THREE: A STRANGER FROM NOWHERE

Orla

Orla stared at her bedroom ceiling in Number Twelve, Forestry Road, and counted the boards. There were twenty-two, stretched out from one wall to the other, and Orla knew them well, having counted them many, many times over the years.

On the border of Dirgemore and the Acadia National Park sat an old colonial home half swallowed by the surrounding forest, swaddled in the shadow of the mountain at its back. The kids in town often said it was haunted, and sometimes Orla agreed with them. A few dingy, white shingles had fallen from the siding, leaving gaps Orla likened to teeth missing from a skull's mouth. If you stood at the end of the drive and gazed up at the main gable, the window there resembled an open, watching eye. Normal families had dogs and welcome mats and potted begonias. Number Twelve, Forestry Road, simply had spiders and old newspapers and untrimmed shrubs instead. Sometimes, Orla wondered if Morty used to be a ghost who lived there, and he'd decided to haunt her instead of the old, dusty house.

Huffing through her nose, Orla sat up on her bed, turning her head to the window. She looked down at the driveway, slanted and covered with old, dead needles shed by three spruce trees that hunched over the roof like old, bitter crones. She'd been banished to her room for two days.

"Stupid, duck-faced Marissa Mallard," she grumbled, wrapping her arms around her folded legs. She rested her chin on her knees. "Hope she gets a scar."

She didn't really hope that. Orla didn't like the girl, but she told herself wishing injury on someone would make her just as awful as Marissa. No matter what other people thought of her, Orla couldn't be considered a violent or malicious person. The worst she usually wished on Marissa was for her grades to be so terrible, she had to transfer to a different school—but Marissa had excellent grades, much better than Orla's. Orla had a great deal of difficulty concentrating in class with Morty at her side.

Groaning, she flopped back onto her bed, the sheets unmade, the room in a state of disarray. She wanted her radio, but that had been the first thing Mr. Byrne removed when he grounded her. Her second-hand Walkman had been the next thing, though she'd tried to hide it. Mr. Byrne could sniff things out like a bloodhound. He'd left the old paperbacks she'd purloined from his collection over the years, though.

A light breeze caused the aluminum blinds to sway, coming in through the cracked open window. Dust glittered in the shafts of sunlight. Orla looked at her nightstand, at the digital clock, seeing the hour had just turned to three in the afternoon.

Orla counted the boards overhead again, all twenty-two of them. She sat up.

"Mr. Byrne!" she shouted. "Is it lunchtime yet? It's past three already!"

No answer came, and so Orla wriggled off her bed and crossed the room, kicking aside stray laundry. She opened the door and leaned over the threshold, shouting toward the stairs. "Mr. Byrne!"

"Stop yelling."

Orla yelped and spun in place, looking toward the head of the hall. Mr. Byrne stepped from his own room, shutting the door behind himself with a quiet thump. He had his spectacles in hand, and he methodically cleaned the lenses with the cuff of his sleeve.

"You're far too noisy, child," he grumbled, his voice low and heavy with a sleepy lassitude. Orla guessed he'd been napping. Sometimes, it felt like Mr. Byrne could sleep for days if he didn't have to get up and feed himself. "Go make yourself lunch."

"Now that it's almost dinner," she grumbled, but she slouched off down the stairs, dragging her bare feet on the carpet. Mr. Byrne followed.

It was dark on the lower floor, the main hallway pitch black without a light on, though Orla could tell Mr. Bryne had left the old television running in the den, tinny music and muffled voices drifting through the archway. Bookshelves lined the walls and made the passage narrow, the smells of old paper, leather, and dust thick in the air.

The kitchen resembled the rest of the house—down on its luck and a little dingy, the cabinets in desperate need of a new paint job, though the dust had been wiped clean off the linoleum floor and tiled counters. Orla glanced at the phone mounted to the paneled wall and the narrow sideboard underneath holding the answering machine. The light blinked red.

"You've a message, Mr. Byrne."

