Kenneth Oppel - Such Wicked Intent

“What were you doing, do you remember?” I asked her.

From outside came a horse’s low whinny. A dog barked twice and then was silent.

Elizabeth frowned. “I had a dream that-”

There was a single sharp knock against the door.

I felt all my breath dragged out of me, as if by hook and line. Elizabeth’s arms clamped about me. Her mouth was against my shoulder, pressed hard to suppress a scream.

“He’s at the door,” she said.

I fought against the weakness in my knees. “It can’t be.”

I felt her take a deep breath. She unlocked her arms and stepped away from me, calmly pushing her hair from her face. “We need to open the door. It’s Konrad.”

“The cottage is locked. And how would-It’s never been here!”

“He’s gotten out somehow,” she said with complete certainty, and reached for the bolt.

I grabbed her hand. “You don’t know what’s out there!”

“Of course I do,” she said. “Who do you think was on the dock?”

Once more I felt a nightmare paralysis grip me as I watched Elizabeth unbolt the door and pull it wide. Cool wind washed over us. No one was there. On the doorstep was a snapped branch from the oak tree in our courtyard.

“There’s the cause of the knock,” I said, pointing.

I moved to close the door, but Elizabeth quickly stepped outside.

“What’re you doing?” I said, following her, but not without first grabbing a stout walking stick. I looked all about the courtyard in the fitful moonlight. Clouds scudded across the sky. Branches swayed. In her bare feet Elizabeth walked across the leaf-strewn cobblestones. From the stables came the reassuring smell of hay and manure. One of the horses nickered.

“There’s no one out here,” I said, eager to get back inside.

“Maybe he’s in the stables,” she said.

“Elizabeth, he’s not-”

“We should’ve opened the door faster.”

I began to wonder if maybe she was still sleepwalking, and pinched her arm.

“I’m awake!” she said with a fiery look.

“We’ll have the dogs up if we don’t get back,” I said. “We’ll wake the household.”

But she insisted on entering the stables. The horses were familiar with the two of us, and softly snorted their greetings. After a night of phantasms I was comforted by their solid, friendly presence.

“No one here,” I said, quickly walking the length of the stable, looking into the stalls and tack room.

Elizabeth frowned and headed back out to the courtyard, squinting into the night.

“It was a branch against the door,” I said impatiently.

I took her elbow and steered her toward the door, but she pulled her arm free and walked on ahead. Inside, I closed the door and quietly bolted it.

“Victor,” she whispered, and something in the choked tone of her voice sent a chill through me.

She was pointing at the floor of the cloakroom. Muddy footprints led down the hall into the house.

We said not a word, only followed the trail with all possible speed. My body felt strangely light, my heartbeat thudding in my ears. My left hand, I realized, still clenched the walking stick. The footprints led us to the base of the main staircase, and I looked up and thought I saw a shadowy figure disappearing from sight. I vaulted up the stairs, Elizabeth at my side.

The footprints were fainter now, little more than a smudge of heel and big toe. We passed Elizabeth’s bedchamber, then mine. After that the trail disappeared altogether, but down the dark hallway I heard the telltale sound of a door opening. I rushed ahead.

The door to the nursery was ajar, and my pulse raged in apprehension as I slipped inside. A curtain had been left open. Frantic moonlight, filtered through the branches of a wind-whipped tree, filled the room.

There it was, leaning over little William’s crib, reaching down with both hands. It had grown yet more and had the body of a strapping thirteen-year-old. It was completely naked, and in the turbulent light the silhouette of its face was not Konrad’s. It was that same brutal face I’d seen in the forest-an aggressively jutting jaw, a low heavy brow. It was the expression of an animal sighting its prey. My pulse became a warrior’s drumbeat, and I strode toward the creature, the stick raised over my shoulder. It saw me coming and whirled with a low whine that sounded to me like a hungry growl. Its muscled arm lifted to ward off my blow.

Elizabeth sped ahead of me and placed her body between us.

“Konrad, it’s all right,” I heard her whisper as she took the creature by the shoulders. She looked back at me severely. “Put that down. You’ve frightened him!”

I did not put it down but lowered it only slightly as I stepped hurriedly to the crib to check on William. My littlest brother was deep asleep. He looked completely unharmed, but I made sure his chest was rising and falling. Beside him in his crib was the soft felt doll Elizabeth had given the creature a few days ago.

My eyes met Elizabeth’s. She’d seen it too but said nothing. The creature had wrapped its arms around her, and she was stroking its hair soothingly. It was now the same height as Elizabeth, and its resemblance to my twin was uncanny. It gazed at me with wide frightened eyes.

I heard a murmur and turned to see Ernest shift in his bed at the far end of the chamber. In the adjoining room was their nurse, Justine. Elizabeth lead the docile creature out, and in the hallway I closed the door softly behind me. We hurried away.

“What did you think he was going to do?” she demanded.

I said nothing.

“He was just giving William his doll,” she insisted.

There was not time for me to speak, or order the maelstrom of my thoughts.

“We need to get it out of here,” was all I said. “Back to the cottage.”

For a moment I thought Elizabeth was going to object, but she nodded. We made our way downstairs to the cloakroom, found coats and boots for all of us, and stepped out into the windy night.

We walked with the creature between us. Even now, when it looked so much like my brother, so much like me, I didn’t like to touch it. I did not take my eyes off it, for fear it would transform once more and lunge at me. But it only watched the moonlit clouds, the stars, the swaying silhouette of the distant wind-racked forest. When we were little more than halfway to the cottage, it began to stumble, and I realized it was falling asleep on its feet. It was still growing so fast that it couldn’t stay awake for long.

When I finally made out the dark outlines of the cottage, Elizabeth said, “It seems so cruel. He must’ve been cold, or lonely. Why else would he come all this way?”

By this time the creature was completely asleep, and we had to half carry, half drag it between us. When we reached the shed, I saw an untidy mound of dirt surrounding a ragged hole against one wall.

“It tunneled out,” I said, taking the key from my robe and unlocking the door.

Inside we lowered the sleeping body into its earthen crib, which it almost entirely filled now. Elizabeth loosened its cloak-for its body would surely be growing even more before morning-and covered it with the blanket as the wind lowered outside.

I looked about and found a short length of rope. One end I tied snugly around the creature’s ankle, and the other to a metal ring on the wall.

“Is that really necessary?” Elizabeth asked indignantly.

“You want it escaping again?” I seized a shovel and began filling in the hole it had dug under the wall.

The creature made a small whimpering sound, and one of its hands patted searchingly at the blanket.

“He’s missing his doll,” said Elizabeth, distressed. “We should’ve brought it with us.”