Whispering Pines

by Heidi Lang

  Caden blinked rapidly, his vision blurring. “What if…?” He swallowed, tried again. “What if I told you that it was my fault? I pushed him into the Other Place.” He waited for her to scream at him, tell him what a terrible brother and son he was. He’d deserve it.

  She exhaled. Not a sigh, but a release. “Oh, Caden. I already knew.”

  “You… what?”

  “Blood opens and blood closes,” she said sadly. “A sacrifice given and taken. This is what the Other Place requires. Since Aiden opened the rift, it could only be closed again behind him. And”—she sighed—“I knew your brother wouldn’t have gone in willingly. Not after he saw what it was like in there.”

  “I didn’t want to.” Water dripped along his nose and off his chin. He touched his face and realized he was crying. His mother had known this whole time, and she’d never said a thing. He wanted to be angry about it, but there was so much guilt pressing down on him, he didn’t have room for any other emotions. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

  An arm dropped around his shoulders, warm and comforting, and his mom pulled him in for a hug. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d hugged him. He sank into it, breathing in the soothing scent of lavender and vanilla while she rocked him.

  “I’m sorry, Caden. You did what you had to do.” She stroked his hair. “Did you know the very first Price was given that name back in the 1650s? It was just after the Hartford Witch Trials.”

  “Hartford Witch Trials?” Caden pulled away.

  “The very first of the witch trials. They happened about thirty years before the more famous Salem Witch Trials. One of our ancestors escaped the night before her execution and came here to Whispering Pines. I won’t bore you with the details, but she made a deal in order to escape, and part of that included a sacred duty: she was in charge of overseeing that the line between our dimension and the Other Place would remain unbroken. She accepted the surname of Price, because if the rift opened, she had to be prepared to pay the cost to close it again. And we have been Prices ever since.”

  “What is the cost?” Caden asked. He wondered why his mom had never shared this family history with him before. Maybe she’d told Aiden all of this. Aiden, who had always been next in line to take over the business from her.

  “The cost is everything. The cost is your life.” She looked away, her eyes unfocusing. “I didn’t want Aiden to look at my Book of Shadows because I knew he would see the possibility, but not the price he’d have to pay. Once the rift is open, it is our job to close it, even if it means going into the Other Place ourselves.”

  Caden recalled those missing pages from her book. “You tore out the description of the ritual,” he said.

  She nodded. “I should have ripped those pages out sooner, before your brother…” She shook her head. “But yes. I thought you might eventually seek out the book, too, and I didn’t want you to be tempted into trying to open the rift on your own.”

  “I thought you didn’t worry about me.”

  She managed a small smile. “I might not be as worried for you, but I still worry. And I know how much you love your brother.”

  Caden swallowed hard. He did love his brother, almost as much as he feared him. He thought of Aiden talking to him through the mirror, begging for his help. “Will Aiden be trapped over there forever?” he asked softly.

  “At first, I was afraid he would be. But I think I might have found a way to free him.”

  “Really?”

  “Do you remember the McCurleys? They wanted me to find their son?”

  Caden nodded.

  “Well… I found him.” Her lips curved down. “Poor boy. He was attacked by something called an Unseeing—”

  Caden gasped.

  “You’ve heard of it. I thought you might have.” She fiddled with one of her rings, twisting it back and forth on her finger. “Unfortunately, it killed him. But… it did a sloppy job. Their first kills usually are.”

  “Usually?” Caden said. “What, are they regular occurrences?”

  “They can be, if our family doesn’t stay vigilant. And I… I’ve been lax. I was too distracted by my own grief to notice that one of those creatures was in our town. And then it figured out how to disguise its psychic footprint from me. But I have Peter’s hat, which links me to him, and from there to the Unseeing. And I have a theory that if the rift is reopened near that creature, the Other Place will attract it like a magnet, pulling it inside and sealing up afterward.”

  “So… Aiden might be able to get out before it closes?”