"Leave it," he said, going to the refrigerator. "Here. Have a sandwich."

He took out the necessary items, rye bread and leftover tuna mixed the day before, Orla making a face behind Mr. Byrne's back because he always added too much mayonnaise. She fixed her expression before he turned around, but judging by his raised brow, he probably knew what she'd been doing.

Mr. Byrne left her there, wandering back into the house, and though Orla couldn't hear his footsteps, she did hear the shuffle of him moving a book, paper crinkling, the recliner creaking under his weight. Orla dug a spoon out of the drawer and plopped tuna onto a stale slice of rye bread, folding it in half and grabbing a napkin instead of a plate. She bit into it and ripped off a hunk, chewing with vigor to work out her frustration. In the corner of her eye, the red light continued blinking.

Orla's chewing slowed, becoming more contemplative. Swallowing, she glanced toward Morty, seated as a crow on the toaster, and they shared a look.

"Well, I'm already in trouble," she mumbled to herself, inching across the kitchen. "Not like I can be more grounded than I already am...."

She listened for a moment, waiting for noise from the other room. Paper fluttered, and she knew Mr. Byrne had to be immersed in one of those newspapers he got from abroad that he didn't let her touch. Orla thumbed down the volume on the answering machine, then pressed play.

"You have two new messa—."

She slapped her hand over the speaker to dull the automated voice, her eyes flicking toward the kitchen door. It remained shut.

"First message. Today, Wednesday, September twelfth, nine-fifteen AM—." Orla tapped her foot, waiting. "Mr. Byrne, this is Sandra Gorn from Ellsworth Public Schools District. I hope you're doing well—uh, we've an odd request for information submitted on your foster daughter, Orla Tiernan, this morning. It seems there's been some misfiling at the state level—anyway, we're going to need you to come in and sign some documents when you get the chance—."

Orla frowned, then took another bite of her sandwich, licking relish off her lip. What was that all about? Feeling spiteful, she hit delete. "Bitch."

Morty pinched her side.

"Ouch, knock it off," she huffed, wriggling. Morty didn't relent. "All right, sorry, sorry...."

"Next message. Today, Wednesday, September twelfth, eleven thirty-six AM—." Orla took another bite, grimacing at the taste of mayo. The machine clicked over to the last recording, and a quiet male began to speak in an ill-used rasp. "Henry," he said. "They know where you are."

The line went dead.

"There are no more messages. To listen to your—."

Brow furrowed, Orla clicked the stop button and ended the playback. What in the world was that? She considered replaying the recording again, maybe to see if she could recognize the voice, but she didn't want to get in more trouble despite her earlier words. She left the answering machine alone after rewinding it, then took her sandwich and hurried upstairs.

"What do you think that was all about?" she asked Morty as she sat on the edge of her bed, turning to look out the window again. "That stuff Principal Gorn said? Seemed weird. Maybe she's trying to get me expelled."

She heard the screen door downstairs shriek on its hinges, and she stood so she could look down at the backyard properly. She saw the back of Mr. Byrne's head, his posture slouched and his hands in his pockets as he headed toward the shed Orla wasn't allowed in. She hummed, then turned away.

Morty's answer didn't come for several minutes, and Orla got the impression he was distracted when he finally did reply. "Uncertainty. Wariness."

Orla picked at the crust on her sandwich, looking toward her shadow. It remained still. "Huh." She pushed the matter from her mind.

She stayed quiet for a time, finishing her lunch, contemplating what she'd do with the rest of the day. She didn't want to read, having read all the books she had, though she guessed she could steal another from downstairs. She could probably go and watch television, considering Mr. Byrne was in the shed, and he could spend hours out there without emerging. Her guardian had terrible time management.

I could do that. Or...I could sneak out.

The thought barely passed through her head before Orla stuffed her napkin into her shorts' pocket and shoved her feet into her sneakers without bothering to find clean socks. She snatched her wallet off the dresser, then headed out her door. She yanked a hair tie off her bony wrist to pull her hair back, but otherwise didn't bother with her appearance. She didn't care what people in Dirgemore thought of her anyway.

