Light to the Hills: A Novel (82)
Beady whispered in Rai’s ear, almost, but not quite, laughing. “Fool thinks he’s dreaming.” Rai held tight to Beady’s hand, trembling and sweating.
The mattress ticking rustled.
“He’s prob’ly crawling up onto the bed to get his bare feet off the floor,” whispered Beady.
Gripp began to moan, whether in fear or because of the poison that now flowed through his body, it was hard to tell. A fine ruckus ensued, with Gripp yelping a strangled cry. He must have met with fangs again—he likely put a hand on one in the bed. His lantern clattered as it fell to the floor and its light was doused, and there was a beat or two of stillness where Beady and Rai heard the buzzing rattles clearly. If he had only stayed still, he might’ve avoided the fangs, but likely his every nerve pulsed with fear and surprise. The shack fell quiet. They waited an eternity, listening, but heard only raspy breathing from inside.
It was enough. Beady and Rai lit their lantern and made their way back down the way they’d come, following the foxfire and moonlight, no longer caring if the roosters crowed. When they reached Rai’s home, they washed their faces and hands and drank long, cool swallows of water from a bucket drawn from the well. They’d made it back before midnight, and they fell into bed, exhausted from the past two days. When the sun shining through the windows in the morning woke them, they lay in the same positions they’d been in when they’d fallen asleep, having slept deep and dreamless from moon till morning.
“We have to go back for the box,” Beady said over coffee the next morning, and Rai nodded.
“I know,” she said. “Eggs?” She stood at the stove and cracked four brown eggs straight into the cast-iron skillet.
“Thank you.” Beady pushed her plate across the table and wrinkled her nose. “It’ll smell like a snake den in there. No worse’n it was. And we’ll need to wear good boots. Don’t want to wind up bit ourselves.”
“Cricket and Finn have some old ones by the door there. We can prob’ly fit ’em. Let’s go after breakfast and chores, get it done,” Rai agreed, flipping two fried eggs onto Beady’s ready plate. Beady forked the runny yolks onto a hunk of cornbread and took a bite.
“Salt?” asked Rai.
“Nah, they’re good as is.”
Now, on their way up to the shack, the roosters tried to outdo one another with their crowing. They perched on top of their shelters and beat their wings with their necks outstretched. Some strutted back and forth as far as their tethers would reach, making throaty squawks and warning them away.
“Maybe we should release them all,” Rai said. “They’ll be up here with no one to tend to ’em.”
“If we do, they’ll just be at each other’s throats. Sheriff and his boys’ll be here soon enough if Finn talks to the right folks, and they can deal with a passel of fightin’ roosters wantin’ to come at ’em with spurs a’flyin’. Personally, I don’t much fancy that.”
The whole way up the slope, they’d kept their eyes peeled for snakes. Given the night they’d spent, every stick and length of thick vine had them sidestepping. Not a soul came out to greet them or warn them off with a shot. In the light of day, the liquor still sat in plain sight behind the grapevine, its fires unlit. Rai knocked twice before she opened the door, just a visitor happening by, curious about the squatter on her land. She stood well back and let daylight fall across the floorboards. A foul, musky scent met them, mixing with the cool and earthy smell of wet leaves in the morning air. Straight off, she counted one, two, three vipers coiled in one corner away from the bed and tangled with each other. A rustle from the opposite side of the shack gave away a fourth taking refuge in the woodpile stacked there.
Beady stepped beside her and held a lantern aloft to better light the room. Rai pointed to the box on the floor where they’d left it. Anyone finding Gripp here would surely question its presence and might recognize it for what it was. Beady took a couple of tentative steps into the shack. Her shadow fell over Gripp where he lay, and they couldn’t help but stare. Whether because he’d been drunk or how many times he’d been bitten, he hadn’t tried to leave the cabin for help. Both his feet were swollen to twice their size, the skin so tight his ankles had disappeared. His damaged hand, the one with three fingers, was streaked with red and swollen as well. But it was his face that held their gaze.
Rai came to stand beside her. “There’s the last ’un,” she whispered, pointing.
In the crook between Gripp’s neck and shoulder, the brownish-gray body of the snake lay curled like a kitten snuggled for warmth. Its tongue darted in and out, testing the air currents that had changed since they’d entered. It had bitten Gripp twice—once in the neck and once in the face, apparently as he lay. If they didn’t already know who he was, it wasn’t certain they could have recognized him, as grotesque as he looked. As they stared, the slit of one eye cracked open. When it registered their presence, it opened wider, as wide as it could, though Gripp didn’t move. His throat and lips were so swollen he couldn’t speak. But Beady could.
“Listen to me, you sorry devil,” she spat. “I reckon you done played your last ace. You remember me?” The slit narrowed. “Reckon you do. These snakes come from the church, so they know to do the Lord’s work. They offer a test of faith, but it appears you put your faith in the wrong things.”