End of Day

by Mae Clair

  Chewing his bottom lip, Clive craned his neck to gaze up at the sky. He was six-three, and the rim of the hole they dug was at least a foot above his head. A few inches deeper and it would be hard to heft himself out, even with Warren giving him a leg up.

  He imagined moonshadow slanting from gravestones, spawning patches of black like the maw of open crypts. Somewhere over his shoulder, a night bird started chattering. The sound came from the boarded-up chapel behind them. The place could have been a mausoleum, all dark shadows and stark angles. Who knew what lurked inside, tucked into corners, under broken floorboards? Spiders. Snakes. Rats.

  Ghosts.

  He tightened his grip on the shovel. “No shit, Warren. I think we’ve been had. Nobody’s buried here.”

  “Then why would Yancy pay us hard cash to dig this bozo up?” Warren planted his shovel in the earth and rested his forearm against the shaft. “I don’t know what you’re whining about. I’m doing most of the work. You keep looking around like you’re waiting for a serial killer to take your head off.”

  “Not a killer.” Clive lowered his voice. “Monsters. Ain’t you heard the rumors about this place? A big black dog. Spook lights.” He normally didn’t mind dogs—loved them—but the black dog that haunted the cemetery was different. He stilled, tensing when the air carried a shivery whisper of sound to his ears. “Listen! Do you hear that?”

  “Hear what?”

  Clive’s gut turned over, rolling like a tumbleweed. “A bell. Can’t you hear it?”

  “The only thing I hear is you babbling like an asshat. Get back to work.”

  “There it is again.” Clive peered up at the chapel. “Ain’t no bell in that tower, but Kirk said if you hear it ring, you ain’t got long for this world.”

  “And you believed him? Kirk’s drunk or high most of the time.” Warren nodded toward the shovel. “Keep digging. You want to get out of here, don’t you?”

  Clive bobbed his head. “I don’t wanna get caught, that’s for sure.” By the living or the dead. He strained his ears, but the only sound to pierce the stillness was the wind cavorting among the tombstones. “What do you think the penalty is for digging up a grave?”

  “Don’t know.” Warren stabbed his shovel into the ground. “Don’t care.”

  Clive hunched lower in the grave. If a demonic spirit lingered in the dark waiting to feast on human flesh, hopefully it wouldn’t see him. Maybe Warren was right. Maybe he’d imagined that nearly imperceptible dirge, like the solemn toll of a funeral bell in the distance. It was Kirk’s fault for filling his head with stupid stories. If he had any sense, he’d listen to Warren and keep clear of their younger brother.

  Gritting his teeth, he jabbed his shovel into the soil. His shoulders protested along with his back, but he set to work, matching Warren’s pace. They labored in silence, the huffs and grunts of their efforts mingling with the distant sound of traffic. Clive would have sworn hours crawled past, an ungodly stretch of feeling the hair prickle on his neck, his mind crawling with images of maggot-infested coffins and looming death. The old hickory tree overshadowing the grave rattled its branches with a sound like bones clacking together. It was starting to stink in the grave. A sick, cloying stench—half sweet, half rotten—soured his gut.

  “Do you smell that?”

  Warren never broke his pace. “Keep digging.”

  Clive wiped sweat from his eyes with a grubby hand and tried to concentrate on something else—a long shower, a cold six-pack. He murmured prayers to his totem animal. The work would have gone faster with Kirk helping, but Warren drew the line at including him. Kirk had screwed up too many times.

  Like when he’d dragged Clive along to the pretty red-haired lady’s house saying they were going to look at puppies. Clive had thought he might leave with a pup, but there weren’t any animals there. Just the woman and her husband, and then Kirk had gone batshit crazy.

  Humming under his breath, Clive put his weight into digging. Humming stopped his mind from toggling back to that tiny house on Mill Street. The gruesome spray of blood splattered over walls and floor.

  “Looks like a fucking abattoir,” Warren had said when he’d hauled their asses out. He’d beaten the shit out of Kirk that night. In an opioid haze, Kirk had blubbered and moaned, threatening to “cut out your fucking heart.” The next day, he could barely crawl from bed, hobbled by the beating. Warren wanted to write him off permanently, but they were blood. When Kirk was well enough to function, Warren kicked him out with only his clothes and twenty bucks to his name. He told Clive to forget what happened on Mill Street.

