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breath.  She felt her lungs locking up, terror
clamping down on her chest like a vice.
    The creature leaned close, its nightmarishly
fanged face dropping until its whiskers brushed her neck.  Blaze trembled and
tried to pull away, struggling to breathe, but the beast easily held her in
place.  She felt a cold draft near her jugular as it took a deep breath near
her neck, nostrils flaring.
    Feeling the warm tongue slide out
and lick her throat, however, Blaze lost it.  She screamed and kicked out, catching
the thing between the legs with all the strength of her terror.
    The slitted green eyes went wide,
then the creature kind of crumpled sideways, releasing her.
    Blaze got up and ran.
    She didn’t slow down for the gun,
didn’t stop for her coat or gear, and, once she realized she didn’t know how to
start the 4-wheeler, kept right on running, making a panicked bee-line for the
trees.
    Behind her, she heard a crash
within the lodge, then she was hurtling through the woods, diving over fallen
trees, running as fast as her freakishly long legs could go.
    “Wait!” she heard, behind her. 
Too close.  Blaze screamed and ran faster, trying to make the lake.  She could
see the water in the distance.  Just a little further…
    A rotten birch caught her ankle,
sending Blaze tumbling face-first into the brush.  Behind her, she heard the
sound of footsteps crashing through the undergrowth, catching up.  She let out
a panicked cry and struggled to get to her feet.
    “Now just hold on!” a very
human-sounding voice cried, within kicking-range.  Something grabbed her
shoulder and held it.  In an instinctive panic, now, Blaze rolled onto her back
and started slamming her boots into anything that moved.
    “Jesus!” Jack cried, stumbling backwards,
hands up.  “I’m not going to hurt you, okay?”  He peered at her as if she were
some sort of dangerous insect, keeping his distance.  His clothes were
tattered.  “I just want you to calm down so we can talk.”  His green eyes were
anxious.  But not, her mind babbled, glowing anymore.  “Let’s just talk,
okay?”  He started easing towards her, one hand out.
    Blaze got up and bolted.  She had
gone maybe thirty feet before Jack tackled her, bringing her solidly to the
ground with all the authority of a ton of bricks.  She screamed into the
undergrowth as he crawled up her body and sat down on top of her, then flipped
her over.  At five-nine, Jack had to weigh something like four hundred pounds. 
She was finding it hard to breathe from the weight on her stomach. 
    “Listen, Blaze,” he panted,
leaning over her and holding down her arms against the mossy forest floor, “I
think we got off to a bad start.”  Brilliant green eyes that had been slitted like
a goddamn snake’s not a moment before were now filled with concern.
    She saw his tattered plaid shirt,
remembered the huge beast that had assaulted her, and sucked in a huge lungful
of air.
    Jack clapped a hand over her
face, glancing nervously at the lake.  “Okay, sweetie,” he said, over her
muffled screams, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.  The easy way is
you stop screaming, follow me back to the lodge, and we have a nice long chat. 
The hard way is I use this shirt, here, to gag you, tie your hands behind your
back, throw you over my shoulder, and take you back anyway.”
    Blaze bit his hand.  Then, as he
cursed and yanked his palm away to examine it, she bucked and kicked underneath
him, trying to dislodge his body.  He remained as solidly in place as the Great
Pyramids of Egypt.  She screamed again, this time making full use of her lungs.
    Jack had a piece of his shirt
stuffed in her mouth and secured before she could repeat the performance. 
Making nervous glances at the lake, he flipped her over, easily dragging her
hands behind her back as she thrashed.  Blaze heard the sound of cloth ripping
and cursed into the gag as she felt him wrap strips of fabric around