CHAPTER THREE
The villagers were celebrating. Whiskey was being passed around, and there was a good deal of boisterous chatter. Someone played a fiddle and someone else banged on a drum as the villagers performed Scottish dances. People seemed surprised to see Kate among them, but to anyone who asked, she mentioned her grandparents. That seemed to make her acceptable to them. She suspected, though, that the amount of whiskey being consumed was contributing to her warm welcome. In the morning, they might feel differently about her.
She met the young woman who had been chosen in this year's lottery. Effie was her name, and she looked about Kate's age or perhaps a little younger. She was quite a flirt, and the young men were hanging around her, urging her to share her kisses before the sea monster assailed her with its big slobbery tongue.
Effie, who was liberally downing the local brew, retorted, "Legend claims he has a far more talented tongue than any of you lot!"
One of the young men in particular was being extra-solicitous to Effie, bringing her more whiskey and smiling nervously at her. He was ginger-haired and sweet-faced, although quite tall and brawny. Not a bad looking lad, all things considered. He clearly had a crush on Effie, but Kate could see no evidence that his feelings were returned. Effie was flirting with all the men. How must it feel, Kate wondered, to be madly in love with the chosen girl on a night like this?
The whole event was bizarre, she decided. She supposed one of the villager men must don a costume that symbolized the sea dragon. No doubt he would strut around making a spectacle of himself. But would he and Effie really have sex tonight? If so, she hoped it was somebody the young woman liked well enough to have a little fun with. It would be horrible if she were forced to participate.
Kate sipped at the whiskey every time it came around. It was strong. She soon began to feel lightheaded.
As it grew darker, the mood on the beach changed. The lighthearted banter turned raucous and there was a violent edge to it that made her uneasy. The laughter of the women was shrill, and the shouts of the men back and forth to each other were harsh and rough.
"The moon is up," someone yelled. "It's time. Effie! Enough with the drink now, lass, off you go."
Effie squealed, still excited about all the attention she was receiving. "Let's go, lads. Row me out to the island and let me see if this monster's really as good a lover as the other girls claim."
The women pushed her forward, and Effie was surrounded by a pack of men, who all grabbed at her. She struggled playfully and yelled, "Get yer fat hands off me. I'm not that drunk. I can walk to the boat."
Kate noticed that although they stopped manhandling her, they still crowded close. The redheaded boy tried to put his arm around her shoulders as he whispered something to her, but Effie shrugged him off. Some of the others tried to touch her in more intimate places, which only made the girl laugh harder. She was bundled into the rowboat and rowed out a short distance to a tiny island. It was little more than a large rock sticking out of the surf a few yards from shore. The rock had a spit of sand facing seaward, with waves breaking fiercely over some submerged rocks. The men had brought ropes, and they looped them around rocky outcroppings to secure Effie against the rock.
Watching along with the others on the beach, Kate was struck by the weird drama of the scene unfolding before her. When Effie was well and truly tied, her arms raised over her head and her hips and legs tightly bound to the rock, she seemed to realize that she was in a predicament. She began to struggle in earnest against the ropes. She started asking the men to untie her, then begging them to do so.
They laughed at her. The mood grew even darker, and Kate began to feel queasy. Maybe she shouldn't have joined in the festivities tonight. She was a stranger here, and this was all a bit over the top. Several of the men around Effie were touching her hair, her mouth, her breasts, her thighs. They began pulling at her clothing—a pretty dress that the girl had obviously chosen for the occasion. Were they going to strip it off her? This might be difficult, given all the rope they had wound around her.
The young man with the crush on Effie started arguing with several of his fellows, but one of the older men shoved a whiskey bottle at him and pushed him away from the girl. Looking uncertain and anguished, the boy lifted a whiskey bottle and drank deeply. He raised the bottle a second time, and gulped the burning liquid down. Kate felt sorry for him.
She also felt indignation and concern for Effie, but that wasn't all she felt. Unaccountably, as she watched the men crowding around their sacrificial victim, an insidious heat built in the deep recesses of her belly. It moved lower, between her legs. Jeez, she was getting wet. In a crazy way, she envied Effie. How would it feel, she wondered, to be the center of all that male attention?
The taboo, the forbidden had always excited her.
Before the men could strip Effie completely, there arose a sibilant hum. The strange vibration crept in from the sea, rising in volume and intensity. In the distance, the waters seemed to glow. Something was speeding toward them. Kate felt the force of a jumble of powerful emotions—lust, rage, and fury—barreling toward them out of the night.
