SleepyHollow2BookBundle (39 page)

As his knees shook, John forced them to remain steady and eyed the stream, longing for the safe haven on the other side, sure that he couldn’t stand one more moment spent in such close proximity to this spasming, terrible creature. The horseman’s scream made him want to clap his hands over his ears and drown it out with a shout of his own.
 

A cloud shifted, revealing the harvest moon in all its glory, and the horseman seemed to diminish in its light, fading by the moment. Still, the scream had reached an ear-piercing level. John eyed the stream. He’d have to jump for it, launching himself over the steep bank and into the safety of the water, where he could swim or wade to the other side. He scrambled toward the bank, annoyed by the lingering stiffness in his legs. But as he ran, the horseman made a sudden movement.

The fiend had given up on trying to remove the dangling crucifix, but apparently he didn’t intend to go easily. One gloved hand disappeared beneath his cloak, and when it emerged, it gripped a severed head by the hair.
 

John was halfway to the bank, and the split second during which he laid eyes on the head seemed to endure forever. It was a man’s head, the skin slack, a pale greyish color that smacked of the grave; the eyes were closed in death. It was impossible to tell what the face had looked like in life; time and decay had erased any sense of personality and the hair was stringy, the color of dirt. Everything about it was dead, except the mouth. The mouth… It was a gaping black hole, defying the otherwise unmistakable lifelessness of the head as it gaped open, screaming. Bile rose up and burned the back of John’s throat as the reek of long-ago death met his nostrils. As he fought the urge to vomit, the horseman drew back his arm and flung his head in a violent gesture.

It hit John squarely in the chest with all the force of a cannonball, and he flew backward, hitting the ground with a breath-stealing impact and tumbling head-over-heels down the soggy incline of the creek bank. The screaming had ceased as soon as John had been hit, and he heard only the sound of his own body slamming against the damp earth again and again. He only had time to think how relieved he was not to have to listen to the screaming anymore as he tumbled and something hard and sharp struck the side of his head, causing stars to burst before his eyes as he heard a splash, and then everything went black.

* * * * *

Katrina awoke with a start, her heart pounding fit to burst as she bolted upright, gripping fistfuls of the linens and gasping. The bedroom was quiet, such a contrast to the terrible noise of her dream, that unearthly scream… It
had
been a dream. She forced herself to look around the room, taking in the ordinary sights like the bedside table and the unlit candle that rested on top of it. Her heart slowed just a little as she breathed deeply, trying to cleanse the nightmare and its effects from her body and mind. She reached out reflexively for John, needing to feel him skin-to-skin, to reassure herself that he was safe.

Her fingers touched only emptiness; the bedclothes were cool where he should have been. She glanced around wildly, searching for any sign of him. He was nowhere in the room. She turned and seized Brom by one muscular shoulder, shaking him awake as she fought to control the panic that was welling up inside her, telling her that the dream had been real, that John was… “Brom!”

He woke suddenly, sitting up and gripping her by her shoulders, smoothing a lock of hair from her face as his eyes met hers, dark and gleaming with concern. “What is it?”

“It’s John.” To her dismay, her throat tightened painfully as she spoke, and her eyes stung, threatening to spill tears. The dream lingered in her memory and body, causing her to shudder. She couldn’t shake the terror, the sheer certainty that what she’d seen had been more than a ridiculous fancy.

Brom looked around, frowning at the empty room. “Must have gone to the privy.”

“No.” She wanted to believe it but couldn’t. “No, he’s… Something’s wrong, Brom.”

“Shhh.” Brom stroked her cheek. “He’s all right – he’ll be back in a minute.”

She choked back a sob, swallowing the feeling of tightness in her throat. “Brom, I dreamt the most terrible thing about him…” Her heart ached more with each beat, and she wrapped her arms around Brom, holding him tight, glad to have him there, though it wasn’t enough.

“Fever dreams. They can be terrible things.”

She’d all but forgotten about the fever. “I don’t think I’m ill anymore. The aches are gone, and I don’t feel cold.”