Orla listened as she thumped down the stairs into the main hall. The house remained quiet, haunted by its own aging groans, the television off now. Mr. Byrne always left the curtains shut over the blinds, so the rooms sat in a semi-permanent twilight, stuffy and dark aside from where the sun glowed beneath the coverings.

Biting her lower lip, Orla eased the front door aside, then inched the screen open. The front screeched marginally less than the one leading to the back, but Orla didn't stop holding her breath until she hopped off the porch. She wasted no time dashing down the driveway, running until she reached Forestry Road, and she walked along the muddled stretch of dirt dividing the pavement from the shallow culvert. She stretched and savored the fresh air.

I'll be in more trouble later if I don't get back before Mr. Byrne notices, she thought to herself. But it's just not fair. I didn't do anything.

A stone wall marked the end of the road where it intersected the main street heading into Dirgemore, joined by the very last streetlight on the town's edge and a derelict phone booth. The light wasn't on, and Orla wagered she had at least two hours to spend how she liked before it started getting late and she truly tested her luck. Mr. Byrne didn't allow her out of the house once it started getting dark, grounded or not. Orla didn't have places to go or people to see, but the consequence stood.

Morty found his way to her shoulder once more, looking sinister as he dripped shadowy rills against the sunlight's bright flush. No one in town noticed him. Few even noticed Orla.

She walked all the way to the coastline to the docks that laid mostly quiet in the afternoon, though a few workers still tarried, getting things ready for the evening. Dirgemore didn't have much of a beach, more a rough line of rocks tumbling into the sea with no stretch of sand in between, but Orla walked there for a time before turning back into town. She started up the hill that would eventually lead her back home.

Orla crossed the road, a truck rattling past, loaded with logs, wafting the smell of cedar and pine and diesel fuel. There was an arcade on the corner, crowded with students who'd rushed there when school let out, the lights buzzing and flashing, laughter breaking like waves on the shore. The noise increased as Orla popped open the glass door, and the bells hanging above it jangled.

She shuffled off to the back, to the machines the other teenagers there weren't interested in because they were scuffed or mostly broken, and she used her pocket change to play. Time got away from her until Morty dug his talons into her shoulder, and Orla looked around, realizing she'd been there longer than she should have been. She shoved her depleted wallet into the back pocket of her shorts and slipped out the side door so she could avoid the older teenagers coming through the front. She crossed the crumbling asphalt lot and hopped the simple fence surrounding the empty field on the other side. She pulled down the wire and hiked her leg over.

Morty bristled by her ear. Sharp prickles glanced over Orla's skin.

"What?" she asked, brushing her fingers through him so he'd stop needling her. Someone might assume passing through Morty would be cold, like passing through a ghost was supposed to be. However, Orla always found him warm—maybe even hot—almost as if she'd touched the outside of an oven.

"Unease."

Orla frowned as she walked, dry grass rustling under her sneakers. Browntail moths flitted from the rustling brush, and she shooed them away from her face. "What's wrong?"

Morty didn't answer in words, but Orla received a flash of images, hazy half-thoughts she didn't quite grasp. She thought there was a man, a hood perhaps, a doorway. Her head hurt, and Orla had to stop walking and squeeze the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes.

When she opened them again, she blinked and looked toward the road, trying to clear the spots. When they were gone, she noticed a man standing on the sidewalk. He stood at least a full foot taller than her, and better resembled a bear in stature than a person. He wore plain black pants and a long coat, which Orla thought odd, given the tenacious heat. Still, she wouldn't have given him much consideration if it hadn't been for him being turned in her direction—and the mask.

A white mask covered most of his face, made to look like some kind of monster or maybe a wolf. Orla couldn't tell from a distance, but she didn't think it was a Halloween mask. It had too many little details, ones even she could see where she stood, strips of gold along the ridges of the porcelain cheeks and glass tufts. He lifted one booted foot and stepped on the wire, using his weight to bend it until it snapped.