She stared out to sea with everybody else. Holy shit. What the hell was that? The waters were parting for it, and, as it moved, it left a wake of phosphorescence glimmering on the surface.
There was a stirring in the crowd, a low murmur of sound, and finally shouts and screams.
"He comes! The sea dragon!"
"The monster!"
"The Zrakon is rising from the sea!"
The men pawing Effie leapt away and flung themselves into the boat. They rowed frantically back to shore. As for Effie, she started screaming, her voice rising high and shrill.
Shit! Were they abandoning her out there? The poor girl was obviously terrified. Kate didn't blame her. Whatever that was out in the ocean, it surely wasn't a villager in a crazy costume.
Effie shrieked. Kate could never bear to hear the sound of a fellow creature in pain or fear. Without thinking, she rushed toward the water. It was one thing to play the part of a sacrificial maiden, but something else entirely to be one.
Effie, no longer so proud to be the center of the villagers’ attention, wasn't a willing participant in the ritual any more. Kate didn't understand what was happening, but it was clear that no one was doing anything to help her. She still couldn't see what the thing in the sea was, but it was heading straight for Effie, and the weird humming sound was getting louder.
She raced to the rowboat. The villagers backed away when they saw her coming. She confronted a group consisting of three of the village’s strongest young men. "Come on, we have to get her off that rock. Quickly! Help me!"
The men looked at one another uneasily, but did not move. A couple of them had just come back from the rock, and they didn't look in any mood to return. She looked around for the ginger-haired boy, but didn't see him anywhere.
"Tis the Zrakon," one of them hissed. "He canna be resisted."
"She chose it," another muttered. "If she tries to take back her choice, the monster will come for us instead."
Kate shook her head vigorously. The Zrakon? The thing even had a name. "Don't be absurd. It's probably a whale or maybe even a giant squid. It can't come ashore, but it might hurt Effie, the way she's bound practically in the water."
In truth, she did not know whether whales would hurt anyone, but what if it was a shark? The sea was too cold for those, wasn't it? Didn't sharks stick to warmer water? She was already splashing into the breakers. One man followed her, only to yell at her, grab her arm and try to hold her back. She jerked away from him, and he didn’t follow her any deeper. She didn't need the boat, she realized. Effie's rock was only a short distance away and the water was freezing, but not too deep.
The surf was rough, but she persevered. She dragged herself onto the mini-island before the sea monster, or whatever it was, was able to get there.
Effie was wailing, tears pouring down her flushed cheeks. "I’ve changed my mind, I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want to be taken by something that big!"
Kate spoke softly to her, telling her not to cry, and to hold still while she cut the rope that bound her. But the blade of her Swiss Army Knife was not sharp, and it seemed to take an age to saw through the rope. If only she had one of those huge, nasty dirks like Ross Malloch.
All the while, the creature was surging closer, its angry hiss much louder now as it sped toward the sacrificial rock. She wasn’t going to make it, Kate realized. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder. The thing was almost upon them. Dammit! There wasn’t enough time!
The rope parted and Effie tore herself free. She leapt down and scrambled back through the thigh-high water toward the villagers. The redheaded lad emerged from the crowd on the beach, staggering from all the whiskey he'd consumed. He rushed into the breakers to help Effie.
As Kate tried to follow, a mighty wave crashed over her, and she stumbled and fell to her knees. The massive shoulders of the sea monster rose out of the water. Standing on reptile legs, he stalked through the surf foaming around the small islet. He opened his mouth and showed his great teeth to the crowd. His roar was like a clap of thunder. As it died away, Kate could hear people moaning. The creature pounded on his chest and roared again.
He turned from the scattering crowd and looked down on Kate, who had managed to stand up again. She was drenched and shivering. Huge eyes glittered like silver as they considered her. One more ground-shaking stride and he was looming over her.
Holy shit. What was this thing? This was no ordinary creature—this was something from the pages of myths and legends. He could not possibly exist...and yet, he did.
The beast they called Zrakon was easily 10 feet tall. He seemed to gain height as he stood there, as if to make himself more imposing, more magnificent. His massive tail curved around him and slashed the water, sending spray all over them. She backed up until she felt something hard smash into her spine. The rock.
Oh no. I have become the sacrifice.