Brom donned a dubious expression, but pressed a hand against her forehead to test her claim. “John’s better at this than I am,” he said when he pulled his hand away.

“Go fetch him then,” Katrina urged, seizing the excuse. “Please.”

“If you insist.” He rose from bed, the blankets slipping from his naked body; he wouldn’t wear a shirt to bed, despite the cold – claimed he didn’t need it. Sleeping curled next to him, basking in his warmth, it wasn’t difficult to believe. He pulled on a shirt before he strode from the room, his calf and thigh muscles gleaming in the moonlight.
 

She waited breathlessly in bed, clutching the blankets as she listened to his every footstep, her heart racing as he checked the second floor rooms and then descended the stairs. After several moments, the kitchen door creaked slightly on its hinges, and she could imagine him standing at the threshold, peering out at the outhouse. Several more moments passed, and she could picture him braving the night clad in only his shirt, checking to see if John was inside the privy. She buried a tooth in her lower lip as she waited for the door to creak again, for his footsteps to sound against the kitchen floor.

When he returned, there was only one set of footsteps to be heard. Her heart sank then sped, and she slipped quickly out of bed, fetching a gown and slipping into it hastily, forgoing stays and petticoats and donning a pair of shoes.

The expression Brom wore when he returned to the bedroom made it obvious that he hadn’t found any trace of John. His jaw was set, and his face looked paler than the moonlight accounted for.

“We must ride to the bridge,” Katrina said, and related her dream to Brom as quickly as she could. By the time she finished telling it, Brom looked half-ill and half-angry. He pulled on breeches and stockings and stuffed his feet into a pair of shoes.

“Wait right here in bed Katrina. I’ll be back as quickly as I can.”

“I wish to go with you.” She laid a hand on his arm, gripping it imploringly as she searched out his eyes, locking gazes with him. She had to go, had to see John. How could she possibly bear sitting alone in the dark, the frantic beating of her heart her only company as she awaited Brom’s return?

Disapproval flickered in his eyes, then he frowned, mouth opening in preparation to protest, surely.

“I’ll be safer with you,” she said. She’d seen the headless horseman disappear, leaving behind nothing but a last wisp of cold fog and an echoing scream. The dreamed-of spectacle had left her with the feeling that he was gone, but the frightfulness of the sight remained. She glanced automatically toward the window, shivering as she remembered what she’d seen one night in her bedroom at her father’s house. Truth be told, the thought of being left alone in the house disturbed her for her own sake as well as John’s – her dream had been unnaturally vivid, and the memory of the horseman and his screaming head was still too strong to bear spending any time alone in the dark with.

“Very well,” Brom said, surely seeing the scene she’d painted for him in his mind’s eye: the mad gallop toward the bridge, the horseman’s hair-raising demise and his last act of violence.

They swept down the stairs and hurried through the kitchen door, toward the barn. Brom’s shirt billowed in a night breeze – he hadn’t taken the time to don a waistcoat or any other outer garment. Katrina’s hair swung freely down her back, and without the protection of a shawl, her shoulders prickled with cold. But it didn’t matter. Fear for John burnt hot within her, limbering her legs and fueling her haste as she and Brom entered through the already open door and made for the stalls with long, hurried strides.
 

“Whoa!” As they entered the barn, a dark shape lunged out of the darkness. Brom stepped in front of her, shielding her with his body as he reached out toward it.

Several heart-pounding moments passed before Katrina realized that the shape had only been Torben and that Brom had seized the stallion by the bridle and was attempting to calm him. She pressed a hand to her chest and breathed deeply. Would she ever look at a black horse – any black horse – the same way again, or was she destined for a lifetime of double takes, of looking over her shoulder to ensure herself that its rider’s head was intact?

“Whoa, boy, whoa.” Brom held Torben firmly by the bridle and stroked him, his broad hand smoothing the hair on the stallion’s neck, but Torben didn’t want to be soothed. He stamped and snorted, a wide rim of white showing around his dark eyes, even in the dimly moonlit barn aisle. “Stand back,” Brom said sharply, barely managing to keep his own toes from being crushed by Torben’s hooves.

