by only the thinnest lines of sunshine, sparkling against the snow. Once the sun set behind the mountain, it would be too dark, too cold, and too dangerous to continue. But stopping, even for a moment, seemed just as dangerous when there was a monster after their blood.

What should he do? James felt like he was gambling with their lives with every decision he made. How could he predict which was right and which was wrong? What if there was no right choice, and all roads eventually lead to their deaths, whether it be by the teeth of that demon, or by the cold embrace of winter?

Don't think like that! You promised Emmy you'd take care of them, so you damn well better do it!

James gritted his teeth and kept going, pretending like he couldn't feel Valery's weight pressing against his back, pretending like he wasn't aware of Luke and Tim's careful glances, trying to gauge if their father really was okay, pretending like the wound in his chest wasn't sapping him of energy at every step.

"Dad." Luke came up beside him. "You've been carrying Vee all day. I can take her for a while."

"It's okay, son," James said. "We'll just keep going till we reach that big tree over there and then we'll make camp for the night. How does that sound?"

Luke examined him carefully. James could feel the boy's eyes roving all over his face, taking in every scrap of information, from the haggard way he was breathing right down to his gait. If he was lucky, Luke would simply dismiss it as exhaustion. If he could keep it up for only one more day, everything would be fine. They'd finally be safe.

"Okay, Dad," Luke said, evidently satisfied. At least for now.

James almost sighed out loud in relief. He couldn't afford to let the kids see what bad shape he was in, especially not Luke. The boy would end up killing himself trying to take responsibility for everyone else, and that was not his job. His job was being a kid. James's job was being a dad, and a dad was exactly what he would be.

The big tree with the gnarled braches wasn't coming any closer, no matter how many steps James took, but he kept walking anyway, knowing it would have no choice but to come closer, as long as he didn't give up. Eventually, he started to make out knots in the trunk, knots that looked almost like eyes... lines of eyes - four, six, eight, like a spider's... such a pity. That was an ash tree. It would have made for a damn fine dining room table were it not for all those ugly knots...

Keep it together, James. Just a little bit further. Just... a little... bit...

He finally stepped inside the big tree's shadow, a small, but vitally important victory.

"All right," he said, turning to face the boys. He hoped his voice sounded normal enough. "Luke, Tim, you stay here and take care of Valery. I'll go and find some firewood. I won't go far. And..." James racked his tired, aching brain, trying to figure out if he had missed something. "Just be careful, okay? If you see or hear something weird, just yell and I'll come running."

They nodded. "Okay, Dad."

I'll take care of you... I promise... I'll take good care of you...

*

The tree was hard against his back, and his eyelids were heavy with fatigue. They kept falling shut of their own accord, and it was getting harder and harder to lift them each time, but James couldn't allow himself to fall asleep. He had to stay vigilant, for the kids. He was all they had left.

They looked so vulnerable in the stuttering glow of their little fire, so exposed. The boys had dropped off almost immediately, and as was often the case with brothers, they had somehow gravitated towards each other in the depths of sleep. Now Luke's left ear was brushing up against Tim's nose, and every time Luke moved or flicked his ear, Tim's face would scrunch up, like he was about to sneeze. A few seconds would pass, and both of them would settle down again, breathing softly.

Valery was sleeping on the other side of the fire, curled up into a tight little ball with her knees pulled up to her chin and her tail wrapped around her shins. It made her look even smaller than she actually was.

She was shivering.

James had to fight every instinct in his bones telling him to throw more wood on their meagre little fire. He had taken every precaution he could think of, but in their current situation, there really wasn't much for him to work with. He had scraped together a wall of snow around their little camp site, and he was only burning the driest hardwood he could find to minimize the smoke, but it didn't feel like he was doing enough. They needed a fire to stay alive, but who knows how far it might shine, or who might see the glow? Even the tiniest of flames seemed so bright on these darkest of nights, when the moon and the stars were hiding behind a thick layer of clouds.

James's head started to dip, and he snapped it back up with a little shake, his eyes darting from tree to tree, shades of deepest black inside oceans of deeper black still.

All was quiet save for the faint crackle of the fire.

His tired mind kept going through every possible thing that could go wrong. What if the fire died, and no one noticed until it was too late? They would simply sleep forever, never waking up again. What if that black demon was out there somewhere, getting closer, sniffing them out like some animal in the night? He could see it... that thing called Banno, lifting Valery up to its face, first licking, then biting...

I want to taste her...

Valery, struggling against his iron grip, trying to get free, reaching for her Daddy, her eyes streaked with tears, begging, pleading for him to come and save her...

I want to taste her death...

Banno's monstrous jaws opening wide, his red teeth shining in the night, dripping blood and drool onto her neck, the fangs clamping down in an explosion of -

James's head snapped up and a terrible bolt of pain stabbed him right in the chest. Every muscle in his body went rigid and he had to bite down hard on his lip to keep from screaming.

