The Misfortune Cycle: River Desert

Chapter 7

Torun couldn't tell who leaned on who as Lanka and Ashraful reached him. Ashraful looked more or less fine, but he limped on his left leg, and a thin trickle of blood came down its side, visible in the now clearing night sky. Lanka looked like hell, with sand all over her body, basically dragging her right foot and holding her side. She wore white tank top that was splattered with droplets of blood. Red or black, Torun could not tell. She held the shotgun like a club.

As they got close, Lanka glanced over everything Torun was sitting between. She left Ashraful behind to approach him faster. Then she pointed at the headless body, "you killed it?"

Torun held up the head he was holding in his hand and, with the other hand, pulled its hair. He felt its jaws shift in a silent shriek. Lanka's one open eye narrowed as Ashraful made a whining choking sound, stepping away. Torun thought he might lose consciousness, but he stayed standing.

"I don't think it's dead," Torun said anyway, letting it slide out of his hand until it hung from his hand with almost three feet of hair. The head dangled like a pendulum.

Lanka looked at the disfigured, monsterous head for a second, then she swung her shotgun around and hit the head like it was a cricket ball. There was a crack and crunch, and the head, much heavier than a cricket ball, rose halfway across Torun's hand before settling back down. Ashraful winced.

"Where is Mohona?" Lanka asked, voice calm and controlled.

A second swing. Stronger now. The thud it made on the head was distinctively wet.

"Where is Mohona?" Lanka asked again.

Torun tried to intervene this time, "Lanka, I-"

Another swing. It sounded like a coconut being crushed and a small chunk of something wet and sludgy landed on Torun's foot.

"Where. Is. Mohona?" Lanka chewed on her words.

"I don't think it can talk," Ashraful said.

Lanka paused, bending to look at him.

"I've heard it talk before."

"No, I mean, it needs it's throat and it's lungs to talk," Ashraful pointed at the headless body, "And they're laying over there."

Lanka considered this for a moment.

"Then how do we get it to tell us where Mohona is?"

Torun wondered what would be the best way to tell Lanka that Mohona is probably not alive anymore.

"The guy you guys caught seemed to know something," Torun's find his mouth saying, "we should go ask him." If he's still on the boat.

"I'll go bring him," Ashraful said, seeming eagre to get out of the scene of gore.

"Go," Lanka said. Ashraful scurried past them towards the boat behind. In the starlight, his image became smaller and smaller, until he reached the black figure of the boat, and disappeared inside of it.

As he went into the boat, Lanka asked, "Who was it?"

"Who?" Torun was staring at the side of the head and was pulled out of a trance when she asked.

"Who did she appear to you as?" Lanka clarified.

Torun glanced at the toppled body, "it was Mohona."

Lanka shifted her jaw, but said nothing.

Ashraful came out a minute later, another figure following him. They both jumped to the bank and walked towards them.

As the man came towards them, Torun lifted the head to show it to him. The man stopped in his tracks. He was looking at Lanka. She had her gun pointed at him.