  “Maybe,” his mom said. “But in order to make all of this happen, I’ll need your help.”

  “My help?”

  “No one senses energies as well as you do.”

  His mom had never complimented him on his supernatural abilities before. And coming from her, there was no higher praise. He thought of all the times he’d longed to hear her say something like that to him. Only now, he knew it was just a lead-up to a question he was afraid to hear.

  “Will you help me reopen the rift?”

  And there it was.

  Caden pictured the Other Place, full of tentacles and teeth and that horrible pulsing light. If he opened it, would he get trapped in there too? But if he didn’t, then the Unseeing would continue hunting. And Rae was obviously its next target.

  Very slowly he nodded.

  29. RAE

  For the first time since she’d transferred to Dana S. Middle School, Rae actually wanted to see Alyssa. She searched for her in the halls, kept glancing up in each of their shared classes, and hurried to her first cross-country practice of the year, hoping Alyssa would at least turn up for that. According to Vivienne, Alyssa never missed a practice.

  Except this time, apparently.

  Rae waved goodbye to Vivienne and climbed into her mom’s car, her stomach queasy with dread.

  Her mom drove her home in stony silence, but Rae was so preoccupied, she didn’t notice. Until they pulled up the driveway to her house, and her mom turned to her. “Remember, you’re still grounded. So go straight in and do your homework, and then get to bed. Understood?”

  Rae scowled. She’d forgotten she was grounded. “Does that mean no dinner, then?” she said, trying her best to keep her voice even. “Next are you going to have me sleep in the closet?”

  “After dinner,” her mom snapped, “then you go to bed.”

  “Fine. Whatever.”

  “Don’t give me that attitude. You skipped school and broke into someone’s house. These are serious things, Rae. And not like you at all!”

  “I told you, I was investigating. It was important.”

  Her mom took a deep breath through her nose, then let it out. “Obviously,” she said, “this transition has been difficult for you. And since Doctor Anderson is no longer an option—”

  “What, because he was stealing kids’ eyeballs?”

  “—I’m looking for a new counselor for you. In fact, I have an appointment with one right now, before I head to work.”

  “I don’t need one.”

  “That’s not your call.”

  “What about you?” Rae demanded. “Why am I the only one going to counseling?”

  “Because I don’t have time.”

  “Yeah, right. Maybe you should make some time.” Rae kicked her door open, grabbed her backpack, and stormed into the house. Not for the first time, she wished it had been her mom who was abducted and not her dad. And then, like every other time she had that thought, she immediately felt guilty for it.

  But her mom never got her the same way her dad did. Whenever she was upset, he’d ask, What’s wrong, sugar cube? Rae always used to scowl at him when he called her that. What? he’d say. They’re sweet, and so are you. Now spill. And then he would listen to her, something her mom no longer even pretended to do.

  Rae slammed the front door, kicked off her shoes, and dropped her backpack on top of them.

  “What was all the shouting about?”
Ava asked. She had papers spread out all over the dining room table.

  “It’s impolite to eavesdrop,” Rae huffed.

  “It’s hardly eavesdropping if all the neighbors can hear you.”

  Rae looked around and saw that Ava had opened most of the windows. She always did that, opening the windows in whatever room she was working in before putting on her sound-canceling headphones. It made Rae uneasy. Anyone could sneak in here.

  “I’m supposed to be your jailer tonight,” Ava said.

  Rae threw a Hot Pocket into the microwave. “That’s nice. You’ll have a boring job of it.”

  “You are really in a mood today, aren’t you?”

  Rae shrugged.

  “Maybe this will cheer you up.” Ava held something out. Something small and metallic and rectangular.

  “My phone?” Rae took it.

  “Just don’t tell Mom.”

  Rae struggled between irritation and gratitude. “Thanks,” she said finally.

  “You’re welcome. Try not to get into any trouble on my watch, would you?”

  Ding!