The kids were still asleep, the rise and fall of their slight bodies just barely visible in the faint firelight.

James carefully opened the shredded hole in his clothes and, dreading what he would see, looked down.

The moss he had stuffed against his wound when the kids weren't looking was soaked almost all the way through, turning it into a mushy black clump that reeked of iron and dirt.

Some healer I turned out to be. Can't even cauterize a single cut properly...

He gathered up the moss and threw it into the woods as far as he could manage, then fished a fresh clump from his pockets. This moss didn't have any medicinal benefits that he knew of, but if it could keep the blood from showing through his clothes, he would use it. Right now the kids needed him to be more than just a father. They needed him to be a rock. If he started cracking, what would happen to them then?

James gritted his teeth and packed the moss against the wound, not liking the way it burned beneath his touch. All that swelling couldn't be good, either. But a little swelling was to be expected, right? He did shove a red hot knife in there, after all.

James leaned his head back against the tree, breathing heavily, and told himself that this was not an infection. It was not. It couldn't be an infection because he couldn't afford an infection. Maybe once they got back to Grovenglen, but not right now. Right now he needed to be strong, he needed...

Oh gods, he needed Emily so badly...

He could feel the tears coming on. They built up inside the corners of his eyes, hot and stinging. They clogged his mouth and nose, making him want to gasp and sob. His entire face burned with the effort of keeping it in.

Don't cry... Don't you dare cry, you son of a bitch! You have no right to cry!

That's when he heard it, a soft mewl, barely louder than a whisper.

He opened his eyes.

The scene was just as he had left it. The boys, fast asleep and happily (yet also begrudgingly) sharing the same space by the fire, and Valery, curled up into a tight little ball, the light washing over her back.

The sound came again, accompanied by a slight heave of her shoulders, much too pronounced to be a trick of the light.

"Valery?" James whispered. She kept still, pretending to be asleep, but he knew. "Valery, come here. It's okay."

She twisted around and looked back over her shoulder, and in the dim light of their little camp fire, James could see the dull shine of tears in her eyes, and it was more than enough to make him forget about his own. He opened his arms, and his one and only girl came to him, sniffling and crying, and buried her face against his chest.

James held her and stroked her hair, feeling her shiver against his body.

"Daddy..."

"It's okay, Vee..." he whispered. "I'm here."

"I dreamed that you weren't..." Her voice was so soft, so choked with tears he could barely hear her, but the raw emotion with which she pulled the words out of herself spoke more than the words themselves. "I dreamed that it was just me and Luke and Tim, and it was dark, and we didn't know what to do, and..."

"Sorry, sweetie, but you're stuck with me. I'm not going anywhere, so you can just forget about that silly dream, okay?"

She nodded, smearing her tear-streaked face against his clothes. "Uh-huh."

"Dad?" Luke was sitting up, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand. "Something wrong?"

"She just had a bad dream, is all. You can go back to sleep."

"Vee did?" Luke blinked his bleary eyes. "Is she okay?"

She had already fallen asleep again, the poor thing. All of them were cold and hungry and tired, but she was so small, much too small to face problems like these. She had been through so much in such a short amount of time, and the fact that she was still the same little girl he loved so much was a miracle.

She reached up and placed her tiny hand right above his heart, as if to make sure that he really was still alive, that she still had her daddy, and that she wouldn't wake up to whatever nightmare had roused her from her slumber.

James hugged her close, the warmth of her tears burning even hotter than the flames of the fire. "Maybe not completely, but she will be. I'll make sure of it. I'll get her out of this. I'll get all of you out of this. We'll go where it's nice and safe and warm, and we can put this terrible ordeal behind us forever. We can be happy again. I promise."

Luke got up, still half asleep, and shuffled closer. He sat down and rested his head against his father's shoulder, snuggling up like he hadn't done since he was about Valery's age. "I promise to help you keep your promise," he mumbled, yawned, and closed his eyes.

James's lip quivered as he struggled to hold back a whole new wave of tears, this one born for a completely different reason. "Thank you, son," he whispered, giving his eldest a loving pat on the head. "I'll hold you to it."

Tim grumbled something and reached for the empty space his brother used to occupy, perhaps sensing his absence even in the depths of sleep. He sat up with a small moan and looked around, blinking groggily.

James motioned for him to come and join them, and Tim just sort of oozed along the ground without ever fully standing up or opening his eyes, and glomped down next to his brother, dropping back to sleep without missing a beat.

"Ahru bu ad..." It was a mumble only a parent could decipher.

I love you, Dad...

"I love you, too," James said. "All of you..."

Emmy, what a great bunch of kids we have... he thought with a smile. He threw a small branch onto their tiny fire and lay back, listening to the overlapping sounds of his children's breathing.

Huddled together on this blackest of nights, with only each other for comfort and warmth, four Foxes drifted off to sleep, painfully unaware that the horror they were fleeing from was far from over.