The Beast From the East (3 page)

I was too scared to move.

Then the beast with the flabby chin stepped forward. It stopped a few inches
away from me.

I slowly raised my eyes. I stared at its furry belly. Then its broad chest. I
saw shiny, black insects crawling in its fur.

I raised my eyes to its face. Its green eyes glared down at me. It opened its
mouth. I stared helplessly at its long fang, chipped on the end.

You don’t need a tooth like that for
eating fruit
! I thought.

The beast stretched to its full height. It raised a furry paw high above us.
Ready to strike.

Nat huddled closer to me. I could practically feel his heart beating through
his T-shirt. Or maybe it was my own heart that was pounding.

The creature growled and swung.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

I felt a slap on my shoulder—so hard it knocked me backwards.

“You’re It!” the creature bellowed.

Huh? My mouth dropped open in astonishment.

“You’re It,” the beast repeated.

I gaped at Nat. His eyes bulged in surprise.

“It… it talked!” Nat stammered to me. “In our language.”

The creature scowled at Nat. “I talk in many languages,” he growled. “We have
a universal language adaptor.”

“Oh,” Nat said weakly. He and I exchanged stunned glances.

The creature growled again and took a step closer to me. “Did you hear me?”
he growled. “You’re It!”

His marble eyes glared into mine. He tapped a paw impatiently on the ground.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

The creature grunted. “You’re the Beast from the East,” he said.

“What are you talking about? I’m not a beast. I’m a girl!” I declared.
“Ginger Wald.”

“I am Fleg,” the beast replied, pounding himself on the chest. He waved a paw
at the creature beside him, a beast with one eye missing. “This is Spork,” Fleg
announced. Fleg pounded the other beast on the back.

Spork grunted at Nat and me. I stared at his dark, empty eye socket. And I
spotted a deep black scar on the side of Spork’s nose.

An eye missing and a scar. The big creature had been in a pretty nasty fight.
I hoped it wasn’t a fight with a human. Because if Spork was the winner, I would
hate to see the loser!

Nat gaped at Spork.

“Uh, this is my brother Nat,” I said quickly.

Spork growled in reply.

“Have you seen our mom and dad?” I asked Fleg. “See, we’re all here camping,
and we got separated. But we’re trying to get back together and go home. So,
we’d better go—”

“There are others?” Fleg glanced sharply around the clearing. “Where?”

“That’s the problem,” Nat answered. “We can’t find them.”

Fleg grunted. “If you can’t find them, they can’t play.”

“Right. That’s the rule,” Spork agreed. He scratched at the insects that
climbed around in his fur.

“Now start moving,” Fleg demanded. “It’s getting late. And you’re It.”

I stared at Nat. This was too weird. What did he mean—
they can’t play
?
And why did he keep saying I was It? Did they want to play tag or something?

The circle of beasts began stomping their paws, shaking the forest ground.
“Play… play…” they chanted.

“Play what?” I demanded. “Is this really some kind of game?”

Spork’s eye bulged and a big smile spread under his ugly, pink snout. “The
best game,” he said. “But you are too slow to win.”

Spork rubbed his paws together. He ran his tongue over the tops of his teeth.
“You should run.” He grunted.

“Yes, run,” Fleg ordered. “Before I count to trel.”

“Hold on,” I protested. “What if we don’t want to play?”

“Yeah—why should we?” Nat demanded.

“You have to play,” Fleg replied. “Read that sign over there.”

He pointed to a cardboard sign tacked to one of the gourd trees. The sign
read: GAME IN SEASON.

Fleg stared down at me. His eyes narrowed menacingly. His wet nose flared.

He grinned. Not a friendly grin.

“Game in season?” Nat read the sign in a trembling voice.

“You have to tell us how to play,” I declared. “I mean, we can’t play a game
without knowing what it is.”

Spork growled deep in his throat and moved closer to me. So close I could
smell his fur. What a sour stench!

Fleg reached out a paw and held Spork back.

“It’s a good game,” Fleg told us. “It’s very exciting.”

“Uh… why is it so exciting?” I asked.

His eyes narrowed. “It’s a game of
survival
!” he replied with a grin.

Survival?

Oh, no!
No way
I wanted to play!

