God Stones: Books 1 - 3

by Otto Schafer

  She wiped the sweat from her face. “I think I know what it wants. It wants us to open it.” She gestured at the gleaming chest. “That’s it, it won’t let us leave until we open it.”

  In the back of the room, three spirals dropped from the vines to the ground. They began to spin into the earth like a corkscrew into a cork. When only the very tip remained above ground, the spirals fractured with a loud crack.

  Breanne began to breathe too hard, too fast. They were shut in, and this damn plant wasn’t going to let them go. Somewhere from deep in her damaged memories, a song played. A song she hated with all her heart. A Christmas song.

  Dark green-black tentacles burst from the fractured spirals. Up into the air, they stretched one foot, then two feet. Deep-blue thorns grew from the strange appendages. Three feet, then four feet, up and up they squirmed. The thorns stretched long, thick, and deadly sharp.

  Paul grabbed her hard by the shoulders. “Breathe, Bre. Don’t you go away! Don’t you leave!”

  She felt herself shake hard as her brother’s thumbs pressed deep into her shoulders. “Stay with us, sis.” Her eyes rolled back into her head. “No! Look here. Look at me! We need you, Bre! We need you to figure this out!”

  A violent explosion of sound. Gunshots! Crack!… Crack… crack, crack!

  29

  Abraham’s Secret

  Present day

  Petersburg, Illinois

  Bursting into the library elicited a frown from the librarian. The boys slowed to a walk as they skirted the front desk and quickly descended the stairs into the basement. There they found Pete and Janis huddled closely together, poring over one of many books they had stacked on the big round table.

  “Pete! You live!” Lenny shouted way too loudly from across the room.

  “Shh! Easy, man!” Pete said, ducking down like Lenny had thrown something at him.

  Lenny looked around and shrugged. Besides Pete and Janis, no one else was even in the lower level of the library, so he didn’t see what the big deal was.

  “It’s all over school that Jack caught up to you at lunch,” Lenny said before turning to Janis. “Hey, Janis.”

  “Hey, fellas,” she said.

  “Pete, man, I heard about the fight, are you okay?” Garrett asked, looking Pete up and down as if expecting to see he was missing a limb or at least had one in a cast.

  “I’m okay… my ribs hurt and I got a black eye, but I’ll live.” Pete removed his glasses and pointed at his eye. “Jerkwad almost broke my glasses too. I wouldn’t call it a fight, though – it was more Jack throwing punches and me getting hit by them,” he said sourly.

  Lenny flipped a chair around backwards and flopped down facing Pete. “Dang, bro! How many hits did you take? What are you going to tell your mom? How will that go over with Jack’s dad dating your mom? Did you turn him in to a teacher? Crap, did he get the book?”

  Pete waved off the questions, unconcerned. “I’ll just tell her I took an elbow in PE class playing dodgeball.”

  “Ugh, I hate that guy – he is such a loser!” Janis said, balling her fist. “Someone needs to teach that jerk a lesson.”

  Everyone looked at Garrett.

  Garrett looked at the floor. “I’m really sorry, Pete, I feel horrible. I never should’ve let you hold that book – I should have taken it with me.” Then he raised his head and locked eyes with Pete. “At least then it would have been me he was after and not you.”

  “It’s not your fault, Garrett,” Pete said.

  But Garrett knew in his heart it was his fault. “I assume he took the book then. Did you at least get it all transferred?”

  “It’s not that easy – the book’s in bad shape, and unless I disassemble it at the binding, my only option is to rely on my humidity chamber to moisten it. It is like starting over every time I turn a page. There was no way to give it the time needed in one evening.”

  “So we’re screwed,” Garrett said, pacing to and fro in front of the table.

  Pete sat back, crossed his arms, and smirked.

  “What are you smiling about? It’s only a matter of time before Jack either figures out where the tunnel is or sells the book to someone who will.”

  Pete continued to smirk.

  “Pete! What’s with the shit-eating grin? You fart or something?” Garrett asked.

