Armageddon's Children - Terry Brooks [111]
I wouldn’t be too sure of that, boy, Michael said.
He was back in the passenger’s seat, his craggy profile expressionless as he sat staring out at the night, hands resting comfortably in his lap atop his Ronin. Logan risked a quick glance over, unable to help himself, feeling the cold seep back into his bones. There was a pale light all around Michael, a hint of something otherworldly, of an ethereal quality that living things did not possess.
Mountain spirits, he thought in disbelief, then cast the thought away.
“You’re dead, Michael,” he said. “Have the decency to stay that way.”
Beside him, Michael shimmered and vanished. Maybe that was all it took, he thought. Just tell them to go away and they would. He smiled despite the shiver that swept through him. Very accommodating, these mountain spirits.
He glanced back at the empty seat several times after that, trying to prevent any reappearance by telling himself that if he kept watch, it wouldn’t happen. He was anxious to get clear of this fog and these mountains now, to get far away from them. Then he could get some sleep and stop hallucinating. He hadn’t realized how tired he was, and when he coupled that with the traveling conditions and his mental state, he could understand why he was seeing dead people.
I don’t think you should keep going this way, a new voice said. I think you should turn back. This road doesn’t belong to the living, Logan.
His father was sitting next to him now, a less clear apparition than Michael, but real enough that it caused him to start. His father wouldn’t look at him, staring straight ahead as Michael had, an ethereal presence that suggested he could vanish in an instant’s time. As Logan continued to stare at him, he did just that. He shimmered, melted into mist, and was gone.
And Logan looked back at the highway just in time to slam on the brakes and swerve to avoid a huge boulder blocking the center of the road. The Lightning skidded along the moisture-dampened road toward a low guardrail and a drop that fell away into blackness. Logan pumped the brakes and pulled the wheel all the way over so that the vehicle was sliding sideways and out of control.
It stopped beside the guardrail with inches to spare. The engine killed with a grunt, and the steady hum turned to a soft ticking in the night silence.
Logan sat without moving, staring at nothing. He closed his eyes and waited for his heart to slow and his breathing to steady. It was all right now, he told himself. But maybe he had to stop after all. Maybe there was nothing for it but to wait for morning and to try to sleep until then.
No rest for the wicked, whispered Michael.
No rest for the living, said his father.
He sighed and opened his eyes. There was no one there. He was alone, locked inside the AV, the soft lights of the dash and the slow ticking of the engine the only signs of life.
Outside the AV, the fog was closing in like a living thing, tendrils tightening about the vehicle, shutting off the sky and the earth, wrapping like a spider’s webbing. At first, he thought he was mistaking what he was seeing. It was so deliberate, so purposeful. But then everything disappeared in a sheet of damp white, and he knew that despite what common sense and reason told him, there was something out there and it was trying to take control.
Should have turned around, said Michael.
Never should have come, said his father.
Faces began to appear outside the AV, ghostly apparitions that materialized one by one and then pressed close to the window glass. Eyes as blank as bare walls peered from faces etched by pain and suffering. Such eyes could not see, and yet it felt as if they did. Hands reached out and brushed the glass, and he flinched. They were all around the Lightning now, and their numbers were increasing by the minute. He reached quickly for the starter, intending to get out of there. But the motor would not catch.