The Madman’s Daughter (29 page)

“We can’t stay here,” Edward said, voice rising. He picked up the claw and thrust it into the obscurity of his pocket. “We need to get off this island.”

“Sh!” I hissed. Alice jerked awake, disoriented, crying out.

My first thought was to tell her it had been a bad
dream. But Montgomery was already by her side, smoothing a hand over her beautiful fair hair. “We’re back,” he said. “You’re safe.”

Because
I
kept her safe
, I thought. Father obviously wasn’t taking care of the island residents, so someone had to.

But she kept shrieking, breathing so quickly I thought she might faint. At last Montgomery scooped her in his arms and carried her out. He passed someone in the courtyard, coming quickly, carrying a lantern.

Father burst into the room. “What’s happened? The barn door is off its hinges and there are a dozen broken tiles.”

I stood up. “One of your monsters came in over the roof.” Venom laced my words.

“That’s preposterous,” he said. “They can’t climb the wall. You’re mistaken.”

“The mistake was to create them!”

He struck my jaw. Pain shot up the side of my face. I stumbled back, stunned. Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised. But somewhere deep inside, I still thought there might be hope for him and me.

Now I understood that there would never be.

Edward stepped in, fast, and twisted the stiff lapel of Father’s jacket. “Don’t ever strike her.”

Father pulled away, seething. “Punch me again, Prince, and you’ll wish you’d never set foot on this island.”

“Stop it. Just stop it.” I stretched my jaw, testing. Nothing broken, just bruised. I understood now. He didn’t
care what happened to any of us. He’d gone mad with delusions. But as little as he cared for us, he might still listen to reason. “Whatever you did to make them docile … it failed. They’re animals. They won’t obey you forever. There’s only one choice, and that’s to abandon your work. Leave this place.”

Father smoothed his cravat, which had gotten ruffled in his tussle with Edward. His eyes were black as the churning sea. “As soon as the weather breaks, we’re going to the village. You’ll see for yourselves that I have everything under control.”

I touched the bruised edge of my jaw, knowing further discussion was useless.

He was beyond reason.

T
HE STORM RAGED FOR
several days. By the time we were able to leave for the village, the jungle was so humid, it felt as though the wagon was rolling underwater. We had to stop every quarter mile to clear the road of downed trees.

I could smell the village long before we arrived. The stench hung like a pestilence. Not just the smell of animals, but a rotten miasma that made me cover my mouth and nose. The beasts were overdue for their treatments, and Montgomery said the change would happen quickly. Father kept insisting they would be peaceful and domesticated in temperament now that the serum was dissipating from their systems.

Pigs, sheep, dairy cows
, he’d said.

The road was practically a lake as we neared the village. Duke stopped, unwilling to go farther. Montgomery had to climb out and drag him by the harness.

The village was filthy. Huts had been torn down or clawed. Smoke billowed from piles of burning refuse. I
exchanged an uncertain glance with Edward. This didn’t look like the work of dairy cows.

We passed a creature wallowing in the mud, belly distended as though it was drunk. Its back legs were so bent, I doubted it could walk. It watched the wagon pass with a vacant stare. Father motioned to it as we passed. “Is this the beast that scaled a twenty-foot wall, Juliet?”

I folded my arms. He was delusional. Nothing I could say would change that.

The wagon jerked to a halt. We were in the village center, though I hardly recognized it. Gone was the praying crowd, the man with the sweeping red robe, the beasts clamoring for a glimpse of their venerable creator.

“No one to greet us,” Montgomery observed.

Father dismissed it with a wave. “That’s to be expected. They’re like livestock now, I told you. Either wallowing like pigs or rooting out grain somewhere.”

I glimpsed a few eyes watching us from sunken doorways. I hugged my arms, feeling a chill despite the heat.

Edward pointed to one of the few huts still standing. Cymbeline peered at us from within, apparently unchanged except for a hardened, distrustful turn to his mouth. I waved. He hissed, baring inch-long fangs he’d never had before. I hugged my arms tighter.

Father climbed down and dusted off his hands. He extended his arms, smiling, like a savior returning to his adoring masses.

“Come out!” he called. “Let me see your beautiful faces.”

No one came. I detected a flicker of uncertainty in his face, but it was gone as fast as the buzzing flies. “You there!” He pointed a long finger at a figure in a doorway. “Don’t be shy. Come on.”

