Beautiful Blood

Carlos and Rosacher grabbed up their rifles, aiming them at the jungle. More screams, and Frederick, accompanied by a splintering of twigs and branches, burst from the shadowy foliage—Frederick as Rosacher had never before seen him, solidified into that bear-like shape that prior to this moment had only been hinted at, except in an artist’s depiction. Standing on his hind legs, slashing at the air with taloned paws, roaring as rifles continued to fire, Frederick’s torchlit reality was far more frightening than his portrait had been. In that posture he must have measured twenty feet from tip to toe, his body covered in coarse black fur, and as he swung his elongated head from side-to-side, its form that of a strange fruiting, some sort of mutant melon or squash, his face came into view, a leathery mask, slightly less black than the fur, that seemed to have been stamped onto the stump-end of a severed limb and had over time become a part of that limb, its nerves and musculature connecting, annealing with those of the stump, growing capable of gross movement, producing snarls and leers and various other expressions of rage and lust. His eyes were rheumy, redder than the artist had portrayed, and were set at more of a slant above the cheeks, giving him the aspect of a Tibetan devil god; but this was no brightly colored, ritualistic abstraction of evil, this was evil itself, evil incarnate, fanged and drooling and monstrous, with a lolling tongue and a furrowed brow and a quality of insane vacancy that somehow dominated the face, that was its base emotion.

All his thoughts of an alliance with the creature fled, scattered by fright, Rosacher fired, fired again, saw bullets strike home, eliciting an even greater roaring, dredging up gouts of blood from Frederick’s cheek and forehead…then a shout from behind him: “Into the river!” A hand caught at his shoulder, yanked, and he pitched off the bank, landing on his back in the water. He went down beneath the surface and came back up sputtering, still holding his rifle, and sought purchase with his feet, but the river was too deep. He wiped the water from his eyes and saw Carlos’ head an arm’s length away. Four or five heads were visible farther upstream, but Rosacher could not identify them. Grumbling, Frederick—his body bulkier, more elephantine—prowled the water’s margin and Rosacher thought that his lie about taking refuge in the river might have been intuitive and that they were safe. And then in the dimness, though he could not be sure of what he saw, the torches no longer flickering, the world drenched in shadow…he thought he saw Frederick lean out over the bank and extend his neck to an improbable degree, stretching to a length of four or five feet, bending to the river and snapping off one of the heads. Shouting in panic, the other swimmers flailed at the water. Rosacher let loose of his rifle, dove beneath the surface and swam as hard as he could for as long as he could without taking a breath. He came up for air and then dove again, repeating this process over and over until, exhausted, he fetched up against the far bank, tucking himself into a fold of shadow, an indentation in the clay, and clung there, alerted by every stirring and sound, however slight. At some point he passed out and when he awoke, his teeth chattering, he saw that a gray dawn had broken over the jungle. He hauled himself up onto the bank and stripped off his wet clothing. A gentle rain began to fall and, gathering his clothes into a bundle, he sought shelter beneath a giant silk-cotton tree, finding a dry spot amidst the roots that stretched out on all sides like the tails of caimans whose heads were trapped beneath the trunk. He stared blankly at the great gray-green dripping presence that pressed in around him, with its feathered fronds and nodding leaves the size of shovel heads that yielded a pattering like the drumming of childish fingers on the skin of a thousand small drums. The rain began to slant downward and its noise grew deafening; a chill settled in Rosacher’s bones. He had no means of making fire and so he set forth walking, jogging when he found it possible…not often, because the trail he followed went uphill and down, often at sharp angles and with only a few yards between slopes. Rocks and roots jabbed at the soles of his bare feet, forcing him to a slower pace—he could not bear to put on his boots, because they reeked of the river and were packed with silt. He had not the least idea of his location or of the direction in which he was going. His thoughts congealed, his mind slowing as had his feet, and he became a sluggish machine capable only of lurching forward.