"Leave," Morty sent to her, followed by, "Urgent. Leave. Urgent."

Swallowing her sudden fear, Orla picked up her feet and started walking, setting her sights on the woods bordering the other end of the lot. All she had to do was cross through that leg of the forest and climb the easement on the other side to reach the street connected to Forestry Road. Orla often took this route home since it wasted less time to cross here than to follow the switchback all the way to where the main avenue started. As an added benefit, Orla hoped making it to the trees would discourage the man behind her.

What does he want? He was definitely looking at me, and I'm not going to stand there and let some weirdo in a mask come up to me in the middle of an empty lot. He could be a pervert!

"Danger," Morty told her. "Danger. Caution. Leave. Urgent."

Orla kept her pace even at first, not wanting to overreact, but when she heard the heavy tread gaining on her, she leaned into a run. She didn't care how it looked—she sprinted for the treeline and dared to glance over her shoulder. The man gave chase, wolf mask flashing in the sun.

Sucking in a startled breath, Orla went faster, not slowing until she reached the fence and had to clamor over it. She rushed, and the top wire dragged across her bruised knee, Orla wincing at the bright, stinging pain. Dirt rose in hazy puffs when she collided with the ground, and Orla scrambled upright again, stumbling. She didn't look behind herself again as she bolted for the waiting pines.

"Hide," Morty said. "Hide. Hide."

That was all well and good for Morty to say, but Orla didn't see anywhere in her frantic searching that would provide a good place for her to find cover. She kept going, hearing bushes and branches snap, the earth seeming to shudder beneath her feet from the person chasing her.

What does this guy want?!

An idea came to her, and Orla changed direction, wincing when twigs dug into her bare legs. She didn't know if it was her own memory or maybe one from Morty, but she recalled a place nearby where she liked to explore in the summer, where the bayberry bushes grew thick as clouds, hiding a shallow den dug beneath the roots of an old, decaying stump. She ran for it, her breaths coming in short and choppy with panic as she dodged trees.

It took her longer than expected to find the den, or perhaps time moved strangely in her fear, trickling by like molasses, her body moving too slowly for her frantic, confused mind. She'd been playing video games only a few minutes ago; now, she was running from some freak in the forest.

Orla yanked aside a bayberry bush and revealed the den. It looked smaller than she remembered, and for one terrible second, she thought she might not fit. Fortunately for Orla, she managed to scrunch down into it, huddled against the stump, and the bush swayed back into place, hiding her from view.

The afternoon had waned while she wasted time in the arcade, and the yellow light cut high through the woods, dipping behind the mountain ridge. It darkened the area under the trees, but the glow leaked between the thick trunks, giving Orla enough to see by as she peered through the shrubs. The pounding footsteps chasing her neared, and Orla held a hand over her mouth as leaves crunched, a shadow moving through the underbrush.

The man breathed heavily, noisy pants curtailing as the crunching slowed.

"Where are you, you little bitch?" he muttered in a gravelly whisper.

Orla didn't dare make a sound as she listened to the heavy boots thud on the earth around her, the stump against her back trembling from the weight. The man exhaled—and then sniffed. He did so several times, clearly trying to catch the scent of something.

Is he—can he smell me? Orla thought. No, that's ridiculous—.

Branches snapped and leaves rustled. The shadow twisted and moved, an emphatic "Shit!" cutting across the silence as something metal shrieked. Footsteps started running away from Orla—too many footsteps to belong to one person. Was there somebody else there? Where had they come from? What did these people want?

The running dwindled into the distance, chased by grunts and the strangest smell of ash and charred wood. Orla remained hidden, her mouth dry, and her legs speckled with tiny cuts and scratches. Blood oozed from her sliced knee. Morty remained at her shoulder, his form amorphous, radiating anxiety.

