The boy felt the deep scratches throb with each beat of his heart, three gashes that ran from behind his neck to the right side of his chest. The collar of his T-shirt was stretched and ripped, and parts of the fabric had adhered to the dried blood. The wound reopened every time he moved, and a warm trickle flowed down his body.

His younger brother sat close to him in the back seat of the car, shaking and staring numbly ahead. His jeans were ripped at the knees, and scratches furrowed his hands.

Their father was behind the wheel, darting glances at the rearview mirror as the needle of the speedometer quivered near one hundred and the headlights illuminated the sycamores lining the road ahead.

The father looked at the deep gash in his palm, and the boy watched him take an old T-shirt from the passenger seat and tear off a strip with his teeth. Holding one end of the strip in his mouth, he wrapped his palm as best as he could and refocused his attention on the drive.

He had gotten the worst of it. Dried blood encrusted his face from a deep cut over his right eye, and his once-white dress shirt clung to his body where the blood was still wet.

Blood was smeared all over the rearview mirror from his father’s constant fidgeting, while the interior was covered with countless flecks and veins of red. There was also blood on the outside of the windows, but the boy knew that this blood was not theirs.

He saw his father adjust the rearview mirror once more, downward and a little to the right until he could see his father’s eyes staring into his.

“Go to sleep,” his father said grimly. “We’ll be there soon.”

The boy nodded slightly and returned his gaze to the sycamores, standing like giants next to the narrow, rural highway.

***

The SUV lurched to a stop in front of an isolated cabin made of cedar logs and asphalt shingles with a chimney of cobblestone. The father shut off the engine and got out of the car. He hastened to the other side of the SUV, which was dented in several places on the hood. The left headlight was shattered, and the side mirror was torn off.

“Quickly,” he said, opening the backseat door.

The boy came out first, surprised by the chill in the air. He was fifteen but small for his age with a thin build, large eyes, and shaggy hair. As he stepped out, the pain shot down the right side of his body, making him grimace.

The younger one came next. He was about ten with a sturdy build and the beginnings of a square jaw. The boys followed their father wordlessly to the cabin's front door where the man fumbled with his keys before finding the right one and opening the door for his boys.

“Come on,” he urged.

Once all three were inside, the man closed the door behind himself and moved to the center of the room, leaving the lights off. He grabbed a corner of the area rug and whipped it aside, revealing a hatch in the middle of the floorboards. He grabbed the ring handle embedded in the wood, gave it a hard twist, and pulled up the hatch.

“Get inside,” he ordered his sons.

The boys stepped uncertainly to the lip of the opening and peered down into the pitch-blackness.

“Now!” the father yelled.

The boys startled and began to climb down the wooden ladder carefully, followed quickly by their father. At the bottom, he reached overhead and pulled a chain that lit a single, dull light bulb, revealing a cramped cellar with cardboard boxes, firewood, and a rusted utility sink against the far wall.

Their father knelt in front of the boys.

“I’ll be back in three days. There’s plenty of food and water to last you until then. I do not want you leaving this cellar until I get back, do you understand?”

“But… what if they find us?” asked the older one, Isaac, trembling and on the verge of tears.

The father hesitated a moment, put his blood-encrusted hands on Isaac’s cheeks, and peered into his eyes. “Then you run. You grab your brother’s hand, and you run, do you hear me?”

Isaac tried to hold back his tears, but they came anyway. The father embraced his sons desperately.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he said, holding back his own tears. He gave them both rough kisses, stood up, and climbed out of the cellar.

Isaac and his little brother, Simon, watched as their father turned and looked at them one last time before he closed the hatch and pulled the rug over.

“Leave the light off until I get back,” they heard him say through the floorboards. The quick thuds of his dress shoes reverberated through the floor above, the opening and shutting of the cabin door, and the sharp click of the setting lock.

The gravel crunched like ice as their father hurried to the car, followed by a slight pause that seemed to them never-ending. The boys held their breaths, but after a moment longer, they heard their father continue into the car and start it. The wheels slipped on the gravel before catching, and the engine's hum receded until there was nothing.

Isaac stared down at his little brother, who was trembling uncontrollably, and then looked up at the light bulb pull chain. Giving his brother one last look, he pulled the chain, plunging them into total darkness.