“John rode him,” Katrina said, eyeing the saddle on Torben’s back. Was the leather still warm where John had sat? “Torben turned and ran for home after John was torn from the saddle.”
 

Brom said nothing, only nodded grimly as he handled the horse, managing after several tense moments to get the animal into a stall, where he left him, still saddled.

“We’ll have to take another horse,” Brom said, slipping quickly into another stall and leading out his second-best horse, a sturdy bay. “Torben is out of control.” He saddled the bay, which pranced a little, clearly unnerved by Torben’s panic. The horse behaved decently as they exited the barn though, and seemed to calm down once they were outside.
 

Brom heaved Katrina onto the bay’s back, behind the saddle, before climbing on himself. Katrina wrapped her arms around his waist and held on tightly as they took off. The motion of the horse’s canter caused the small crucifix she wore around her neck to bounce against her chest. John had given her the necklace when he’d still been living at the Jansens’, and had implored her to wear it for protection. She was glad she’d listened, though the cross couldn’t lessen her worry over John.

The woods were dead-silent, and the quiet was eerie. The horseman’s scream echoed in Katrina’s mind as the wind rushed through her loose hair, combing through it like cold fingers. The horse rocked beneath her, its hooves beating a hard rhythm against the earth and their prints blending in with the tracks of other animals. The road had clearly been traveled recently by horses going at a dead run. She’d dreamt that, believed that, but seeing it for herself caused her pulse to quicken as she pressed her cheek against Brom’s back, absorbing what warmth she could.

At last, the bridge came into view, and Katrina peered over Brom’s shoulder, straining for any sign of John. “He tumbled over the bank,” she reminded Brom, cringing as the sound of running water met her ears.
Oh God, don’t let him have drowned, don’t let him have drowned…
She chanted the little prayer over and over again in her mind, aware that John had taken a nasty tumble and that he might have landed in the water and sank beneath its surface, stunned by his fall.

Brom reined the bay to a halt and leapt from the saddle, seizing Katrina by the waist and quickly lifting her, depositing her on the ground. They rushed to the bank together, and Katrina couldn’t help but hold her breath as she craned her neck to peer down at the water, her shoes slipping slightly on the damp grass.

John was there. He lay prone in the mud, half his body in the creek. Fortunately, the water lapped around his waist, leaving his face dry. But blood shone in his hair, terribly vivid in the moonlight. Brom and Katrina scrambled down the bank together and reached him at the same time.

Katrina pressed her fingers against his neck, praying and feeling for a sign of life. His skin was as cold as death, but a pulse fluttered against her fingertips, flooding her with warm relief. “He’s alive,” she sighed.

Brom slid his arms beneath John and carefully scooped him up. The mud made a squelching sound, and the imprint of John’s prone body remained. How long had he lain there unconscious? Since Katrina had dreamt of him falling and woken from the nightmare? It had taken her and Brom perhaps twenty minutes to reach him. Too long. She smoothed long strands of bloody hair from his face. “He must have struck his head on something – a rock, perhaps.” The bank boasted several of them, jutting out dangerously from the soft earth.

Brom nodded silently, and his knuckles stood out white against John’s muddy shirt as he held him close against his chest.

Still kneeling, Katrina cupped her hands and scooped water from the nearby creek. She poured it over John’s head, letting it wash much of the blood and dirt from his face, revealing a gash just above his hairline. She drew in a sharp breath at the sight of it, but it appeared stitchable. She said so to Brom, who nodded stoically. He must have felt the same way she had at the sight of John – terribly relieved and frightened at the same time; desperate to help, and at the same time, just to touch him. Overwhelmed by the impulse, she dared to embrace him. Cold water dampened her bodice and trickled between her breasts, and blood stained her fingers, but it still felt good to hold him. After a few moments she relented, and Brom stood.

When they made it to the top of the bank, their mount was still there, nibbling at a bit of the thinning autumn grass. Katrina hurried to pick up the reins before the horse could step on them.