  Pete’s grin twisted to a frown and his cheeks flushed cherry red as he glanced towards Janis. “No, I didn’t fart or something! Look, I never said Jack took the book.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll tell you, but sit down, man. You’re doing that thing where you pace, and you’re making me nervous,” Pete said, smiling wide.

  “Alright, alright, but get on with it already,” Garrett said anxiously. He could tell Pete was thoroughly enjoying the suspense.

  “Last night after you guys went to class, Janis and I searched and couldn’t find a single thing on the Keepers of the Light, so we decided to research something else.” Pete shot Janis a knowing look that elicited a giggle.

  Garrett sighed.

  “Alright, alright. Anyway, we researched how to age paper, then when I got home, I made a replica of the book. I copied some random text onto some blank paper that I cut down to the correct size. I burned the edges, then I rubbed off the burns to make the paper look chewed or rotted. Then I brewed some of my mom’s tea and soaked the paper in it. I already had an old book with a similar cover, so I just took the old book apart and inserted the fake pages using glue, matching it as closely as I could. It wasn’t easy, but using our space heater I was able dry the paper and leather out. I almost caught the whole thing on fire with that space heater. Anyway, by the time I finished, I’d created a decent enough fake to fool that idiot Jack.”

  The prideful smile on Pete’s face and the way he placed both hands behind his head, interlocking his fingers as he leaned back, said it all, but Lenny went ahead and confirmed it for everyone anyway. “Dude’s a freaking genius!”

  “Okay, Pete, well done, but what happens when he opens it and tries to read it? Or when he takes it to one of the antique stores? He’s going to figure it out pretty quick, right?” Garrett asked.

  “Well, sure. Listen, I didn’t say how long it would fool the idiot. If he even tries to open it, it will fall apart. The purpose of the fake was to get me out of the situation I knew I would be in when Jack caught up to me. The fake already did what I hoped it would do… save my ass and buy us another day.”

  “Screw Jack! I would love to be there when he tries to sell it to an antique store and they laugh in his face,” Janis said.

  Pete shrugged. “Well, if he’s smart enough to at least open it he may already know it’s a fake.” Pete looked at Janis and gave her an ornery smile. “Plus, I left some surprises inside the book for him.”

  “What surprises?” Janis asked, wide-eyed.

  “Just a few choice words for Jack,” Pete said, raising his eyebrows up and down deviously.

  “Oh no, Pete! What did you do?” Garrett said.

  Lenny laughed.

  “This isn’t funny, Lenny – he’s going to get himself beat to a pulp!” Garrett said.

  “Well, whatever you do, don’t let him kick you, man – he kicks like a mule,” David said. “I should know. I’m the only one out of us who’s fought him.”

  “Yeah, David, and when we were yelling, ‘Kick him back, David. Kick him back!’ you should have listened,” Lenny said.

  “I had hiking boots on. I wasn’t going to cheat and kick him with my boots on.”

  “He was kicking the shit out of you, bro. There is no ‘fair’ in that situation, there is only survival,” Lenny said.

  “Maybe, but I have my morals.”

  “No, what you had was three broken ribs and a busted lip,” Lenny said.

  Garrett started in again. “I don’t know what you were thinking, Pete! This is cra—”

  “I don’t care, Garrett! I’m sick of the way he treats people, I’m sick of wat
ching him bully people, I’m sick of the way he makes fun of… my speech.” His eyes started to glisten with moisture. “I’m sick of… sick of him! I don’t care what he does, I’m not scared of him.” He slammed his hand palm down on the table with the loud whack! of flesh slapping wood. “I’m not taking his shit anymore! I’m just not.”

  The room fell uncomfortably silent.

  Garrett had never felt so ashamed of himself. He swallowed hard, pulling his eyes from the floor until he found Pete’s, then he found his voice – but it was a new voice, quiet and determined. “Listen to me, Pete. If he opens or tries to sell that book today, he is going to find you tomorrow, and when he does, you need to tell him the whole fake was my idea.”

  Everyone at the table stared, wordless.

  “Whatever messages you left for him in that book, you tell him I made you write them. You tell him I have the book. You tell him if he wants it to come and get it. You send him to me, Pete. You send him to me, and tell him… I’ll be waiting.”

