Track of the Beast: A Brock Stone Adventure

7- Stalked

This was all Brock Stone’s fault. He was the one who had set Trinity on John Kane’s trail. If it weren’t for him, she would never have come to this wilderness in the first place. She was tired, dirty, and hungry, but she could live with those things. What she could not abide was failure.

“If that old man lied to me, I will give him a piece of my mind, and the toe of my boot in his…” A shiver ran through her, cutting her off in midsentence. Between the deep shadows and the altitude, she never felt warm in this forest. Goosebumps rose on her flesh and she rubbed her hands together for a little warmth.

“How much longer should I search before I give up?” she wondered aloud. Anger made her cheeks burn. She had swallowed the old prospector’s story hook, line, and sinker. He had seemed so earnest. “He must have a background in theatre,” she mumbled. Then again, she had only given the small slot canyon a cursory search before moving on to the larger box canyon, which she had mostly inspected from the cliffs above. There remained a great deal of ground to cover if she intended to make a thorough search.

She shrugged off her backpack and took out a map. She sat down on a log, unfolded it, and searched for her location. She laughed when she found it. A dot labeled Rockmire amidst a sea of green.

“You bought a map without even looking at it to see if it would be of use.” Cursing, she crumpled it into a ball and stuck it into her backpack. It would make good tinder should she need to start a fire.

She glanced up at the sky, scarcely visible among the treetops that lined the narrow canyon. Faint streaks of orange told her it was getting late. The sight turned her mood dark. She might not be able to make it out before dark. The thought sent a shiver down her spine. She wasn’t afraid, exactly, but she didn’t love the idea of camping out here, just in case the stories were true.

The path leading up to the slot canyon was hard to find and even harder to ascend. By the time she reached the top, she was soaked with sweat and her muscles felt like water. What a sight she must be. Not that there was anyone around to see her.

No sooner had the thought occurred to her than she had the sensation of being watched. She sprang to her feet and looked around. Noting but green. And then she heard a sharp crack, like a tree limb snapping. In the quiet it sounded like a gunshot. Someone was out here.

She stood there, tension tying her stomach into knots, waiting. Her heart thrummed, her breathing was loud and heavy. Except that wasn’t the sound of her breath. It was someone else… or something else. The sound was a deep, wet, animal snuffling. And it was coming closer.

She considered her options. Should she try to run? Where could she go? Did the thing even know she was here? Perhaps the dense thicket of fir trees covered her scent. Maybe if she could just be quiet, it would go away.

She held her breath, sat motionless, and waited. The noise continued, circling the spot where she sat. And then a pungent odor, feral, almost sulfurous, washed over her, borne on the night air. She retched, her empty stomach flip-flopping.

My word, what is that?

But she knew what it was. She had gathered enough stories to be something of an expert. Dizzy with disbelief, she shrugged off her backpack and dug inside, searching for her camera. She should have had it at the ready, but the skeptic in her had quashed the idea.

And then the foul stench was gone. All was silent.

Trinity stood there, arm buried in her backpack, eyes searching the surrounding. Nothing moved. There was no sound but her ragged breathing. She took a few moments to let her heart rate return to something approaching normal.

“Foolishness,” she scolded herself. “A wild animal passed somewhere close by and your imagination turned it into something else.”

Just then, the foliage in front of her parted.

Trinity screamed.