The figure slunk forward on all fours, moving rhythmically. Its limbs popped in the sockets as it moved. It circled us slowly and then stood upright on two feet and slunk closer.

The python-woman. Her face was horribly stretched, and she no longer wore clothing. She approached my father with the grace of a snake.

He smiled, oblivious to her horrible appearance. “Where is Caesar, my dear?”

“Caesar,” she repeated. She slunk along the side of the wagon. My stomach clenched. Montgomery swore I wasn’t like the beasts, but I couldn’t help but fear I’d end up like her if I stopped taking my treatment.

She gave a few hissing chuckles. “Caesar says no more.”

More creatures emerged, creeping toward us slowly. Bodies stretched unnaturally, moving on four legs. Montgomery calmly placed a hand on his rifle.

“Where is he?” Father commanded. The smile was gone. “Bring him out!”

Python-woman laughed again. Her forked tongue darted in a thin-lipped mouth. “Bring him out, bring him out, he says.”

Creatures started to swarm like flies, blocking the road behind us. At last we heard a faint wheezing. The
creatures bobbed up and down like a restless herd. A giant figure passed through the crowd, taunted as it came forward. I covered my mouth. It was Caesar, antlers broken off, only splintered nubs left. One shoulder twisted at an unnatural angle. Black stains covered the skin around his eyes and mouth.

“We should leave,” I said. But no one responded.

Father took one look at Caesar and moved his hand to his pistol. “You weren’t supposed to stop
his
treatment,” he growled at Montgomery.

“I didn’t,” Montgomery said. “This isn’t regression. The others did this to him.”

Father rested a foot on the worn stone stand. “Recite the commandments, Caesar,” he ordered. “They seem to have forgotten!”

But Caesar bobbed his head, as if rubbing his antlers on a phantom tree. “Speak!” Father ordered again, and the python-woman hissed.

“Caesar says no more,” she repeated.

Father grabbed Caesar’s jaw and forced his mouth open. There was a gurgle of saliva and clinking teeth, and Father’s mutterings to himself. His back went rigid, and then his hand fell away, releasing Caesar. The elk-man dropped his chin to his chest.

Father came over in long, reluctant steps, running a shaky hand over his whiskers. “They’ve cut out his tongue,” he said.

I drew back in revulsion. “My God.”

Father gave me a sharp look. “We can do just as well without him.” I didn’t know if he meant Caesar or God himself.

Father turned back to the crowd. “Listen! I shall speak the commandments myself, you wicked creatures! You call yourselves human, yet you live in filth. You crawl upon the ground like four-legged things. How soon you have forgotten the commandments!” The shuffling and murmuring in the crowd quieted. The creatures cocked their heads as if remembering a long-forgotten song.

“Thou shalt not drink spirits! Thou shalt not eat flesh of living creatures! Thou shalt not roam at night!” Father paused. I knew what came next but I waited, as breathless as the creatures. “Thou shalt not kill other men!” He stamped his foot. “This is the word of your god!”

Silence pervaded. The creatures stared with dull, watery eyes.
No
, I wanted to shout.
They aren’t the word of any god
. They’re the words of a madman.

“Yes!” A husky voice broke the silence. “Yes, the word of our god!” Low murmurs ran through the crowd. We all strained to find the voice. A hulking creature pushed his way toward us. His gait was lilting. It was the bearlike creature I’d seen in the jungle with Jaguar. His hands were crippled into twisted claws he kept tucked against his chest.

He stopped in front of Father. The islanders huddled closer like cattle. “The word of our god!” the bear-man shouted.

I glanced at Edward. His arms were folded, muscles tight as wire.

“We shall not drink spirits!” the bear-man cried again, dancing on his monstrous legs. “We shall not eat flesh! The words of our god!”

The beast-people began to stir again, as uncertain as I was. Python-woman slunk up to me, her slanted eyes blinking. She licked her mouth with an unnaturally large tongue. I sucked in a breath.

“Very good, Antigonus,” Father said to the bear-man. His lips twisted in a self-satisfied smirk. “Now, my fellow, tell me who did this horrible thing to Caesar.”