  He only wished he could. Sometimes he was certain he was going straight to Hell for his part in the butchery. Maybe that’s why he feared the black dog and the tolling church bell more than Warren. Too bad regret didn’t bring people back from the dead.

  “Do you think we got ancestors buried in this place?”

  Warren maintained a furious pace with the shovel. “Don’t know. Don’t care.”

  Clive blew out a breath. “What the hell do you care about?”

  “Keep your voice down!” Warren cuffed him.

  “That’s it!” Clive heaved his spade to the ground. “I’m done. I don’t care how much Yancy is paying. There ain’t no—” He stopped suddenly, spurred to silence by the look on Warren’s face. His brother stared past him, focused on a patch of earth at the head of the pit.

  Clive turned slowly, noting where the soil had jiggled away from his fallen shovel. A skeletal finger pointed in his direction. A finger that seemed to condemn him for his part in a heinous crime.

  Mill Street.

  Warren was oblivious. “Damn.” He slumped against the edge of the pit. “I think we just found Gabriel Vane.”

  Chapter 2

  October 10, 1799

  Gabriel blew on his hands to warm them as he slid into a pew beside Jasper. If his friend was bothered by the cold, he gave no indication. The chapel was small, newly built, the smell of sawdust as heavy as the twin augers of anger and fear boring through the heart of every man in the gathering. Gabriel counted twenty, but more filed through the rear door. Too many people spoke at once, tossing out opinions, clamoring to be heard.

  “Silence!” Standing by the pulpit, Atticus Crowe banged the butt of his musket against the floorboards. “We will get nowhere with everyone bellowing at once.”

  “And we will get nowhere sitting on our arses.” Cyrus Herman bull-dogged his way to the front. “I lost half a dozen birds last night, Atticus. We need to do something about the bloody beast and do it quick. If it keeps up this slaughter—”

  “It got my young sow night before last,” Ira Blake cut him off. “Ripped her up like parchment. My missus darn near had a heart attack when she come on the remains the next morning.”

  “Slaughtered four of my chickens,” someone called from the back.

  “Eight of mine,” another voice chimed in.

  “Would have got my cow if my coon hounds hadn’t chased it off,” Thaddeus Keel added.

  Atticus held up his hands. “We’re formulating a plan to hunt the beast.”

  Gabriel stirred restlessly. If there was a plan, no matter how sketchy, it was time to share the details. The mood was growing uglier, weighted by the slick sweat of fear. Leaning closer to Jasper, he lowered his voice. “Does your father really have a plan?”

  His friend rolled his shoulders. “I don’t know. Normally, he confers with Vernon Hode.”

  “Where is Hode?” Gabriel craned his neck to look around the chapel. Together with Atticus, Vernon Hode had assumed a leadership role among the men of the remote village and outlying farms. “I don’t see him.”

  “Enoch said he’s in mourning.” Jasper’s older brother, Enoch, was a frequent visitor to the Hode house, usually calling on Vernon’s middle daughter, Abigail. “They say Hode got word his mother died
in the Old Country. He’s sworn off all visitors.”

  Gabriel grimaced. “But surely he understands the importance of this meeting?”

  “Enoch sent word through his hired hand, but the man turned Enoch away at the gate. Vernon says he can’t break from religious obligation and will see no one for a period of weeks.”

  “That puts the full weight of the beast on your father’s shoulders.” Gabriel frowned. He looked to where Enoch stood behind Crowe, several steps to the right. As oldest son, he was there to keep order if the meeting got out of hand. Tempers ran high, but if anyone could instill sense in the group, it was Atticus.

  In the small chapel it was easy to imagine him in the role of a fire-and-brimstone preacher, delivering judgment on anyone who questioned his authority. He didn’t stand behind the pulpit—that was reserved for Jasper’s Sunday sermons about serving the Lord. Gabriel’s friend was young to be a pastor—nineteen, to Gabriel’s eighteen years—but he’d agreed to shepherd their flock until an ordained man of God could be found. The chapel had been built in the hopes of attracting just such a minster to the village. The ground to the rear had yet to see a single grave cut into the sod.

