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The Royal River sounds louder in the dark and I’m grateful for its noise, concealing my footsteps. But then we arrive at Mossy Bridge and I don’t think I can do it. The log is too narrow and covered with moss and I can’t carry Teddy across.
“T-bear, listen to me. I need you to walk.”
He shakes his head no and squeezes me tighter. He doesn’t know what’s happening but he’s terrified. I try to set him down but his arms are locked around my neck. There are more and more police sirens wailing in the distance; they must have reached the Maxwells’ by now. Most likely a neighbor heard the gunshots and called the police. But they’re too far away to help me.
A narrow shaft of white light cuts through the forest. The flashlight beam on Caroline’s Viper. I don’t know if she’s spotted me but I have to keep moving. I tighten my grip around Teddy and take one step onto the bridge, then another. I can see enough to discern the shape of the log, but not its entire surface. I can’t tell which parts are rotten or speckled with slippery moss. Below us, the water is rushing swiftly, two or three feet deep. With every step forward I’m certain I’m going to slip off the sides, but somehow I keep my footing. I scramble up the trail to the base of the Giant Beanstalk before my arms give out. I can’t carry Teddy another inch. “Buddy, I need you to do this part yourself.” I point up to our hideout in the boughs of the tree. “Come on, you need to climb.”
He’s too petrified to move. Using the last of my strength, I push him onto the tree, and fortunately he grabs a branch to steady himself. Then I push up on his bottom and slowly, haltingly, he starts to move.
The flashlight beam sweeps across the base of the tree—Caroline’s at the river, she’s getting close. I grab the lowest limb and pull myself up, following Teddy from bough to bough, all the way up to a branch we call Cloud Deck. I wish we could climb even higher but there’s no time and I don’t dare risk the noise. “This is good,” I whisper. I put my arms around his waist, holding him close, and lower my mouth to his ear. “Now we just need to stay very quiet, okay? Are you all right?”
He doesn’t say anything. His body is trembling; it’s coiled like a spring. He seems to understand that no, we are not all right, something is very very wrong. I stare down at the ground and wish we’d climbed even higher. We’re only eight or ten feet above the trail and if Caroline stays on the path she will walk directly underneath us. If Teddy makes so much as a whimper—
I reach into the hollow, fumbling through our arsenal of rocks and tennis balls until I find the broken arrow, the short, splintered shaft with the pyramid blade tip. I know it’s a useless weapon but it’s comforting to have something—anything—in my grip.
And now I see her coming. Caroline is over the mossy bridge and she’s advancing toward us, sweeping the flashlight over the path. I whisper to Teddy that we need to be very quiet. I tell him he’s going to see his mommy but he has to promise not to say anything. And fortunately he does not ask any questions because she scrambles up the trail and stops right below our tree. There are voices in the distance, men’s voices, shouting. A dog, barking. Caroline looks back in their direction. She seems to understand she’s running out of time. I’m so scared, I am holding my breath. And my grip on Teddy is so tight, he can’t help but make a little cry of protest.
Caroline looks up. She points her flashlight into the tree and it’s so bright I have to shield my eyes. “Oh, Teddy, thank goodness! There you are! Mommy’s been looking all over! What are you doing up there?”
I see she’s still holding the pistol in her opposite hand, carrying it casually, like it’s an iPhone or a water bottle.
“Stay here,” I tell Teddy.
“No, Teddy, please, it’s not safe up there,” Caroline says. “Mallory is wrong. You need to come down and we’ll get you back to the house. You should be in bed right now!”
“Don’t move,” I tell him. “You’re okay right here.”
But I can feel him moving toward her, instinctively, drawn to the sound of her voice. I tighten my grip around his waist and I’m shocked by the warmth coming off his body. He’s burning like he has a fever.
“Teddy, listen to me,” Caroline says. “You have to move away from Mallory. She’s very sick. She’s had what’s called a psychotic break. That’s why she drew all over the walls. She stole this gun from Mitzi and she used it to hurt your daddy and now she’s trying to keep you all for herself. The police are at our house and they’re looking for us right now. So let’s get down from there. Let’s go tell them what happened. Leave Mallory in the tree and let’s go straighten this out.”
But there’s no way Caroline is leaving me in the tree. She’s already told me too much. She’s told me the name of Teddy’s real mother. Her name was Margit Baroth and she was murdered near Seneca Lake. If the police do even a cursory investigation of my story, they’ll realize I’m telling the truth. Caroline has no choice but to kill me. As soon as she gets Teddy down from the tree. And then she’ll try to spin the whole thing as self-defense. And I’ll never know if she gets away with it, because I’ll be dead.
“Come on, sweetie. We need to go. Say bye-bye and come down.”
He shakes off my grip and shimmies across the limb.
“Teddy, no!”
And when he looks back, I can see the whites of his eyes. His pupils have rolled back into his head. His right hand reaches out, snatching the arrow from my grip, and then he leaps from the tree. Caroline raises her arms, like she thinks she can actually catch him. Instead she collapses beneath his weight, tumbling backward. The gun and flashlight fly from her hands, disappearing into the bushes. With a sickening thump she lands on her back, holding Teddy close to her chest, protecting him from the fall.
“Are you okay? Teddy, sweetie, are you okay?”
He sits up so his body is straddling Caroline’s waist. She’s still asking if he’s okay when he spears the arrow through the side of her neck. I don’t think she realizes she’s been stabbed until he pulls it out and stabs her again, three more times, chop-chop-chop. By the time she starts screaming she’s already lost her voice; all that comes out is a wet gurgling yelp.
I cry out “No!” but Teddy doesn’t stop—or rather, Margit doesn’t stop. She can’t control most of her son’s body, just his right hand and his right arm—but surprise has given her the advantage, and Caroline is choking and gagging on her own blood. The dogs bark louder, drawn by the sounds of struggle. The men in the forest are getting closer. They say they’re coming to help us, they yell for us to make more noise. I scramble down from the tree and rip Teddy off Caroline’s body. His skin is hot to the touch, like a boiling pot on a stove. Caroline lies thrashing on her back, clutching the remains of her neck, and Teddy is soaked with gore. It’s in his hair, all over his face, and dripping from his pajamas. And somehow I have the clarity to think clearly, to understand what has happened. I know that Margit just saved my life. And if I don’t act very quickly, Teddy will spend the rest of his in an institution.
He’s still clutching the arrow in his right hand. I lift him off the ground and pull him close, squeezing hard, so the blood spreads from his clothes onto mine. And then I carry him down the trail to the banks of the Royal River. I step into the water and my foot sinks into the mossy, squelchy mud. I take another step and another, wading deeper and deeper until the water is waist-high and the shock of the cold jolts Teddy awake. His pupils snap back into place; his body goes limp in my arms. He drops the arrow, but I manage to catch it before it hits the water and sinks out of sight.
“Mallory? Where are we?”
Teddy is terrified. Imagine waking from a trance and finding yourself in a dark forest, up to your neck in a cold creek.
“It’s okay, T-Bear.” I splash water onto his cheeks, scrubbing off the worst of the blood. “We’re going to be okay. Everything’s going to be fine.”
“Are we dreaming?”
“No, buddy, I’m sorry. This is real.”