  “Hell, yeah! That’s what I’m talking about!” Lenny said, jumping up from the table.

  Pete held Garrett’s gaze, unable to say anything. The silence stretched out, pregnant with emotions that needed no words. More than simple acknowledgement, Pete’s eyes were grateful.

  “Alright!” Lenny said, breaking the stillness. “Now that we have that out of the way, let me tell you guys what we found in the tunnel.” He drew in a deep breath. “Okay, here goes. We found a total of four bricks on the south wall of the arch, with each brick containing a different set of initials, and best of all… the last brick had the initials a.l. on it!” He slapped the table, beaming with pride.

  “Perfect!” Pete said, shifting in his chair.

  “Perfect what?” Garrett asked.

  Pete pursed his lips in thought. “This is a major find, and further, I think I have already figured out who most of those initials belong to.”

  “What? When?” Lenny asked in surprise.

  “I just figured it out as we were sitting here,” Pete said.

  “Of course you did,” Janis said, smiling.

  Garrett shook his head, unsurprised.

  “Come on, Lenny. It’s fairly obvious. We have the initials a.r., b.g., j.c., and a.l. Anyone want to take a stab at who these guys are?” Pete looked around the table.

  They all looked at one another.

  “No. Just tell us!” Lenny said, giving Pete’s chair a kick.

  “Very well. a.l. is Abraham Lincoln, of course. J.C. is John Calhoun, a close friend of Lincoln’s from his days in New Salem, and last but not least, B.G. Last chance… anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?” asked Pete.

  “Biscuits and Gravy,” David said, laughing.

  “Bubble Guts,” Lenny said, glancing over to David. “That’s what happens every time I eat biscuits and gravy.”

  “Nice, Lenny,” Janis said, pulling a face.

  “You guys disappoint me,” Pete said, shaking his head disapprovingly. “b.g. is Bowling Green, Lincoln’s friend, also mentioned in the journal. Come on, guys.” He threw his hands up in the air. “As for a.r., I’m still working on that one.”

  Lenny cocked an eyebrow at Pete. “I am convinced someone dropped you on your head as a child but instead of it damaging your brain like it did for poor David here” – he shook his head sadly at David – “it somehow made you into a freak genius.”

  David threw up his middle finger.

  “Okay, so what’s our next move?” Garrett asked.

  Pete opened his notebook containing his transcriptions from the journal. “Well, the journal says, Once inside, look for the archway, which holds a xxx xxx xxx. When you find xxx xxx remove xxx beloved xxx and, once removed, reach inside and pull the lever. This will allow the way to open, showing you the path.”

  Janis reached over and pulled Pete’s notebook close, studying the entry. “So now we can assume the part that says ‘when you find xxx xxx’ means when you find the ‘initialed bricks’ or ‘the initials,’ but what does ‘xxx beloved xxx’ mean? Remove beloved brick?”

  Pete shook his head. “No, that can’t be right.”

  “Pete, are you sure you transferred this correctly?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I’m sure, but we’re obviously missing something. The names I have given you guys were all people Lincoln would have cared about.”

  Lenny rapped his fingers on the table in thought, then stopped abruptly. “I think we just need to go back in and start pulling bricks one by one, starting with the one that’s initialed A.L. As long as we have a hammer and screwdriver, it won’t take long to chip the mortar out and pull the bricks. If there is a lever behind one, we will find it easy enough.”

  “Right, and by then we can just try and figure out the next step of the journal,” Janis said.

  Garrett nodded, addressing the group. “Okay, well, I’m working for Eugene tomorrow to try and get the first half of the book. Pete, you’re supposed to go with me, Lenny is teaching class, and that leaves David and Janis to pull bricks in the tunnel.”

  “Wait, there is something else,” Lenny said uneasily. “We weren’t alone at the tunnel today.”

  “What do you mean?” Pete asked.

  “Someone was outside while we were inside,” Garrett said uneasily. “They came all the way down the embankment and were right outside the tunnel. I think they were listening to us. We did get pretty loud when we found the bricks.”

