The truth of the matter

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The Next Attack The slope eased as I reached the bottom of the mountain. Soon I was making my way through the woods again, pushing through brush and tangled branches, moving slowly under towering pine trees and past the gnarled, eerie shapes of leafless oaks. The sun was shining in between the large clouds that sailed majestically through the blue sky, but the air was dry and crisp and cold. I welcomed the feel of the cold air on my skin. I was hot with effort and covered in sweat and the chill was refreshing on my bloody face.

As I moved, I could feel the pain building inside me again. I knew it was only a matter of time before another memory attack came on. Before it happened, before it left me helpless and unconscious on the forest floor, I had to put as much distance between me and the police as I could.

My idea was this: if it was true, as Waylon had said, that there was someone else who knew me, who knew about Waterman and his plan to frame me for murder and work me inside the Homelanders organization, then maybe I already knew who it was. Maybe, I mean, the information was already deep down there in my brain somewhere and I just hadn’t remembered it yet. And with my memory slowly coming back to me one painful attack after another, maybe if I could just survive until the next attack, I’d remember who my ally was and figure out how to find my way to him.

The problem was, the memory attacks left me helpless. While I was busy lying unconscious writhing in agony and going back into the past and so on, the police-and Rose-would be spreading out through the forest looking for me. I needed to find a safe place where I could go through the whole rotten process in relative peace.

So I kept pushing my way through the tangled branches and underbrush, kept heading downhill, hoping to find a road or a house or even just a cave or something, hoping I could hold the attack at bay until I was someplace where I could hide and collapse and let myself go.

But with every step, I could feel myself growing weaker. I was thirsty, hungry. Every part of my body seemed to ache or sting or burn. Luckily, the forest floor was growing more and more level as I descended. I thought I must be getting near the bottom of the hill.

I paused. I leaned against the trunk of a tall pine, breathless. I looked into what seemed an endless tangle of forest. The sun was pouring down through the branches in yellow columns. As I scanned the scene, I saw, some yards ahead, a beam of sun fall through a stand of hemlocks to land glittering on the ground.

I saw that glitter and I thought: Water!

I moved toward the light. Sure enough, a stream was there, bubbling quickly over a bed of rocks. I knelt on the stream’s banks and drew the water out in my cupped hands and drank and drank until my head cleared. I bathed my sores, washed the blood off my face…

And as I did, I heard something.

I wasn’t sure of it at first. The trickling sound of the water obscured the other noise. But I held very still and listened very hard and after another moment, yes, I did hear it: an engine. The sound of a car or a truck on a road nearby!

I leapt to my feet. I crossed over the stream. I moved through the trees as quickly as I could. The engine sound grew louder. I was pretty sure it was a truck now. It was getting nearer and nearer to where I was.

Was it the police coming after me? The Homelanders? Or someone else, just an ordinary citizen passing through? In any case, it meant I was close to a road, close to finding a way out of the woods.

The sound of the truck grew louder. Then I saw it. Off in the distance, through the trees. A red pickup zipping along a road just beyond the edge of the forest. Not the police anyway. I didn’t think it was the Homelanders either.

The truck moved along the road, getting closer and closer to me.

Despite all my aches and pains, despite my exhaustion, I broke out in a smile. I moved faster and faster toward the truck. Maybe I could stop it. Maybe I could hitch a ride. But even if I couldn’t, the fact was: I had made it. I had found my way. I was almost out of the woods…

I took another step-and that’s when the dragon of pain burst to life inside me.

The next memory attack struck me to the ground.