2.
Two days. His wife was yelling "two days", but that was impossible. Surely it had been far longer than that. He'd crawled over every inch of land for three miles in every direction. He'd dug through every bramble and bush with his bare hands. Trudged through shallows and climbed into caverns. He had to. Had to look everywhere he could; because he couldn't call out. None of them could ever call out. Could all that be done in only two days?
But it seemed far too short a measure as well. He'd spent every waking moment in a blind panic. He hadn't slept, nor had he eaten. He'd found, pleaded to, raged against, and renounced God at least four times. His body was moving of its own volition and his mind had lost all association with time. It couldn't have been more than two hours. Please, God, don't let it have been more than two hours.
But it was two days. Two days since his baby girl had vanished. An eternity and an instant.
He'd just returned with his scouting party to the village. The others nearly collapsed after passing through the gate, immediately swarmed by their eagerly waiting families. But Horace never slowed nor faltered, and his poor wife and boys had to chase after him in a sobbing panic. She beat at his shoulders and tugged at his clothes, but the man would not slow. She begged for news; for any signs of little Lucia, but he had none to give. She pleaded and she cursed, and eventually all she could manage between sobs and gasps was "Two days! It's been two days!"
"Sofia!" he barked as he finally turned around and grasped her arms. "There was NOTHING. No forgotten toys, no scraps of cloth, no… no blood." He sank lower and hid his head against hers as the tears came but dammit he couldn't afford them now. "I prepared myself… for the worst. Made ready to find her little body floating in the river, or dashed on some rocks far below, but there was nothing. Even Yuri couldn't find any tracks…" He steeled himself. Standing up straight he pushed her away a few inches and spoke to her in an authoritarian manner, as one would a child. "And that means she was taken." He kissed her on the forehead, then turned around and kept marching. Sofia collapsed into the dirt; their two boys charging forward and clutching at her in mutual desperation.
The whole village was built to be as small as possible. A perfect oval, enclosed in a log fence 10 feet high, and surrounded by dense forest and fog. Fifteen small mud huts, filled with fourteen complete families, were wedged into two semicircles split through by a single lane. Seven families in seven huts on each side, with one standing slightly elevated above the rest at the end of the path. Elder Jonah stood outside it. He was wearily gripping on his weathered walking staff; his legs screaming in arthritic pain. He'd felt the storm clouds long before they rolled in with the return of the party, and the cold water striking his unblinking face did little to distract his mind from terrible premonition.
Horace was approaching the hut as though he intended to march through it. Jonah raised his free hand forward. "Horace, brother, stop."
And he did. For a moment a pained expression passed over his face, but it was quickly replaced by the steely hatred of a man recognizing an obstacle. "I mean to have it, Jonah. Don't wanna take it from ya, but know that I will." He started moving forward once more. Jonah hobbled out into the mud. "Hear me! This is not what's best for any of our little ones! We are, all of us, going to do everything in our power to find little Lucia. We must at least wait until the other parties return. They may have found…"
Horace cut him off. "It's been two days and now this damn storm is coming in. If there were any traces, and there aren't, they'd all be washed away. My little girl didn't get lost, or go pokin' her head where she oughtn't. Some thing has her and by God I will have that weapon to go and get her back!"
"I know your hurt, Horace; and I've known it several times over," declared Jonah as he led Horace's gaze to the small grassless plot up the hill from the village. From here you could just make out the small rocks placed at the head of each grave. They couldn't afford to place any markings more visible than that. "But we are responsible for more than just our own children. Three nights ago we used it, and if we use it again so soon we'll have every beast of the whole Wood tearing down our doors!" Sofia and the boys had caught up to Horace, and were pleading with him in sobbing cries and desperate pulls at his shoulders. His eyes were still on the graveyard, but he wasn't looking at the graves. He was looking at the unspoiled patch of land that had yet to be dug: an open vacancy begging for a tenant. The other townsfolk had begun to swarm around them now, keeping their distance. They all sensed more than the storm was brewing in the air. Horace felt the eyes upon him and began to bellow.
"Yes, we used it. We put two of those bastards down and the very next night my daughter vanishes! Whatever it was that took her, it came here to do it! We have been FOUND!" The others began to squirm and murmur. A few panicked shouts of "But they've never found us before!" and "Will more come for us?" echoed amongst the small crowd. Horace looked from the fear on their faces to the rapidly-forming panic on Jonah's grizzled countenance and seized his opportunity. "If we don't find it, and kill it, then it will come for all our babies!" He was shouting at the top of his lungs now, which was absolutely forbidden. He just couldn't manage to give a damn about that now. "I'm going back out there! I'm gonna find my little girl and whatever nightmare has taken her! And I'm gonna be armed-with-fire when I do!"
He had stepped forward directly in front of Jonah. The two men felt each other's hot breath on their faces even as the frigid rain started to truly pour over them. The others were in an uproar. Sofia was begging for her husband to stop. Some of the other men were pleading for him to go on. Jonah scanned the crowd and lowered his head in exasperation. He gently placed his hand on Horace's chest and spoke so only he could hear. "You fired those shots, and now your Lucia is gone. Who will pay the price for your next outburst?"
Horace kicked his staff out from under him. The man who practically raised him crashed into the mud with a sickening yelp. Horace knew if he saw the old man's face, twinged with that crushing look of love and disappointment, that he wouldn't be able to continue. So he kicked him hard in the jaw before he had a chance to look up. And kicked him again. And just kept right on kicking. He told himself he'd feel shame for it later and prayed to whoever was listening that that was true.
He began to step over the unmoving man in the mud when he heard a *click* that was louder than any thunderclap. The noise of the crowd died in an instant. Standing in the doorway of Jonah's hut was Elizabeth, his scrawny and wiry-haired 15 year old granddaughter. And in her hands was a double-barreled hunk of metal that was aimed directly at Horace's chest. "S-stop hurting my g-g-granddaddy, Horace."
He didn't even hesitate. He charged forward ignoring the girl's desperate pleas. "I'll shoot you, sir! I will! Don't you make me-" A cannon fired. The fence post at the front of Jonah's yard exploded into splinters. Horace could see only white and hear only a high-pitched whine; but the momentum he started with carried him forward. When his senses cleared, the weapon was in his hands and the girl was crumbled on the mud floor of her home, cradling her bloody nose and mouth in cupped hands. Did he mean to hit her that hard? He didn't even know at this point. He found the wooden box where the fire had been kept, and took out several of the ancient metal tubes that were its fuel. Stuffing the slugs in his pocket, he crashed back through the door into the downpour. Everyone was just staring at him in disbelief. His wife was on her knees, cradling their unconscious leader and stubbornly avoiding his gaze. His boys were huddled behind her with their hands clutched over their ears. He strode up next to them, and tried not to notice when they recoiled at his approach.
"If they didn't know where our home was before, they damn well do now" he called with a shrug back towards the still-reeling granddaughter. "This isn't how I wanted things to go, but I will do whatever I must to protect what is ours. Jonah is too weak to search; too weak to stand; and thus I says he's too weak to be the holder of the fire." He held the metal upwards, not pointed at the crowd but enough in their direction to make the right impression. "I'm going back out there, and this time I'm going armed." He brought the metal down with a slap as his other hand clasped the underside of the dual barrels. He took a dedicated moment to lock eyes with each of the six men who were standing in that unforgiving rain with their families, then put all the venom he could muster into his voice.
"So… Who's. Coming. With me?"