  “What happens when this beast tires of our pigs and chickens?” The crack of Thaddeus Keel’s voice drew Gabriel back to the present. “When it decides to feast on our children and our women?”

  “Don’t be absurd.” Musket butt-end to the floor, Atticus wrapped his hand around the stock, his brows furrowed in a thunderous line. “Have you not heard a single thing I’ve said? We must hunt the creature. Track it during daylight hours when it will surely be holed up in a den.”

  “And leave our womenfolk unprotected?” Cyrus shook his head. “I will not entertain such nonsense.” A chorus of voices rose in agreement, men talking over each other, striving to be heard. Gabriel felt their fear, understood their anger.

  The creature had come from nowhere, a plague for the last two weeks. What began as sporadic attacks progressed to almost nightly occurrences. Farms were raided, livestock slaughtered. Villagers and farmers alike sequestered inside once the sun set, fearful of what the darkness would bring. Sometimes the foul beast didn’t bother to eat its kill, plundering as if for pleasure. Other times, it left little more than bones to mark butchered prey.

  A few people had spied the creature—Cyrus, along with Farley, the tanner. Both claimed it was far too large to be a natural wolf but said it ran on all fours and was lupine in shape. In the mind of many villagers, it had taken on a supernatural aura. Some whispered of demons and monsters, fiends that haunted the Old Country. Others talked in hushed tones of werewolves. Men slept with muskets beside their beds, and women hunched over prayer books and Bibles.

  Gabriel thought of Dinah. He’d been courting Jasper’s sister since spring and had every intention of asking Atticus for her hand. Were it not for the untimely appearance of the beast, he might have done so already. He understood Cyrus’s protest, the fear of the other men. If anything happened to Dinah because she was left unprotected, he would not have the strength to continue. Yet, someone needed to see the demon-creature cornered and killed.

  “It will only take a few,” he whispered.

  “What?” Jasper frowned at him.

  Determination rooted in Gabriel. For Dinah and their future, he would do what was needed. Gripping the pew in front of him, he shot to his feet. “It will only take a few.” He pitched his voice, shouting over the others. “It isn’t necessary for all to go, only a handful. Let stealth be in our favor.”

  One by one, those nearest turned to look at him, their arguments fading.

  Atticus extended his hands, palms down, motioning for quiet. “You have something to say, Gabriel?” The strength of his voice overpowered any lingering protests, the room succumbing to silence.

  Gabriel tightened his hands on the pew. His opinion did not carry the weight of his elders, but in this, he could do what they could not. If he was successful, the victory would surely play in his favor when he asked Atticus for Dinah’s hand.

  “Cyrus makes a valid point about leaving our womenfolk unprotected.”

  “And what affair is that of yours?” Atticus’s scowl etched a crevasse into his face. “You have no wife to concern you.”

  “Should I be so fortunate in the future, I would want others to protect her and my family, as I am ready to protect theirs. What good is it to send groups of men traipsing into the woods? So many will only alert the creature to the hunt while stripping our village and farms of protection.”

  “Hear! Hear!” someone shouted from the back.

  Atticus stood straighter, his frown deepening. “You have another suggestion?”

  “A small hunting party.” Gabriel drew a breath. He had not seen the creature himself but had witnessed the bloody destruction it wrought. It would be no easy task to flush out the beast and bring it down, but for Dinah and the safety of his village, he must try. “I will go. I ask only for one or two others to join me.”

  Stunned silence fell over the room. For a period of five seconds no one spoke; then Jasper stood beside him. “I will go with my friend.”

  “I will go, too.”

  Gabriel turned his head. Hiram Blum stood two rows behind, across the aisle. A gruff man with a large frame and a squared-off face, he’d appeared in the village a week ago, taking odd jobs for room and board. Little was known about him, but it was rumored he’d once served under Washington. A good ally to have in a fight.

