My instincts had been wrong.
My vision was blurry and my head pounded—I’d missed my injection that morning. I wiped my face and noticed a streak of red on my arm. Blood bubbled from the thorn scratches. I touched my forehead, my cheeks, my neck. Blood stuck to my skin like tar. I’d become prey to the island but, as in my dream, I felt no pain. Only a fascination with the webs of slashes and bloody marks on my body. I was sliding, slipping away from humanity.
Had my father slid the same way?
Something fast and damp darted across my hand. I sat up with a shriek. Across the stream, something flashed again, then closer, moving incredibly fast. It was about the size of a rat but of an odd fleshy color. The longer I sat still, the more creatures appeared, slinking around on the other side of the stream. I bent forward slowly to take a drink, cupping the water in my hands, and looked up to find one standing on its hind legs on a rock, head cocked. I gasped. Not afraid, just bewildered. I’d never seen anything like it. It was a little smaller than a rat, furless, with a face like a snapping turtle. The thing squawked and disappeared back into the foliage. For a few moments, not a single leaf rustled.
Biologists discovered new species all the time, but these rats seemed unnatural somehow. My thoughts were so consumed that I hardly noticed that the water had turned a dark tint like rust. The little creatures congregated on the other stream bank, leaping and chattering.
“What are you so excited about?” I muttered, wading over to them. The creatures scattered, revealing a mauled chunk of flesh and fur—one of the rabbits I’d set free. I jolted in surprise. It was ripped apart but uneaten. Blood still trickled into the stream.
A recent kill.
Something much bigger than the rat things was responsible. Maybe something with three claws, big enough to kill the islanders. I scurried to the opposite bank, tunneling into a thicket of bamboo to hide. The ratlike creatures vanished. The jungle filled with the trickling sound of water and the ever-present calls of birds. Slowly, I made out two voices.
Arguing.
The voices had a strange, rough lilt, like Balthazar’s. Thou shalt not crawl in the dirt, I remembered him saying. Thou shalt not kill other men. The voices of islanders, which meant they were likely loyal to my father and could take me to the compound. But something held me back. There was no proof the murderer was a wild animal. It wouldn’t be hard for a man to disguise knife wounds to look like claw marks.
I crept closer, silently.
“He says, Caesar,” one of them said.
“Shalt not eat flesh. Shalt not eat flesh. Nonsense,” another answered.
My chest pressed to the rotting leaves. Between the twisted roots, I made out two figures with their backs to me. Islanders for sure. They shuffled as they argued, making quick, awkward movements. The underbrush hid their bottom halves, so I couldn’t see if they were barefoot or count the number of toes.
Through the screen of leaves I could tell one of the men was about Balthazar’s size, perhaps even larger, with matted black hair and a canvas jacket like Montgomery’s. The other was smaller, with a dingy white shirt. His straw-colored hair was gathered messily at the nape of his neck. These men were even more malformed than the servants at the compound. I reached into my pocket for the shears, just in case.
“Shalt not eat flesh,” the large one grunted, motioning to something in the other’s hand. I saw a flash of white—the rabbit’s head. A drop of sweat rolled down my face. Montgomery had said they didn’t eat meat, but ripping a rabbit in half didn’t sound like the actions of a vegetarian. “Shalt not kill,” he added.
These men were not my allies, that was clear. But it was too risky to creep back to the stream. All it took was one snap of a branch to give me away.
The blond one growled and waved the rabbit head around. “Nonsense! Nonsense!” He walked more gracefully than the other. His nimble, quick movements reminded me of the panther on the Curitiba, pacing, pacing, tensed to spring at any moment. The bigger man lumbered as if he wasn’t used to his own feet. They continued arguing.