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  Shadow Animals © 2014 by Keith Deininger

  Cover design by Sumrow Art and Illustration

  All Rights Reserved.

  Copy Editor: Kari Sanders

  www.KeithDeininger.com

  This book may or may not be a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or evidence of fictional realism. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, may or may not be entirely coincidental.

  Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  “It seems to me I am trying to tell you a dream—making a vain attempt, because no relation of a dream can convey the dream-sensation, that commingling of absurdity, surprise, and bewilderment in a tremor of struggling revolt, that notion of being captured by the incredible which is of the very essence of dreams...No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one's existence—that which makes its truth, its meaning—its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream—alone...”

  ― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

  SHADOW ANIMALS

  There was a map my son had found somewhere on the wall of my study back home and sometimes, coming back late from a long weekend trip up river, I’d lie on the couch and look at it, too tired to do anything else. That map was amazing, especially because it wasn’t of any place real. It was very old, the only one like it I’d ever seen. Its edges were curled and frayed by the dry heat of the desert, revealing a deep orange parchment beneath, the land it depicted appearing dull and ancient, snaking roads and the Purgatoire River going on and on. “That’s old,” I’d tell my wife whenever she came in to check on me, it’s probably not like that anymore.

  My son used to play alone along the banks of the arroyo where we live in the southwestern United States—in Copperton, New Mexico, named for the color of the leaves during the fall season—where the waters trickle sluggishly in gray rivulets through the sand, trees yellowish and drooping. Once a year, the rains come and don’t let up for days, hammering the roof of our house, rattling the windows, smearing the dust down the glass in messy slug trails. The arroyo fills with water, sometimes suddenly, a hollow roar you can hear miles off, echoing through the valley from one mountain top to the next like titanic conspirators. For several days, the storms rage. People carry umbrellas and wear black rubber boots as they dash to their cars, driving slowly through several inches of runoff, white cascades of slush flying through the air as they thump through the deeper puddles, on their way to work, or the grocery store for batteries and canned food in case the electricity goes out again. Then, just as suddenly as it begins, the rain sputters out and dies. The water level in the arroyo immediately descends, flows away downstream and is gone, becomes nothing but a dull dribble.

  My son, overly excited at finally being able to go outside, rushes down to the creek to see what the waters have brought this time. The sun comes out and, for a little while, the air is hung with a vaporous veil of moisture. My son collects things, shows me his discoveries with the gleaming eyes of a mad professor, licking his lips over and over again as he waves his hands over his treasure trove: river-smoothed stones of colored marble, pale pink, turquoise and amber; driftwood shaped like animals, like small rodents, a log like an alligator; a crushed and twisted ball of wire like a man-made tumbleweed; a mattress like a small raft, sticks and branches piercing it like spears, splattered with dark stains; a skull from an animal of some sort, a fox or badger; a couple of ribs, pieces of fractured spine; an entire refrigerator, missing everything inside except for a few brown condiment bottles in the door rack; a child’s plastic doll with a man’s belt pulled tightly about its neck; and next to that a small collection of children’s tennis shoes; and next to that an assortment of vessels, plastic tubs, and canning jars, and a porcelain dog bowl with the name “Ralph” carved into it; and next to that a small statuette, perhaps broken from the top of a trophy, of a woman holding something, but whatever it is—a broom? a golf club? a rifle? a ceremonial knife?—is missing and likely lost forever.

  And then there are the stranger items, many of which I have saved and now lurk on the shelf in my study: a dark, wooden flute; a curve-bladed karambit; the corroded remains of a pistol made from iron, branded in an unknown language; a small metal chair figurine on a chain to be worn around the neck; a wicker box filled with shriveled ears, purplish in color; a plaque carved with a complex, geometrical design from another world; a tangle of lace that might have been a wedding veil; a scimitar; something like a wine bladder made from an unknown animal, still fragrant from the acrid liquid that once filled it; a jar of rare and unusual pickled insects, and another jar of eyes, perfectly preserved, of such variety, occupying a central place of honor on the shelf in my study: some round and yellow, some almond-shaped, others with striations of veins, and still others with misshapen pupils, some purely black; blues, and browns, and reds; some nictitating and others with tapetum lucidum; from animals and people of such diversity many of them could only have come from the region upriver, where my son has gone, where he has become lost—stolen from me, and my wife—where I now camp amongst the dark trees, travelling alone, praying I’ll be the first to find him, the shadows chasing us both.

  Saul looked up into the tree; he’d been here before, although he couldn’t remember ever having come this far up the river. It was larger than any tree he’d ever seen, it’s girth rolling upwards, branches reaching out and up to regions he thought, if he’d been able to draw a sightline through the dense canopy of dipping leaves like baby blankets in the dark, must be further than the eye could see, where the air was thin. Its roots twisted into the earth, giant organic sheets, creating crevasses of safety, one of which had become his campsite for the night. His fire glowed dully within his crevasse like a cave. It was strange: he’d forgotten all about this tree. He’d climbed in it once, when he was a child, but his memories were vague and he was old now; he felt old. His fish sputtered in its own grease in the skillet he’d lain over the coals. He was moving as quickly as he could, as many miles as he could each day, but he had to keep up his strength; he had to hunt and fish, since there was only so much he could carry, and he was on foot, which slowed his progress. Fortunately, the river was teeming with fish, from trout and bass to those he couldn’t name—black and white striped, or with tufts of mousey hair—and it didn’t take long to catch his supper. There was also plenty of game, but he wasn’t much good with the rifle or with traps and such tasks would require more effort and hours in the day than he was willing to expend.

