A TAIL OF NINE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: Nothing like an Apocalypse to Spruce the Place up a Little

The sign says CIVIL WAR TRAILS. Makes me wonder about ghosts. It would be cool to see one, but I have to keep my mind on what's going on. I haven't seen any evidence of Tulip. Maybe that thing is hiding in a cave somewhere. I doubt I'm gonna get that lucky.

Home.

I can't get Tulip's voice out of my head. It's a growl I never want to hear again, but there was something so sad and alone in it.

Alone like me.

It isn't dark yet. I admit it. I spent some extra time in a little truck stop off the interstate so I wouldn't have to cross over the county line when the sun was down. Nobody picks up hitchhikers around here, though. I have to walk the whole way in by myself. Maybe people know that people can be bad. Simple thought, but true. Or just maybe there's a sense that something a whole lot less than human lingers in Dooms.

From what I see (and remember), Augusta County is mainly farms and teeny houses on sprawling pieces of land. I pass a lot of woods and that makes me feel better. It has to be late afternoon, judging from how low the sun hangs in the sky. Soon the mountains'll devour the last of the daylight.

Where do I start? I need to find the Once-Kingdom ... But first, I need to let Mr. Unger know about Kon. Maybe he knows something that can help her against Mirabelle.

Moving forward and following more road signs, I end up in Dooms. Crossing into it is like running through a field and then suddenly plummeting a thousand feet. The air feels ... solid ... like I'm pushing through it. It's suffocating.

Even though it's been over ten years, after a war with magic, this town and around it is bound to be up to its eyeballs in weirdness ... whether people want to admit it or not. Before coming here, I thought the magic here would be welcoming, almost comforting.

It isn't.

There has to be a reason that nobody's out on the streets. When I pass one house, the shades are pulled down, a flimsy layer of fabric to protect what's within, or maybe to shut out the outside--like a paper fan against a hurricane.

Some parts of town have been rebuilt. Big ruts snake through Main Street. This isn't the part I want to see. I see roads like Beagle Gap and stuff like that. And the old Fire Station road. Didn't Dylan Caid live down there?

I blink. And then blink again. The main road disappears and I'm in a field, standing in a black puddle.

If someone had melted the purest bit of onyx, that would be what's rippling around my ankles right now. Or maybe it's more like liquid midnight. Either way, it's cold and seeping into my shoes to the point that my feet go numb.

I've grown up in backwoods with roads that have no names. And I've never seen the movie Deliverance all the way through, but I've seen enough clips of it on YouTube to know that if I hear banjos, I'm running like hell.

Even after stepping out of the puddle, the black clings to me. Just keep going, Jack, I tell myself. Maybe I can find someone to ask.

That's when I find a gravel road with a tree growing out of the middle of it. One side of it is scorched, like it's been licked by lightning. When I touch the spot, my skin crawls.

The sun's sinking really low now, drowning in a cradle of mountains and shadow. The red stretches out forming glowing rivers in the sky. One cloud looks like a pot-bellied dragon with gaping nostrils. Another one looks like a moose with a hamster head.

What's that rattling sound? Maybe it's just a rattlesnake giving me a warning to stay away from where he is. But something like that wouldn't be out at dusk ... in the middle of winter. Even a snake's got sense to get in out of the cold, Mr. Unger would say.