A labyrinth of ferns led him toward an obscure corridor of the forest and even at the resistance of the horse and donkey he followed the path. He could hardly see past his own body and when he reached his hand out to feel his way forward he touched coarse flesh of a certain size and make and it immediately registered as belonging to his own father. He stopped more out of anger than fear.
“You leave me be,” he said.
The horse halted and yet the pressure came not through the reins but as a slight grip on his shoulder and once again he pulled away from it.
“I will go my own way,” he said.
The ground became a soggy morass and he figured he’d somehow gotten himself turned around back in the direction of the swamps. He was ready to give up. His body was undone. He dropped the reins and fell to his knees in submission—and then a shadow moved, the kind of flicker in the corner of the eye that is gone once you look closer, and yet the thing before him was unmistakably there, unhidden. He could not rise, but had he tried he would have failed to meet its height; the beast, uncrushed by the density of the darkness, roused to stand, was double his size. Its chest was armored by a thick mane darker than the night itself and its milky eyes showed out from its skull like coins of moonlight reflected off a pond.
George thought his heart might burst in ecstasy. The beast stood motionlessly and stared at him with no aura of threat or danger between them and George suddenly had great confidence that the beast had laid eyes on him before—indeed （for he was certain now）， it had been watching over him for years, and only now had he been privileged enough to glimpse its true nature, and what a rapturous joy it was, enough to bring a man to his knees were he not already there.
“Might you come closer?” he begged.
There was nothing he wanted more than to get a better look at the very thing that had eluded him for a lifetime, for in the presence of the beast his doubts washed away, his convictions grew in clarity, his spirits rose. So energizing was the sight that it brought him to his feet once more. His legs wobbled, and he wiped the mud from them. He stepped forward carefully. Never did the beast waver. It stood so still, in such peace, such stoic grace, that its face blended into the red gypsum haze that had overtaken the sky, and its chest began to fade into the cavernous blackness of the night; with panicked despair George reached out to touch the beast before it disappeared entirely, yet all he felt was an absence, and all that was visible before his eyes were his own hands. Never had he felt so confused, so unsure of his surroundings, and he began to spin in circles.
“Ridley!” he pleaded. “Do you hear my voice? Come find me. Ridley!”
The darkness was resolute in its stillness. Ridley was gone. He was accompanied by only the wind, which was so forceful now that it managed to transport him to the ground—and calm enough in its whispers to put him to sleep.
*
That night his mind cycled through the previous day with torturous repetition. He woke more than once, realizing where he was yet paralyzed by a passing dream, his body unable to rejoin the waking world. He felt cocooned within himself and the only thing that pulled him free from the grasp of sleep was the strong, reliable urge to urinate. He raised himself to a seated position, breathing calmly, happy to see the burgeoning daylight.
He felt fevered and removed his shirt, then pissed where he stood. A look around told him that he had （as he’d guessed） circled back to the swamps. The temperature was surprisingly cool, the heat from the night having sheared itself from the morning sky in a thick gray mist that ran on far enough to mask the distance beyond him.
The greatest relief was finding Ridley and the horse before him, still roped to each other, both of them idling quietly. It took no time to convince himself that the horse—young, restless, and excitable—had probably tried to run off, yet Ridley, dear Ridley, was too loyal to do so and had held the mare at bay, waiting for George to rise from his slumber. He was embarrassed by his conduct the night before and approached the animals with his head held low.
The sky was still concealed in smoke, the sun still glowing red, and he wondered what hell had descended upon the world. Once he was oriented, he took a jar of Isabelle’s peaches from the horse’s saddlebag. He was deathly tired, his skin pallid, his face gaunt, and he contemplated how much longer he could last. Would even the ride home be too much? He’d never missed a soul when he was on one of his jaunts in the woods but he missed his wife dearly now and could not shake the fear that Caleb and Prentiss had found harm somewhere—that his plan had failed them.