  Only yesterday he’d found their campsite. They’d tried to conceal it, brushing away their tracks, scattering the stones from their fire and covering the ashes with boughs they’d trimmed from the bushes nearby, but he’d seen their marks. He’d seen the ashes staining the soil dark and, darker still, signs of their religious practices, mists pooling in the depressions left by their digging, tiny dolls made from husks of vegetation, discarded in the dust.

  He was catching up.

  He knew he was getting closer because Ezzy, short for Ezekiel, had left him clues. He’d found scraps of clothing tied conspicuously to bushes, flapping in the wind. He’d found marks in the sand—not words; nothing his son would be caught by his captors doing—but a small “X” or “O” from time to time. Once, he’d found a pile of leaves ripped into shapes resembling animals, like the ones his son was so good at making in the shadows on the wall using his hands against a lamp late at night.

  Saul, wrapped in his sleeping bag, lay in the crook of the tree, and closed his eyes. He didn’t have a tent, but he did have a tarp—a cheap plastic thing he’d purchased at Wal-Mart before embarking on this journey, that was already tearing—tied over his head. The night air was cooling quickly, but there was no threat of rain. Against the tree he felt safe.

  He knew only a little of what stalked him. His father had spoken of it once, but he’d never seen it. He knew only that it was something looming, a powerful presence few had dared challenge. He didn’t know why it came after him now. Did it need a reason? It was unnamable; no one had ever had the courage to give it a designation. It didn’t move fast, was all he knew. He had to keep moving. If he kept moving, he might be okay.

  At daybreak he’d be on his weary feet again, and he’d be pushing himself to move as quickly as he could. If there was any other way for him to travel he would have found it. He certainly couldn’t drive his old, beat-up Toyota truck up here, the ground was too rocky, the trees too dense, even too much for a motorcycle or dirt bike. On horseback, maybe? But there were places, where the vines hung down from above and the brush beneath tangled in clumps, which would be difficult even for a horse to traverse, even if he had managed to acquire one. He had neighbors in Copperton who kept horses, of course, but he’d never been close with his neighbors.

  Finally, he drifted into sleep and dreamed his son was standing on a small rise at the other side of a great grove of trees filled with mist that made it impossible to cross. He called out to his son, but even though Ezzy’s face was obscured in shadow, he could tell his son was crying, shaking with fear. His son lifted his hand out, as if he might grasp Saul—his beloved father, his protector—through all that distance. The trees shook and the collective roaring noise of thousands of animals filled the air, and eyes of many various shapes and size
s opened and glowed from the shadows.

  * * *

  In the morning, he packed quickly. He kicked dirt over his fire, rolled up his tarp and sleeping bag, tightened the laces on his hiking boots, and was on his way. He ate a few mixed nuts from what was now a small baggy that he’d brought with him, as he kicked his legs forward, forcing circulation into them. His bottle was filled with water he’d boiled over the fire the night before from which he periodically drank. He forged his path, always going upriver, deeper into the unknown, always upriver.

  By mid-morning he was struggling. The ground had begun to soften and there were patches of reed-lined mud buzzing with biting flies that threatened to suck the boots right off his feet. He was forced to move slowly, being as careful as he could be. He lost the trail; there were no more visible signs left by his son. He was forced to go around certain swampy patches, straying further and further from the river, and he was afraid, at times, of becoming lost. The river was his guide; as long as he followed the river, he knew he was going in the right general direction.

  Somewhere in the forest, it was impossible to tell how close or how far away as it echoed through the trees, a bird made a sound like laughter. The sun had gone behind some clouds and it was now gray and damp in the forest. He was sweating, his clothes hanging soggy over his shoulders. The ferns were replaced with trembling clots of moss like spider’s sacks.

  He trampled the foliage with his boots, no longer possessing the energy to pick his steps carefully. When his foot dropped into another mud bog, he tore it free and moved forward blindly. His cheek bled where a branch had whipped it. He was panting, out of breath. Only the day before, he’d moved easily, the ground soft and spongy with fallen needles from the pines. Now, each step was an effort and he’d lost the trail to his son.

  He stopped to catch his breath, the dry lining of his throat feeling as if it absorbed the water he poured down it before it even hit his stomach. He felt sick, despair and hopelessness sinking into him as a stone sinks in a scummy pond. Before him was the largest patch of swamp he’d seen so far. He knew he’d have to turn west and travel even further from the river to go around it. He could feel whatever hunted him getting closer. Whatever it was, it didn’t move like he did, it wasn’t slowed by difficult terrain. In his mind he heard the laughing bird again. He grimaced and forced himself to move.

