Today's Reading
SOMEWHERE NEAR THE LONG TRAIL, FIRST DAY OF SPRING
I am not going to die. not here. not now. not like this. this is my world, my domain, my game—and everyone else is just hunting in it. I may be between a rock and a hard place at the moment, but I have been here before, and I will find my way out. My enemies will pay for this. As always.
I try to sit up, but I can't. I take stock of my injuries: a flattened nose, a couple of broken ribs, sprained right wrist, busted ring finger. My legs are numb with cold, but I think I can count on them to work should I manage to stand.
I look up from the freezing, sodden ground where I lie and see only a jagged swatch of gray sky surrounded by the ragged tops of towering pines. I listen, but the forest is still.
I need to get up and make my way back to the park. My rifle and my pack are gone. My hunting knife is missing from its sheath, as is my hat from my head. I rummage through the dead leaves on the forest floor for a downed branch. I drag a thick stick toward me and use it to prop myself up, scooting back until my shoulders rest against the trunk of an old hemlock. I release the limb, which falls onto my lap. I breathe heavily with relief and exhaustion. The effort costs me, but its success floods my being with the adrenaline of a win.
I am alive. I will survive. And I will prevail. As always.
A vague chirping in the trees. A slight shimmer in the gloom. A faint rustling behind me.
"Explore. Expand. Exploit. Exterminate." The claim of victory, whispered in my ear.
I reach for the stick in my lap, but I am too late. I gasp at the cold, silent blade against my throat. So swift is the cut that I barely register the pain and the blood before the woods blur to black all around me.
I should know better. Life is a zero-sum game. Game over.
As always.
CHAPTER ONE
Tell me about a complicated man.
—HOMER'S THE ODYSSEY, TRANSLATED BY EMILY WILSON
BEAR MOUNTAIN, VERMONT
The first thing the muddled mind of homer grant registered was the rough rub of a slobbery tongue on his wet cheek. The second thing was the metallic smell of spilled blood. He was on the floor of his one-room cabin, lying on his back on the shaggy old sheepskin rug he'd nicked from an empty hunting lodge on the far side of the mountain. He didn't feel much like moving. What he felt like was a worn and weary warrior. A beaten-down Ares in a battle with Athena.
When he finally opened his eyes, Homer was greeted by a blurry oval of tan and black fur. "Argos," he mumbled, and the bloodhound howled in return. The big dog loomed over him, licking his face.
"Spectacles," he managed to say.
Argos sniffed the rug, snatching up his eyeglasses and dropping them onto his chest. Homer curled his fingers around the thick black frames, sticky with what he hoped to hell was not blood but knew probably was, hope being among the most useless of emotions. Using the flannel sleeve of his shirt, he wiped off the dark red splotches from the lenses, swiping at the temples before slipping them on over his ears.
Now Homer could see very clearly the mess he was in. He threw his arms around the wrinkled neck of his hundred-pound hound. "Back," he said, and the dog shuffled backward on his hips, his powerful legs providing the leverage Homer needed to pull himself upright to a sitting position.
The view from here was even worse. Slowly he swiveled his aching head around the place he called home. There was the bookcase, and the table where his beloved Hermes 2000 typewriter sat, the shredded pages of his masterwork scattered all over the cabin like so much confetti. There was the Scrabble board on the old trunk that sat between two overstuffed chairs, set up for his next game with his new friend, Mercy Carr. And there was the futon where he and Argos slept each night, forever spoiled by the dead man with the axe in his chest.
At least Homer thought he was dead. Hoped he was dead. He closed his eyes against the bloodied body on his bed and tried to remember how it came to be there. But all he could see was the axe flying toward its target.
Once again Homer had angered the gods. Once again he'd somehow failed to do the right thing. He'd thought that living alone in the woods, away from the torments and temptations of humanity, would protect him. And once again, he was wrong.
Homer wondered what his punishment would be this time.
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