“You have until the sun sinks behind the Gulla Willow,” Fleg declared.

“What’s a Gulla Willow?” Nat asked.

“And where is it?” I wanted to know.

“At the edge of the woods,” Fleg replied. He waved a paw to the trees.

“Which edge? Where? How will we know which tree?” I demanded.

Fleg flashed Spork a grin. They both made weird choking sounds in their
throats.

I could tell they were laughing. All the other creatures started laughing,
too. Such an ugly sound. More like gagging than laughing.

“We can’t play the game unless we know more,” I shouted.

The laughter stopped.

Spork scratched the bugs on his chest. “It’s simple. If you’re It when the sun goes down, you lose,” he told me.

The others grunted in agreement.

“And what happens to the losers?” I asked in a trembling voice.

“We nibble on them,” Fleg replied.

“Excuse me?” I asked. “You nibble?”

“Yes, we nibble on them. Until dinnertime. Then we eat them.”

The creatures around us exploded into more laughter. The sick gagging sound
made me feel like puking.

“It’s not funny!” Nat shrieked.

Fleg narrowed his eyes at us. “It’s our favorite game.”

“Well, I don’t like your game!” Nat cried.

“We’re not going to play. We don’t want to,” I added.

Spork’s eye lit up. “You mean you surrender? You give up?” He smacked his
lips hungrily.

“NO!” I shouted. Nat and I jumped back. “We’ll play. But by the rules. You
have to tell us the rules. All of them.”

A cloud rolled overhead. It cast a shadow over the clearing. I shivered.

Were they going to attack us because we didn’t want to play?

“Made in the Shade!” Spork cried suddenly.

“Made in the Shade,” Fleg repeated.

Huh?

“What’s going on?” I demanded.

The cloud slowly passed.

“No time to explain,” Fleg said. He waved a paw at the other creatures.
“Let’s go,” he insisted. “This time-out has been too long.”

“This isn’t fair!” Nat protested. “Please. We need to know the rules.”

“Okay,” Fleg said as he turned to go. “Gling—you must always attack from
the east.”

“The east,” I mumbled. I raised a hand to shade my eyes as I scanned the
clearing.

East. North. South. West. I pictured a map. East was to my right. West to my
left. But which direction was east out here in the woods? Why hadn’t I listened
at that outdoors camp?

“Proo—the brown squares are Free Lunch squares,” Fleg continued.

“You mean they’re for resting? They’re safe?” I asked. I liked that rule.
Maybe we could find a brown square and stay there until sunset.

Fleg snorted.

“No. Free Lunch. It means anyone can eat you!” He glared down at me. “Rule
Zee,” he announced. “You must be three feet tall to play.”

I glanced at the beasts. They were at least ten feet tall! So much for Fleg’s
rules.

“Well, thanks for explaining,” I said, shaking my head. “But we really can’t
play this game. We have to find our parents and—”

“You
must
play,” Fleg growled. “You’re It. You’re the Beast from the
East. Play—or surrender.”

“The sun will be down soon,” Spork added, licking his fang.

“You have until the sun goes down behind the Gulla Willow tree,” Fleg said.
“Then, the Beast from the East is the loser.”

Spork made a choking sound, his ugly laugh. “You will make a delicious loser.
I’m thinking maybe a sweet-and-sour sauce. Or perhaps you’d go better with
something a little more spicy.”

The creatures all gagged and choked. They thought Spork was a riot.

Fleg turned to the woods. He stopped. “Oh,” he added with an evil grin. “Good
luck.”

“Good luck,” Spork repeated. He poked a finger into his open eye socket and
scratched inside it. Then he turned and lumbered after Fleg.

The other creatures followed. The earth trembled under their heavy feet. In a
few moments, the clearing stood empty again.

I gaped at Nat.

This wasn’t a game! These evil monsters searched the woods for lost kids. And
then they—

“What are we going to do?” Nat cried. “Maybe they already ate Pat. Maybe they
found him on a brown Free Lunch square.”

“And Mom and Dad, too,” I murmured.

He let out a frightened gasp.

“There
has
to be someplace safe!” I told him. “The way we use the
porch at home when we play tag.”

Nat swallowed nervously. “What’s safe here?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know,” I admitted.