  “Are you sure?” Pete asked.

  “He’s sure alright. We were whooping and hollering plenty loud,” David said.

  “No, I mean that someone was there, dumbass,” Pete said.

  “Oh. In that case, piss off, Pete,” David said. “And yes, to answer your questions, he’s sure. I heard it, too, and it was definitely a person. When they heard us talking about leaving, they scrambled back up the bank, knocking down dirt and rocks, obviously in a hurry not to let us see them,” David said.

  “Who could that be… Jack?” Janis said.

  “I don’t think he would have been secretive if he knew we were there. He would have just come in,” Lenny said.

  “Yeah, I agree. It had to be someone else,” Pete said.

  “So, yeah, no offense, guys, but I’m not going back in the tunnel unless we all go. Besides, we should all be there when we find the lever thingy,” David said.

  “I agree,” Garrett said, nodding. “Alright, well, we all have a pretty busy week. Let’s just plan on Saturday morning, and by then we’ll hopefully have the second half of the book and understand what we’re dealing with.” Turning to Pete, Garrett asked, “Do you think you can decipher the rest of the journal over the next couple days?”

  Pete pulled at his lower lip in consideration, then nodded slowly. “Maybe. I’ll sure try.”

  “Alright, then, it’s Eugene’s for Pete and me tomorrow, then Lenny and I test on Wednesday, so let’s regroup back here on Thursday to review what we have,” Garrett said.

  Everyone agreed.

  “Janis, I’ll walk you home,” Pete said, picking up her backpack.

  “Thanks, Pete.”

  The sun sank low behind the old slate roofs of the Victorians dotting the hillsides of Petersburg as the teens made their way out of the library. Soon the streetlights would be on. They paused briefly in front of the library and said their goodbyes. Garrett could feel his friends’ excitement for the possibilities held by the secret they shared, and he felt it too. They were part of something important, some historic mystery – Lincoln’s secret.

  To Garrett’s surprise, Phillip had informed Lenny’s parents he would be spending the night for a second school night in a row. For Phillip’s next mind-blowing feat, he told them there was no need to train or to do chores. Instead, his father recommended he and Lenny practice for their test, then hit the sack. Garrett asked no questions. He only nodded.

  It was apparent to him now that there was a secret, a conspiracy – something the adults knew that he simply
wasn’t in on. What he didn’t know and couldn’t know was whether this deception was foul. He only knew he didn’t like the feeling and he didn’t trust what was happening. Because when it came down to it, he simply couldn’t fathom why. Was this another test? Was it really just part of his training? A trick by Phillip to give him hope, then take it away? Was there a lesson in this? Something he should be figuring out? Would Phillip really tell him everything if he just waited? All he could do was play the game and find out. But two days felt like an eternity.

  By some point late in the night or early in the morning, all the speculations about the day’s adventures were vetted and the talk was tired. Eyelids hung heavy as all the excitement flushed out, leaving both boys exhausted. Still, sleep didn’t come easy for Garrett, a boy heavy in thought. When finally it did come, it wasn’t real. It wasn’t rest. It was horror, raw and vivid. He couldn’t escape the great fire that consumed everything it touched.

  Garrett’s night offered no repose as he tossed and turned, fighting with nightmares of dragon’s breath.

  30

  This Must Be What It Feels Like to Die

  Present day

  Oak Island, Nova Scotia

  Breanne blinked wildly, throwing her hands over her ears.

  “That’s it, stay here! Stay with me!” Paul shouted, but the gunshots were deafening in the small space. She could only see his lips moving now. What were they shooting at anyway? She broke her gaze from Paul to see her father shooting at thorny octopus tentacles coming from the floor. But they weren’t octopus at all, they were covered in thorns. Crack… Crack! He shot again and again. She flinched away, then finally, after many shots, she couldn’t say how many, the gun went quiet.

  She drew a deep breath and another, steadier now. Hesitantly, she looked back at the tentacles. They were almost reaching the ceiling, whipping wildly, stretching to reach her, her brothers, her father. She looked back to the doorway, where Edward had squatted down, chopping wildly at the vines near the floor.