“Lucky,” Mattie said. Her voice was still small and strained.
“I bet it doesn’t feel too lucky, though,” Jen said with a little laugh.
Mattie gave her a half-smile back and shook her head. “Where . . . are . . . we . . . going?”
“Dunno,” C.P. said. “I just wanted to get away from that nutjob.”
Mattie said, “Down . . . the . . . mountain. Away.”
“It takes about a day or so to get back to the base when we’re all in good shape and moving along, and there’s no snow to slow us down. With you and Griffin like this, it will take a lot longer, and I don’t think either of you are in any condition to do a lot of walking. We need to find someplace to hole up for a day or so and rest before we try.”
“A . . . day?” Mattie shook her head. “William . . . goes . . . to . . . town . . . and back. Same day.”
“Well, I don’t know how he does that unless he’s got a vehicle, like an ATV or something. You just can’t do the hike that quickly no matter what kind of shape you’re in,” Jen said.
“ATV?” Mattie asked.
“All-terrain vehicle. Like a little car, but with big wheels so it can go over rough ground. Does he have something like that?” C.P. asked.
“No,” she said. “I’ve . . . never . . . seen.”
Though now that she considered it, of course it made sense that William might have some kind of vehicle stashed away somewhere. How else could he have brought up all the heavy gear he’d bought the other day? Did she really believe that William had dragged it all up the mountain on a sled?
If he did have a vehicle he’d made certain that she didn’t know of its existence, and the key would certainly be on his key ring. Which was on his person, and they’d never get it off him as long as he lived.
Not that it would do her any good if she found a vehicle, in any case. She didn’t have the least idea of how to operate one.
Mattie shivered. She’d been sweaty from the exertion of the fight and the fast pace, but now that they were sitting still her body was cooling. Jen noticed and sat down next to her, so that all four of them were crammed on the flat lip of the boulder. Jen put her arm around Mattie’s shoulder and pulled her close.
“You’re not dressed for this weather,” she said, rubbing her hand up and down Mattie’s arm. “And it will be dark in a few hours. We need to find a safe place to pitch the tents and start a fire.”
“We should go up to those caves,” C.P. said. “You know, the ones where we saw the tracks.”
Mattie stiffened. “You . . . went . . . to . . . the . . . caves?”
“Yeah,” C.P. said, his eyes alight with enthusiasm. “We saw that weird cave with all the bones and stuff that you told us about, too. I’ve got some amazing pictures on my phone, and Griffin has even better ones on the camera.”
“No,” Mattie said. Her throat hurt so much. Every time she spoke she saw William’s mad face above her, felt his hands on her throat again. But she needed to tell them, to warn them again. “No . . . no. Creature . . . warned . . . us. Can’t . . . go . . . there.”
The idiots. The absolute idiots. She’d told them not to follow the creature, not to play in things they didn’t understand. They hadn’t listened.
There came an unearthly roar, almost as if the creature had heard what they were saying, or had caught their scent. It wasn’t too close, but it wasn’t far enough away for Mattie to feel safe, either.
“What was that?” Jen asked. She didn’t look scared, though. She looked curious, and a little excited—just like C.P.
“Creature,” Mattie said. She stood up so quickly that her head spun. “Hide.”
“Creature? You mean the thing that made the tracks on the mountain? I want to see it,” C.P. said.
“No . . . no,” Mattie said. She wanted to shake him. What kind of person saw a room of bones and organs and thought, I really want to meet the animal that mutilated all these other animals? “You . . . don’t. Will . . . kill . . . you.”
“It didn’t kill you, right? You said you saw it. It came right up to your house.”
The creature roared again, and this time it sounded different. It sounded louder—and angrier. The roar echoed all around them, all through the forest—bouncing off the trees, filling up the air, echoing inside Mattie’s ears so that she had to cover them with her mittened hands or else that sound would seep inside her head and stay there.