  Rae grabbed her Hot Pocket and sat at the kitchen table across from Ava and her mess. She took a careful bite. Scalding. But she knew from experience the middle would still be frozen.

  “I don’t know how you eat those.” Ava wrinkled her nose.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be studying?”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be upstairs, doing your homework?”

  Knock-knock-knock!

  “Rae?” A boy called from the front door, his voice carrying through the open windows. “Rae, are you there?”

  Rae hesitated. She was sure her mom didn’t want her to have friends over. She glanced at Ava.

  Ava deliberately put her headphones on and turned away. “Plausible deniability,” she said. “Just don’t be out there long.”

  “Thanks,” Rae said.

  Ava shrugged and went back to her work.

  Rae opened the front door, expecting Caden, but instead getting—

  “Ivan?”

  “Oh, I’m so glad you’re here!” His eyes were wide, his blond hair sticking out in all directions. “I need your help.”

  “My help? Why?”

  “It’s Alyssa,” Ivan said. “I think she’s in trouble.”

  Immediately Rae felt a burst of adrenaline, like she’d just taken a dose of her inhaler. Her whole body shook. “Is she… was she taken?”

  Ivan nodded, his hands twisting together miserably. “But it’s not too late to save her. I think I know where she’s being held. Will you come with me?”

  Rae hesitated. She glanced back at her sister sitting there, working. “Just a second,” she whispered. She jammed her sneakers back on and grabbed her inhaler out of her backpack, thrusting it into her coat pocket. And then she slipped out the front door, closing it silently behind her.

  Even before Ivan led the way, Rae knew they were heading back into the Watchful Woods.

  “We need to hurry,” Ivan said, leading her beneath the trees. The sky had begun to darken around the edges as evening crept in, the forest growing cold and dark. Up ahead, Rae could see the outline of the stone wall. Everything felt even quieter than it had the night she’d explored here with Vivienne and Caden. That night, she’d felt like something was watching her the whole time. Now it was a stronger sensation. No longer watching, but waiting. As if the forest knew what was about to happen.

  Rae knew she was just imagining things. The trees were just trees, and the forest was just a forest. But as her lungs tightened up, her breath wheezing with every step, she couldn’t shake the sense that there was something more here. Something aware, and eager, and not very nice.

  She shivered and hunched deeper into her jacket.

  Ivan paused at the stone wall, his hands hovering an inch from the moss-covered surface. His nose wrinkled in disgust. Then he took a few steps back, charged forward, and leaped the wall without touching it.

  Rae blinked. “You should be on the track team.”

  “Maybe I’ll try out in the spring.”

  Rae climbed over the wall and dropped down on the other side. Her breathing was getting worse, but Ivan had already started moving again. Rae hesitated, then slipped her hand into her coat pocket for her inhaler. She pulled it out.

  “Mint Attack” was printed in bold letters on the metal cylinder.

  Rae groaned. In her haste to rescue Alyssa, she had grabbed Vivienne’s breath freshener instead of her albuterol.

  She slipped the Mint Attack back into her coat pocket and glanced down at her phone. No new messages, and not a single bar of reception. She tucked her phone away and hurried to keep up with Ivan, concentrating on taking shallow, even breaths, like little sips of oxygen.

  Ivan led her down a very familiar deer trail, the forest silent around them. The only noise Rae could hear above her own ragged breaths and the leaves crunching under her feet was the soft whispering sound of a nearby brook.

  She knew exactly where he was leading her. “Wait, Ivan,” she called, but he didn’t turn around, and he didn’t slow down.

  Fear swam through her head and made her dizzy. She should never have come out here. What had she been thinking? Why hadn’t she called the police?

  She looked around at the trees hovering over her, their branches bare and skeletal. She could always go back. But the thought of Alyssa maimed like Jeremy and Brandi, her eyes missing, her mouth slack, all the things that made her Alyssa taken away… it was too horrible. Rae couldn’t turn around now, not if she could help save her. So she picked up her pace, catching up with Ivan just as he reached the crest of a small hill.