Antigonus took a few stilted steps toward Father, beckoning with a clawed hand. His other hand was still clutched at his waist. Just as he leaned his bear snout close enough to whisper, a knife blade glinted in his hand. It jerked toward Father’s throat.

A shot rang out.

Montgomery had scrambled for his rifle, but Edward had fired first. The creatures panicked, climbing over one another to get away. Antigonus’s body fell at my father’s feet, spilling blood on his leather shoes. Father’s eyes were wide. One of his precious creatures had turned on him.

Montgomery rushed to the body. Dust clouded around them. But I couldn’t take my eyes off Edward. He had killed. Defending my father, no less. The pistol fell from his hands. He looked as stunned as I felt.

“Edward—” I said, but I couldn’t finish. He was a killer now, too.

His face was blank, wide-eyed. He ran a hand over his head, shaken, staring at the fallen body as though it was
going to stand up and haunt him. His eyes held the same look as when we had found him in the dinghy, torn between life and death and sea madness.

He turned and disappeared into the jungle, as though he could run from what he’d done.

W
E RODE BACK IN
miserable silence. There was no sign of Edward, no matter how much I’d yelled for him. Montgomery assured me that a man who could survive twenty days in a battered dinghy could make it back to the compound. But at sea the only thing hunting Edward had been the inescapable sun and his own haunted memories, and here there was a monster loose.

Someone shouted ahead. Through the leaves, the compound’s walls appeared. Balthazar came running, big chest huffing, eyes rimmed in red. I recalled the first time I’d seen him, when I thought he was hideous. Now, after the horrible faces of the python-woman and Antigonus and the others, he looked as human as any of us. I hoped Montgomery would never stop giving him the treatments. I couldn’t stand to see Balthazar regress.

“What is it?” Montgomery asked. His hand tightened on the rifle.

“Come quickly,” Balthazar said, out of breath. His lower lip trembled. “Hurry.”

Montgomery handed the reins to Father and jumped from the wagon. He took off at a jog with Balthazar. Ahead, I saw the wooden gate was broken. The boards had been splintered by a terrible force.

Father brought up the wagon quickly. No one waited to take it. Puck, Alice, the other servants—they weren’t there. Something clenched in my stomach. A primal need to get inside. To find out what had happened.

Father thrust the reins at me. “Stay here. Hold Duke.”

“But what happened?” I asked. He ignored me. I twisted my fingers in Duke’s mane, watching the men disappear through the broken gate. Why was no one saying anything? Why didn’t someone come for the horse?

There were tracks in the mud outside the gate. Slipping, gliding tracks like the monster had made before. But the gate was reinforced with iron bars. The monster couldn’t bend iron, could it?

A man yelled. I recognized Montgomery’s voice.

“Stay here and be damned,” I muttered, and led Duke and the wagon to a tree. I looped the reins around a branch and hoped he wouldn’t try to bolt.

I bunched my skirt in one hand as I climbed through the broken gate. My breath caught. The courtyard was a wreck. The tomato plants had been trampled, the lanterns broken, the chicken house shattered.

Voices came from the kitchen. I stepped toward them slowly.

“The devil take you!” Montgomery yelled from around the corner. “The devil take you all!” The anguish in his voice made me stop in my tracks. He was usually so controlled, even when he was seething with fury.

I pressed my cheek against the stone wall. They were right around the corner. I only had to look. But somehow, I
was afraid that looking would change everything.

“The devil take you!” Montgomery yelled again. Curiosity took control, compelling me to look at whatever had Montgomery so enraged.

Montgomery and Father were outside the kitchen door with Balthazar and Puck. Montgomery paced back and forth wildly, hulking shoulders straining like a beast’s. A trembling hand covered his mouth.

“Calm down,” Father said. His hand was shaking, too. “You’ll drive yourself mad.”

A flash of white on the kitchen floor caught my eye. I blinked, not sure I was seeing correctly. Alice’s white skirt peeked out from the doorway, flat on the ground, with two pale bare feet streaked in mud. A line of dark blood dripped from her big toe into a puddle. The feet didn’t move. As certain as I’d ever been of anything, I knew those feet would never move again.

Alice was dead.

M
ONTGOMERY SLAMMED HIS FIST
into the kitchen door. The wood splintered too easily, and he growled, unsatisfied. He swung his other fist at the solid stone wall.