Page 58 of A Better World

Above the skulls was a hearthstone outcrop from which red slow-dripped. She peered directly overhead, couldn’t discern what hung there. She glimpsed just its side—no face or legs. Her guess was a slaughtered animal. But its pelt was thicker than fur and dirty white. Wool? A lamb?

An insult to God, she thought. Did she believe in God? Yes, maybe she did, because she could discern its absence. God existed, but not here.

Beneath the carcass was about a foot of stacked skulls, sopping and dissolving in the blood. Dissolving? How were they dissolving? What the hell was happening?

Hands on either side of her reached out along the row where she knelt. They took the skulls. Were people eating them? Yes, they were. They were eating blood and bone in a makeshift church built inside an underground labyrinth, and God didn’t like it one bit, but the monster was happy. The monster was loose.

She’d never sleep tonight, never feel safe in this town, unless she stayed right now, and checked. She pulled free a skull from the stacked pile. It felt grainy and loose in her fingers, not like bone. She copied the rest and set it under the dripping red, which was too thick and sticky for blood.

She knew by then that this was a trick. A joke. But her body didn’t believe it.

She ran her finger along the red and tasted sweet syrup on the tip of her tongue. She licked the skull: granulated sugar. As if to conquer the thing, she took a giant bite.

“Ha!” She laughed, loud and with a full mouth. “You guys are pranksters!” Familiar faces turned from kneeling positions, their expressions bright with amusement, but they didn’t break character.

So, it really was just for fun. No monsters. No madness. Nothing loose.

How had she imagined such absurdity?

She got up off her knees. Most people took the right turn out of the skull room, but it was loud in there, lights flashing. She went left and caught her breath. As she walked, she found a large spyhole in the hay wall. She looked through, making sure to stay far enough from the aperture that a hand couldn’t grab her.

On the other side, more maze.

A bunch of teens stood in a half circle, passing several flasks between them. The polite zombie from before was trying to scare them, grabbing at their arms and snarling.Dude, it’s like he shit his pants and made it a costume, one said.Man, he smells like he’s dead, said another. The zombie broke character, dropping his arms to his sides and standing tall. He looked at them for a beat or two, then lurched in another direction, to try to scare some people it might actually be fun to scare. The kids made soft laughing sounds that Linda’s adult mind interpreted as contrition. They were at an age where they still didn’t understand that they had power. That adults cared what they thought, that adults’ feelings could be hurt.

She saw, then, a soccer shirt and Josie’s inside-out number: 14.

“Oh,” she cried in deflated surprise.

Josie heard, somehow, even though the music was still loud. She looked around in all directions.

Linda chose not to call out to her, embarrass her. She made a left, and then another left, thinking it would lead her to the group of teens, but somehow, it led elsewhere. This was impossible. This had to end. It wasn’t fear so much as adrenaline drain. She was exhausted. Her sexy cat outfit wasn’t nearly enough clothing.

Something leaped out. Its costume was a black, skintight suit, the ill-fitting Beltane Crown upon its head.Boo!It laughed. Keith’s voice. He jigged left, blocking her passage.

He’d caught her alone. She should have guessed he was the type to delight in sneak attacks.

“Let me go, Keith,” she said. “I know this is your job and I want to play along. But I’m done. I can’t.”

She went right. He jigged and blocked her. Through his skintight suit, he had an erection.

It occurred to her that he could do whatever he pleased. There weren’t witnesses. Even if she told people and they believed her, this was a Parson.

“Please,” she said. Her voice came soft. Begging. It shocked her that she was the kind of person who would beg under such circumstances.

The smug son of a bitch lunged. It happened so fast she didn’t scream. His ropelike arms circled her shoulders, drew her tight to his broad chest. She was pressed against him, hearing his heart beat fast and uneven. How had this happened? Why had she talked to him? Why hadn’t she run?

“Beware the sacrifice,” he cooed in the kind of lulling voice a certain kind of creepy guy might use during foreplay.

She dug her elbows into his chest. No effect. He was solid as a mountain. His suit was so glossy and shining that she saw a reflection against his face. She saw herself, a frightened woman. But there was something dirty white behind her. It was moving closer. It was huge.

Her imagination, surely. It often ran away with her. But she remembered the shadow. The monster in the Labyrinth. The reflection came closer: a graceless, slow-moving creature.

“Today, it’s me. Tomorrow—” he shouted so hard her eardrums sang. The white was getting bigger, coming closer. “It’s y—!”

She kneed him in the crotch, a delicate squish. He let go for only a second. Enough time to break away.

She didn’t look back as she ran, though she heard his pain-moan. She didn’t care. Her last burst of adrenaline burned explosive, like a struck match. It honed her instincts: 99.9 percent chance Keith Parson was a harmless weirdo who took the Beltane King thing too seriously; 0.1 percent chance he was a maniac in cahoots with the scuttling, hungry thing that lived down here, and in her nightmares, too.

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