It had been quiet for long enough that Orla started to move, thinking it safe to leave—but then, she caught the faintest noise of dry, dead foliage rustling, footsteps lighter than those before coming nearer. They were steady and patient, marked by the slightest bump when the person's heel met the ground. The person stopped—and Orla let out a startled gasp as the bush over her was pulled aside.

Another man peered down at her—another man in another mask, though this one was clearly a fox. He wore a plain, dark gray hooded sweater—a new one, given it still had creases from where it'd been folded and sitting on a display shelf—and black pants. He was shorter and more slender than the behemoth who'd chased her, but that still made him larger than Orla. She didn't move.

"Come on," he said in a deep, bored voice, the words rounded by a sigh. "Come here. Let's get you home."

"I don't know you," Orla blurted out.

"Obviously," he retorted. "Get out of the dirt, kid, before he comes back."

Orla didn't have any idea what was going on, but she didn't have much choice but to listen now that the guy had found her. She grimaced as she unfolded herself from the den and crawled past the jagged edges of the bush, part of her hair falling from its tie. The man in the fox mask continued to survey the forest—waiting, watching. He had his hood up, and Orla could see the impression of a mouth below the shadowed edge of the fox's stylized jaw. That mouth pulled into a frown when he noticed her staring, and the man turned away.

"Let's go."

"Who are you?" Orla demanded, her voice warbling despite her attempted bravado. "Who was that man?"

He didn't answer. He just started walking, and Orla followed.

They made it a few yards through the underbrush before he asked, "Why aren't you at home?"

Orla clenched her jaw, too embarrassed to say she'd snuck out like some bratty kid. She could have been hurt, or kidnapped, or—who knows what, and no one would have known about it. Mr. Byrne would have been upset. He didn't like her much, but Orla knew he didn't want her hurt.

"Why aren't you?" she retorted.

"I don't have one anymore," the man said, simple as could be. The fading sunlight glinted off the patches of gold lining his mask. It was definitely ceramic and appeared heavy, not something bought out of a cheap costume store, though Orla didn't see how it stayed on.

That mask dipped toward her as the man paused, and Orla froze, feeling the weight of the stranger's gaze though she couldn't see his eyes. The forest echoed around them, eerie in its silence, no birds in the trees, no insects in the grass. The man studied her for a long, awkward moment. "If I said the word Morsath, I'm guessing it wouldn't mean anything to you, would it?"

Morsath? What is that? Frowning, Orla shook her head.

"How about The Ominous?"

Again, Orla shook her head. "No, I don't know what that is. Am—am I supposed to?"

The man sighed, then laughed, a low, rumbling noise that cut off as soon as it began. He turned around and kept walking, his words tangling on an exhale. When the breeze rose, Orla could smell smoke on his clothes. "The bastard."

Orla fidgeted, stopping herself from reaching for Morty on her shoulder. Morty remained calm but leery. His tension reflected through her, and it made Orla uncomfortable.

The man shook his head, his hood rustling. "Don't worry about it," he told her. "Let's get you home."

"Who was that man?" Orla tried again. "And why are you both wearing masks?"

He didn't answer. The stranger pressed on as the evening drew closer, and Orla followed.

They came to the end of Forestry Road, where the stone wall waited with the old phone booth and the town's last streetlight, the bulb feebly flickering as it powered on. In the distance, Orla heard a familiar voice rise and echo through the trees.

"Orla! Orla!"

"Crap," she whispered under her breath. Mr. Byrne's would be furious with her.

Orla turned toward the stranger to say—well, she didn't rightly know. Maybe to thank him, or to demand more answers. Why had he been in the woods? Had he driven the other man away? Why did he take her home? Who was he?

The stranger had disappeared, and if not for the lingering smell of smoke, she would have thought him to have never been there at all. Mr. Byrne's voice drifted closer through the forest, magnified by the backing mountain, so Orla didn't have time to search for where the man had gone. She ran up the road toward Number Twelve.

It didn't occur to her until much later that the stranger had known where she lived.

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