“We can call time-out,” Nat suggested. “You’re always allowed a time-out in
every game.”

“This is different. This is for our lives,” I said softly.

The leaves rustled in the trees above us. The wind made the gourds whistle.

I heard a low growl. Then a creature laughed. That ugly gagging sound. Twigs
crackled. Bushes swayed. I heard low grunts.

“We’d better start playing,” Nat urged. “They sound hungry.”

“How can we play?” I cried. “There’s no way we can win. There are too many of
them. And we don’t even know where that Gulla tree is.”

“So what?” Nat demanded. “We don’t have a choice—do we?”

The leaves in a tree branch over our heads rustled. The branch started
thrashing around.

Thud.

I shrieked and leaped back.

Something small and brown hit the ground at my feet.

One of those small, brown animals we had seen earlier. It rubbed up against
my leg, and made a gurgling sound.

“At least these little guys aren’t mean,” Nat said. He reached down to pet
it.

The animal snapped at Nat’s hand, clamping four rows of tiny, sharp teeth.

“Whooa!” Nat jerked his hand away and leaped back. The animal scurried into the underbrush.

Nat swallowed hard. “Weird,” he murmured. “What kind of forest is this? How
come there aren’t any
normal
animals?”

“Shhh!” I placed my finger over my lips and scowled. “Listen.”

“I don’t hear anything,” Nat complained.

“Exactly,” I answered.

The grunts and growls and choking laughter had vanished. The woods were
quiet.
Really
quiet.

“Now’s our chance!” I cried. “Let’s run for it.” I grabbed his hand.

“Wait!” Nat cried. “Which way?”

I squinted around the clearing. “Back to the stream,” I declared. “We’ll try
to follow it back to Mom and Dad. Maybe we’ll hear their voices along the
water.”

“Okay,” Nat agreed.

We raced across the clearing. We plunged into the woods and pushed through
the thick line of trees.

I peered ahead into the forest. “This way!” I shouted, pointing to my left.

“Why?” Nat asked.

“Because,” I said impatiently. “I see light through the trees up ahead. That
means the woods thin out. There were fewer trees near the stream, remember?”

I hurried on. Nat followed. We ran silently for a while. The trees did begin
to thin out. Soon, scraggly bushes dotted the ground.

“There!” I stopped. Nat nearly crashed into me. “Up ahead.”

“The stream!” Nat exclaimed. He slapped me a high five.

Excited now. we began to run. We reached the water at about the same time.

“Now what?” Nat asked.

“Let’s head left again,” I suggested. “The sun was in our eyes when we
started. So now we want it on our backs.”

Yes! I thought. We were definitely headed back the way we came. All we had to
do now was follow the stream back to the right clearing. Back to our parents.

“Stay low,” I told Nat. “Try not to make any noise, just in case.” In case
the beasts were following us. “And keep an eye out for Pat,” I added.

I had no idea if Pat was still in the woods or not. I hoped he had made it
back to our camp. But he could be anywhere. Maybe hiding someplace nearby, alone
and scared.

Thinking about how scared Pat might be made me feel braver. We had to stay
calm so we could help Pat.

Nat and I crouched down. We scooted along the stream, pushing through the umbrella bushes that grew close to the water’s
edge.

I could still see the silvery-blue fish circling below the surface of the
water.

Gazing at the fish, I stumbled. I grabbed at a leaf on an umbrella bush to
steady myself. The leaf shredded in my hand. Blue sap smeared over my fingers.

Not again! Another color. Yellow. Red. And now blue. “Ginger! Come here!”

Nat’s cry startled me. I rushed to his side.

Nat pointed to the ground.

I glanced down, afraid of what I would see.

“A footprint,” I said, frowning. Then I let out a loud whoop.

Nat’s boot rested inside the footprint perfectly. It was exactly the same
size as his.

“Pat!” we said together.

“He
has
been here!” Nat cried joyfully.

“Yes!” I shouted. Pat had found his way back to the stream.

“Maybe he already made it back to camp,” Nat said excitedly. “We can follow
his footprints.”

We started out eagerly. With each step I pictured Mom and Dad and Pat’s
smiling faces when Nat and I showed up at camp.

Pat’s footprints marched along the stream for a while. Then they veered into
the woods.