Page 375 - TheRedSon_PrintInterior_430pp_5.5x8.5_9-22-2019_v1

into the branches beyond, his path outlined in the fire of his
rage.
With my naked hand, I seized the remaining blade,
moving down its length until what was left of my grip closed
over his wrist. I snapped that one as well. Wasting no time,
I used my weight to crush him against the trunk of a tree,
holding his arms outstretched. I couldn’t allow him to slip
free. His speed was many times my better, and even with
broken wrists, his knives could find their way back to my
eyes, and then some. Face-to-face, I could feel our mutual
sadness at what needed to happen. He was about to speak,
the smallest sound leaving his lips, but I couldn’t listen to
any more.
I sank my teeth into both of his faces, shattering plastic
and enamel. His hand managed to slip free in the collision,
the blade it barely held sank deeply across my neck. I only
pushed my broken teeth deeper, splitting his mask and
tearing his flesh. I swallowed, feeling the chunks fall from
the gaping hole he’d opened in my throat. As I had with all
my family, I merely closed my eyes and devoured him.
Once Jack had gone still, the forest’s knight dead, I
lowered what was left of my friend to the ground. By the
glow of countless dead, smiling faces, I looked upon the
thing that once walked with me in dream. Even dead, Jack
Lantern was only barely discernible as a man.
I defied gravity for only an instant longer, my body
collapsing under its own weight. With my ear to the ground,
I could detect the faint tread of something approaching. And
I could hear the Dream of Wolves, now complete and fully
joined. It came from everywhere. It was coming from me.
A door was opening, a crack in the woods at first, then the
night, then death itself. The lights of the other side merged
with the burning trees of the Woods, the bright dead smiles
of an eternal Halloween, and my blood where it mixed with
Jack’s.

378 | Mark Anzalone