  He’d never been this far upriver before. He couldn’t remember ever encountering a swampy region. But, then again, maybe he had. It had been many years since he’d come this far, and the forest had a way of changing on you, often in surprising and unusual ways.

  Only earlier that morning, as he’d passed between the trees, he’d heard a noise, stopped, and seen an elk so large he’d had to rub his eyes to be sure he was actually seeing it. Mostly what he saw were its muscular legs, thick as tree trunks, and the mass of its body, its flat-ridged antlers rising above the canopy of the trees. There had still been mist in the air and when the animal moved Saul had felt the ground tremble. He’d thought briefly of trying to slay the elk with his rifle for his supper, but quickly gave up the idea, as he knew the animal was too large to kill with his rifle alone, and then it was gone.

  “Hey, mister? You lost or something?”

  Saul jumped, ripped from his thoughts, his hands grappling awkwardly for his rifle. He swung around, glancing through the trees.

  “Right here,” the voice said.

  He glanced up and realized there was someone crouched on a branch in one of the trees almost directly in front of him. He lifted the rifle; its barrel shook visibly.

  “You make an awful lot of noise, you know that?” And, to Saul’s complete surprise, the owner of that voice smiled at him, an easy smile—the kind of smile one might give an old friend over a tumbler of brandy by a fire indoors.

  The figure dropped easily from the tree, landing on a clear and solid patch of soil and stood before him. She was a woman—well, a girl; she was young, a teenager perhaps. She had straight, dark hair that bobbed casually just above her shoulders and a smooth, small-featured face.

  “I’ve been following you for a while now, but you seem to be having a tough time,” she said. “Maybe I can help.”

  Saul let the rifle drop to his side. “Do you know how to get out of this damn swamp?”

  The girl smiled. “Oh yeah. Of course. No problem. Follow me.”

  “Wait,” Saul said. The girl stopped. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Koryn.”

  “Where did you come from?”

  “I’m not supposed to come out here so don’t tell anyone. Are you trying to reach the Great Wall? You’re closer than you think.” She darted into the bushes.

  “Wait!”

  Koryn looked back.

  “Have you seen anyone?”

  Koryn scowled. “Why?”

  Saul staggered up to the girl. “They have my boy. Have you seen a young boy with blonde hair?”

  Koryn dropped her eyes. “Is that who you’re after?”

  Saul looked closely into Koryn’s face. “Yes. Have you seen my boy?”

  “Yeah, I saw him, but I wouldn’t mess with the shadow animals.”

  Saul gripped his rifle across his chest. “I know. But I have to. They have my son. Do you know where they’re going?”

  “Sure.”

  “Will you show me?”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  * * *

  He followed Koryn. The path she forged was winding and, at least as it appeared to Saul, a series of random turns left and then right and then right again and then left, yet she led him successfully out of the bog and the ground became firm again and easily travelled. He could no longer hear the comforting flow of the river, but he trusted Koryn, she seemed to know what she was doing and in which direction she was going.

  “I’m from Sage,” she told him, when the path widened enough for the two of them to walk side by side. “It’s a small village not far from here. It’s boring.”

  Saul scowled to himself, trying to remember. “Have you lived there long?”

  Koryn skipped up and over a jutting tree trunk. “My whole life. I’ve always played in these woods.”

  “Isn’t that dangerous? What do your parents think of that?”

  “Oh, they don’t know how far I go. They think I stay close to town. They think I’m staying at my friend Jenna’s house tonight, in fact.”

  Saul could vaguely remember visiting some place with his father; he could remember his father talking about a tiny village upriver.

  “My mom is always talking about these woods,” Koryn said. “She says that every forest has a dark heart at its center. She says the dark heart breeds dark things. I saw a lizard once with a forked tongue and three tails. I tried to catch it, but it was too fast. I guess that’s what she means. Mutant things. You just have to know which places to stay out of.”

  Saul shrugged. “Yeah. I guess so.”

  “We’re not gonna make it there by nightfall,” Koryn said.

  “We’re not?”

  Koryn shook her head. “Nope. The Great Wall is too far from here. We should find a place to camp.”

  “The Great Wall? Is that where they’ve taken my son?”

  “Where else would they go? Besides, I know someone there who can help.”

  Saul didn’t reply. What choice did he have? He’d long ago lost the trail—his tracking skills being rather limited—and he knew his best chance was with this girl as his guide.

  “Koryn?” he asked.

  She turned to look at him, her eyes bright. “Yeah?”

  “How old are you?”

  She smiled. “Fifteen.” She darted through the trees.

  * * *

  That evening, by the glow of the fire, glimmering high on her cheeks and impish nose, Koryn said, “I sleep in the trees mostly, when I camp out. I feel safe in the trees. But I’ll sleep on the ground with you tonight. I feel safe with you.”

  Saul rubbed his hands together, then held his palms out to the fire. “This is your forest. You know it better than I do.”