Sunkissed Innsmouth
Part Twenty Eight
Felecia crept away from the shack and the two men busy divvying up Mullens’ stolen goods. A brisk walk back to the mob showed Phillip encased and fallen to apathetic silence. He was never going to get any answers and the increasingly agitated crowd was forcing his hand.
Even if she could reach Phillip, even with them both armed, combined they wouldn’t be able to shout the truth over the jeers, howls, and calls for justice.
“These people have no concept of justice, and no moral compass either.”
Felecia whispered on her way back to her weapons and the words sounded abrasive, cruel maybe, but nevertheless true. This was another one of those moments, like the one had with Mullens under her stand of trees. A moment where Nana’s words and way of thinking, abhorrent as they had always seemed while Felecia lived in Rotary house, suddenly seemed more accurate than anything else.
Phillip wanted a bridge, someone who would bring people together. The hollow-eyed denizens of Rotary house weren’t people though, not really, they were ghosts, entrenched house servants and dwindling family members alike. All in Rotary house danced to the tune that Nana played. As for the village, none of them are people either, selfish savages, or simpletons otherwise. Rotary house wasn’t worth saving, and neither was the village. Felecia was no longer welcome in one place and would likely never be in the other. In the moment the only thing that did matter was right and wrong. Mullens’ son didn’t kill anyone, he was being hurt and would soon die for the crimes committed by another and the only two who could do something about that were busy collecting up their plunder.
Felecia armed herself and didn’t bother with hunching her shoulders or keeping her eyes on the ground. She moved with purpose from the tree line back over to the shack and managed to gather a bit of attention as she did so. By the time she reached the shack and kicked at the door, demanding that the two profiteers show themselves, the crowd surrounding Phillip and the boat launch were starting to take notice.
A particularly unwelcome but familiar face appeared from that crowd. “There you are, you little bitch!”
The lout who grabbed at her before, the one she had to kick in the groin to escape from, he burst from the gathering crowd with obvious intent. Felecia dared to turn her attention from the door she made her demand at over to the lout. She already had her bow in hand with an arrow knocked.
Felecia drew down on the lout, “Keep coming at me and I will defend myself.”
The lout stopped fast walking but kept taking steps toward her, “You shoot me with an arrow and you’ll get strung up right behind that murdering retard.”
“You’ll still be dead.” Felecia hoped the steel in her voice and her careful choice of words would be enough. She knew she wasn’t going to kill Mullens and she knew she wouldn’t be able to kill the drunken lout either. Though in the moment she felt confident enough to defend herself by making sure he would never walk right again.
With Felecia’s attention on the lout the door in front of her opened and she only barely managed to turn back in time to be met with a burlap sack full of canned goods. The blow was awful. Felecia could feel her mouth being split open, one lip, then the other, before the force of the blow sent her crashing, ass first onto the mud. She could taste blood and feel loosened teeth as her already swollen tongue pushed around to see what was still left intact. Her right eye was refusing to open and her left eye gave a view of a world hued by blood.
There was the presence of mind to reach for her bow, and then her knife when she realized the bow was nowhere to be seen. A rough hand clamped down on Felecia’s left arm and she lashed out with the knife managing to nick herself on the way to dragging the blade across a set of knuckles. Felecia heard a gasp and a low growl of pain, she also heard shouted words, the gathering crowd had a hundred voices and many of them were calling for someone to disarm her, to show Felecia her place.