  Gabriel nodded. “I am honored to have you both at my side.” He clapped Jasper on the shoulder then turned to face Atticus. “We will need provisions and enough ammunition to last several nights. The creature must be close, to frequent as often as it does. If we are unable to deliver a carcass by the Sabbath next, we will return for fresh supplies.” He stood taller, proud when Atticus nodded agreement. Respect gleamed in the older man’s eyes, admiration previously lacking.

  “How say you?” Atticus called to the assembly.

  “Aye!” The group answered as one.

  Within moments, Gabriel and Jasper were surrounded. Men pummeled their backs, shook their hands, wished them Godspeed and a dozen other regards. Elation displaced anger, sweeping the vinegar of fear from the chapel. Through the throng, Gabriel watched Hiram Blum slip from the crowd. The big man hesitated near the door, then cast a glance over his shoulder. A second later, he eased outside.

  But not before Gabriel had caught the feral yellow glint of his eyes.

  * * * *

  Present Day

  Elliott hooked his backpack higher and stepped outside. He’d delayed as long as possible at school, texting his mom to say he was going to stay late and join the science club. He’d probably have gotten around to joining anyway, but after today, he needed a quick out to save his butt. Accidentally sending Rodney Townsend sprawling in the cafeteria had skyrocketed the move to the top of his list.

  Rodney and his friends made it clear they planned to kick his “sorry ass” after school, so Elliott had done the only thing a coward could—he’d wasted an hour in the science lab watching the clock inch closer to 4:00, praying his tormentors had taken the bus home. Mr. Knoll had been glad to welcome him to the group, but Elliott barely heard a word the teacher said, his mind on the incident in the cafeteria. If only he’d been looking where he was going instead of burying his nose in his cell phone, he would have seen Rodney carrying his lunch tray. The other boy had been talking over his shoulder to Finn Carrigan but, of course, the fault was Elliott’s when they collided. No way could Rodney—badass and mouthy—be in the wrong.

  Rodney blundered backward into Finn, who’d dominoed into Troy Weaver. All three had gone down, but only Rodney had been carrying food. Only Rodney ended up wearing a plateful of macaroni and cheese, a corn dog slathered with mustard, and gobs of chocolate pudding. It might have been comical if Elliott wasn’t the one
who caused the mess.

  He’d gaped with his mouth hanging open, cell still locked on Simon’s Cat while the cafeteria roared with laughter. By the time the three boys had scrambled to their feet, Rodney snarling in his face, Mr. Fielding and Ms. Trevor arrived to pull them apart. Elliott had tried to apologize, but the humiliation couldn’t be undone. In math class, Rodney had lobbed spit-wads at the back of his head when Mrs. Martinez wasn’t looking. Between classes, Finn tripped him in the hallway, sending his glasses flying. Troy kicked them to Rodney, who did his best psychotic goalie impression with a spectacular block and rebound. Only Mr. Lafferty’s timely intervention as he stepped from his classroom to see what the ruckus was saved the glasses from being crushed. But even the mocking laughter of everyone who’d witnessed the spectacle hadn’t been enough to satisfy Rodney.

  “We’re going to kick your sorry ass, Camden,” he’d told Elliott before the start of next period. Lafferty saddling him with a detention for the following week hadn’t helped.

  Elliott lived in fear the remainder of the day, going out of his way to avoid his tormentors. When three o’clock rolled around, he hightailed it to Mr. Knoll’s classroom but spent the time fighting the urge to throw up. At least it was Friday. He didn’t have to face school tomorrow. If he could make it home, he’d be okay. Rodney and the others might forget everything by Monday.

  Yeah. Right.

  He’d worry about Monday when Monday came. Fake the stomach flu or something.

  Elliott licked his lips. His palms were sweaty, and his mouth was dry. Outside, a couple parents had arrived to pick up students who’d stayed for afterschool activities. Elliott hustled past and up the sidewalk to the road. No sign of Rodney, Finn, or Troy anywhere. When he reached the crosswalk, he considered himself in the clear. He lived close enough to walk home, but the other three would have needed to catch a bus. The thought of skirting Hickory Chapel Cemetery without a group of other kids walking in the same direction made him nervous, but the trade-off was worth not getting his butt kicked.