  “Did you call the police before coming to me?” Rae asked.

  “Of course,” Ivan said.

  Rae breathed a small sigh of relief. Then she wondered why he did come to her. Trust? He barely knew her. “Shouldn’t we wait for them?” she asked.

  “Can’t. No time.”

  Ahead, the rundown cabin peered through the trees like a wild creature. Rae followed Ivan closer, unable to look away from the ruin. The best anyone could say about it was that it had personality—just not the warm and fuzzy type. It had a slanted roof that had probably seen better days, and a sagging porch that definitely had. All of the windows were boarded up like the house was trying to either keep something out or trapped inside, and paint peeled from the walls in long, curling strips.

  “How do you know she’s here?” Rae asked Ivan.

  He stared up at the house and didn’t answer. Rae didn’t know if it was the darkening sky, but an alien shadow seemed to pass over his face, his features shifting, the hollows around his eyes deepening, mouth stretching, until he looked something other than human. He stepped onto the porch, the wood groaning under his feet like an agonized living thing. And when he opened the front door, the dark rectangle hung there like the gaping maw of a large beast.

  He disappeared inside without a word.

  Rae’s heart hammered painfully, her pulse filling her ears. Spots flickered at the edges of her vision, threatening to engulf her.

  This didn’t feel right. Not at all.

  She wondered if her dad had felt like this when he’d come face-to-face with something that did not belong in their world. If he’d still confronted it anyhow. She pictured him standing tall and brave, even as he was taken.

  Rae swallowed hard and stepped onto the porch, the wood shaking beneath her feet. Each step felt harder than the last, until she reached that doorway. She flicked the flashlight on her phone, and looked back at the silent wood. Then she turned, and walked through into the dark, dark house.

  30. CADEN

  What do we have to do?” Caden asked his mom.

  She rubbed her temples, suddenly looking exhausted. “I have some supplies to gather first.”

  “Like what?”

  She dropped her hands. “Just… supplies.”

  Caden frowned. “If you want me to help, I need to know wh
at we’re doing.”

  “And I’ll explain everything eventually, I promise.”

  Caden wasn’t sure he believed that.

  “We’ll also need to find a place where the barrier between dimensions is already thin,” she continued. “Somewhere with a lot of negative energy.”

  “Somewhere like Doctor Anderson’s house?” Caden guessed.

  “Yes.”

  Caden pictured the house, the way the cellar had looked the night Aiden had used it as his portal to the Other Place.

  She walked toward Caden, the lines on the sides of her mouth etched in too deep. “When this is over, you and I will need to sit down and have a much longer chat.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “I’ve always thought it would be your brother… but maybe you, Caden, will be the one to take over from me.”

  Caden squirmed uncomfortably beneath the weight of her hand. Ever since Aiden had performed his own version of justice against Zachary Mitchell, Caden had decided he wanted nothing to do with the supernatural. All he wanted was to graduate and leave Whispering Pines, and his family’s business, behind. But he hadn’t told his parents that yet, and this didn’t really seem like the time. “This Unseeing,” he said instead. “Is it Doctor Anderson?”

  “What?”

  “Is he the host?”

  His mom frowned. “It doesn’t work that way. The Other Place isn’t like the spirit realm. The things that exist there have corporeal bodies—they are physically present. So if one were to cross over, it could perhaps shape itself to look human, but it wouldn’t be able to take over a human body. It wouldn’t be a possession.”

  Caden’s heart sank as he thought of the doctor being hauled away to Green On!, the place where his wife had died. Maybe he really had been keeping Jeremy at his house to save him from those secret labs.

  “What would the Unseeing look like?” Caden asked, trying not to think too hard about Doctor Anderson. There wasn’t much he could do for the doctor right now. Not until he found the real Unseeing.